Author: Habeeb Mohammed

  • Always Within Reach: The Quiet Anxiety of Smartphone Life

    Always Within Reach: The Quiet Anxiety of Smartphone Life

    According to a recent study by Harmony Healthcare, 44% of Americans cannot go 24 hours without their phone, and 76% feel anxious if they do not know where their phone is. Thankfully, I’m not part of this group. My first phone was a basic feature phone in the mid-2000s, so I understand what it is like to be without a screen. Today, I could go a whole day without my smartphone, yet I rarely do, simply because it’s always close.

    We like to think of phones as simple tools — small gateways to convenience, connection, and sometimes distraction. But for many of us, they have become an extension of our attention: always present, rarely out of reach. I don’t panic if I lose signal; what unsettles me is the gravitational pull of social media. I find myself nervously reaching for the phone when it is visible. Once I open a feed, I feel the creeping lethargy, the mental fog, and the difficulty of resuming any focused work. Thus, for me, the problem lies not in absence but in engagement. The structure of endless scrolling chips away at attention and worsens emotional well-being. It’s therefore not far-fetched to believe that these platforms are designed to trap us.

    Hence, the role of a phone in my life is both liberating and distracting. I see in myself and others the tiny anxieties that arise not from disconnection, but from overconnection. Recognizing this tension, I believe, is the first step toward controlling it.

  • From Ghana to the U.S.: A Millennial’s Take on Health Narratives

    From Ghana to the U.S.: A Millennial’s Take on Health Narratives

    As a millennial who grew up in Ghana and now lives in the US, I find a lot of the “Make America Healthy Again” messaging from Gen Z influencers both laudable and disconnected from the reality I have known.

    When I was growing up, public health campaigns made the importance of vaccines against childhood killer diseases abundantly clear and simple. Parents didn’t argue about their effectiveness on social media. Instead, they lined up to protect their children, because they had seen frequently and personally the terrible impact of illnesses like measles and polio. It’s why skepticism about vaccines has always struck me as bizarre. Big Pharma did not consider vaccines a profit-driven scam, but life-saving interventions that allowed us to grow up healthy. This is why my generation finds the anti-vaccine subtext in MAHA narratives odd. Nurturing good habits like clean eating and wellness are beneficial, though they can’t replace effective public health. For a lot of millennials like me, health is not just about personal lifestyle choices — it’s also about collective responsibility. Vaccines save people and, more importantly, protect entire communities.

    To conclude, as much as I love the Gen Z’s penchant for questioning systems and their commitment to healthier living, messages that undercut faith in science-based medicine risk undermining decades of progress. Wellness trends come and go, but people shouldn’t view the foundation of public health, including childhood vaccinations, as optional or suspect.

  • Are we going or we’re coming? The curious case of noisy EVs

    Are we going or we’re coming? The curious case of noisy EVs

    I came across a story in the WSJ today which I found really curious. Apparently EV drivers are calling on manufacturers to bring back noisy engines, analogous to gasoline engines. Honestly I don’t know how popular this view is among the public but I chose to put down a few thoughts on the subject.

    The story just keeps getting funnier. When EVs were introduced to the mainstream, one of their major selling points was how blissfully quiet they are. No engine roar, no exhaust rumble — just a smooth, nearly silent swish down the street. It felt futuristic, almost peaceful, as though cities might finally catch a break from the ceaseless growl of traffic. But now the pendulum is swinging back in the other direction: performance brands are cranking up the volume again, and this time it’s not even actual engine noise. It’s designer soundtracks, made by other sports car companies, occasionally with the help of Hollywood composers, that help to lend EVs the same emotional punch their customers are used to.

    Honestly, I get the appeal. A big part of what makes driving a high performance car so exhilarating is the feel of it, and sound plays a large role in that. The growl of an engine can get your heart racing even before you press the gas pedal. And so if it turns out that a silent electric supercar leaves its driver craving something more, perhaps a judiciously designed soundscape is fair game. It’s like how video games have fake engine noise for immersion- not required for function but adds to the experience.

    But there’s also something a little funny about the idea that we spend decades trying to take noise out of cars, and then we start putting it back in again artificially. We finally have vehicles that don’t need a roar to be genuinely thrilling — but instead of welcoming the sci-fi hush, we’re cobwebbing our silent dune buggies with digital vrooms to ease our nostalgia. Wonder if this is really driver enjoyment or just brand identity. Companies such as Ferrari have created a whole image around the sound of their engines, perhaps they are just trying to maintain that atmosphere even if it is different mechanics under the hood.

    Either way, it’s going to be interesting (and likely a bit weird) to see how this all plays out when Ferrari launches its first electric model. Will it roar like a spaceship, or will it sound like a classic V12 in disguise? If we’re entering an electric future, let’s make it sound like one.