Crop circles, Superman Movies, and scraped palimpsests: Weird passages from Claire White’s “An Introduction to the Cognitive Science of Religion”

December 27, 2024 Leonardo Ambasciano

The cover of Claire White’s *An Introduction to the Cognitive Science of Religion: Connecting Evolution, Brain, Cognition, and Culture*. The image depicted on the cover is a “full brain tractography with artistic color” (from the back cover). The fact that a book about cognition presents itself to the readers with a neuroimaging picture is problematic, to say the least. See text for details. **Source**: personal collection.

I have eagerly waited for a general, comprehensive, and user-friendly introduction to the Cognitive Science of Religion (CSR) for many, many years. Finally, the book I’ve long dreamed about is here. And the result, while impressive in sheer size and scope, leaves much to be desired.

The toxic legacy of Michael Crichton

February 15, 2023 Leonardo Ambasciano

“I’m telling you, *this is the way modern society works* – by the constant creation of fear.” The cover of Michael Crichton’s fourteenth novel, *State of Fear* (2004), courtesy of my local library. London: HarperCollins (cit. from Prof. Hoffman’s tirade on p. 456).

When Crichton addressed the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1999, he gaslighted the scientific community by saying that stereotypical portrayals of mad scientists and other negative tropes in the movies were absolutely normal (“Since all occupations are portrayed negatively, why expect scientists to be treated differently?”).

The End of the (Jurassic) World

February 13, 2023 Leonardo Ambasciano

*Cadillacs and Dinosaurs*!? Nope, wrong franchise. *Jurassic World* release poster (2015). © Universal Studios and Amblin Entertainment, Inc. Source: IMP.

When a graduate student of Stephen Jay Gould went to the movies to watch Steven Spielberg’s blockbuster tentpole Jurassic Park in 1993, he lamented that the animals depicted in the movie – in particular the Velociraptor, called raptors – were “the same old, ordinary, dinosaur shit-green” (Gould 1996: 230). When Gould reported his student’s colourful impressions in a studious review of the movie, he duly noted that Spielberg tried to experiment “in early plans and models” with the “bright colors” you would expect in a birdlike animal evolutionarily closer to birds than lizards and other reptiles. However, in the end the production team decided to revert to dull, dated, and monochromatic reptilian hues (Gould 1996: 230). They had already renounced the hissing serpent-like tongue for the raptors featured in the first shooting tests for the kitchen attack sequence – and that was quite enough, thank you very much.

Religion 101: How I Would Design a Kick-ass Course

July 7, 2021 Leonardo Ambasciano

Exchange Building, University of Nottingham. Source: Wikipedia; author: mattbuck. — Exchange Building, University of Nottingham. **Source**: Wikipedia; author: mattbuck.

Introduction to the Critical and Interdisciplinary Study of Religion 101: A work in progress.

Unhorror, Propp’s universal grammar, and box office successes

August 20, 2020 Leonardo Ambasciano

Horror comes in many shapes and forms… Private collection.

... quiet… quiet … BANG! Darryl Jones has recently suggested to label unhorror the blockbuster, mainstream “marketization” of the post-millennial horror, which compensates for its depoliticized and polished nature by the implementation of the now “dominant aesthetic technique” called scare-jumps or “jump-shocks”.

From Magic Lantern Ghost Shows to IMAX: Horror and Modernity

August 5, 2020 Leonardo Ambasciano

Engraving depicting the most successful magic lantern ghost show of the 19th century, Étienne-Gaspard Robertson’s Fantasmagorie. Source: F. Marion, L’Optique, 1867. From Wikipedia. — Engraving depicting the most successful magic lantern ghost show of the 19th century, Étienne-Gaspard Robertson’s *Fantasmagorie*. Source: F. Marion, *L’Optique*, 1867. From Wikipedia.

In his On Deep History and the Brain, historian Daniel L. Smail suggested that technologies and dedicated socio-economic systems develop around specific psychotropic practices, that is, practices which piggyback our neuroendocrine system to deliver a rewarding, addictive experience (Smail 2008). According to Smail, the period that ranges from the Peace of Westphalia (1648) to the imperial coda of the French Revolution (1815) stands out as a pivotal moment in the “invention” of a distinctly modern mass economy of psychotropic products and practices.

A cognitive exploration of horror tropes

April 25, 2020 Leonardo Ambasciano

“2019 Bela Lugosi Dracula Funko Super7 ReAction 9943.” Author: Brechtbug (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

You know the drill. You went to the movies to watch the latest installment or the much talked about reboot of your favourite horror/thriller series. You read the interviews, you heard the podcasts, you checked some quite promising non-spoiler reviews. This time it really looked like the new movie could be a lot of fun. All you hoped for was a breath of fresh air, and then… meh. Nothing. Been there, done that. Déjà vu. Just more of the same.

The (neurochemical) medium is the message

April 24, 2020 Leonardo Ambasciano

“Movie Theater at Shibuya.” Author: naoyafujii (CC BY-NC 2.0).

Cinema provides a virtual environment specifically engineered to stimulate our cognitive and sensorial inclinations – for our own entertainment. The cinematic experience itself is an embodied simulation based on illusory stimuli able to elicit the mirror neurons of our brains – putting us effortlessly in the characters’ shoes and making us feel what they feel (Gallese and Guerra 2012; Gallese and Guerra 2015). The illusion does not stop at emotionally connecting to the characters’ adventures. We intuitively transform opaque cinematic techniques into flawless narratives (e.g., converting an illogical jump cut into the natural blink of an eye).

Plus ça change... From scary stories around the campfire to horror hyperreality

December 11, 2019 Leonardo Ambasciano

Original poster for the Spanish 1966 horror movie El sonido de la muerte (“The Sound of Horror”, dir. José Antonio Nieves Conde). All rights reserved. Source: IMDb — Original poster for the Spanish 1966 horror movie El sonido de la muerte (“The Sound of Horror”, dir. José Antonio Nieves Conde). All rights reserved. **Source**: IMDb

Perhaps no other cinema and literary genre has already experienced the same exploration of genre variations as horror. Giant ants, blobs, werewolves, vampires, ghosts, humanoid monsters, shapeshifting creatures, living dead, living meteors, interdimensional demonic books, mind-controlling aliens, bloodthirsty hounds from hell, televisions as infernal gateways, invisible bloodthirsty dinosaurs… yes, you read that right: El sonido de la muerte (“The Sound of Horror”, Spain, 1966) features an invisible prehistoric reptilian creature hatching from a fossilized egg after being inadvertently awakened by controlled explosions carried out by a group of archaeologists. Given enough time and a competitive environment, every cinema genre is set to exploit a mind-blowing number of variations of its own tropes, but horror truly stands out. Is there anything that has not been thrown at the wall by horror producers to see if it sticks? Is there a limit to what can be literally thought of? And, most interestingly, why are we so addicted to horror?

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