5. New York City

James follows the news of coronavirus outbreak. He notices that the name of Jenny, his former student, displays prominently on the topic of the origin of this outbreak. He watches as the epicenter of the epidemic shifts from Wuhan, to Europe, then to New York, with vengeance.  

New York is a city with grand buildings, grand universities, grand money and grand pride. Yet the tiny viruses sweep through New York just like any places. Indeed, the viruses hit New York much harder than other cities. The viruses pay little attention to all the impressive looking scientists, all the impressive looking bankers and all the impressive looking artists. These coronaviruses are tiny, much tinier than the tiny bacteria. But they charge fearlessly against the most revered, most feared, the grandest personalities. They pay no respect to the self important modern and post modern institutions.

In an April early morning, James ventured down to the street from his apartment.  He looked up the street, and down the street. The whole street is eerily quiet. Then he looked up into the sky. It was a fortress of tall buildings. James was ambivalent about his feeling towards those skyscrapers. They were supposed to be impressive. And James was duly impressed. But James also feels oppressed by the tall and weighty buildings. He feels squeezed by the narrow openings between the gigantic skyscrapers.  Everything impressive is at the same time oppressive.

James looked at those rigidly built up gigantic skyscrapers. Then he thought about the farm houses his father built. They were less impressive. But his father designed them himself and built them himself, according to his own imagination. Science research is the same, he reckons. The early science research, the kind of research conducted by Copernicus, Kepler and Mendel, may not look very impressive. But they were the imagination of the individuals. They were the labor of love. The newest researches, built upon a skyscraper of established research, with long and respectable list of references, look impressive. But they were created in the oppressive and rigid environment of vast amount of established results. You are supposed to improve the results of more senior members of the research community, but not to negate the whole foundation of the research community. You improve your reputation by improving the reputation of your peers. If your work destroys the reputation of the whole community, you destroy your own reputation and your career.

It is in this rigidly built up city, grand and rigid science clashes with meek and nimble viruses. Viruses are versatile, economical, and most of all, fecund. They are ancient. And they are forever young. They are the most prolific and most successful life on the earth. Yet many scientists don’t even call viruses life. They simply define life in a way to exclude viruses. How arrogant and self centered some people are! Viruses are our stern masters.  They guide us, discipline us and prune us in more ways than we can imagine.

James was lost in his thought. He walked slowly and aimlessly along the street. At the corner of the street, several kids run around toward his direction, chasing each other on the street. They seemed totally ignorant of social distancing. Or they simply ignore it. Maybe the kids know something about the viruses he doesn’t, thought James. Maybe we need more june juveniles than august authorities. After all, juveniles rejuvenate our life. August authorities don’t, no matter how impressive they look, how wealthy they are, how much pain they can inflict upon others.

(The End)