An illness, a disease, a neurotoxin that is fatal. Beginning in crowded areas with massive populations and an abundance of homes, businesses and infrastructure. Targeting everyone despite age, gender and race. A toxin so powerful that an epidemic was declared in the state of New York within hours. Beginning in New York at Central Park, men and women went on with their daily lives and routines before being hit with a gust of wind accompanied by an altered mental state with profound confusion and short term memory. Victims lost memory of where they were, who they were and what they were doing. After confusion hit, a scream is heard by all and the most severe symptom occurred; suicide. A sensation to murder oneself that was so deep and overpowering, …show more content…
What links them all together is their identity as a toxin. More specifically, a neurotoxin is a substance that attacks or damages nerve cells (Donald Venes). This can affect a human’s brain, specifically the limbic system, including the brain stem and emotional centers. As stated earlier, the limbic system controls higher mental functions and cognitive thinking. It is made up of several structures including the, “hippocampus, amygdala, fornicate gyrus” (Julie K. Stegman). When these centers are damaged, consequences are severe and can result in confusion, depression, amnesia and many other neurological disorders. Many of which are similar to the symptoms shown in The …show more content…
Furthermore, symptoms can progress and worsen and cause an altered mental state of confusion (Thigpen). This mental confusion could cause other mental problems such as loss of memory, physical disorientation and emotional responses. Although meningitis is not identical to the movie organism, it shares a common symptom of mental confusion and disorientation. With that in mind, bacterial meningitis can be treated with antibiotics while the movie organism has no cure. Slightly different than Toxoplasmic gondii and bacterial meningitis is Pfiesteria. Pfiesteria is a heterotrophic dinoflagellate that produces a toxin when environmental conditions are ideal. It is most commonly associated with the phenomenon known as “Red Tide”. The red tide is an “algal bloom that appears red or brownish in colour” and is caused by “agricultural run-off or other nutrient-rich material produced mainly from human activities” (Christine
Dinoflagellates are one of the four main types of phytoplankton, which are photosynthetic, single celled and free living organisms in the ocean. Dinoflagellates cause the Harmful Algal Blooms (HAB) also known as the red tide effect (Hackett et al 2004). Toxicity persisting at upper levels of the food chain is detected in them from the ones which are toxic, but not all such blooms are toxic. Enhanced detection capabilities may in part contribute to observed high frequency and severity of toxic blooms. As they are also important in the health of coral reefs their study has gained significant interest. Species are often selected for genome sequencing based on their importance as a model organism or relevance to human health, such as the HAB case.
In the novel, a father had thoughtfully kept himself and his son some bread, but after his son saw he was hiding the bread, even though his father had him some too, the son attacked his father. The son didn’t care that his father had him bread aswell, he wanted it all to himself, so he could have more. In order to do so, the boy killed his father and took the bread for himself. Next, in New York City, an earthquake occurred and everyone inside of the buildings that were being demolished, falling in, etc all reacted differently to the situation. Some froze, others just screamed, and several other things.
“This experience is much harder, and weirder, to describe than extreme fear or terror, most people know what it is like to be seriously afraid. If they haven’t felt it themselves, they’ve at least seen a movie, or read a book, or talked to a frightened friend – they can at least imagine it. But explaining what I’ve come to call ‘disorganization’ is a different challenge altogether. Consciousness gradually loses its coherence, one’s center gives away. The center cannot hold. The ‘me’ becomes a haze, and the solid center from which one experiences reality breaks up like a bad radio signal. (Saks, p. 13)”
The main idea or concept of Didion’s “The Los Angeles Notebook” is to portray how human behavior and thought is a result of mechanics. Didion describes the Santa Ana winds as the omnipotent force that pulls humans to their mechanical nature. Los Angeles residents feel the arrival of the “bad wind” and succumb to the paranoia. Didion pairs a story of indians committing suicide to escape the wind with descriptions of the ominous changes that occur in the atmosphere during a Santa Ana to establish a mood of foreboding. After painting a Santa Ana as a paranormal force, Didion concludes to explain the science behind its “supernatural influence” on LA residents. She states that in the case of a Santa Ana, science can prove folk wisdom. The Santa Ana appears as a hot dry wind and whenever one occurs, doctors report patients with frequent “headaches, nausea and allergies, about nervousness and depression” (Didion 3). The excessive amount of
At least one person committed suicide after becoming an unwitting subject of a CIA LSD test, crashing through a highstory plate-glass window in a New York hotel as his Agency guardian watched. (Or perhaps the guardian did more than watch. In June 1994 the victim’s family had his thirty-year-old corpse exhumed to check for signs that he may have been thrown out that window.) Numerous others lost their grip on reality.
My feet planted firm on the ground as I bit the inside of my cheeks to feel something. My pigtails and gray uniform forgotten along with my surroundings as I just watched death do his work. I didn’t feel like a kid anymore. The once peaceful scene turned into a mass of chaotic moments as soon as metal clashed on metal, and the remains of glass littered the floor of the street in front of the fenced gates of my school. My peers screamed loudly but the sound of the crash replayed in my head, but worst of all is that I saw the blond hair of the woman cover her face like a veil tainted red. My teacher ushered us to wait inside yet my mind was numb and my thoughts blurred as I heard the cries of the adults.
Rob Santana, a patient at the Rotenberg Center, woke in a pool of his own sweat almost every morning after having gut-wrenching nightmares about the pain he had to endure for simply being his natural self. What crime did Rob commit for him to have to live in such an immense torment? What could Rob have possibly done to be burdened with this inescapable anxiety? Rob, in a lugubrious tone, stated,"I thought of killing myself a few times." The electrical shocks caused him so much pain that he contemplated suicide as a means to escape his reality at the Rotenberg Center. Not only were there children like Rob suffering from anxiety and depression as the result of receiving repeated electrical shocks, there were children who lost their lives as well. Tragic occurrences at the
As I inched my way toward the cliff, my legs were shaking uncontrollably. I could feel the coldness of the rock beneath my feet when my toes curled around the edge in one last futile attempt at survival. My heart was racing like a trapped bird, desperate to escape. Gazing down the sheer drop, I nearly fainted; my entire life flashed before my eyes. I could hear stones breaking free and fiercely tumbling down the hillside, plummeting into the dark abyss of the forbidding black water. The trees began to rapidly close in around me in a suffocating clench, and the piercing screams from my friends did little to ease the pain. The cool breeze felt like needles upon my bare skin, leaving a trail of goose bumps. The threatening mountains surrounding me seemed to grow more sinister with each passing moment, I felt myself fighting for air. The hot summer sun began to blacken while misty clouds loomed overhead. Trembling with anxiety, I shut my eyes, murmuring one last pathetic prayer. I gathered my last breath, hoping it would last a lifetime, took a step back and plun...
Dioxin is the common name used to refer to the chemical 2, 3, 7, 8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (2, 3, 7, 8-TCDD). Dioxin is one of the most toxic chemicals known CDD and the most studied (Hilgenkamp, 2006, p. 89-90), ("ATSDR - Public Health Statement: Chlorinated Dibenzo-p-dioxins (CDDs)", 1998).
Nature has many toxins it uses to protect itself against predators. Toxins in nature can either kill humans or can do damage to the body. In the animal and plant kingdom there are toxins deadly to humans, but we have found ways to combat some of them. How do the toxins in nature affect the body and how does man fight back?
A brain disorder is a mental disorder, which is also called a mental illness, psychological disorder or psychiatric disorder, is mental or behavioral pattern that causes either suffering or a poor ability to function in an ordinary life. The brain
“George Layhe,” the boss yelled, “Get your firefighting blockhead in here!” Why I needed to rush was beyond me because nothing ever happens here in the North End neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. Just then I heard what sounded to be gunfire. The alarm went off and we slid down the pole. As soon as we got to the bottom, the ground shook and it sounded as if an elevated train was above us. We frantically ran outside and drove to 529 Commercial Street.
Josiah, McCaan and Ms. Fawcett, a well- known family in West Plano had their lives taken on Friday morning. I woke up to the endless amounts of notifications on my phone and the lists of missed calls. My heart was unsteady as I feared what was ahead of me. I promised myself I was in a nightmare but what I thought was a nightmare turned into reality. I was distraught and lost in words, my heart mourned for my friends. I had been informed that McCaan had stabbed Josiah and his mom to death that night and McCaan had been a star basketball player at Plano West but his dreams came to a halt as he suffered two concussions. I could see the dramatic difference before and after his concussions. I feel as if this resembles the part when the boys were being worked up at the bottom of the mountain. They were chanting and yelling, their minds were seduced into an animalistic nature and this led to the murder of their fellow friend, Simon. Josiah had a dynamic personality and magnetism about him. He was considered a leader and an independent person like Simon he was a courageous person and symbolized his independence by searching for the parachutist, alone. I felt there was a void in my heart. I missed him. In my life, I had never really been exposed to death. It never crept upon me or happen
When death has once entered into a house, it almost invariably returns immediately, as if it knew the way, and the young woman, overwhelmed with grief, took to her bed and was delirious for six weeks. Then a species of calm lassitude succeeded that violent crisis, and she remained motionless, eating next to nothing, and only moving her eyes. Every time they tried to make her get up, she screamed as if they were about to kill her, and so they ended by leaving her continually in bed, and only taking her out to wash her, to change her linen, and to turn her mattress.
The vicissitude of weather came suddenly and unbeknownst to our small sleeping company. Thunder boomed. Lightning cracked and split the sky. Clouds formed overhead, rain began to fall, and the wind grew unpropitious. Clamoring voices pulled me from unconsciousness. Water pooled at the base of our tent, our rain fly and tarp doing little to protect us from the raging storm. Our counselor, Jane, ripped open the zippers of the neighboring tent and emerged. Her voice barely carried over the harsh drumming of the rain, coaxing us out of our saturated shelter where she explicated her