Independent Thinking

When I was a child, one of the many world-famous paintings I loved featured melting clocks, which left a deep impression on me, though I never knew the artist's name. At the end of June this year, my wife and I had the fortune to visit the Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg, where I was astonished to realize that the masterpiece I had long admired was created by this very artist. Dalí, along with Picasso and Miró, is considered one of the three great Spanish artists of the 20th century. He was a surrealist painter. Throughout the exhibition, I could clearly see the artist’s obsession and dedication to his craft, as well as the evolution of his style across different periods. First, I visited Dalí's later works, mostly created between the 1960s and 1970s. Most of these pieces are surrealist works created using etching or lithography. The primary motivation for using printmaking techniques was their reproducibility. It is evident that in his later years, Dalí preferred printmaking as ...

I come from a country where freedom of speech is restricted. I remember when I first registered my Twitter account in 2017, it felt like opening a new world. Indeed, at that time, I fully experienced the allure of free speech; social media became a favorable place for me to express my political views. Because the topics I am interested in cannot be discussed on China's "intranet," I became engrossed in Twitter, spending significant time daily sharing my thoughts and opinions. However, I found that over time, a sense of isolation from my relatives and colleagues in real life began to develop. Firstly, the primary reason for this isolation was that the topics we focused on were no longer the same. My relatives and friends enjoyed their peaceful lives, discussing topics like cuisine, housing, cars, and children's education. Meanwhile, on Twitter, I was exposed to content I had never seen before in my life. I learned about massacres committed by the authorities against th...

China is renowned for its strict government regulation and supervision of religious activities. The Chinese education system has no introduction to relevant teaching about religion. Therefore, having been born and worked in China, my understanding of the stories and doctrines of different religions is quite limited. My only fragmented memories consist of moments in my childhood when my mother would take me to temples to bow before the Bodhisattva and instances where I was taken by older relatives to churches for mass without comprehending the significance of these ceremonies. Upon completing Chapter 4 on world religions, I came to the realization that this was my first thorough study and understanding of the three major world religions, including Buddhism. (John 2:13-17. Jesus goes up to Jerusalem and cleanseth the temple from defilement) From Abraham becoming the bond between God and the Hebrews (Fiero 96) to Moses leading the Israelites out of Egypt back to Canaan and receiving the T...

Surgeons can determine life or death, and they may struggle to maintain their integrity when faced with significant financial temptations. For me, when confronted with this issue, if I were to accept a bribe when confronted with this issue, I would be causing someone who could have received an organ to lose their life, as well as inflicting harm on their family. Moreover, setting aside any professional ethical issues, such behavior goes against my conscience. My thoughts might never rest, day or night. Therefore, I would firmly and decisively say no to such actions without a second thought. First, let’s discuss the background of my ethical foundations. I come from China, where bribing doctors is a common practice. Many people have become wealthy through these means, and some of my relatives and friends as medical representatives still bribe doctors to get their drugs more frequently prescribed. I disdain such behavior because I hold unique cultural and contextual considerations. The Ch...

I wanted to share some of my real experiences and thoughts here. I grew up in China and moved to the United States when I was around 30. I've always been critical of the Chinese government. However, under China's repressive political climate, with internet restrictions and speech control, people hardly have any means to express their political demands. The only option within China is to use what the government deems "illegal" VPNs to access social media like Twitter and YouTube. After arriving in the United States, I embraced freedom of speech and various social media platforms, frequently expressing my political views or criticisms of the Chinese government and the CCP (The Chinese Communist Party). However, the United States is a melting pot of cultures, with 5.4 million Chinese people ("2023 Asian American & Pacific Islander Heritage Month: Key U.S. Census Stats"), not all of whom disapprove of China's authoritarian regime. In fact, some even admi...

I was pleased to see so many former top employees of tech giants expressing their pessimistic views on today's social media and giving warnings to the world in this documentary. This is an excellent documentary shot in 2020, but four years later, such a "dilemma" has not been solved and is even more serious.         Firstly, the documentary raised the issue of phone addiction, which I can refer to as "artificially created opium." The goal of software operators is to get users addicted to increase user retention time. The "culprit" here is the online advertising model. Rather than saying social media provides feeds for you to get more of the information you want, it's more accurate to say that the time users waste on social media is the real "feed" for platforms or vested interests, enabling them to earn more income.          Secondly, why are users addicted to different types of social media? The documentary also mentions artificial ...

“Your platform should be banned,” said Congresswoman Cathy Rodgers, setting the stage for the marathon five-hour-long Congressional hearing (“America May Be a Step Closer”). On March 23, 2023, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew faced questioning from Congress members, with intelligence and legislative bodies from the Biden administration expressing fears that the Chinese government might weaponize American app-usage data. This situation was not the first time TikTok found itself in such a predicament (Perrigo). In 2020, then-President of the United States, Donald Trump, utilized the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to issue an executive order that required TikTok to stop operations in the United States because of national security concerns (“United States Pursues Regulatory Actions”). In response, TikTok filed a lawsuit against the American courts and secured a preliminary injunction against the executive order (“United States Pursues Regulatory Actions”). Despite granting TikT...

The United States has been an excellent international police, and since its founding, it has never had ambitions for wealth and land outside of its borders. Generally, once the U.S. completes its objectives, it withdraws. However, when the U.S. military withdrew from Afghanistan, the Taliban regained control of the country, and thousands of people gathered at the Kabul International Airport, hoping to evacuate. Many people chased after and even desperately climbed onto a U.S. Air Force transport plane that was about to take off, which shows that many Afghans either wanted the U.S. to continue its military presence or longed for freedom and democracy. " Afghanistan patrol " by The U.S. Army is licensed under CC BY 2.0 . There is a belief that the United States has brought freedom, democracy, and equality to the people of Afghanistan, and I believe this is indeed true. Unfortunately, my analysis based on the Economist Intelligence Unit data shows that since the U.S. military w...

First, I would like to express my condolences to those who have died from gun violence. According to the statistics, in 2021, approximately 20,000 people died from gun violence in the United States. Yes, 20,000 , and this number is on the rise in 2022. However, these numbers did not shock me. Because in 2021, 39,000 people died in car accidents in the United States, while over 71,000 people died from overdosing on synthetic opioid drugs, mainly fentanyl, and the main source of fentanyl is China. In January 2023, the United States also experienced four shooting incidents in 4 days, resulting in 22 deaths from gun violence. At that time, I was already considering whether the government should pass more gun control measures, and my answer was no, because, as the Second Amendment states, " A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed. " Therefore, when the Second Amendment was w...

杰米·F·梅策尔 的发言 美国众议院冠状病毒大流行特别小组委员会 关于“调查COVID-19的起源”的听证会 2023年3月8日             温斯特鲁普主席、卢伊兹高阶委员和冠状病毒大流行特别小组委员会成员们，             很荣幸今天能够加入您们。我们主要在这里是因为中国政府尽其所能阻止对COVID-19大流行起源的调查，虽然调查已经迟了三年，但仍然迫切需要。我们今天还在这里，是因为即使中国继续拖延，我们在美国仍可以做更多、必须推进的事情。这包括建立一个跨两党的美国国家COVID-19委员会。           这些听证会我已经等待了超过三年。我们能到今天的阶段，和来自世界各地的一群不知疲倦、自我激励、高度能干并且不会因为威胁而沉默的专家社群付出巨大的努力息息相关。           因为我们中的许多人已经在逆境中努力了很多年，为这些听证会奠定了基础，所以今天我加入你们，并深切而真诚地请求，希望你们的委员会尽可能以证据为基础、深入探讨和解决问题的方式来进行这些听证会，以此来尊重我们的工作。           只有不分党派的两党合作，才能真正的理解出了什么问题，并确定我们如何做得更好。我碰巧是民主党人，虽然这和我的工作没有关系，但自从疫情开始以来，我一直与特朗普和拜登政府的官员保持密切联系，并与两党的国会议员就疫情起源问题展开合作。           虽然我的观点在我的书面证言中有更充分的阐述，但我想快速概括一下我的主要观点。           首先，也是最重要的，大约2000万人，其中包括100多万美国人，因COVID-19而死亡。这些是我们的父母，伴侣，孩子，亲戚，同事和朋友。我们欠对每个受害者以及自己，对这场原本可以避免的悲剧的发生进行最彻底的调查，并尽最大努力确保这样的灾难不会再次发生。         ...

In today's China, freedom of speech no longer exists, and the situation is getting worse. Whether you shout protest slogans on the street or post "sensitive" comments on the internet, you may face severe sanctions, or even be sent to prison. This is the reality of modern China, a country without human rights and without press freedom. Image source: U.S. Department of State's " China's Disregard for Human Rights " In this country, all news is controlled by the authorities, and every news item is filtered and reviewed. The media dare not report the truth and can only publish government-approved speeches. This situation is very frightening and helpless. We have lost our freedom and our choices and can only accept the information that is being fed to us, becoming passive listeners. What is even more disturbing is that the Chinese government uses technology to monitor and restrict people. In the era of the Internet, people can express their opinions and ideas...

The right to free speech is inherent to the human condition, but in light of the events of Covid-19, I am apprehensive about its future, and I am delighted to tell you about my experience here. I'm from China, which is where Coivd-19 came from. In September 2019, the Chinese government held a virus-related drill at Wuhan airport called "Yunnan Jadeite" in preparation for the imminent release of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. In fact, no one knew that the virus would hit the world in February 2020. " 'FREE SPEECH*' " by Newtown grafitti is licensed under CC BY 2.0 . In December 2019, the virus had already begun to spread in Wuhan, and the Chinese government admonished an ophthalmologist named Li Wenliang for warning the general public about the severity of this virus via social media. We could not save Dr. Li's life after he became infected with Covid-19 on February 6, 2020, and he passed away. From December 2019 until January 19, 2020, I used my Chinese soci...