In Daimonic Reality, Patrick Harpur eloquently describes the surreal, dreamlike feeling that almost always pervades paranormal experiences, including UFO encounters. He also dwells at some length on the implications for our understanding of reality itself. Although the same level of philosophical focus isn’t evident in a recent article about UFO encounters from the Union newspaper…
Author: Matt Cardin
Teeming Brain founder and editor Matt Cardin is the author of DARK AWAKENINGS, DIVINATIONS OF THE DEEP, A COURSE IN DEMONIC CREATIVITY: A WRITER'S GUIDE TO THE INNER GENIUS, and TO ROUSE LEVIATHAN. He is also the editor of BORN TO FEAR: INTERVIEWS WITH THOMAS LIGOTTI and the academic encyclopedias MUMMIES AROUND THE WORLD; GHOSTS, SPIRITS, AND PSYCHICS: THE PARANORMAL FROM ALCHEMY TO ZOMBIES; and HORROR LITERATURE THROUGH HISTORY.
Rhode Island School of Design now requiring incoming freshmen to read H.P. Lovecraft
Is it really possible that a modern-day American college has actively taken steps to transform the experience and education they offer their students into an overtly Lovecraftian affair? Why, yes, it is, much to my jaw-dropped astonishment and delight. Cue the sound of stars aligning. First, the wide-scope background: As reported by The New York…
High food prices and global societal collapse: US researchers warn of a link
If anyone still wants to question or deny whether the era of peaking fossil fuels, along with the epic government-backed financial swindles of the past few decades, will have — is currently having — distinct real-world impacts of a severely disruptive nature, please note the emphasis on the role of biofuels and government deregulation of…
International Consciousness Research Labs: “Strengthening the foundations of science by reclaiming its spiritual heritage”
The world continues to get more fascinating as our global economic calamities, political instabilities, societal disruptions, and cultural meltdowns are paralleled in lockstep by philosophical, scientific, and technological developments of a profoundly exciting and forward-looking nature. Case in point: The International Consciousness Research Laboratories, or ICRL, “an international, interdisciplinary, and inter-generational consortium of some 75…
Celebrating Lovecraft’s birthday and Ligotti’s un-birthday
It’s still August 20 in my time zone as I type these words, so it’s not too late for me to send out this year’s Lovecraftian birthday acknowledgment into the cyber-ether. Thus: Happy Birthday, Howard, wherever you are or are not. If it’s the former, if you really are somewhere, then I know you’re eternally…
In praise of horror movie music, from Bernard Hermann to Goblin to Ennio Morricone to John Carpenter
A recent engaging article from the Guardian pings on a number of my most cherished horror film themes and composers by examining the contributions of, among others, Bernard Hermann, Howard Shore, John Carpenter, Goblin, and Ennio Morricone, and by invoking the cinematic legacy of such directors as Dario Argento, Umberto Lenzi, Tobe Hooper, John Carpenter, and William Friedkin.
Ray Bradbury and Mike Medavoy (producer of BLACK SWAN and SHUTTER ISLAND) adapting ‘Dandelion Wine’ for the screen
This is rather exhilarating news to accompany Ray Bradbury’s imminent birthday (August 22). It also coincides nicely with the the fact that I’ve been listening to a truly outstanding two-hour audio dramatization of his Something Wicked This Comes over the past couple of days (and have been finding that it sharply intensifies my already intense…
Which movies horrify the masters of horror?
Jason Zinoman, a theater reporter for The New York Times, has been showing up virtually everywhere in media land this summer thanks to the publication of his new book Shock Value in July. Subtitled “How a Few Eccentric Outsiders Gave Us Nightmares, Conquered Hollywood, and Invented Modern Horror,” the book has been characterized as the…
The world riots, nations shudder, Cthulhu wakes
What do Lovecraft, Cthulhu, Eckhart Tolle, global economic collapse, Queensryche, Robert Bloch, Rage against the Machine, and proliferating riots around the world have to do with each other? Simple: They herald a period of cosmic, cultural, and human disruption.
40 years on, the Stanford prison experiment continues to disturb
I first heard of the Stanford prison experiment several years ago in a televised lecture by Philip Zimbardo, the psychologist who devised and conducted it. It was a gripping way to learn of it, I can tell you. And wow, does the cultural memory of it, not to mention the lessons from it, continue to…