Log #5

Wicked Weeds.

Last semester, I was doing a project about the legalization of weeds. I have been really interested in weed since I was in senior high. I've read many articles about some facts about weeds. According to nearly all of the recent research in weeds, it's actually not harmful to human body. In fact, it's actually good for our body in some certain field of medical cares. And, since this is the first novel related to weeds, I decided to read it right away.

The characters were set as zombies. Not the kind of zombies that we know commonly, but the kind of zombies whose body condition is like a man who just smoked weed. They know what’s happening, they know how to react, but they don’t understand things that happen after they smoke it. I was worrying about whether this book can help me discover myself until I read this sentence.

“Qualia is the living being’s capacity to establish a connection between his experience of the world and the self. A living person can understand that the things that happen to him, happen to something that is him, his self, the consciousness of being one’s own self. If he feels joy or sorrow, if he’s overwhelmed by beauty or by danger, he knows that himself is feeling all of these things in such a way what he himself is feeling all of these things in such a way that he perceives the attributes of each.”

To me, the “living being” is implying the ones who are aware of what’s happening to his self. In contrast, the “zombie” means the ones whose mind is not with his body. This make me think of: “Am I still alive?” Because sometimes I don’t understand things that are happening to me. I feel like I’m not really existing. I’ve never had the time to talk to myself. Hence, I hope by reading this novel, I can discover something about my self (it’s not a typo).