Monday, May 23, 2022

Phobias and ophidiophobia

I thought of writing a book on phobias and there is not a lot of terminology to fill a book.

So I have to start with dentist phobia.

I do not fear the dentist but I fear his drill and like a snake I cannot stand vibrations.

Snakes can detect vibration of humans footsteps  20 feet away and they are gone even before one step out of the door.

I lived with a giant cobra in my official quarters as a DMO which I used to call as the reincarnation of the former DMO.

I do not fear cockroaches or insects but I hate mosquitoes.

I can tolerate their bite but hate their music.

I have trained my ears to hear soft cardiac murmurs that are not audible unless amplified by a simple tubing system called a stethoscope.

I have given my cardiac stethoscope to a practising doctor since I have said goodbye to diagnostics for good but keep a spare, just for posterity.

Ophidiophobia is fearing snakes.

I have lived around all types of snakes in Galagedera where T.B.and Thamara Illangaratne cut their political and literary teeth.

I have killed a young cobra even before I was three years old and another innocent water snake when I was about 8 years and vowed  not to kill any animal but killed a rat in rage and several toads (gased by chloroform) while doing Advanced Level practicals.

I respect all cockroaches but accidentally trampled  one today and hence this piece  and the cockroach is my evolutionary illuminary or friend who has outlived even dinasaures.

I hate Chinese who even eat cockroaches, who are  the biggest danger to mother earth, apart from their contribution to global warming.

Every Chinese dying of Coronavirus is a blessing for the well-being of the planet earth.

If is not Russia we have to fear but China's global expansion in many fields.

Coming back to my phobia of snakes is a new phenomenon.

During the last three years I have encountered three large cobras and one I touched accidentally fetching the morning post.

That did not bother me but the giant cobra behind my back resting on a parapet wall in front of the big fish tank was a near miss.

Fellow had come looking for frogs and my fish tank is the main attraction of all frogs and toads.

Even the long tail of the chameleon provokes fear of snakes now.

MugaMaruwa or Ceylon krait, I touched accidentally, nearly killed our dog.

I have found a plant with pungent smell to repel them but the fear lingers on.

Hence the reason for writing a book on phobias.


Phylogenetic Tree

This piece I am writing with anger and disgust.

I have lot of books in many fields including,Science, Biology, Linux, Buddhism and lot of dictionaries.
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1. I love Linux.
Even though, it's kernel is of several million lines of coding BUT with about 10 commands, I can get to what I want to explore in Linux.
With my favourite Debian and with LibreOffice, I can finish writing a book in 3 days.
This is not so with other utilities.

2. Dhamma inherits it's words in Pali and with a dictionary in hand I can attempt to understand the meaning in Pali.

By the way, Buddhist monks have made a mockery of its interpretation that vary from monk to monk.

I follow only Satipattana and 37 Bhodhipakkariyadhammas.

That's it.

In Dhamma there is meaning (atta), condition or law (dhamma), etymology (nirutti) and understanding (patibhana).

They are collectively called Patisambhida.

3. I hate all languages especially French since the syntax of which is confusing and spoken language is dissimilar varying from person to person.

I am only interested in reading a text in French not speaking it except for greeting someone nicely.
It is as pleasant language in that sense, unlike German or English.

English has borrowed so many words from other languages it has no way of avoiding adding more and more words to the ever enlarging dictionary.

When I started learning French at the age of 55, I thought all what I need is a basic text and a good dictionary but I was proven wrong.

By the way, I sat GCE (O) Level and had a pass and distinction in English.

4. I hate psychology by default.

One day I browsed a dictionary of psychology and found it has more words than all the words combined, in three subjects of mathematics, physics and chemistry.

No wonder psychologist commit suicide more often than a radiologist or a pathologist who sees, the things in perspective, instead of attaching any significance or bondage or emotion.
Bit dry sense and bare bone medicine has always being not inspiring to me.

A radiologist sees a shadow of an object and pathologist sees it after the fact or death.
Both professions may points the findings  to a disease process or more  but have no clinical responsibility to treat the living or consoling the dead, unless, it is a case of murder when a forensic guy takes over.

In other words psychologists are entangled in their own cooked up terminology with no meaning to the subject in suffering, they are trying to treat.

They poor subject is dosed up with a drug ultimately and with no escape.

So it better NOT to have a language or have a primitive pidgin language for communication.

I think prehistoric man never had psychological disease but fear of some sort to real situation at hand was their problem, for example lightening or to thunder.

All  religions have not answered this basic fear but has added another layer of confusion and many more words.

I was looking for as diagram showing phylogenetic tree of evolution on this planet from all my biology books and I could not anything worthwhile.

I used Google search engine and found a link to Wikipedia but the entry was in bits and pieces.

My current interest is how the brain developed from monkeys to apes to human and even the embryology book, I bought has very limited entry on brain and it's development.

There is something wrong in the teaching of science globally including medicine.

They are inundated with massive knowledge base.

It is not limited to psychology.

I have decided to a write few books under 100 pages starting with Cloud physics, lightening, phobias, mind and rebirth.

But power cuts are hindering my efforts.

So cellphone has come to my rescue diffuse the pent up pressure due to no gas and no electricity.

Hunger I have decided to stomach but not mental boredom.
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