WEBVTT - From the Vault: Where the Shadows Lie, Part 2 0:00:06.200 --> 0:00:08.280 Hey, you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My 0:00:08.360 --> 0:00:10.639 name is Robert Lamb and it is Saturday once more, 0:00:10.680 --> 0:00:13.800 so we have another vault episode for you. This is 0:00:13.840 --> 0:00:16.800 Where the Shadows Lie, Part two. It originally published ten 0:00:16.880 --> 0:00:20.080 twenty six, twenty twenty three. Let's jump right. 0:00:19.960 --> 0:00:25.919 In Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production 0:00:25.960 --> 0:00:27.880 of iHeartRadio. 0:00:34.240 --> 0:00:36.159 Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My 0:00:36.280 --> 0:00:37.320 name is Robert. 0:00:37.120 --> 0:00:40.120 Lamb and I am Joe McCormick. And our month of 0:00:40.200 --> 0:00:44.040 creepy topics continues. We are back with part two in 0:00:44.120 --> 0:00:47.920 our series on shadows. In part one, we talked about 0:00:47.960 --> 0:00:51.559 historical examples of people infusing the concept of the shadow 0:00:51.680 --> 0:00:56.680 with strange power or supernatural connotations. We talked about how 0:00:56.800 --> 0:01:01.720 the brain perceives shadows, and some cognitive science research regarding shadows, 0:01:01.840 --> 0:01:05.280 including the interesting finding that a lot of the time 0:01:05.600 --> 0:01:09.560 people do not detect when shadows apparently cast by objects 0:01:09.600 --> 0:01:13.640 are physically impossible. We also talked about legends of the 0:01:13.680 --> 0:01:16.759 Icelandic wizard who lost his shadow when it was snatched 0:01:16.800 --> 0:01:20.200 away by the devil, a kind of a violent tuition 0:01:20.440 --> 0:01:24.640 extraction for his fees for going to which school. But 0:01:24.760 --> 0:01:28.240 also we talked about what it was understood to mean 0:01:28.319 --> 0:01:31.960 that a vampire had no shadow at the time Bram 0:01:32.000 --> 0:01:35.560 Stoker was writing the novel Dracula. Today we're back to 0:01:35.760 --> 0:01:40.440 examine the shadows yet again. And to get started today, 0:01:40.560 --> 0:01:44.920 I wanted to talk about shadows with halos. So to 0:01:45.080 --> 0:01:47.920 introduce this item, I'm going to read a passage from 0:01:48.000 --> 0:01:53.800 the memoirs of one ben Venudo Cellini, a sixteenth century 0:01:53.880 --> 0:01:59.280 Italian sculptor and goldsmith who I had never heard of before. 0:01:59.360 --> 0:02:02.919 But this this guy is interesting. He told his life 0:02:02.960 --> 0:02:09.320 story in a weird, passionate, melodramatic autobiography full of bragging 0:02:09.720 --> 0:02:13.880 that became widely celebrated in translation long after his death. 0:02:14.160 --> 0:02:18.639 This memoir was especially beloved by artists and authors of 0:02:18.680 --> 0:02:23.560 the Romantic movement in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Rob, 0:02:23.680 --> 0:02:26.640 just so you can get a quick flavor of Chillini's 0:02:26.720 --> 0:02:31.440 comprehensive too muchness of personality, I attached an image for 0:02:31.520 --> 0:02:35.360 you to look at. This is a famous salt seller 0:02:35.720 --> 0:02:40.880 that Benvenudo Chillini designed. This was used to store salt, 0:02:41.160 --> 0:02:42.120 like for cooking. 0:02:43.760 --> 0:02:46.640 You know, I always find it weird that it's essentially 0:02:46.680 --> 0:02:48.800 a salt box, and I think it's sometimes called a 0:02:48.800 --> 0:02:51.560 salt box, but it's also called a salt cellar and 0:02:51.600 --> 0:02:55.600 a salt pig. Neither of these terms really feel very 0:02:56.160 --> 0:02:57.560 true to what the thing is, at. 0:02:57.600 --> 0:02:59.480 Least to be even less so in this case. So 0:02:59.560 --> 0:03:01.359 let me just describe for those of you who cannot 0:03:01.400 --> 0:03:04.720 see the image. What we have here is a sculpture 0:03:05.320 --> 0:03:10.799 with two towering nude gods, one male, one female. They 0:03:10.840 --> 0:03:15.480 are lying back, their legs entangled with one another's, suggestively. 0:03:16.120 --> 0:03:19.440 The male immortal here is pointing with a trident, kind 0:03:19.480 --> 0:03:24.160 of holding it out sort of languidly. He's like almost 0:03:24.200 --> 0:03:27.240 like he's, you know, very tired from having feasted long, 0:03:27.400 --> 0:03:29.959 but he's still he still wants that thing over there, 0:03:30.000 --> 0:03:32.560 so he's sort of gesturing with his trident as if 0:03:32.560 --> 0:03:36.800 to a servant, like bring me that. Meanwhile, the goddess 0:03:36.800 --> 0:03:40.240 here appears to be sort of pinching her own breast. 0:03:40.960 --> 0:03:44.920 Both figures are huge, they're made of gold. They are 0:03:45.000 --> 0:03:48.680 over a landscape of blue water crashing on a rocky shore, 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:53.120 with golden horse heads shrieking from the surf, a golden 0:03:53.240 --> 0:03:58.240 temple with three archways under the giant goddess's shadow. I 0:03:58.280 --> 0:04:01.120 think this is supposed to be Poseidon in Gaya playing 0:04:01.160 --> 0:04:03.560 foot see here, or rather I guess in a Roman 0:04:03.600 --> 0:04:07.800 context it would be Neptune and Tara Mater. And if 0:04:07.800 --> 0:04:10.400 you think about it, the gods selected are actually on 0:04:10.600 --> 0:04:13.200 theme here because this is a salt cellar and these 0:04:13.240 --> 0:04:16.880 are If it's a Neptune and Terra mater, this would 0:04:16.920 --> 0:04:18.360 be gods of the earth and sea. 0:04:19.080 --> 0:04:21.760 And I think those are hippocampi there right behind the 0:04:22.200 --> 0:04:25.320 male god right, so that would be a strong indicator 0:04:25.400 --> 0:04:27.120 of aquatic divinity. 0:04:27.720 --> 0:04:28.599 Ah, that's a good point. 0:04:28.680 --> 0:04:29.479 I didn't think of that. 0:04:30.120 --> 0:04:32.960 Another thing here, So there's a dish next to the 0:04:33.000 --> 0:04:35.880 two gods and the salt I guess goes in the dish. 0:04:36.120 --> 0:04:38.440 But rob you see that little temple at the bottom 0:04:38.520 --> 0:04:41.320 underneath the goddess. That's for peppercorns. 0:04:42.040 --> 0:04:43.400 Oh okay. 0:04:45.600 --> 0:04:50.200 Also strange fact, this salt cellar was stolen from a 0:04:50.320 --> 0:04:53.120 museum in Austria in two thousand and three by a 0:04:53.160 --> 0:04:56.640 man who ran an alarm system company. I was reading 0:04:56.680 --> 0:04:59.360 about this in an article in the Guardian. The man 0:05:00.040 --> 0:05:02.920 the suspect, later claimed that the theft was quote all 0:05:03.000 --> 0:05:07.920 rather spontaneous. The salt seller was valued at thirty five 0:05:08.000 --> 0:05:10.920 million pounds at the time. I think the thief tried 0:05:10.960 --> 0:05:13.880 to get a ransom, maybe from the insurance company or something, 0:05:13.920 --> 0:05:16.320 but eventually he was caught and the museum got. 0:05:16.120 --> 0:05:18.480 The piece back. Well that's good. 0:05:18.680 --> 0:05:22.680 So in his memoirs Benvenudo, Cellini tells the story of 0:05:22.839 --> 0:05:27.040 creating this masterpiece. At one point he says that he 0:05:28.000 --> 0:05:31.200 took a mock up design and showed it to the 0:05:31.279 --> 0:05:34.159 King of France at the time, Francis the First, who 0:05:34.279 --> 0:05:38.719 was so impressed by this model that he commissioned him 0:05:38.839 --> 0:05:41.360 to make the salt cellar out of gold from his 0:05:41.440 --> 0:05:45.400 own treasury. And he was like, Chillini, you are a genius, 0:05:45.480 --> 0:05:48.680 You're the best ever. And then Chillini says, okay. So 0:05:48.720 --> 0:05:50.960 he gets the gold. He's carrying it back to his 0:05:51.000 --> 0:05:54.760 workshop in a basket to make to cast the design 0:05:54.800 --> 0:05:57.760 in gold. When he was set upon by four armed 0:05:57.800 --> 0:06:01.200 highwaymen and then he had to draw his sword and 0:06:01.279 --> 0:06:04.480 defeat them single handedly, he says. 0:06:05.600 --> 0:06:05.920 Okay. 0:06:06.960 --> 0:06:10.279 He also brags about a time that he decided to 0:06:10.440 --> 0:06:13.640 stab some guys who had sued him and prevailed in court. 0:06:14.040 --> 0:06:17.560 He writes, in translation quote, I perceived that my cause 0:06:17.600 --> 0:06:21.080 had been unjustly lost I had recourse for my defense 0:06:21.160 --> 0:06:23.240 to a great dagger I carried. 0:06:25.320 --> 0:06:25.760 All right. 0:06:26.279 --> 0:06:27.960 By the way, if you want to read more about 0:06:27.960 --> 0:06:30.800 the salt cellar in particular, there's a good Jaystore Daily 0:06:30.839 --> 0:06:36.520 feature about this story by Giovanni Garcia Finitch. But needless 0:06:36.560 --> 0:06:39.800 to say, Chilini seems to have had a fairly grandiose 0:06:39.920 --> 0:06:44.159 idea of his own personal genius and historical significance. He 0:06:44.200 --> 0:06:45.480 thought he was pretty cool. 0:06:46.160 --> 0:06:49.000 I mean, he sounds pretty cool just from this account, right, 0:06:49.040 --> 0:06:53.480 And he's going around getting into sword fights, stabbing people 0:06:53.480 --> 0:06:55.000 in legal disputes. 0:06:55.040 --> 0:06:57.080 He says, But I don't know who knows. 0:06:57.120 --> 0:06:57.640 Maybe. 0:06:57.920 --> 0:07:01.840 Among Chilini's many adventures and travails, at one point he 0:07:01.920 --> 0:07:06.720 found himself imprisoned in Castle San Angelo in Rome after 0:07:06.760 --> 0:07:10.520 being accused of embezzlement. By the way, he escaped from 0:07:10.520 --> 0:07:13.840 prison later, Oh, and then he got caught and returned 0:07:13.840 --> 0:07:17.120 to prison. But then he got busted out of prison 0:07:17.480 --> 0:07:21.960 by the like a rich family. Anyway. He tells stories 0:07:22.000 --> 0:07:24.720 of his time in prison in his memoirs, including the 0:07:24.720 --> 0:07:27.800 fact that he had a dream in which an angel 0:07:27.880 --> 0:07:30.840 came to him and wrote words of great importance on 0:07:30.920 --> 0:07:33.480 his forehead with a red and he says, when he 0:07:33.560 --> 0:07:36.600 woke up that morning, he found that his forehead actually 0:07:36.640 --> 0:07:39.680 had marks on it, and he concludes that he was 0:07:39.760 --> 0:07:43.880 at the time receiving messages from a heavenly angel. But 0:07:43.960 --> 0:07:45.840 here we get to the passage that brings us back 0:07:45.880 --> 0:07:51.000 to shadows. Cillini writes, quote another circumstance, I must not omit, 0:07:51.960 --> 0:07:54.360 which is one of the most extraordinary things that ever 0:07:54.480 --> 0:07:57.640 happened to any man, And I mention it in justice 0:07:57.680 --> 0:08:00.920 to God and the wondrous ways of His providce towards me. 0:08:01.880 --> 0:08:04.560 From the very moment that I beheld the phenomenon, there 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:09.600 appeared strange to relate a resplendent light over my head, 0:08:09.720 --> 0:08:12.880 which has displayed itself conspicuously to all that I have 0:08:12.920 --> 0:08:15.920 thought proper to show it to, but those were very few. 0:08:16.520 --> 0:08:19.160 This shining light is to be seen in the morning 0:08:19.560 --> 0:08:23.240 over my shadow till two o'clock in the afternoon, and 0:08:23.320 --> 0:08:26.120 it appears to the greatest advantage when the grass is 0:08:26.240 --> 0:08:29.880 moist with dew. It is likewise visible in the evening 0:08:29.880 --> 0:08:33.040 at sunset. This phenomenon I took notice of when I 0:08:33.080 --> 0:08:36.000 was at Paris, because the air is exceedingly clear in 0:08:36.040 --> 0:08:38.880 that climate, so that I could distinguish it there much 0:08:38.960 --> 0:08:42.200 plainer than in Italy, where mists are much more frequent. 0:08:42.600 --> 0:08:45.440 But I can still see it even here and show 0:08:45.480 --> 0:08:48.079 it to others, though not to the same advantage as 0:08:48.080 --> 0:08:48.640 in France. 0:08:49.320 --> 0:08:51.880 All right, well, no, that's cool. Not only is he 0:08:51.920 --> 0:08:54.640 going around getting into sword fights and stabbing people in 0:08:54.720 --> 0:08:58.720 legal disputes, but he has some sort of mysterious halo 0:08:59.480 --> 0:09:04.480 that is about his shadow, at least for certain parts 0:09:04.520 --> 0:09:07.280 of the day, during certain environmental conditions. 0:09:07.480 --> 0:09:10.120 That's right, He says, God likes me so much that 0:09:10.200 --> 0:09:14.240 he sometimes puts a halo around my shadow's head, and 0:09:14.320 --> 0:09:17.000 you can see the shadows radiance. Especially in the morning 0:09:17.320 --> 0:09:19.760 when the grass is wet with dew, there will be 0:09:19.840 --> 0:09:23.200 visible to all a seraphic light in circling the face 0:09:23.480 --> 0:09:26.720 of my shadow, as if my shadow's head contained a 0:09:26.720 --> 0:09:27.360 second sun. 0:09:28.040 --> 0:09:30.160 But not between the hours of two and six that's 0:09:30.160 --> 0:09:31.480 Willie's time. I get. 0:09:32.360 --> 0:09:35.800 That's all right. So it's a fantastic story. But the 0:09:36.000 --> 0:09:39.480 more fantastic part of it would probably do injury to 0:09:39.600 --> 0:09:44.880 Chillini's sense of specialness, because, unfortunately for him, other people 0:09:45.000 --> 0:09:48.400 have seen this same effect. In fact, it's very common 0:09:48.920 --> 0:09:52.920 when standing over a field of grass in the morning sunlight, 0:09:53.280 --> 0:09:57.160 you can often see a ring of golden light surrounding 0:09:57.200 --> 0:10:01.600 your shadow's head. Rob, I've attached some pictures for you 0:10:01.640 --> 0:10:04.600 to look at here. Presumably the people who took these 0:10:04.640 --> 0:10:07.520 pictures are not specially blessed by God. They were not 0:10:07.679 --> 0:10:11.520 given a you know, plus four modifier on sword fighting bandits. 0:10:11.559 --> 0:10:15.080 They're they're not the most genius goldsmith that ever existed. 0:10:15.280 --> 0:10:17.679 These are just photographers. And what do you know they're 0:10:17.720 --> 0:10:20.040 looking at in the field. They're taking a photo and 0:10:20.120 --> 0:10:23.800 there is a ring, like a sort of emanation of 0:10:23.920 --> 0:10:25.959 radiance off of the top of their shadow. 0:10:26.640 --> 0:10:28.640 Absolutely, yeah, yeah, I see it. 0:10:29.120 --> 0:10:31.280 Folks at home, you can look this up yourself with 0:10:31.320 --> 0:10:33.720 the term I'm about to give you. The phenomenon is 0:10:33.840 --> 0:10:38.400 known as highligenshine h e i l I g e 0:10:38.600 --> 0:10:42.240 n s c h e i n, meaning the light 0:10:42.320 --> 0:10:45.880 of the Holy One or holy light, sometimes also known 0:10:45.920 --> 0:10:49.880 as Chillini's halo after the passage in question, and it 0:10:50.000 --> 0:10:52.800 is not in fact the flame of the Lord's favor 0:10:52.840 --> 0:10:55.719 for the rattus dude in Renaissance Italy. It is an 0:10:55.720 --> 0:11:00.520 optical effect created by the interplay of sunlight and certain 0:11:00.679 --> 0:11:05.520 types of backgrounds, especially backgrounds containing drops of dew. 0:11:06.080 --> 0:11:08.960 Also not to be confused with heinekenshine. That's a different 0:11:09.240 --> 0:11:10.120 opical phenomenon. 0:11:10.640 --> 0:11:14.839 So much like Chilini describes, the hiligenshine is most often 0:11:14.880 --> 0:11:17.839 seen in fields early in the morning, when the sun 0:11:18.000 --> 0:11:20.679 is at a low angle and the observer has a 0:11:20.800 --> 0:11:24.920 long shadow falling over wet grass. The fact that the 0:11:25.040 --> 0:11:28.280 light is brightest right around your shadow's head here is 0:11:28.400 --> 0:11:31.439 of course not magic. It's also not really anything special 0:11:31.520 --> 0:11:35.040 about your shadow or the head of your shadow. Rather, 0:11:35.120 --> 0:11:40.160 it's about perspective. It's about light sources and reflecting backgrounds 0:11:40.240 --> 0:11:44.880 and perspective. The halo is located around your shadow's head 0:11:45.320 --> 0:11:48.560 because your eyes are in your head, and thus the 0:11:48.640 --> 0:11:52.640 head of your shadow is the place exactly opposite the 0:11:52.760 --> 0:11:55.480 sun from your eyes. Maybe even never thought about it 0:11:55.520 --> 0:11:59.600 that way before, but that's always true. This point opposite 0:11:59.600 --> 0:12:03.560 the sun from your head is known as your antisolar point. 0:12:04.080 --> 0:12:06.840 And another way to picture this concept is that you 0:12:06.880 --> 0:12:10.840 can always draw a straight line in three dimensional space 0:12:10.960 --> 0:12:15.000 from the sun through your head to your shadow's head. 0:12:15.400 --> 0:12:17.720 Your shadow's head is at one end of that line, 0:12:17.760 --> 0:12:19.439 the sun is at the other. The line goes straight 0:12:19.520 --> 0:12:20.320 through your face. 0:12:20.960 --> 0:12:22.360 All right, all right, I can picture it. 0:12:22.920 --> 0:12:26.760 So the explanation for the optical effect usually goes like this. 0:12:27.400 --> 0:12:31.880 The intensity of light reflected off of a drop of water, 0:12:32.200 --> 0:12:34.760 or through a drop of water and back towards you 0:12:35.120 --> 0:12:38.960 depends on the angle of reflection. Rays of light that 0:12:39.040 --> 0:12:43.719 reflect straight back through a droplet of water are most intense. 0:12:44.320 --> 0:12:47.440 That this straight bounce back angle of reflection would be 0:12:47.760 --> 0:12:51.000 one hundred and eighty degrees right, going straight into and 0:12:51.040 --> 0:12:54.560 back like your reflection looking straight into a mirror. As 0:12:54.559 --> 0:12:58.240 the angle of reflection shifts further away from one hundred 0:12:58.280 --> 0:13:02.480 and eighty degrees, the reflect light becomes significantly less bright. 0:13:02.800 --> 0:13:04.760 Why would that be? Well, I was reading about this 0:13:04.880 --> 0:13:10.240 in the American Meteorological Society's Glossary of Meteorology, and they write, quote, 0:13:10.559 --> 0:13:13.920 dew drops held off the surface of the leaf by 0:13:14.000 --> 0:13:18.120 small hairs focus sunlight on the leaf where it is 0:13:18.160 --> 0:13:22.400 diffusely reflected. The drop, acting in a manner similar to 0:13:22.440 --> 0:13:26.520 the lens of a lighthouse, then collects a large fraction 0:13:26.720 --> 0:13:30.320 of this diffusely reflected light that would have otherwise gone 0:13:30.360 --> 0:13:34.080 in other directions, and sends it back toward the source 0:13:34.200 --> 0:13:37.280 and the observer. So in other words, the dew drop 0:13:37.440 --> 0:13:41.600 acts as a kind of focusing lens to reflect light 0:13:41.760 --> 0:13:45.120 directly back at the sun. Again, that's one hundred and 0:13:45.120 --> 0:13:48.240 eighty degrees the angle of reflection. Of course, when you 0:13:48.280 --> 0:13:51.040 look out at a field in the sunlight, no light 0:13:51.080 --> 0:13:54.480 from the sun is reflected to your eyes from exactly 0:13:54.520 --> 0:13:56.520 one hundred and eighty degrees because your head is in 0:13:56.559 --> 0:13:58.880 the way right that's where your shadow is, so you're 0:13:58.920 --> 0:14:03.000 blocking the exact at one hundred and eighty degree reflection point. 0:14:03.520 --> 0:14:08.280 But light reflected in droplets from right around your antisolar 0:14:08.320 --> 0:14:10.840 point can be pretty close to one hundred and eighty 0:14:10.840 --> 0:14:14.520 degrees and thus significantly brighter when when the rays are 0:14:14.559 --> 0:14:17.800 focused by the droplets like this than the light from 0:14:17.800 --> 0:14:21.480 all around. This is especially true if the angle of 0:14:21.520 --> 0:14:25.400 the sun is low and your shadow is long, and 0:14:25.440 --> 0:14:28.440 your antisolar point on the ground is thus farther away 0:14:28.480 --> 0:14:31.120 from you, And if you think about it for a minute, 0:14:31.360 --> 0:14:35.120 this makes sense because as your shadow's head gets farther 0:14:35.240 --> 0:14:38.360 away from your eyes because the sun is lower, the 0:14:38.520 --> 0:14:43.880 difference in the angle between like your exact antisolar point 0:14:43.920 --> 0:14:46.520 and some point on the ground maybe eight inches to 0:14:46.560 --> 0:14:49.920 the side of it that difference in angle becomes smaller 0:14:49.960 --> 0:14:54.360 and smaller as the antisolar point gets farther away. You 0:14:54.400 --> 0:14:56.920 could compare this to like, if you are aiming a 0:14:57.000 --> 0:14:59.880 bow and arrow at two targets that are one foot 0:15:00.040 --> 0:15:03.600 apart from each other, You'll have to make a larger 0:15:03.640 --> 0:15:07.000 adjustment if those targets are one foot apart from each 0:15:07.040 --> 0:15:09.440 other and ten feet in front of you than you 0:15:09.480 --> 0:15:12.240 would if they were one foot apart from each other 0:15:12.320 --> 0:15:15.680 and thirty feet in front of you. That smaller adjustment 0:15:15.760 --> 0:15:20.520 in aim is a smaller angle of difference. So this 0:15:20.600 --> 0:15:24.080 holy glow around your shadow's head has to do with 0:15:24.160 --> 0:15:28.360 the angle of reflected light hitting your eyes. It's closest 0:15:28.440 --> 0:15:31.640 to a one hundred and eighty degree angle of reflection 0:15:32.280 --> 0:15:35.720 near where your shadow's head is, so the light front 0:15:35.760 --> 0:15:39.760 reflected from the surface around that area is brighter. If 0:15:39.800 --> 0:15:42.440 you could see it, it would be brightest exactly where 0:15:42.480 --> 0:15:44.920 your head is, but your head's in the way. One 0:15:44.920 --> 0:15:48.360 way of demonstrating this actually visually, that's quite simple. As 0:15:48.360 --> 0:15:52.200 I've seen online, somebody takes a photo of themself with 0:15:52.280 --> 0:15:55.560 the highlgenshine and the camera is right in front of 0:15:55.560 --> 0:15:57.960 their face, and then they hold the camera away from 0:15:58.000 --> 0:16:01.080 their head over to the side, and the glow is 0:16:01.120 --> 0:16:03.560 around the camera and not around their shadow's head. 0:16:04.120 --> 0:16:04.880 Ah. There you go. 0:16:05.560 --> 0:16:10.440 One other tidbit from the American Meteorological Society entry the 0:16:10.480 --> 0:16:13.880 glossary entry, though, is that while it's entirely true that 0:16:14.200 --> 0:16:18.720 this effect is much stronger on wet irregular surfaces like 0:16:18.880 --> 0:16:23.040 dewy grass, there's actually a weaker version of the shadow 0:16:23.080 --> 0:16:27.560 halo effect that occurs even on dry surfaces. They write, quote, 0:16:27.760 --> 0:16:30.680 when an observer's shadow is cast on a dry irregular 0:16:30.720 --> 0:16:35.360 surface such as gravel or vegetation, each irregularity near the 0:16:35.400 --> 0:16:39.680 antisolar point covers its own shadow in other directions. The 0:16:39.720 --> 0:16:44.160 average brightness results from a mixture of sunlit and shaded surfaces. 0:16:44.640 --> 0:16:47.680 The lower the sun in the sky, the longer the shadows, 0:16:47.720 --> 0:16:50.520 and so the greater the contrast with the brighter region 0:16:50.880 --> 0:16:54.520 near the antisolar point. So even if there's no dew, 0:16:54.600 --> 0:16:56.480 you're still going to have the effect that if you 0:16:56.520 --> 0:16:59.520 look around the world places that are farther away from 0:16:59.560 --> 0:17:02.320 your anti solar point, you're going to be seeing light 0:17:02.440 --> 0:17:08.080 reflected kind of bouncing in all directions from both brightly 0:17:08.119 --> 0:17:12.920 sunlit areas and shaded areas. But when you're looking straight 0:17:13.200 --> 0:17:16.920 at your antisolar point the stuff right around there, you're 0:17:17.000 --> 0:17:21.280 pretty much only going to be seeing non shaded areas 0:17:21.359 --> 0:17:25.080 because shaded areas are blocked by the objects right. 0:17:25.440 --> 0:17:29.680 Right, all right. So it sounds then like that Seleni 0:17:29.760 --> 0:17:32.280 probably had a case here. He was actually seeing this 0:17:33.040 --> 0:17:37.200 optical phenomenon when he was out walking in the fields 0:17:37.280 --> 0:17:39.760 and there was dew on the grass and so forth. 0:17:40.440 --> 0:17:42.800 That's right, there's no reason to doubt his story that 0:17:42.880 --> 0:17:44.959 he saw this. Lots of other people have seen it. 0:17:45.000 --> 0:17:47.840 You can probably see it too in the right conditions. However, 0:17:47.960 --> 0:17:51.720 I am doubtful about Chilini's claims that other people could 0:17:51.760 --> 0:17:54.320 see his halo. Remember he says, like, I've showed it 0:17:54.359 --> 0:17:57.119 to a few special people and they said, yes, it's there. 0:17:58.040 --> 0:18:01.639 The highligenshine is a phenomenon that is dependent on the 0:18:01.680 --> 0:18:06.040 position of the viewer. It is not actually an object 0:18:06.160 --> 0:18:08.440 out there in the world. Like you and I can 0:18:08.520 --> 0:18:10.639 stand and look at a tree from different angles and 0:18:10.680 --> 0:18:14.160 both see the tree. The highligenshine is about the angle 0:18:14.400 --> 0:18:18.760 of reflected rays of light hitting your eyes, and the 0:18:18.840 --> 0:18:22.120 rays are actually being reflected in this manner all over 0:18:22.160 --> 0:18:24.800 the surface of the earth, the sunlit side of the Earth. 0:18:25.080 --> 0:18:29.120 It just happens to be around your shadow's head that 0:18:29.280 --> 0:18:33.720 you see it, because that's your particular antisolar point. So 0:18:34.040 --> 0:18:35.879 I don't know. Maybe they could see it if they 0:18:35.880 --> 0:18:38.560 got really close to him, like cheek to cheek, and 0:18:38.640 --> 0:18:40.320 then they'd be like, oh wow, yeah, there is a 0:18:40.359 --> 0:18:44.119 glow around our heads. I'm curious how close exactly you 0:18:44.160 --> 0:18:46.520 would have to be to see the same thing. Maybe 0:18:46.600 --> 0:18:49.440 you don't have to be cheek to cheek, but you'd 0:18:49.440 --> 0:18:52.040 basically have to be looking from the same perspective that 0:18:52.119 --> 0:18:52.439 he is. 0:18:53.600 --> 0:18:55.560 Yeah, I mean, I guess you can well imagine being 0:18:55.600 --> 0:18:59.280 a scenario where since it's a subtle enough effect, if 0:18:59.320 --> 0:19:02.080 it was, if he's there like pointing it out to you, 0:19:02.080 --> 0:19:04.800 you might say, okay, I think I see something. Or 0:19:05.720 --> 0:19:07.040 this is a guy that seemed to have a very 0:19:07.040 --> 0:19:10.680 strong personality, yes, and there were at least stories about 0:19:10.760 --> 0:19:13.879 him stabbing people. You know, you might be inclined to 0:19:13.920 --> 0:19:17.679 just be like, yeah, totally, I do see that halo 0:19:17.800 --> 0:19:20.000 around your shadow. No, no, no, we don't have to. 0:19:20.040 --> 0:19:21.919 I don't have to put my head next to yours. 0:19:21.720 --> 0:19:24.840 It's fine, I got you. I can see it. Too. 0:19:25.000 --> 0:19:27.680 Yes, you're a genius. Yes you're really cool. Yes that 0:19:28.080 --> 0:19:29.480 coat looks cool on you. 0:19:29.560 --> 0:19:30.840 Please put the dagger away. 0:19:31.320 --> 0:19:34.120 So that's the Highligan shine. But I am I am 0:19:34.160 --> 0:19:37.520 so interested in this bombastic weirdo. I might try to 0:19:37.520 --> 0:19:41.280 find another way to keep reading about ben Venudo Cellini 0:19:41.320 --> 0:19:42.879 and see if I can bring him back to the 0:19:42.920 --> 0:19:43.719 show in the future. 0:19:44.400 --> 0:19:47.800 And then he sounds like a big character who had 0:19:47.840 --> 0:19:49.720 a lot of thoughts about a lot of topics, so 0:19:49.840 --> 0:19:51.760 I won't I wouldn't be surprised if he pops back 0:19:51.840 --> 0:20:03.240 up again. All right, I want to come back to 0:20:03.560 --> 0:20:06.520 a couple of things. In the last episode, we talked 0:20:06.520 --> 0:20:11.240 about people and things that, due to some sort of 0:20:11.240 --> 0:20:14.400 supernatural reason do not cast a shadow, or a thought 0:20:14.400 --> 0:20:16.960 to not cast a shadow, and how this is generally 0:20:17.000 --> 0:20:20.560 a comment on something going on with their soul or 0:20:20.680 --> 0:20:24.399 lack thereof. As I was telling my wife about all 0:20:24.400 --> 0:20:25.720 of this, she was like, well, you've got to mention 0:20:25.880 --> 0:20:28.879 that episode of The Simpsons. I believe this is the 0:20:28.920 --> 0:20:31.600 episode where Lisa becomes a vegan for a little bit, 0:20:33.359 --> 0:20:34.760 or at least she encounters a vegan. I know she 0:20:34.800 --> 0:20:37.880 becomes vegan for an episode, but I can't remember if 0:20:37.880 --> 0:20:39.520 this is the same episode. 0:20:39.800 --> 0:20:42.160 I think she becomes a vegetan, unless this happens more 0:20:42.200 --> 0:20:46.240 than once. She becomes a vegetarian, and then she ruins 0:20:46.240 --> 0:20:48.760 Homer's barbecue. 0:20:49.560 --> 0:20:52.159 Yeah, and then there's another episode where she meets and 0:20:52.200 --> 0:20:56.600 falls in love with a vegan who claims that he 0:20:56.720 --> 0:20:59.240 is a level five vegan and he doesn't eat anything 0:20:59.240 --> 0:21:03.040 that casts a shot. Now, I have to admit, you know, 0:21:03.080 --> 0:21:06.640 sometimes looking back on, especially at vegetarian and vegan jokes 0:21:06.640 --> 0:21:11.359 from the nineteen nineties, a lot of them hit unnecessarily hard, 0:21:11.960 --> 0:21:16.200 and especially you know, as a vegetarian I and someone 0:21:16.320 --> 0:21:19.440 has lots of vegan friends, you know, I often will 0:21:19.480 --> 0:21:22.520 be like, I think that's that's a bit much nineties comedy. 0:21:22.880 --> 0:21:24.679 But this one, I don't know. I've always liked this 0:21:24.720 --> 0:21:27.520 one because, you know, at one hand, it's it's a 0:21:27.520 --> 0:21:31.760 parody of it's poking fun at a particular dietary choice. 0:21:32.040 --> 0:21:35.080 But on the other hand, this idea of eating something 0:21:35.119 --> 0:21:38.879 that doesn't cast a shadow, it does line up with 0:21:38.920 --> 0:21:40.399 a lot of what we were talking about, the idea 0:21:40.440 --> 0:21:44.439 that like, okay, this is a creature with diminished or 0:21:44.440 --> 0:21:49.000 non existent personhood and therefore or a plant. Even I 0:21:49.040 --> 0:21:50.960 guess more and more likely it would be the scenario 0:21:51.080 --> 0:21:55.720 like this particular stalk of corn that doesn't cast a shadow, 0:21:55.800 --> 0:21:58.880 and therefore it is okay to eat corn from this plant. 0:21:58.960 --> 0:22:00.320 Like a lot of comedy, if you think about it 0:22:00.359 --> 0:22:02.840 too hard, it doesn't work. But I always found it 0:22:02.840 --> 0:22:05.080 a bit funny, all right, So I had to mention 0:22:05.200 --> 0:22:08.120 that one Another thing, This is another one that came 0:22:08.200 --> 0:22:12.119 up and talking about these episodes with my wife, she said, oh, 0:22:12.200 --> 0:22:15.240 you've got to mention zero shadow days. So it's worth 0:22:15.400 --> 0:22:17.600 noting that if you're standing in just the right place 0:22:17.640 --> 0:22:20.080 at just the right time, you might well encounter a 0:22:20.119 --> 0:22:23.000 world with I don't want to say no shadows, but 0:22:23.080 --> 0:22:29.280 let's say significantly decrease shadow activity, Like if you were 0:22:29.480 --> 0:22:33.240 let's say you're an individual in a supernatural horror show 0:22:33.320 --> 0:22:35.119 and you always have to be on guard for shadow 0:22:35.119 --> 0:22:38.120 monsters climbing out of the shadows and dragging you to hell. Well, 0:22:38.119 --> 0:22:41.119 these are the places you would want to be because 0:22:41.160 --> 0:22:43.520 you would, I guess, have fewer pools of shadow from 0:22:43.520 --> 0:22:46.719 which things might crop. As pointed out on NASA's Night 0:22:46.760 --> 0:22:50.159 Sky Network website, this is a reality of the solstice 0:22:50.560 --> 0:22:52.600