WEBVTT - Where the Shadows Lie, Part 2 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:07.040 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:13.560 --> 0:00:15.480 Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My 0:00:15.600 --> 0:00:16.560 name is Robert. 0:00:16.400 --> 0:00:19.439 Lamb and I am Joe McCormick, and our month of 0:00:19.520 --> 0:00:23.360 creepy Topics continues. We are back with part two in 0:00:23.440 --> 0:00:27.240 our series on shadows. In part one, we talked about 0:00:27.280 --> 0:00:30.840 historical examples of people infusing the concept of the shadow 0:00:31.000 --> 0:00:36.000 with strange power or supernatural connotations. We talked about how 0:00:36.080 --> 0:00:41.040 the brain perceives shadows, and some cognitive science research regarding shadows, 0:00:41.159 --> 0:00:44.600 including the interesting finding that a lot of the time 0:00:44.920 --> 0:00:48.880 people do not detect when shadows apparently cast by objects 0:00:48.880 --> 0:00:52.960 are physically impossible. We also talked about legends of the 0:00:53.000 --> 0:00:56.080 Icelandic wizard who lost his shadow when it was snatched 0:00:56.120 --> 0:00:59.480 away by the devil, a kind of a violent tuition 0:00:59.680 --> 0:01:03.960 extra for his fees for going to which school. But 0:01:04.080 --> 0:01:07.559 also we talked about what it was understood to mean 0:01:07.600 --> 0:01:11.280 that a vampire had no shadow at the time Bram 0:01:11.319 --> 0:01:14.880 Stoker was writing the novel Dracula. Today, we're back to 0:01:15.080 --> 0:01:19.759 examine the shadows yet again, and to get started today, 0:01:19.880 --> 0:01:24.240 I wanted to talk about shadows with halos, so to 0:01:24.400 --> 0:01:27.280 introduce this item, I'm going to read a passage from 0:01:27.319 --> 0:01:33.080 the memoirs of one ben Venudo Cellini, a sixteenth century 0:01:33.200 --> 0:01:38.600 Italian sculptor and goldsmith who I had never heard of before. 0:01:38.680 --> 0:01:43.199 But this guy is interesting. He told his life story 0:01:43.240 --> 0:01:49.080 in a weird, passionate, melodramatic autobiography full of bragging that 0:01:49.200 --> 0:01:53.640 became widely celebrated in translation long after his death. This 0:01:54.120 --> 0:01:58.080 memoir was especially beloved by artists and authors of the 0:01:58.160 --> 0:02:02.880 Romantic movement in the late eighteen and early nineteenth centuries. Rob, 0:02:03.000 --> 0:02:05.960 Just so you can get a quick flavor of Chillini's 0:02:06.000 --> 0:02:10.760 comprehensive too muchness of personality, I attached an image for 0:02:10.800 --> 0:02:14.639 you to look at. This is a famous salt cellar 0:02:15.040 --> 0:02:20.200 that ben Venudo Chillini designed. This was used to store salt, 0:02:20.480 --> 0:02:21.440 like for cooking. 0:02:23.040 --> 0:02:25.519 You know, I always find it weird that that it's 0:02:25.600 --> 0:02:28.000 essentially a salt box. And I think it's sometimes called 0:02:28.040 --> 0:02:30.239 a salt box, but it's also called a salt cellar 0:02:30.760 --> 0:02:34.600 and a salt pig. Neither of these terms really feel 0:02:34.720 --> 0:02:37.280 very true to what the thing is, at least to me. 0:02:37.560 --> 0:02:39.600 Even less so in this case. So let me describe 0:02:39.680 --> 0:02:41.960 for those of you who cannot see the image. What 0:02:42.080 --> 0:02:48.000 we have here is a sculpture with two towering nude gods, 0:02:48.160 --> 0:02:52.120 one male, one female. They are lying back, their legs 0:02:52.360 --> 0:02:57.080 entangled with one another's, suggestively. The male immortal here is 0:02:57.240 --> 0:03:00.720 pointing with a trident, kind of holding it out, sort 0:03:00.720 --> 0:03:04.639 of languidly. He's like almost like he's, you know, very 0:03:04.680 --> 0:03:08.040 tired from having feasted long, but he's still he still 0:03:08.080 --> 0:03:10.440 wants that thing over there, so he's sort of gesturing 0:03:10.440 --> 0:03:13.040 with his trident as if to a servant, like bring 0:03:13.080 --> 0:03:17.440 me that. Meanwhile, the goddess here appears to be sort 0:03:17.480 --> 0:03:22.600 of pinching her own breast. Both figures are huge, they're 0:03:22.639 --> 0:03:26.040 made of gold. They are over a landscape of blue 0:03:26.040 --> 0:03:29.960 water crashing on a rocky shore, with golden horse heads 0:03:30.000 --> 0:03:34.480 shrieking from the surf, a golden temple with three archways 0:03:34.639 --> 0:03:38.520 under the giant goddess's shadow. I think this is supposed 0:03:38.520 --> 0:03:41.320 to be Poseidon and Gaya playing foot see here, or 0:03:41.400 --> 0:03:44.680 rather I guess in a Roman context it would be 0:03:44.840 --> 0:03:47.800 Neptune and Tara Mater. And if you think about it, 0:03:47.960 --> 0:03:50.840 the gods selected are actually on theme here because this 0:03:50.960 --> 0:03:53.760 is a salt cellar and these are if it's a 0:03:53.840 --> 0:03:56.920 Neptune and Ta Mater. This would be gods of the 0:03:56.960 --> 0:03:57.680 earth and sea. 0:03:58.360 --> 0:04:01.040 And I think those are hippocampi there right behind the 0:04:01.520 --> 0:04:04.640 mail god right, so that would be a strong indicator 0:04:04.720 --> 0:04:06.440 of aquatic divinity. 0:04:07.000 --> 0:04:08.760 Ah, that's a good point. I didn't think of that. 0:04:09.440 --> 0:04:12.280 Another thing here, So there's a dish next to the 0:04:12.320 --> 0:04:15.080 two gods and the salt I guess goes in the dish. 0:04:15.440 --> 0:04:17.719 But rob you see that little temple at the bottom 0:04:17.800 --> 0:04:20.640 underneath the goddess. That's for peppercorns. 0:04:21.360 --> 0:04:22.320 Oh okay. 0:04:24.920 --> 0:04:29.520 Also strange fact, this salt cellar was stolen from a 0:04:29.600 --> 0:04:32.440 museum in Austria in two thousand and three by a 0:04:32.480 --> 0:04:35.960 man who ran an alarm system company. I was reading 0:04:36.000 --> 0:04:39.880 about this in an article in The Guardian. The suspect 0:04:40.000 --> 0:04:43.640 later claimed that the theft was quote all rather spontaneous. 0:04:45.080 --> 0:04:48.200 The salt seller was valued at thirty five million pounds 0:04:48.200 --> 0:04:50.480 at the time. I think the thief tried to get 0:04:50.480 --> 0:04:53.279 a ransom, maybe from the insurance company or something, but 0:04:53.360 --> 0:04:56.120 eventually he was caught and the museum got the peace back. 0:04:56.839 --> 0:04:57.440 Well that's good. 0:04:57.960 --> 0:05:01.839 So in his memoirs, benven Nudo Cellini tells the story 0:05:01.880 --> 0:05:05.720 of creating this masterpiece. At one point, he says that 0:05:06.320 --> 0:05:10.400 he took a mock up design and showed it to 0:05:10.480 --> 0:05:12.919 the King of France at the time, Francis the First, 0:05:13.279 --> 0:05:17.760 who was so impressed by this model that he commissioned 0:05:17.839 --> 0:05:20.560 him to make the salt cellar out of gold from 0:05:20.560 --> 0:05:24.080 his own treasury. And he was like, Chillini, you are 0:05:24.120 --> 0:05:27.839 a genius. You're the best ever. And then Chillini says, okay. 0:05:27.880 --> 0:05:30.080 So he gets the gold. He's carrying it back to 0:05:30.160 --> 0:05:33.640 his workshop in a basket to make to cast the 0:05:33.680 --> 0:05:36.640 design in gold. When he was set upon by four 0:05:36.800 --> 0:05:40.320 armed highwaymen and then he had to draw his sword 0:05:40.440 --> 0:05:43.680 and defeat them single handedly, he says. 0:05:44.880 --> 0:05:45.240 Okay. 0:05:46.240 --> 0:05:49.599 He also brags about a time that he decided to 0:05:49.760 --> 0:05:52.919 stab some guys who had sued him and prevailed in court. 0:05:53.360 --> 0:05:56.839 He writes, in translation quote, I perceived that my cause 0:05:56.920 --> 0:06:00.520 had been unjustly lost. I had recourse for my to 0:06:00.600 --> 0:06:02.560 a great dagger I carried. 0:06:04.600 --> 0:06:05.080 All right. 0:06:05.600 --> 0:06:07.240 By the way, if you want to read more about 0:06:07.279 --> 0:06:10.119 the salt Cellar in particular, there's a good Jaystore Daily 0:06:10.160 --> 0:06:15.839 feature about this story by Giovanni Garcia Finitch. But needless 0:06:15.839 --> 0:06:19.120 to say, Chilini seems to have had a fairly grandiose 0:06:19.200 --> 0:06:23.479 idea of his own personal genius and historical significance. He 0:06:23.520 --> 0:06:24.760 thought he was pretty cool. 0:06:25.480 --> 0:06:28.320 I mean, he sounds pretty cool just from this account, right, 0:06:28.360 --> 0:06:32.760 And he's going around getting into sword fights, stabbing people 0:06:32.800 --> 0:06:34.320 in legal disputes. 0:06:34.360 --> 0:06:36.400 He says, But I don't know who knows. 0:06:36.440 --> 0:06:36.880 Maybe. 0:06:37.240 --> 0:06:41.160 Among Chillini's many adventures in Travail's, at one point he 0:06:41.200 --> 0:06:46.039 found himself imprisoned in Castle San Angelo in Rome after 0:06:46.080 --> 0:06:49.760 being accused of embezzlement. By the way, he escaped from 0:06:49.839 --> 0:06:53.160 prison later. Oh, and then he got caught and returned 0:06:53.160 --> 0:06:56.400 to prison. But then he got busted out of prison 0:06:56.800 --> 0:07:00.760 by like the like a rich family. Anyway, He tells 0:07:00.800 --> 0:07:03.920 stories of his time in prison in his memoirs, including 0:07:03.960 --> 0:07:06.599 the fact that he had a dream in which an 0:07:06.680 --> 0:07:10.000 angel came to him and wrote words of great importance 0:07:10.080 --> 0:07:12.720 on his forehead with a red and he says when 0:07:12.720 --> 0:07:15.360 he woke up that morning, he found that his forehead 0:07:15.440 --> 0:07:18.760 actually had marks on it, and he concludes that he 0:07:18.920 --> 0:07:22.520 was at the time receiving messages from a heavenly angel. 0:07:23.120 --> 0:07:25.000 But here we get to the passage that brings us 0:07:25.000 --> 0:07:29.720 back to shadows. Cellini writes quote another circumstance, I must 0:07:29.760 --> 0:07:33.200 not omit, which is one of the most extraordinary things 0:07:33.240 --> 0:07:36.160 that ever happened to any man, and I mention it 0:07:36.280 --> 0:07:38.880 in justice to God and the wondrous ways of His 0:07:39.000 --> 0:07:42.920 providence towards me. From the very moment that I beheld 0:07:42.920 --> 0:07:47.480 the phenomenon, there appeared strange to relate a resplendent light 0:07:47.760 --> 0:07:51.760 over my head, which has displayed itself conspicuously to all 0:07:51.840 --> 0:07:54.040 that I have thought proper to show it to, but 0:07:54.120 --> 0:07:57.200 those were very few. This shining light is to be 0:07:57.280 --> 0:08:01.239 seen in the morning over my shadow till two o'clock 0:08:01.280 --> 0:08:04.400 in the afternoon, and it appears to the greatest advantage 0:08:04.400 --> 0:08:08.040 when the grass is moist with dew. It is likewise 0:08:08.120 --> 0:08:11.520 visible in the evening at sunset. This phenomenon I took 0:08:11.560 --> 0:08:14.040 notice of when I was at Paris, because the air 0:08:14.160 --> 0:08:16.840 is exceedingly clear in that climate, so that I could 0:08:16.840 --> 0:08:20.440 distinguish it there, much plainer than in Italy, where mists 0:08:20.440 --> 0:08:23.320 are much more frequent. But I can still see it 0:08:23.400 --> 0:08:26.200 even here and show it to others, though not to 0:08:26.240 --> 0:08:27.960 the same advantage as in France. 0:08:28.640 --> 0:08:31.200 All right, well, no, that's cool. Not only is he 0:08:31.240 --> 0:08:33.959 going around getting into sword fights and stabbing people in 0:08:34.040 --> 0:08:38.040 legal disputes. But he has some sort of mysterious halo 0:08:38.800 --> 0:08:43.360 that is visible about his shadow, at least for certain 0:08:43.480 --> 0:08:46.600 parts of the day, during certain environmental conditions. 0:08:46.800 --> 0:08:49.440 That's right, he says, God likes me so much that 0:08:49.520 --> 0:08:53.480 he sometimes puts a halo around my shadow's head, and 0:08:53.600 --> 0:08:56.319 you can see the shadows radiance. Especially in the morning, 0:08:56.640 --> 0:08:59.080 when the grass is wet with dew, there will be 0:08:59.160 --> 0:09:02.520 visible to all a seraphic light in circling the face 0:09:02.559 --> 0:09:06.040 of my shadow, as if my shadow's head contained a 0:09:06.040 --> 0:09:06.920 second sun. 0:09:07.320 --> 0:09:09.480 But not between the hours of two and six that's 0:09:09.480 --> 0:09:10.800 Willie's time. I get. 0:09:11.679 --> 0:09:15.520 That's right. So it's a fantastic story. But the more 0:09:15.600 --> 0:09:19.559 fantastic part of it would probably do injury to Chillini's 0:09:19.600 --> 0:09:24.360 sense of specialness, because, unfortunately for him, other people have 0:09:24.520 --> 0:09:28.440 seen this same effect. In fact, it's very common when 0:09:28.520 --> 0:09:32.240 standing over a field of grass in the morning sunlight, 0:09:32.600 --> 0:09:36.480 you can often see a ring of golden light surrounding 0:09:36.480 --> 0:09:40.800 your shadow's head. M Rob, I've attached some pictures for 0:09:40.840 --> 0:09:43.680 you to look at here. Presumably the people who took 0:09:43.720 --> 0:09:46.760 these pictures are not specially blessed by God. They were 0:09:46.760 --> 0:09:49.920 not given a you know, plus four modifier on sword 0:09:49.960 --> 0:09:54.400 fighting bandits. They're not the most genius goldsmith that ever existed. 0:09:54.600 --> 0:09:57.000 These are just photographers. And what do you know, they're 0:09:57.040 --> 0:09:59.320 looking out of the field, they're taking a photo and 0:09:59.440 --> 0:10:03.120 there is a ring, like a sort of emanation of 0:10:03.240 --> 0:10:05.280 radiance off of the top of their shadow. 0:10:05.960 --> 0:10:07.920 Absolutely, yeah, yeah, I see it. 0:10:08.440 --> 0:10:10.560 Folks at home, you can look this up yourself with 0:10:10.640 --> 0:10:13.000 the term I'm about to give you. The phenomenon is 0:10:13.160 --> 0:10:17.719 known as hiligenshine h e i l I g e 0:10:17.880 --> 0:10:21.560 n s c h e i n, meaning the light 0:10:21.600 --> 0:10:25.200 of the Holy One or holy light, sometimes also known 0:10:25.240 --> 0:10:29.200 as Chilini's halo after the passage in question, and it 0:10:29.280 --> 0:10:32.080 is not in fact the flame of the Lord's favor 0:10:32.160 --> 0:10:35.000 for the rattus dude in Renaissance Italy. It is an 0:10:35.040 --> 0:10:39.840 optical effect created by the interplay of sunlight and certain 0:10:40.000 --> 0:10:44.840 types of backgrounds, especially backgrounds containing drops of dew. 0:10:45.400 --> 0:10:48.280 Also not to be confused with heinegenshine, that's a different 0:10:48.520 --> 0:10:49.439 optical phenomenon. 0:10:49.960 --> 0:10:54.160 So much like Chilini describes, the hiligenshine is most often 0:10:54.200 --> 0:10:57.160 seen in fields early in the morning, when the sun 0:10:57.320 --> 0:11:00.079 is at a low angle, and the observer has a 0:11:00.120 --> 0:11:04.240 long shadow falling over wet grass. The fact that the 0:11:04.320 --> 0:11:07.600 light is brightest right around your shadow's head here is 0:11:07.720 --> 0:11:10.760 of course not magic. It's also not really anything special 0:11:10.840 --> 0:11:14.360 about your shadow or the head of your shadow. Rather, 0:11:14.400 --> 0:11:19.479 it's about perspective. It's about light sources and reflecting backgrounds 0:11:19.559 --> 0:11:24.160 and perspective. The halo is located around your shadow's head 0:11:24.640 --> 0:11:27.880 because your eyes are in your head, and thus the 0:11:27.960 --> 0:11:31.960 head of your shadow is the place exactly opposite the 0:11:32.040 --> 0:11:34.800 sun from your eyes. Maybe even never thought about it 0:11:34.840 --> 0:11:38.920 that way before, but that's always true. This point opposite 0:11:38.920 --> 0:11:42.840 the sun from your head is known as your antisolar point. 0:11:43.400 --> 0:11:46.160 And another way to picture this concept is that you 0:11:46.200 --> 0:11:50.120 can always draw a straight line in three dimensional space 0:11:50.240 --> 0:11:54.280 from the sun through your head to your shadow's head. 0:11:54.720 --> 0:11:57.040 Your shadow's head is at one end of that line, 0:11:57.040 --> 0:11:58.760 the sun is at the other. The line goes straight 0:11:58.840 --> 0:11:59.640 through your face. 0:12:00.280 --> 0:12:01.679 All right, all right, I can picture it. 0:12:02.240 --> 0:12:06.040 So the explanation for the optical effect usually goes like this. 0:12:06.679 --> 0:12:10.800 The intensity of light reflected off of a drop of 0:12:10.880 --> 0:12:13.960 water or through a drop of water and back towards 0:12:13.960 --> 0:12:18.040 you depends on the angle of reflection. Rays of light 0:12:18.120 --> 0:12:21.719 that reflect straight back through a droplet of water are 0:12:21.920 --> 0:12:26.280 most intense that this straight bounce back angle of reflection 0:12:26.360 --> 0:12:29.800 would be one hundred and eighty degrees right, going straight 0:12:29.840 --> 0:12:33.360 into and back, like the reflection looking straight into a mirror. 0:12:33.679 --> 0:12:37.200 As the angle of reflection shifts further away from one 0:12:37.280 --> 0:12:41.840 hundred and eighty degrees, the reflected light becomes significantly less bright. 0:12:42.120 --> 0:12:44.080 Why would that be, well, I was reading about this 0:12:44.200 --> 0:12:49.560 in the American Meteorological Society's Glossary of Meteorology, and they write, quote, 0:12:49.880 --> 0:12:53.240 do drops held off the surface of the leaf by 0:12:53.320 --> 0:12:57.440 small hairs focus sunlight on the leaf where it is 0:12:57.440 --> 0:13:01.680 diffusely reflected. The drop, acting in a manner similar to 0:13:01.760 --> 0:13:05.840 the lens of a lighthouse, then collects a large fraction 0:13:06.040 --> 0:13:09.600 of this diffusely reflected light that would have otherwise gone 0:13:09.679 --> 0:13:13.400 in other directions, and sends it back toward the source 0:13:13.520 --> 0:13:17.080 and the observer. So, in other words, the dewdrop acts 0:13:17.080 --> 0:13:21.640 as a kind of focusing lens to reflect light directly 0:13:21.720 --> 0:13:24.640 back at the sun. Again, that's one hundred and eighty 0:13:24.679 --> 0:13:27.800 degrees the angle of reflection. Of course, when you look 0:13:27.840 --> 0:13:30.520 out at a field in the sunlight, no light from 0:13:30.600 --> 0:13:33.920 the sun is reflected to your eyes from exactly one 0:13:34.000 --> 0:13:35.960 hundred and eighty degrees because your head is in the 0:13:35.960 --> 0:13:38.680 way right that's where your shadow is, so you're blocking 0:13:38.720 --> 0:13:43.680 the exact one hundred and eighty reflection point. But light 0:13:43.760 --> 0:13:48.320 reflected in droplets from right around your antisolar point can 0:13:48.400 --> 0:13:50.640 be pretty close to one hundred and eighty degrees and 0:13:50.679 --> 0:13:55.120 thus significantly brighter when the rays are focused by the 0:13:55.200 --> 0:13:58.160 droplets like this than the light from all around. This 0:13:58.240 --> 0:14:01.640 is especially true if the angle of the sun is 0:14:01.920 --> 0:14:05.840 low and your shadow is long, and your antisolar point 0:14:05.920 --> 0:14:09.200 on the ground is thus farther away from you. And 0:14:09.240 --> 0:14:11.360 if you think about it for a minute, this makes 0:14:11.400 --> 0:14:15.000 sense because as your shadow's head gets farther away from 0:14:15.080 --> 0:14:18.680 your eyes because the sun is lower, the difference in 0:14:18.760 --> 0:14:23.640 the angle between like your exact antisolar point and some 0:14:23.800 --> 0:14:26.240 point on the ground maybe eight inches to the side 0:14:26.280 --> 0:14:29.960 of it. That difference in angle becomes smaller and smaller 0:14:30.080 --> 0:14:34.280 as the antisolar point gets farther away. You could compare 0:14:34.320 --> 0:14:36.640 this to like if you are aiming a bow and 0:14:36.760 --> 0:14:39.840 arrow at two targets that are one foot apart from 0:14:39.880 --> 0:14:44.080 each other, You'll have to make a larger adjustment if 0:14:44.160 --> 0:14:46.760 those targets are one foot apart from each other and 0:14:46.880 --> 0:14:49.400 ten feet in front of you than you would if 0:14:49.440 --> 0:14:52.240 they were one foot apart from each other and thirty 0:14:52.280 --> 0:14:55.560 feet in front of you. That smaller adjustment in aim 0:14:55.720 --> 0:15:00.600 is a smaller angle of difference. So this whole glow 0:15:00.840 --> 0:15:04.120 around your shadow's head has to do with the angle 0:15:04.440 --> 0:15:08.120 of reflected light hitting your eyes. It's closest to a 0:15:08.160 --> 0:15:12.240 one hundred and eighty degree angle of reflection near where 0:15:12.320 --> 0:15:15.880 your shadow's head is, so the light fro reflected from 0:15:15.920 --> 0:15:19.400 the surface around that area is brighter. If you could 0:15:19.440 --> 0:15:22.280 see it, it would be brightest exactly where your head is, 0:15:22.360 --> 0:15:25.360 but your head's in the way. One way of demonstrating 0:15:25.400 --> 0:15:28.520 this actually visually, that's quite simple. As I've seen online. 0:15:29.400 --> 0:15:32.520 Somebody takes a photo of themself with the Highligen shine 0:15:33.320 --> 0:15:35.360 and the camera is right in front of their face, 0:15:35.400 --> 0:15:37.840 and then they hold the camera away from their head 0:15:38.040 --> 0:15:40.840 over to the side, and the glow is around the 0:15:40.880 --> 0:15:42.880 camera and not around their shadows head. 0:15:43.440 --> 0:15:43.600 Ah. 0:15:43.680 --> 0:15:44.160 There you go. 0:15:44.880 --> 0:15:49.760 One other tidbit from the American Meteorological Society entry. The 0:15:49.760 --> 0:15:53.200 glossary entry, though, is that while it's entirely true that 0:15:53.520 --> 0:15:57.960 this effect is much stronger on wet irregular surfaces like 0:15:58.200 --> 0:16:02.680 dewy grass. There's actually weaker version of the shadow halo 0:16:02.720 --> 0:16:06.840 effect that occurs even on dry surfaces. They write, quote, 0:16:07.080 --> 0:16:10.000 when an observer's shadow is cast on a dry irregular 0:16:10.040 --> 0:16:14.680 surface such as gravel or vegetation, each irregularity near the 0:16:14.720 --> 0:16:19.000 antisolar point covers its own shadow in other directions. The 0:16:19.040 --> 0:16:23.440 average brightness results from a mixture of sunlit and shaded surfaces. 0:16:23.920 --> 0:16:26.960 The lower the sun in the sky, the longer the shadows, 0:16:27.040 --> 0:16:29.800 and so the greater the contrast with the brighter region 0:16:30.200 --> 0:16:33.840 near the antisolar point. So even if there's no dew, 0:16:33.920 --> 0:16:35.800 you're still going to have the effect that if you 0:16:35.840 --> 0:16:38.880 look around the world places that are farther away from 0:16:38.920 --> 0:16:42.400 your antisolar point, you're going to be seeing light reflected 0:16:43.160 --> 0:16:47.840 kind of bouncing in all directions from both brightly sunlit 0:16:47.880 --> 0:16:52.800 areas and shaded areas. But when you're looking straight at 0:16:52.840 --> 0:16:56.600 your antisolar point, the stuff right around there, you're pretty 0:16:56.640 --> 0:17:00.960 much only going to be seeing non shaded areas because 0:17:01.000 --> 0:17:04.400 shaded areas are blocked by the objects, right. 0:17:04.760 --> 0:17:09.000 Right, All right, so's it sounds then like that Seleni 0:17:09.040 --> 0:17:12.159 probably had a case here he was actually seeing this 0:17:12.320 --> 0:17:16.520 optical phenomenon when he was out walking in the fields 0:17:16.600 --> 0:17:19.080 and there was dew on the grass and so forth. 0:17:19.760 --> 0:17:22.120 That's right, there's no reason to doubt his story that 0:17:22.160 --> 0:17:24.240 he saw this. Lots of other people have seen it. 0:17:24.320 --> 0:17:27.160 You can probably see it too in the right conditions. However, 0:17:27.280 --> 0:17:31.000 I am doubtful about Chilini's claims that other people could 0:17:31.040 --> 0:17:33.639 see his halo. Remember he says, like, I've showed it 0:17:33.680 --> 0:17:36.400 to a few special people and they said, yes, it's there. 0:17:37.359 --> 0:17:40.959 The hiligenshine is a phenomenon that is dependent on the 0:17:41.000 --> 0:17:45.360 position of the viewer. It is not actually an object 0:17:45.440 --> 0:17:47.320 out there in the world. Like you know, you and 0:17:47.400 --> 0:17:49.439 I can stand and look at a tree from different 0:17:49.440 --> 0:17:52.639 angles and both see the tree. The hiligenshine is about 0:17:52.680 --> 0:17:57.399 the angle of reflected rays of light hitting your eyes, 0:17:57.880 --> 0:18:00.800 and the rays are actually being reflected in this manner 0:18:01.000 --> 0:18:03.640 all over the surface of the Earth, the sunlit side 0:18:03.680 --> 0:18:06.680 of the Earth. It just happens to be around your 0:18:06.880 --> 0:18:11.240 shadow's head that you see it, because that's your particular 0:18:11.320 --> 0:18:14.640 anti solar point. So I don't know. Maybe they could 0:18:14.640 --> 0:18:16.720 see it if they got really close to him, like 0:18:16.800 --> 0:18:19.280 cheek to cheek and then they'd be like, oh wow, yeah, 0:18:19.280 --> 0:18:22.320 there is a glow around our heads. I'm curious how 0:18:22.440 --> 0:18:24.720 close exactly you would have to be to see the 0:18:24.760 --> 0:18:27.639 same thing. Maybe you don't have to be cheek to cheek, 0:18:27.720 --> 0:18:30.600 but you'd basically have to be looking from the same 0:18:30.680 --> 0:18:31.760 perspective that he is. 0:18:32.920 --> 0:18:34.720 Yeah, I mean, I guess you can well imagine it 0:18:34.720 --> 0:18:37.880 being a scenario where since it's a subtle enough effect, 0:18:38.400 --> 0:18:41.080 if it was, if he's there like pointing it out 0:18:41.080 --> 0:18:43.400 to you, you might say, Okay, I think I see something. 0:18:44.000 --> 0:18:46.119 Or this is a guy that seemed to have a 0:18:46.200 --> 0:18:49.720 very strong personality. Yes, and there were at least stories 0:18:49.760 --> 0:18:53.080 about him stabbing people. You know, you might be inclined 0:18:53.080 --> 0:18:55.720 to just be like, yeah, totally, I do see that 0:18:56.640 --> 0:18:59.280 halo around your shadow. No, no, no, we don't have to. 0:18:59.320 --> 0:19:01.200 I don't have to put my head next to yours. 0:19:01.000 --> 0:19:02.960 It's fine. I got you. 0:19:03.320 --> 0:19:05.640 I can see it too. Yes you're a genius, Yes 0:19:05.680 --> 0:19:08.800 you're really cool. Yes that coat looks cool on you. 0:19:08.840 --> 0:19:10.119 Please put the dagger away. 0:19:10.640 --> 0:19:13.440 So that's the Highligan shine. But I am I am 0:19:13.480 --> 0:19:16.800 so interested in this bombastic weirdo. I might try to 0:19:16.840 --> 0:19:20.760 find another way to keep reading about Benvenuto Cellini and 0:19:21.000 --> 0:19:22.440 see if I can bring him back to the show 0:19:22.440 --> 0:19:23.040 in the future. 0:19:23.680 --> 0:19:27.120 And then it sounds like a big character who had 0:19:27.160 --> 0:19:29.000 a lot of thoughts about a lot of topics, So 0:19:29.119 --> 0:19:31.520 I wouldn't be surprised if he pops back up again. 0:19:41.520 --> 0:19:43.240 All right, I want to come back to a couple 0:19:43.240 --> 0:19:47.879 of things. In the last episode, we talked about people 0:19:48.240 --> 0:19:51.520 and things that, due to some sort of supernatural reason, 0:19:51.960 --> 0:19:54.000 do not cast a shadow, or a thought to not 0:19:54.200 --> 0:19:56.880 cast a shadow, and how this is generally a comment 0:19:57.520 --> 0:20:02.160 on something going on with their soul or thereof. As 0:20:02.200 --> 0:20:04.000 I was telling my wife about all of this, she 0:20:04.080 --> 0:20:05.879 was like, well, you've got to mention that episode of 0:20:05.880 --> 0:20:09.400 The Simpsons. I believe this is the episode where Lisa 0:20:09.440 --> 0:20:13.040 becomes a vegan for a little bit, or at least 0:20:13.040 --> 0:20:15.119 she encounters a vegan. I know she becomes vegan for 0:20:15.760 --> 0:20:17.639 an episode, but I can't remember if this is the 0:20:17.680 --> 0:20:18.840 same episode. 0:20:19.119 --> 0:20:21.480 I think she becomes a vegetan unless this happens more 0:20:21.520 --> 0:20:25.560 than once. She becomes a vegetarian, and then she ruins 0:20:25.560 --> 0:20:28.080 Homer's barbecue by how. 0:20:28.880 --> 0:20:31.480 Yeah, and then there's another episode where she meets and 0:20:31.480 --> 0:20:35.919 falls in love with a vegan who claims that he 0:20:36.040 --> 0:20:38.560 is a level five vegan and he doesn't eat anything 0:20:38.560 --> 0:20:42.160 that casts a shadow. Yes, now, I have to admit, 0:20:42.200 --> 0:20:45.600 you know, sometimes looking back, especially at vegetarian and vegan 0:20:45.720 --> 0:20:49.280 jokes from the nineteen nineties, a lot of them hit 0:20:49.400 --> 0:20:54.960 unnecessarily hard, and especially you know, as a vegetarian and 0:20:55.320 --> 0:20:58.520 someone has lots of vegan friends, you know, I often 0:20:58.560 --> 0:21:01.840 will be like, I think that's that's a much nineiest comedy. 0:21:02.200 --> 0:21:04.000 But this one, I don't know. I've always liked this 0:21:04.040 --> 0:21:07.280 one because you know, at one hand, it's a parody 0:21:07.560 --> 0:21:11.439 of it's poking fun at a particular dietary choice. But 0:21:11.600 --> 0:21:14.480 on the other hand, this idea of eating something that 0:21:14.520 --> 0:21:18.280 doesn't cast a shadow, it does line up with a 0:21:18.280 --> 0:21:20.280 lot of what we were talking about, the idea that like, okay, 0:21:20.320 --> 0:21:25.440 this is a creature with diminished or non existent personhood 0:21:25.480 --> 0:21:28.919 and therefore or a plant. Even I guess more and 0:21:28.920 --> 0:21:31.320 more likely it would be the scenario like this particular 0:21:31.760 --> 0:21:35.680 stalk of corn that doesn't cast a shadow, and therefore 0:21:35.760 --> 0:21:38.000 it is okay to eat corn from this plant. I 0:21:38.000 --> 0:21:39.560 don't like a lot of comedy. If you think about 0:21:39.560 --> 0:21:42.080 it too hard, it doesn't work. But I always found 0:21:42.080 --> 0:21:44.159 it a bit funny, all right, So I had to 0:21:44.200 --> 0:21:47.240 mention that one another thing, this is another one that 0:21:47.280 --> 0:21:50.240 came up and talking about these episodes with my wife, 0:21:51.000 --> 0:21:53.359 she said, oh, well, you've got to mention zero shadow days. 0:21:53.880 --> 0:21:56.240 So it's worth noting that if you're standing in just 0:21:56.280 --> 0:21:58.360 the right place at just the right time, you might 0:21:58.440 --> 0:22:01.560 well encounter a world with I don't want to say 0:22:01.560 --> 0:22:07.919 no shadows, but let's say significantly decrease shadow activity, like 0:22:08.040 --> 0:22:11.320 if you were let's say you're an individual in a 0:22:11.359 --> 0:22:13.639 supernatural horror show and you always have to be on 0:22:13.680 --> 0:22:16.000 guard for shadow monsters climbing out of the shadows and 0:22:16.080 --> 0:22:18.320 dragging you to hell. Well, these are the places you 0:22:18.320 --> 0:22:21.199 would want to be because you would, I guess, have 0:22:21.400 --> 0:22:24.520 fewer pools of shadow from which things might crop. As 0:22:24.600 --> 0:22:27.560 pointed out on NASA's Night Sky Network website, this is 0:22:27.560 --> 0:22:31.000 a reality of the solstice in the tropics between the 0:22:31.040 --> 0:22:34.040 Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn. Here people 0:22:34.119 --> 0:22:37.840 experience two zero shadow days per year, so called when 0:22:37.880 --> 0:22:41.640 the sun is directly overhead at solar noon, and this 0:22:42.280 --> 0:22:46.760 makes objects and people cast a minimal shadow. It's often 0:22:46.800 --> 0:22:49.439 been observed that you may have to jump in the 0:22:49.480 --> 0:22:51.360 air to see your own shadow. 0:22:51.640 --> 0:22:55.040 So it's not literally zero shadow, but it's as close 0:22:55.080 --> 0:22:58.080 as it gets on Earth to zero shadow. Because the 0:22:58.840 --> 0:23:02.120 sun is directly over so you're not casting. There's really 0:23:02.160 --> 0:23:05.879 no horizontality to your shadow, right right. 0:23:05.840 --> 0:23:09.520 No lengthen shadows for the most part. Yeah, it's a 0:23:09.560 --> 0:23:10.840 minimal shadow activity. 0:23:11.240 --> 0:23:13.760 Ooh. You know though, I wonder if you could say 0:23:13.760 --> 0:23:18.080 that there's actually even less shadow on days when the 0:23:18.080 --> 0:23:22.040 sun is obscured by clouds, because then the directionality of 0:23:22.160 --> 0:23:26.480 light is greatly reduced and light is more just kind 0:23:26.480 --> 0:23:29.919 of diffuse, So you know, there's much I guess you 0:23:30.000 --> 0:23:32.360 still have a shadow, but it's much much less intense. 0:23:32.400 --> 0:23:35.600 It's very faint, yeah, fainter shadows. And then of course 0:23:35.680 --> 0:23:37.840 we also have to take into account our world of 0:23:39.400 --> 0:23:43.760 so much modern illumination, artificial illumination, it's going to continue 0:23:43.840 --> 0:23:47.520 to cast all sorts of interesting shadows as well. In fact, 0:23:47.520 --> 0:23:49.920 that's kind of a defining aspect of sort of the 0:23:49.960 --> 0:23:54.560 modern urban environment. You know, we've talked about that before, 0:23:54.680 --> 0:23:59.600 these various realities and conceptions of the big city, you know, 0:23:59.640 --> 0:24:04.800 having like gulches of shadow between skyscrapers that our position 0:24:05.000 --> 0:24:08.040 too closely or don't taper off as they climb into 0:24:08.080 --> 0:24:10.360 the sky, that sort of thing. And then you get 0:24:10.400 --> 0:24:14.040 into various forms of artificial illumination, particularly at night. I mean, 0:24:14.040 --> 0:24:18.280 this is a defining character of so many visuals that 0:24:18.359 --> 0:24:21.840 we have with you know, from various noir films, you know, 0:24:21.960 --> 0:24:26.399 where it's like this this shadowy night scape, urban nightscape 0:24:26.400 --> 0:24:29.160 in which there are all these places where one may hide, 0:24:29.240 --> 0:24:31.720 but also all these places where one will be starkly 0:24:31.760 --> 0:24:36.520 illuminated and be in more vulnerable perhaps to the nighttime city. 0:24:36.720 --> 0:24:39.320 Well, yeah, the environment of the modern city makes for 0:24:39.760 --> 0:24:43.560 you can almost kind of recreate the striking lighting of 0:24:43.680 --> 0:24:47.199 like stage effects, but within a realistic context, you know, 0:24:47.240 --> 0:24:50.359 having like a dark street with a single street lamp 0:24:50.400 --> 0:24:53.280 illuminating something. It's like a spotlight, but you know it's 0:24:53.320 --> 0:24:54.520 plausible to reality. 0:24:55.119 --> 0:24:57.920 Yeah, like that classic what it's the the movie poster 0:24:58.000 --> 0:25:01.440 for The Exorcist that way, you know, it's got a 0:25:01.520 --> 0:25:05.520 sort of noir styling to the poster, but also it's like, hey, 0:25:05.840 --> 0:25:10.760 here comes the Exorcist front and center, spotlights on you, buddy, 0:25:10.800 --> 0:25:12.280 Time to put on a show for the devil. 0:25:12.960 --> 0:25:14.800 The way he's got the bag. Yet it almost looks 0:25:14.840 --> 0:25:17.440 like he's gonna put on like a costume and tap 0:25:17.520 --> 0:25:19.439 dancing shoes or something like. 0:25:19.480 --> 0:25:21.320 The suitcase is full of like prop comedy. 0:25:21.680 --> 0:25:23.960 Yeah, got a can of spring snakes. 0:25:25.800 --> 0:25:27.639 Oh man, the devil won't see that kind of ye 0:25:27.760 --> 0:25:28.280 with devil? 0:25:28.280 --> 0:25:31.080 Would you like a boiled peanut? 0:25:32.240 --> 0:25:33.800 Now, at this point, I'd like to get once more 0:25:33.800 --> 0:25:37.040 into the world of art and shadow and get a 0:25:37.080 --> 0:25:40.000 little bit into philosophy and history here as well. And yeah, 0:25:40.000 --> 0:25:42.840 this is gonna be like a big tint discussion. I'm 0:25:42.840 --> 0:25:45.400 not gonna get into all the details here, because ultimately, 0:25:45.920 --> 0:25:48.680 you know, shadows have always been with us. They've they're 0:25:48.720 --> 0:25:51.840 never far from us. And so anytime throughout history when 0:25:51.840 --> 0:25:56.960 you've had a particularly contemplative individual who's gonna indulge in 0:25:57.000 --> 0:26:01.000 a bit of of navel gazing, the shadow was always 0:26:01.040 --> 0:26:03.840 there to aid us. And yeah, there's been a lot 0:26:03.840 --> 0:26:06.280 of deep thoughts about shadows, about what is and isn't 0:26:06.280 --> 0:26:09.080 a shadow? Can you actually look at a shadow? Does 0:26:09.119 --> 0:26:11.960 a moving bird cast one shadow or multiple shadows? And 0:26:12.000 --> 0:26:14.760 so forth? And I'm not saying it isn't interesting, but 0:26:14.800 --> 0:26:19.480 it all kind of started turning my brain upside down 0:26:19.520 --> 0:26:22.240 after a bit, so I'm gonna skip around a bit here, 0:26:22.320 --> 0:26:27.280 but I was initially reminded once more of our episode 0:26:27.320 --> 0:26:31.240 on necromancy, or one of our episodes on necromancy, when 0:26:31.280 --> 0:26:35.960 we briefly discussed shadow puppetry and its possible connections to 0:26:36.119 --> 0:26:42.240 shamanistic practices and or necromancy in the sense of some 0:26:42.280 --> 0:26:45.080 sort of ritualistic way of attempting to speak with the 0:26:45.160 --> 0:26:47.640 dead or to create the illusion of speaking with the dead. 0:26:48.280 --> 0:26:50.879 Right, So, the example from the necromancy episode was a 0:26:50.920 --> 0:26:55.560 story about a Chinese emperor long ago who had a 0:26:55.640 --> 0:26:58.720 sort of wizard like advisor who told him that he 0:26:58.800 --> 0:27:02.280 could resurre the spirit of a concubine who he had 0:27:02.359 --> 0:27:05.600 loved very much but who had passed away, and that 0:27:05.680 --> 0:27:08.040 she could speak to him again, but she would appear 0:27:08.119 --> 0:27:11.000 as like a shadow behind a screen, and that this 0:27:11.200 --> 0:27:13.240 was attributed later to shadow puppetry. 0:27:14.080 --> 0:27:17.520 Right, it's it's unknown exactly how this played out or 0:27:17.560 --> 0:27:20.439 you know, ultimately you know how true this account is. 0:27:20.600 --> 0:27:22.119 And there were some thoughts that it was like a 0:27:22.160 --> 0:27:26.320 statue behind the screen or scrim that it was more 0:27:26.320 --> 0:27:30.439 traditional shadow puppetry or that, and also disagreements over to 0:27:30.520 --> 0:27:33.200 what extent the emperor would have been conned by this, 0:27:34.280 --> 0:27:37.719 but it's it's an interesting slice of history. But at 0:27:37.720 --> 0:27:41.639 any rate, setting all that aside, shadow theater anyway you 0:27:41.720 --> 0:27:45.080 slice it is an ancient performance are that probably began 0:27:45.200 --> 0:27:48.399 in Central Asia or China or possibly India during the 0:27:48.400 --> 0:27:52.280 first millennium BC. That's at least, I mean, who knows 0:27:52.520 --> 0:27:55.439 ultimately how far back it goes, because of course people 0:27:56.000 --> 0:27:58.760 along before that were aware of their shadows, and they 0:27:58.840 --> 0:28:03.119 might have caught on to ways that you might manipulate 0:28:03.160 --> 0:28:09.439 that shadow. So as it stands, shadow puppetry contains a 0:28:09.520 --> 0:28:13.720 number of different styles and traditions, you know, their use 0:28:13.760 --> 0:28:18.000 of puppets, cut out or otherwise. Also you have instances 0:28:18.000 --> 0:28:20.960 where individuals are using their own bodies. I think the 0:28:21.000 --> 0:28:24.679 most famous example of this is of course shadow graphy, 0:28:25.000 --> 0:28:26.800 or the use of you know, like making a little 0:28:26.800 --> 0:28:30.200 bunny out of your hands and far more complicated things 0:28:30.520 --> 0:28:33.720 and then using that with light to create a shadow creature. 0:28:34.520 --> 0:28:36.520 And then that's a you know, you may think of 0:28:36.520 --> 0:28:39.240 that as just like a quick, little, you know, dad 0:28:39.320 --> 0:28:42.200 trick or something, but it's actually a very refined craft 0:28:42.520 --> 0:28:45.200 and it is likely it likely originated in China or 0:28:45.200 --> 0:28:46.440 the Far East, as well. 0:28:46.720 --> 0:28:50.640 In my limited recent experiences doing hand shadow puppetry for 0:28:50.720 --> 0:28:57.400 my daughter. It's interesting the way that it's unlike some 0:28:57.480 --> 0:29:01.320 other art forms in that by re shaping your hand 0:29:01.600 --> 0:29:04.520 in front of the to block the light and looking 0:29:04.520 --> 0:29:07.960 at the shadow, you can kind of get a instant, 0:29:08.080 --> 0:29:12.000 continuous feedback on how close you're getting to the object 0:29:12.040 --> 0:29:14.840 you're trying to represent as you move your hand around. 0:29:15.680 --> 0:29:18.480 You know, it's unlike I would say in my experience drawing, 0:29:18.520 --> 0:29:20.680 which I'm not good at at all, which is a 0:29:20.720 --> 0:29:24.880 more laborious path to the realization of the image, and 0:29:24.920 --> 0:29:27.360 then if you make a mistake, it's laborious to undo 0:29:27.440 --> 0:29:30.360 it and try to change it. With the shadow puppet, 0:29:30.360 --> 0:29:32.720 I felt like my hand kind of became a form 0:29:32.760 --> 0:29:36.200 of jelly that was just automatically adjusting itself to try 0:29:36.240 --> 0:29:38.240 to look more and more like a dinosaur head. 0:29:38.960 --> 0:29:42.000 Yeah, it's probably worth keeping in mind, this act of 0:29:42.120 --> 0:29:45.080 making your hand into this three dimensional object, this three 0:29:45.080 --> 0:29:49.240 dimensional arrangement of digits that can then be manipulated in 0:29:49.320 --> 0:29:52.560 three D space in order to change a two D 0:29:52.800 --> 0:29:56.800 silhouette and make it resemble something else. We're thinking about 0:29:56.840 --> 0:29:59.080 it when we get into a discussion of shadows as 0:29:59.280 --> 0:30:03.200 truth and shhados as lies or manipulation. So at any rate, 0:30:03.240 --> 0:30:06.440 I think you know shadow publishers worth thinking about here, though, 0:30:06.480 --> 0:30:08.720 of course, we can easily become lost in discussions over 0:30:08.760 --> 0:30:11.320 to what extent we're talking about shadow in these various 0:30:11.320 --> 0:30:17.200 performances rather than shade, silhouette, translucent materials, et cetera. You know, 0:30:17.240 --> 0:30:19.800 there's a lot going on in any given example of 0:30:19.960 --> 0:30:24.400 shadow theater, But what about shadows elsewhere in art? This 0:30:24.440 --> 0:30:26.640 is another huge topic that we're not going to be 0:30:26.680 --> 0:30:30.120 able to do full justice too. But I was reading 0:30:30.160 --> 0:30:34.320 a bit about this in a really excellent jay Store 0:30:34.440 --> 0:30:38.480 article type Jaystore Daily article titled do We Actually See Shadows? 0:30:38.760 --> 0:30:42.440 By Roy Sorensen, an article that I recommend for anyone 0:30:42.480 --> 0:30:45.680 wanting a nice look at the various philosophical arguments over 0:30:45.720 --> 0:30:48.280 whether we can see a shadow or not When you 0:30:48.280 --> 0:30:50.160 look at a shadow, are you looking at something? Or 0:30:50.160 --> 0:30:52.720 are you looking at nothing? That sort of thing. 0:30:53.360 --> 0:30:57.320 This seems exactly the perfect kind of debate to like 0:30:57.440 --> 0:31:01.640 occupy the minds and debates of medieval scholastics. 0:31:02.120 --> 0:31:04.720 Yes, yeah, so there's a great deal in there. This 0:31:04.840 --> 0:31:08.360 article also gets into some of these theological discussions. What 0:31:08.360 --> 0:31:10.120 does it mean that a shadow moves over the deep, 0:31:10.160 --> 0:31:13.920 et cetera, but it covers a lot of ground in here. 0:31:14.000 --> 0:31:18.640 At one point he mentions, quote, shadows were fringe phenomena 0:31:18.840 --> 0:31:22.400 in the European Dark Ages. They are rarely depicted in 0:31:22.440 --> 0:31:25.760 the era's paintings. Perhaps the artist portrayed only what they 0:31:25.800 --> 0:31:28.520 believe to be visible. So coming back to this idea 0:31:28.560 --> 0:31:32.280 that maybe a sort of negative view of the shadow 0:31:32.760 --> 0:31:35.360 was maybe more predominant during this period of time. 0:31:35.880 --> 0:31:39.120 Oh, I'm having an idea. It's only sort of half formed, 0:31:39.160 --> 0:31:42.400 but I'm thinking about how when you look at like 0:31:42.480 --> 0:31:47.640 a medieval artwork that might to some modern critics appear 0:31:47.720 --> 0:31:51.160 kind of primitive somehow, because it's like a maybe a 0:31:51.200 --> 0:31:56.040 representation of a human that shows no optical effects or 0:31:56.080 --> 0:31:59.160 effects of perspective at all. Like so it doesn't show 0:31:59.200 --> 0:32:02.480 any difference is in illumination by the direction of light. 0:32:02.560 --> 0:32:05.720 It doesn't have any shadows or anything like that. That 0:32:05.840 --> 0:32:10.120 might look kind of unsophisticated as an artwork because it 0:32:10.240 --> 0:32:14.400 doesn't show all the tricks and plays of light that 0:32:14.560 --> 0:32:17.960 are so prized in the you know, in the passionate 0:32:18.000 --> 0:32:21.360 realistic artworks of I don't know, the Renaissance or whatever. 0:32:21.800 --> 0:32:24.720 But you could look at that and say, actually, by 0:32:24.800 --> 0:32:27.400 taking out all of those light effects, that is a 0:32:27.960 --> 0:32:33.320 that is a more highly processed visual representation. That is 0:32:33.600 --> 0:32:37.200 what the brain. That is the information the brain is 0:32:37.240 --> 0:32:39.400 trying to interpret in a scene, because, as we talked 0:32:39.440 --> 0:32:41.640 about it in the last episode, the brain has to 0:32:41.720 --> 0:32:45.280 kind of ignore a lot of things about shadows and 0:32:45.720 --> 0:32:48.440 effects of light to try to just get information about 0:32:48.480 --> 0:32:51.120 what are the physical objects in my space and what 0:32:51.160 --> 0:32:54.160 are the physical agents in my space that I need 0:32:54.200 --> 0:32:57.800 to understand as possibly having relevance to what I'm about 0:32:57.800 --> 0:33:00.640 to do. You know, you need to be able to 0:33:00.680 --> 0:33:02.920 see that there are two people standing in the room 0:33:02.960 --> 0:33:04.880 in front of you, and there's a rock right there 0:33:04.920 --> 0:33:07.840 that you could trip on, and not be confused by 0:33:07.920 --> 0:33:10.520 shadows and changes in shading due to the position of 0:33:10.560 --> 0:33:14.560 the light source. That might be literal differences that you 0:33:14.640 --> 0:33:19.480 see with your eyes, but are not relevant information about 0:33:19.480 --> 0:33:22.280 what the objects in your space are. So when you 0:33:22.360 --> 0:33:25.280 see that artwork that is like a picture of a 0:33:25.320 --> 0:33:28.640 person without any effects of light sources or shadows or 0:33:28.640 --> 0:33:32.080 anything like that, that is kind of a mental representation 0:33:32.280 --> 0:33:35.400 of a person. That's not how we actually see the world. 0:33:36.000 --> 0:33:38.720 Yeah. Yeah, so it's still a true image, but in 0:33:39.080 --> 0:33:41.800 a different way. And again you can also factor into 0:33:41.840 --> 0:33:44.960 these various discussions about whether or not we actually see 0:33:45.320 --> 0:33:48.920 a shadow, that sort of thing. But Sorenson does get 0:33:48.960 --> 0:33:51.840 back to the idea of shadow theater in ways that 0:33:52.400 --> 0:33:55.760 I was not expecting. He writes, quote, if shadows were 0:33:55.800 --> 0:33:59.560 not seen as figures, shadow plays would be as visually inert. 0:34:01.200 --> 0:34:05.680 Shadows are enlivened by actions such as jumping, bowing, and kissing. 0:34:05.800 --> 0:34:09.920 This animation raised medieval concerns about idolatry to appease the 0:34:09.960 --> 0:34:14.520 pious puppets were perforated. The dots of light were reminders 0:34:14.560 --> 0:34:18.120 that shadows are lifeless effects of positive causes. 0:34:18.640 --> 0:34:23.400 Hmm, it seems like even if it's perforated, the principle remains. 0:34:23.520 --> 0:34:24.360 But I don't know. 0:34:24.440 --> 0:34:26.360 That just seems like one of those funny, kind of 0:34:26.840 --> 0:34:30.719 ineffectual gesture is to try to appease somebody who just 0:34:30.760 --> 0:34:32.240 wants to complain about something. 0:34:32.840 --> 0:34:34.879 Yeah, yeah, I mean it also reminds me of other 0:34:35.080 --> 0:34:40.040 stories and tales we've read about where it's like, if 0:34:40.040 --> 0:34:45.120 you don't complete a highly realistic painting, then it there's 0:34:45.239 --> 0:34:47.560 less risk of it coming alive, Like, do not dot 0:34:47.640 --> 0:34:51.000 the dragon's eye less the dragon climb out of the painting. 0:34:51.080 --> 0:34:54.080 That sort of thing. Hmm. Now, it is true that 0:34:54.120 --> 0:34:57.400 puppetry has at times raised the ire of iconoclasts and 0:34:57.520 --> 0:35:00.480 raised fears of idolatry, though at the same it's also 0:35:00.520 --> 0:35:02.759 been utilized by religious groups and it's still utilized by 0:35:02.760 --> 0:35:06.040 religious groups today. I mean, puppetry is just generally speaking, 0:35:06.120 --> 0:35:10.040 a performance medium that is very ancient and well entrenched 0:35:10.040 --> 0:35:13.120 in human tradition. But I was curious about this idea 0:35:13.239 --> 0:35:17.000 of perforation, the idea like we were discussing that, Okay, 0:35:17.000 --> 0:35:18.880 here's this shadow thing we've created on the wall, but 0:35:18.920 --> 0:35:21.040 don't worry, it has holes in it. It can't possibly 0:35:21.080 --> 0:35:25.560 be real because, on one hand, outside of European context especially, 0:35:25.640 --> 0:35:30.200 you see plenty of examples of shadow puppetry, thinking especially 0:35:30.239 --> 0:35:38.560 of Indonesian traditions that depend on perforated puppets structures in 0:35:38.680 --> 0:35:41.880 order to allow light to pass through and enhance the 0:35:41.920 --> 0:35:45.719 overall effect. It's those holes, at least to me as 0:35:45.719 --> 0:35:49.480 a viewer, they help bring the things alive more, not 0:35:49.600 --> 0:35:52.200 make them seem less alive. I don't know where you 0:35:52.200 --> 0:35:54.680 would stand on the argument of making it less real. 0:35:56.160 --> 0:35:59.640 But I did find something written about this as it 0:36:00.000 --> 0:36:05.920 concerns traditional Turkish shadow puppetry. This is from the article 0:36:06.360 --> 0:36:12.280 Karagaz and Hazavat Projections of Subversion and Conformance by James Smith. 0:36:12.360 --> 0:36:15.319 This was an Asian theater journal from back in two 0:36:15.360 --> 0:36:19.719 thousand and four. The author writes Islamic Sufi thought, one 0:36:19.719 --> 0:36:22.759 of the most powerful cultural forces within Islamic society from 0:36:22.760 --> 0:36:27.560 the twelfth century on, also affected Karrago's performance. According to 0:36:27.640 --> 0:36:32.480 Karragao's expert Linda Merceades, Turkish shadow puppetry was designed both 0:36:32.520 --> 0:36:36.200 to entertain and to achieve religious experience, based on the 0:36:36.200 --> 0:36:40.040 Sufi Islam doctrine that man is but a shadow manipulated 0:36:40.120 --> 0:36:44.960 by his creator. The opening poem, typically recited by either 0:36:45.120 --> 0:36:50.080 k or Hasavat, is a ghazal. The rules against forms 0:36:50.120 --> 0:36:54.920 of representation expressed by the Quran in Surutu are fairly strict, 0:36:55.080 --> 0:36:59.879 but Sufi clerics defended Karaga's performance a complex theological argument 0:37:00.200 --> 0:37:06.239 formulated because Islam forbids the representation of animate beings, and furthermore, 0:37:06.280 --> 0:37:10.160 because shadow puppets were perforated by holes, there was no 0:37:10.320 --> 0:37:14.160 possible reason to think of shadow puppets as animate beings. 0:37:14.600 --> 0:37:18.759 Thus shadow puppet shows could be performed. Now there's a 0:37:18.800 --> 0:37:21.120 lot to process there that I think is just fascinating. 0:37:21.160 --> 0:37:25.440 On one hand, this idea of human beings as shadows 0:37:25.480 --> 0:37:30.000 cast by God, and thus God is far beyond us, 0:37:30.360 --> 0:37:32.799 as a human being is beyond the substance of his 0:37:32.840 --> 0:37:36.040 own shadow. I think that's all really really deep and 0:37:36.080 --> 0:37:38.799 cool to think about. And we'll also see some reflections 0:37:38.800 --> 0:37:42.719 of that in another religious example coming up. And then 0:37:42.760 --> 0:37:46.160 we have this idea that, hey, puppets have holes in them, 0:37:47.120 --> 0:37:50.800 and therefore they can't possibly be mistaken for living, animate creatures. 0:37:51.880 --> 0:37:55.280 It's interesting as well, it seems again I still feel 0:37:55.280 --> 0:37:59.440 like the holes overall in any given shadow puppetry example 0:38:00.120 --> 0:38:02.720 they do aid to bring the thing to life more. 0:38:02.760 --> 0:38:04.480 But it's interesting to think of it as kind of 0:38:04.520 --> 0:38:17.479 like a theological loophole as well. All right, Now, moving 0:38:17.480 --> 0:38:19.920 along to some other areas, this is another one that 0:38:19.920 --> 0:38:23.560 I imagine is on listeners' minds already. It's worth at 0:38:23.640 --> 0:38:26.840 least noting that Plato's allegory of the cave concerns shadow 0:38:26.840 --> 0:38:29.440 images on a wall, essentially shadow puppets, I guess you 0:38:29.440 --> 0:38:32.880 could say. And this of course, regards humanity's ability to 0:38:32.920 --> 0:38:36.120 see beyond the material world and into something far greater. 0:38:36.680 --> 0:38:41.560 So it's an allegory in which shadows on a wall 0:38:41.600 --> 0:38:44.799 are taken for reality because there's no additional context for 0:38:44.880 --> 0:38:48.160 the viewer to understand them. And we also have this 0:38:48.280 --> 0:38:52.240 idea of shadows ultimately as something less than reality, something 0:38:52.280 --> 0:38:54.920 that can mislead us about the true nature of reality. 0:38:55.440 --> 0:38:58.480 Now they come back to visual art, Yeah, there is 0:38:58.520 --> 0:39:00.200 often the lack of shadows, like we're then discus and 0:39:00.280 --> 0:39:03.640 older works, unless shadow is key to the work itself. 0:39:04.239 --> 0:39:07.240 During the Dark Ages, again, Soresen suggests that perhaps artists 0:39:07.239 --> 0:39:09.880 were just more concerned with the visible as opposed to 0:39:09.920 --> 0:39:13.560 the invisible world of shadows. But shadows would of course 0:39:13.600 --> 0:39:17.640 become more popular again during the Renaissance as perspective became 0:39:17.680 --> 0:39:21.560 increasingly important in works of Western art, and post Renaissance 0:39:21.560 --> 0:39:24.640 shadows became just standard in all manner of Western art. 0:39:25.320 --> 0:39:28.440 As William Chapman Sharp points out in a twenty seventeen 0:39:28.560 --> 0:39:31.880 article for the Oxford University Press titled What's going On 0:39:31.960 --> 0:39:35.719 in the Shadows? A Visual arts Timeline, you eventually get 0:39:35.760 --> 0:39:38.960 to a point in the nineteenth century where standalone shadows 0:39:39.000 --> 0:39:42.640 without an in picture source, so like the shadow is 0:39:42.760 --> 0:39:45.800 cast by someone essentially out of frame or off screen. 0:39:45.880 --> 0:39:49.680 If you will, these begin to pop up. He specifically 0:39:49.719 --> 0:39:52.640 points to an eighteen thirty three p piece by William 0:39:52.719 --> 0:39:56.400 Collins that you can look up online titled Rustic Civility. 0:39:56.800 --> 0:39:59.880 Oh boy, I don't know if this is the intended effect. 0:40:00.080 --> 0:40:02.760 Maybe I'm just in the Halloween mindset, but I'm finding 0:40:02.800 --> 0:40:07.120 this painting rather spooky. So what we see here is 0:40:07.160 --> 0:40:11.360 like a sort of road leading through a gate into 0:40:11.440 --> 0:40:14.080 a wooded grove, and there's a house in the distance. 0:40:14.320 --> 0:40:17.720 The gate is open, and there are three children standing 0:40:17.800 --> 0:40:21.560 beside the gate. They're sort of like squinting in the sun. 0:40:21.640 --> 0:40:24.520 I think one is holding up a holding up a 0:40:24.560 --> 0:40:27.640 hand to block the sun over his eyes, and two 0:40:27.680 --> 0:40:30.040 of the children seem to be kind of hiding behind 0:40:30.080 --> 0:40:33.319 the third. And then we see in the foreground on 0:40:33.360 --> 0:40:36.959 the road just a shadow of a figure and a hat. 0:40:37.040 --> 0:40:39.640 I think it's a man mounted on a horse. Maybe. 0:40:40.480 --> 0:40:42.120 Yep, that's the impression I get. 0:40:42.840 --> 0:40:47.600 We don't see the figure itself, we just see its shadow, 0:40:47.680 --> 0:40:49.400 but it seems rather ominous. 0:40:50.520 --> 0:40:52.880 Yeah, I think that's a valid interpretation. Again, I'm not 0:40:52.880 --> 0:40:55.440 sure offhand what the artist's exact intent was here, but 0:40:55.560 --> 0:40:58.680 you could look at this like, oh, Dad's home. Yeah, 0:40:58.920 --> 0:41:01.160 the kids are excited. The kids don't look particularly fearful, 0:41:01.160 --> 0:41:05.359 but they are they are children. Yeah. The other interpretation 0:41:05.560 --> 0:41:08.440 is that this is a stranger and then therefore we 0:41:08.520 --> 0:41:10.919 have no idea what the intent is. But we don't 0:41:11.000 --> 0:41:13.520 see the individual in this in this, in this painting, 0:41:13.600 --> 0:41:16.560 all we see is the shadow they cast on the 0:41:16.680 --> 0:41:18.560 road in front of the children. 0:41:18.840 --> 0:41:22.360 Well, I apologize to William Collins if I've read menace 0:41:22.440 --> 0:41:24.959 into his artwork that he did not intend. But yeah, 0:41:25.000 --> 0:41:26.719 this is looking to me, this is kind of like 0:41:27.280 --> 0:41:30.520 some of those paintings by Edward Hopper, like gas by 0:41:30.560 --> 0:41:33.479 Hopper that just to me always look more and more 0:41:33.600 --> 0:41:36.520 foreboding and ominous the more I look at them. 0:41:36.800 --> 0:41:41.600 Yeah, yeah, absolutely, but but nothing else. You know. It's 0:41:41.640 --> 0:41:45.040 an example of a case where in a painting the 0:41:45.120 --> 0:41:48.040 shadow is not merely incidental. The shadow is key to 0:41:48.120 --> 0:41:50.719 the work. It's not just oh, it's nice that things 0:41:50.760 --> 0:41:52.640 have shadows and people have shadows now like that. The 0:41:52.680 --> 0:41:55.600 shadow is key to whatever the artist is trying to 0:41:55.600 --> 0:41:58.120 say here. Now, once we reach the age of photography 0:41:58.160 --> 0:42:02.320 and then cinema, of course, shadow becomes increasingly essential. In fact, 0:42:03.400 --> 0:42:07.280 the author of this Oxford University Press piece sharp points 0:42:07.360 --> 0:42:12.239 out that Henry Fox Talbot originally discussed photography as a 0:42:12.280 --> 0:42:15.480 matter of fixing a shadow, and various others made this 0:42:15.560 --> 0:42:18.640 connection between photography and shadow as well. I mean, you 0:42:18.680 --> 0:42:23.239 can't engage in photography without at least thinking about shadows, right, 0:42:23.280 --> 0:42:26.960 if not exploiting them and using them. One example though, 0:42:27.120 --> 0:42:29.520 of people of the time period thinking about shadows and 0:42:29.560 --> 0:42:33.560 photography apparently a poet Elizabeth Barrett wrote to a friend 0:42:33.600 --> 0:42:36.560 in eighteen forty three that a photograph was like quote 0:42:36.640 --> 0:42:40.320 the very shadow of the person lying there fixed forever. 0:42:40.719 --> 0:42:44.640 Ooh yeah, going around with your cameras just snatching shadows 0:42:44.719 --> 0:42:47.080 left and right. And then, of course, once we get 0:42:47.080 --> 0:42:49.600 into the era of film, which we touched on earlier. You, 0:42:49.719 --> 0:42:52.120 especially when you look at the work of German expressionists 0:42:52.680 --> 0:42:56.040 during the Silent Era, they made terrific use of shadow. 0:42:56.160 --> 0:42:59.040 Not only is just a way of capturing the mood, 0:42:59.080 --> 0:43:02.680 but making them become an active part of the visual narrative, 0:43:02.719 --> 0:43:06.279 which of course brings us back to Nosferatu, and you 0:43:06.320 --> 0:43:09.640 know those scenes of Nosferatu, the vampire creep or I 0:43:09.680 --> 0:43:12.200 guess his name's not nos Faratu, It's called crown Count 0:43:12.440 --> 0:43:18.239 Orlock or creeping up the stairs. His shadow lengthened and menacing. 0:43:18.600 --> 0:43:22.120 The shadow is an active part of the narrative that 0:43:22.200 --> 0:43:26.680 is being presented on the screen. Now rewinding things a bit. 0:43:27.280 --> 0:43:29.719 Our old friend Plenty of the Elder famously chimed in 0:43:29.800 --> 0:43:33.080 on the role of shadow in art. In the natural history, 0:43:33.760 --> 0:43:38.799 he shares the story of the Corinthian Butedes, who allegedly 0:43:38.840 --> 0:43:41.480 invented the art of modeling via shadow, or at least 0:43:41.520 --> 0:43:45.560 the art of modeling clay in relief utilizing shadow. In 0:43:45.640 --> 0:43:48.719 translation quote, it was through his daughter that he made 0:43:48.760 --> 0:43:51.480 the discovery, who, upon being deeply in love with a 0:43:51.520 --> 0:43:54.400 young man about to depart on a long journey, traced 0:43:54.440 --> 0:43:57.080 the profile of his face as thrown upon the wall 0:43:57.160 --> 0:43:59.680 by the light of the lamp. Upon seeing this, her 0:43:59.719 --> 0:44:03.520 father filled in the outline by compressing clay upon the surface, 0:44:03.880 --> 0:44:06.600 and so made a face in relief, which he then 0:44:06.680 --> 0:44:10.320 hardened by fire along with other articles of pottery. 0:44:10.560 --> 0:44:14.200 Oh interesting, but so I would think via that method 0:44:14.280 --> 0:44:19.080 you could only get a two dimensional silhouette, not a 0:44:19.440 --> 0:44:21.200 three dimensional cast right. 0:44:21.520 --> 0:44:24.160 Right right, So he would have to add in additional 0:44:24.160 --> 0:44:27.760 details via his craft, but he would have at least 0:44:28.440 --> 0:44:31.200 some aspect at least the silo out of the individual 0:44:31.400 --> 0:44:35.319 is captured on the wall. So it's interest especially when 0:44:35.360 --> 0:44:37.360 you sort of compare it to Plato. And again, Plato 0:44:37.480 --> 0:44:39.839 is making other points. Plato's not just talking about, hey, 0:44:39.920 --> 0:44:41.520 let me tell you all about shadows and what they're 0:44:41.560 --> 0:44:44.960 up to. He's using it to make a different point. 0:44:45.440 --> 0:44:49.600 But instead of shadow being a dangerous deceiver regarding the 0:44:49.600 --> 0:44:52.920 true nature of reality, in this case, it actually allows 0:44:52.960 --> 0:44:57.200 reality to at least a certain degree, be captured, to 0:44:57.200 --> 0:45:01.400 be recreated or duplicated. This story would apparently become a 0:45:01.440 --> 0:45:04.360 popular painting subject in and of itself in the eighteenth 0:45:04.400 --> 0:45:07.480 century and again because you're getting into a time period 0:45:07.480 --> 0:45:10.319 where painters want to make use of shadow, and here 0:45:10.800 --> 0:45:15.120 here is a story about artistic creation or recreation via shadow. 0:45:15.320 --> 0:45:19.319 So it's a perfect topic to consider in your art 0:45:19.920 --> 0:45:22.359 in the topic itself, and the idea of using silhouettes 0:45:22.360 --> 0:45:25.440 and shadow in portraits also became popular again in this 0:45:25.520 --> 0:45:28.960 time period. All right, And finally, I want to return 0:45:29.120 --> 0:45:34.040 back to the world of shadows and mythology and religion 0:45:34.160 --> 0:45:36.800 here just for a couple of examples that I didn't 0:45:36.800 --> 0:45:38.960 turn up earlier that turned out kind of late in 0:45:39.000 --> 0:45:42.680 my research. They're both really good. First of all, is 0:45:42.719 --> 0:45:46.360 the idea that in Hinduism there is a Hindu goddess 0:45:46.400 --> 0:45:50.120 of shadows and her name is Chaia, and Chaia is 0:45:50.160 --> 0:45:53.520 an interesting goddess from Hinduism. She is the cast shadow 0:45:53.920 --> 0:45:57.719 of the goddess surround you that the first wife of 0:45:57.800 --> 0:46:01.200 the sun and the sun god Surya, and I've seen 0:46:01.239 --> 0:46:04.440 some treatments that discuss her as a sort of shadow clone. 0:46:04.480 --> 0:46:07.920 I've seen the word clone used a lot. She becomes 0:46:08.000 --> 0:46:13.879 Surya's wife after the first wife, Saranyu, temporarily temporarily leaves him, 0:46:14.160 --> 0:46:19.319 and together they actually, the shadow wife here and the 0:46:19.360 --> 0:46:23.400 son actually have three children. He has other children with 0:46:23.560 --> 0:46:27.000 other wives, but at different points. But yeah, they they 0:46:27.200 --> 0:46:30.680 he has three children with the shadow wife. But anyway, 0:46:30.719 --> 0:46:34.120 this idea of like the shadow actually taking on the 0:46:34.280 --> 0:46:37.360 likeness of that which casts the shadow is really interesting. 0:46:37.960 --> 0:46:41.960 And then finally this is really interesting as well. I'd 0:46:42.000 --> 0:46:45.600 read a little bit about this before, certainly, but the 0:46:45.640 --> 0:46:49.640 idea of the shadow in ancient Egyptian religion and culture 0:46:49.800 --> 0:46:54.799 is also fascinating. The shadow is it would be called 0:46:54.840 --> 0:46:58.799 a shut or I've seen it. I think it's pronounced shut, 0:46:58.880 --> 0:47:04.719 but it's sometimes spelled swt in English translation. And you know, 0:47:04.760 --> 0:47:07.560 it should come as no surprise that many of the 0:47:07.600 --> 0:47:12.560 same elements we've discussed already concerning shadows in these episodes 0:47:12.640 --> 0:47:14.600 also is in play here. So first of all, the 0:47:14.640 --> 0:47:18.719 idea of the shadow as darkness, you know, they're almost 0:47:18.800 --> 0:47:22.719 used interchangeably in a lot of languages and traditions. But 0:47:22.760 --> 0:47:24.800 then of course we have the idea of the shadow 0:47:24.880 --> 0:47:27.920 as the soul, or in the case of the ancient 0:47:27.920 --> 0:47:31.960 Egyptian religion, one aspect of the human soul alongside at 0:47:32.040 --> 0:47:36.520 least the ba. So the shadow or shoot is more 0:47:36.600 --> 0:47:40.800 spiritual in nature, while the ba is more physical, or 0:47:40.840 --> 0:47:43.760 at least that's the rough overview of it. The concepts 0:47:43.800 --> 0:47:46.960 of the soul and ancient Egyptian religion are rather complicated 0:47:46.960 --> 0:47:48.240 and have multiple. 0:47:47.920 --> 0:47:49.880 Parts to them. 0:47:49.960 --> 0:47:53.040 And then also the idea of the shadow as a 0:47:53.040 --> 0:47:57.400 copy of something, and particularly it's interesting with the idea 0:47:57.719 --> 0:48:01.040 of a shadow of a god as a kind of 0:48:01.120 --> 0:48:04.920 manifestation of the god. So apparently a statue of a 0:48:04.960 --> 0:48:08.520 god was sometimes discussed as a shadow, and even a 0:48:08.560 --> 0:48:12.759 temple to a god was considered that God's shadow. All right. 0:48:12.800 --> 0:48:14.680 So I don't think any of those ideas comes as 0:48:14.680 --> 0:48:17.280 a complete shocker or anything. But there are two additional 0:48:17.320 --> 0:48:23.200 contexts here that that I thought were rather fascinating. One 0:48:23.239 --> 0:48:27.760 is that shadows are associated with quick movement without any sound, 0:48:28.160 --> 0:48:30.200 which I suppose is key given this. You know, the 0:48:30.200 --> 0:48:32.880 speedy and silent movement of the shadow, a thing that, 0:48:32.960 --> 0:48:37.120 according to may Ahmed Hasani in light, darkness and shadow 0:48:37.160 --> 0:48:40.279 in ancient Egypt was considered a physical entity. So it 0:48:40.360 --> 0:48:43.160 was largely thought like the shadow as being more or 0:48:43.239 --> 0:48:44.479 less physical in form. 0:48:44.840 --> 0:48:47.200 So it's like a substance that moves, but it does 0:48:47.239 --> 0:48:50.680 so without making a sound and even without generating a breeze. 0:48:51.040 --> 0:48:54.120 Yeah. Now, a lot of what we've discussed in terms 0:48:54.160 --> 0:48:57.480 of supernatural and mythic and religious treatments of shadows, you know, 0:48:57.480 --> 0:49:00.600 they get down to some sort of deep metaphysical truth. 0:49:00.719 --> 0:49:03.520 You know, it's connected to the soul or it is 0:49:03.520 --> 0:49:07.319 connected to the darkness. Right, So this last bit I 0:49:07.320 --> 0:49:10.760 found very fascinating, and this is something that Hasti mentions 0:49:10.760 --> 0:49:14.000 in the article. The idea that also to the ancient Egyptians, 0:49:14.480 --> 0:49:19.319 shadow was associated with protection from the sun and the heat. 0:49:19.360 --> 0:49:24.160 And also when you start factoring in these various divine invocations, 0:49:24.480 --> 0:49:28.360 it becomes a metaphor for the protection of the gods, 0:49:28.840 --> 0:49:32.120 you know. So it's one of those things that once 0:49:32.160 --> 0:49:33.759 it's pointed out to you, it seems kind of like 0:49:33.800 --> 0:49:36.680 a no brainer, because obviously, under the intense Egyptian sun, 0:49:37.200 --> 0:49:40.280 shadow is also a refuge, it's a place of protection 0:49:40.480 --> 0:49:44.040 or rest. But yeah, you factor in these divine aspects 0:49:44.480 --> 0:49:47.840 and so, you know, Hasting points out that shadow becomes 0:49:47.880 --> 0:49:50.759 a symbolic word for protection from the sun god, a 0:49:50.800 --> 0:49:54.680 metaphor for protection in general, in addition to being part 0:49:54.719 --> 0:49:57.800 of a human being's essence that survives moral death. 0:49:58.440 --> 0:50:01.120 Oh yeah, so you can see how that complex of 0:50:01.160 --> 0:50:06.000 different symbols converging could generate some very interesting, I don't know, 0:50:06.160 --> 0:50:09.560 mythological grammar, like the idea that the shadow is both 0:50:09.680 --> 0:50:13.880 a reflection like sort of a soul copy of a person, 0:50:14.760 --> 0:50:17.840 but it is also the place in which you could 0:50:17.880 --> 0:50:19.920 stand to be sheltered by that person. 0:50:20.640 --> 0:50:23.120 Right. Yeah, So this idea of like, step into my 0:50:23.200 --> 0:50:27.720 shadow would be an an invitation to enter into my protection. 0:50:27.920 --> 0:50:30.120 That sort of thing. And then we also get back 0:50:30.120 --> 0:50:32.560 to this idea that we referenced earlier about like a 0:50:32.680 --> 0:50:35.640 shadow of something, especially if we're talking about a god, 0:50:36.120 --> 0:50:39.000 a divine being of some sort, like the shadow is creation, 0:50:39.239 --> 0:50:42.720 the shadow is replication, at least to some lesser extent. 0:50:43.320 --> 0:50:44.120 Yeah, I see that. 0:50:44.640 --> 0:50:48.040 So just some final mythological and religious ideas about shadows, 0:50:48.080 --> 0:50:51.400 I think to sort of take us home for these episodes. 0:50:52.000 --> 0:50:55.160 It's been fascinating to go through all this. There were 0:50:55.160 --> 0:50:57.320 a lot of things I expected to find and expected 0:50:57.320 --> 0:51:00.239 to see other takes in the shadow that I I 0:51:00.360 --> 0:51:03.880 just was blisifully unaware of, or you know, we're not 0:51:04.000 --> 0:51:07.280 in the forefront of my mind when we first ventured 0:51:07.320 --> 0:51:09.600 into it. I know we didn't even we didn't even 0:51:09.640 --> 0:51:13.640 really get into any I guess real shadow monsters we 0:51:13.680 --> 0:51:16.239 talked about, not in like the sort of dungeons and 0:51:16.320 --> 0:51:18.480 dragons sense of the word. I did a little bit 0:51:18.480 --> 0:51:20.960 of looking around to see about mentions of shadows and 0:51:21.000 --> 0:51:26.560 shades and a couple of my favorite monster guides and 0:51:26.600 --> 0:51:30.880 so forth, but nothing else really came up. Maybe I 0:51:30.960 --> 0:51:33.160 missed something. It also can get a little difficult to 0:51:33.640 --> 0:51:36.800 research things related to the word shadow because of course, 0:51:37.320 --> 0:51:40.680 shadow is used so frequently to refer to things that 0:51:40.719 --> 0:51:44.840 are not specifically shadows, or things that are just metaphorically shadows. 0:51:45.200 --> 0:51:47.440 I'm sure some of you out there are thinking of 0:51:47.440 --> 0:51:49.440 a shadow monster right now that you want to tell 0:51:49.520 --> 0:51:50.680 us about, right in. 0:51:51.760 --> 0:51:54.800 That's right, send us your shadow monsters. We'd love to 0:51:54.840 --> 0:51:57.680 talk about them in a future listener Mail episode. All right, Well, 0:51:57.719 --> 0:51:59.200 on that note, we're going to go ahead and close 0:51:59.200 --> 0:52:02.560 out this episode, but yeah, write in, we'd love to 0:52:02.560 --> 0:52:05.120 hear from you. On Mondays we do listener Mail. Tuesdays 0:52:05.160 --> 0:52:08.320 and Thursdays are core episodes. On Wednesdays we do a 0:52:08.320 --> 0:52:11.320 short form monster fact or artifact episode, and on Fridays 0:52:11.320 --> 0:52:13.479 we set aside most serious concerns to just talk about 0:52:13.480 --> 0:52:17.319 a weird movie on Weird House Cinema. Also, I want 0:52:17.360 --> 0:52:19.560 to stress hey, you might have noticed that we have 0:52:19.760 --> 0:52:22.120 new host photos for Stuff to Blow your Mind. If 0:52:22.120 --> 0:52:25.200 you haven't seen them, run by our recently revived social 0:52:25.239 --> 0:52:28.720 media presences all linked off of Stuff to Blow Yourmind 0:52:28.760 --> 0:52:30.719 dot com, or you can look them up independently. Maybe 0:52:30.719 --> 0:52:34.799 you already follow them. We are STBYM podcast on Instagram, 0:52:35.280 --> 0:52:37.000 so you can go there. You can see these new 0:52:37.040 --> 0:52:40.239 photos of Joe and myself. If you're wondering, well, where 0:52:40.280 --> 0:52:43.959 did you take these fabulous and strange photos with these cool, 0:52:44.000 --> 0:52:47.120 weird mirrors and so forth, Well, we visited Museum of 0:52:47.160 --> 0:52:51.560 Illusions Atlanta, a delightful and educational attraction located in Atlantic Station. 0:52:52.080 --> 0:52:55.920 They feature a whole host of visual illusions, including illusion 0:52:56.040 --> 0:52:58.799 rooms you can walk into an interact with, and that 0:52:58.840 --> 0:53:02.040 includes use the cameras there or your own cameras to 0:53:02.080 --> 0:53:05.480 take some selfies and some cool shots. This is a 0:53:05.480 --> 0:53:08.200 real fun place, good for all ages, the whole family. 0:53:08.719 --> 0:53:13.520 These are not scary mirror rooms. These are awe inspiring 0:53:13.960 --> 0:53:18.000 mirror rooms. These are whimsical mirror based illusions and other 0:53:18.120 --> 0:53:19.680 sorts of illusions that you encounter. 0:53:20.120 --> 0:53:22.319 Yeah, it's not like a creepy haunted house though. Well 0:53:22.360 --> 0:53:24.239 I don't know if they do something for October. Maybe 0:53:24.280 --> 0:53:24.839 they do, but. 0:53:25.320 --> 0:53:27.680 It is I think they put some some decorations up now. 0:53:27.880 --> 0:53:30.280 The other thing is, since a number of the rooms 0:53:30.320 --> 0:53:35.480 do involve mirrors, if you yourself are creepy, then I'm 0:53:35.520 --> 0:53:38.040 afraid that your experience might be creepy because it will 0:53:38.080 --> 0:53:40.840 be built upon your own reflection, and if you have 0:53:41.040 --> 0:53:44.080 lost your reflection, due to some sort of wizardry, mishap 0:53:44.280 --> 0:53:47.799 or undead status. Well, I don't think you can get 0:53:47.840 --> 0:53:48.439 your money back. 0:53:48.760 --> 0:53:51.719 It's a great place to find that out though, Yes. 0:53:51.719 --> 0:53:53.560 So yeah. If you want to learn more about Museum 0:53:53.560 --> 0:53:56.720 of Illusions Atlanta, visit MOI Atlanta dot com. 0:53:56.880 --> 0:53:59.560 It's a great place check it out. Huge Things, as 0:53:59.560 --> 0:54:03.400 always are excellent audio producer JJ Posway. If you would 0:54:03.440 --> 0:54:05.520 like to get in touch with us with feedback on 0:54:05.600 --> 0:54:08.239 this episode or any other, to suggest a topic for 0:54:08.280 --> 0:54:10.840 the future, or just to say hello, you can email 0:54:10.920 --> 0:54:21.280 us at contact at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com. 0:54:21.360 --> 0:54:24.319 Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For 0:54:24.400 --> 0:54:27.160 more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, 0:54:27.320 --> 0:54:44.319 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.