The mythological machines of Homo sapiens

We are eminently social primates highly susceptible to power dynamics, individual status, and social hierarchies, to the point that we spend a considerable amount of our time and resources in obtaining prestige goods, following charismatic individuals, and accessing or owning places deemed special, sacred, or relevant by our in-group. If you don’t believe me, just have a look at all the pop items auctioned for jaw-dropping sums of money, from vintage comic books to sport and cinema paraphernalia. In 2003, for instance, comic book artist and creator Todd McFarlane bought baseball player Mark McGwire's 70th home run ball from 1998 for $3 million. Today, Golden Era comic books in good conditions are worth millions of dollars.

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Digital panem et circenses

When I was very young, and already a history buff, I loved to devour books about the history of dinosaur paleontology and play two groundbreaking MS-DOS turn-based strategy videogames on a clunky INTEL 80286, Centurion: Defender of Rome (Bits of Magic, 1990) and Sid Meier’s Civilization (MicroProse, 1991). Both videogames were early examples of what would have become known as “4X” empire-building strategy games, i.e., videogames that involved the exploration of a virtual map, expansion of territory with the conquest or annexation of provinces, exploitation of the resources available on the map, and extermination of (or diplomatic alliance with) enemy factions (Ghita and Andrikopulos 2009). As their names suggest, Centurion allowed the player to take active part in Roman military history as an army officer, while Civilization offered the exhilarating possibility of replaying history with several civilizations on ever-different scenarios and maps.

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