The Validity of Theories

“Scientific theories are simply tools made by man in order to comprehend the machinations of the universe. They are by no means perfect, just as humans are not perfect.” (Robidillo, 2015) [rephrased]

Our awesome chemistry professor said this. I find this very true. Major scientific theories (such as the VSEPR) all have exceptions in them. This brings to the consequent realization that scientific theories should then not be used to question God, who's perfect and omnipotent. This also means the "Big Bang Theory" or "Evolution Theory" or whatever theory doesn't disprove nor contradict God's existence, God's creation or God's intervention. The theories may be true or be superseded by another theory. Newton's Law of Gravitation was superseded by Einstein's Theory of General Relativity. Moreover, Quantum Mechanics, which was used to discover many, many postmodern scientific breakthroughs such as the black hole, Higgs-boson and cosmology, hinges on Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, which is, in some sense, making assumptions from uncertainty.

Allow me to digress.
"God does not play dice!" - Albert Einstein to Niels Bohr

Albert Einstein, the founder of Quantum Mechanics, spent his entire life destroying the very science he founded. Unfortunately he failed.

Therefore, to me, nothing changes the fact that all scientific knowledge (which is still incomplete) that mankind took millennia to discover and find out (whether it is in physics, biology or chemistry) is but a infinitesimal fraction of God's omniscience - how He thought the world should work. The manner by which the universal laws of physics are made and maintained is only possible by God's omnipotence. All I can do is to marvel at His creation and design.

Eternal Winter

Alone I stand in the eternal winter -
Ignored.
Where the merciless blizzard constricts my heartbeat,
Frozen.
Wishing to give you a melody, yet,
Silenced.
My eyes seem ever so restless and cold.
Hollow.

Buried under the snow are those irreplaceable days,
Gone.
Lost in the turbulence are those shared memories,
Forgotten.
Ceasing to exist, those colorful smiles sublime,
Dissolved.
As my heart becomes one with the grayscale,
Evanesced.

Tell me why
My fragile world is oblivion in your absence.
Tell me why
I can't forget these memories under the snow.
Tell me why
My heart still beats at the slightest thought of you.
Tell me why
My feelings are trampled in this deafening noise

Give me a reason
Not to lose my next breath.
Give me a reason
Not to shed my next tear.
Give me a reason
To smile for the crumbling tomorrow.
Give me a reason
To gather the lost pieces of my heart.

I can't bear
To live through this infinite cold.
Yet I am
To endure and relish this excruciating pain.
It's irrevocably futile
To grasp the 'now' that's already lost.
Is there any meaning
To see that "one more chance"?

I cannot fathom
To open my heart to love.
I can only
Remain lost in these illusory reveries.
I only see
Despair quelling love so ephemeral.
Tell me why
Love leads to nothing but pain!

The coldness of your heart has numbed me;
I have died, yet I haven't died enough.
Perhaps it is time to bid love goodbye -
Time to cease my humanity so flawed.
In this eternal winter where despair prevails,
May it remain buried, depth incomprehensible,
Along with my flame and obstinate memories,
Never in eternity to be sought again!

Insights from TEDxUPM

This afternoon, I attended something I had been looking forward to for quite a long time - to witness a live TEDx talk. In my school, UP Manila, #TEDxUPM was conducted. There was also a live streaming conducted by Rappler.com.

The first speaker, Julia Chu, the Local Committee President of AIESEC UP Diliman, spoke of five things she learned through her journey to several countries such as Russia, Japan, Sri Lanka and more...

  

1. I took the road less traveled.

2. Collect moments, not things. "People die, and in the end, your relationships with them matter the most,"  she said.

3. Life beings at the end of your comfort zone.

4. Adventures are the best ways to learn.

5. It is better to see something once than to hear about it a thousand times.

Among those points, what struck me the most was the first one. She mentioned something about how people nowadays normally incorporate the "life script" into their life. According to her, "life script" is the typical pattern that works like this:

• study
• get good grades
• graduate
• get a job
• earn enough money
• get married-have a family
• travel around the world with your family

In addition to that she challenged the audience by using the phrase "not following the conventional measure of success".

The second speaker, Antoinette Jadaone, the director of the film That Thing Called Tadhana, began her talk with a catchy "How to get a last laugh out of a heartbreak..."

"We are most creative when our emotions are at their highest," she said, "When you're heartbroken, you should savor the pain, for it is at that moment you can write, sing or express yourself in a very expressive manner." She also added that it would be useful to bring a notebook anywhere. "Write down every thought. Don't edit yet. Write with your heart; edit it with your brain. Remember. Remember everything. Write it down."

The third speaker, Tony Abad, the President and CEO of the Philippine International Trading Corporation, spoke of "The Power of Competition".

"The missing ingredient in the Philippines is competition. Competition allows us to have more choices, lower prices and better quality," he said, "If we have enough competition, there will be dynamic efficiency, innovation, entrpreneurship, development and prosperity." According to him, those who take risks will be rewarded more. "The greatest threat that the Philippines is facing now is Anti-Competition, where there is concentration of wealth, corruption, bad governance and poverty." He used the prevalence of cartel as an evidence to this point.

The fourth speaker, Abbey Sy, the blogger behind artistic-dreams.com, spoke of creativity.

To every insight, she used her artistic works of lettering to illustrate her ideas:
1. You are always a work in progress.
2. Your next adventure is at the end of your comfort zone.
3. Creativity takes courage.
4. Make your mark and make it a good one.

She ended her speech with a short video showing the process of her making the lettering. The finale was "Always Be Creating". I find her ideas quite insightful. Whether the aspect is intrapersonal, interpersonal or career, it is always important to always work harder than others. "Always Be Creating".

Meanwhile, aside from the four speakers, #TEDxUPM also showed two TED speech videos.

David Steindl-Rast: Want to be happy? Be grateful.
"Opportunity is the gift within every gift. Moment by moment. Stop. Look. Go."

Amy Webb: How I hacked online dating
"Love can be made into an algorithm."