Jack Hunter, editor of Paranthropology: Journal of Anthropological Approaches to the Paranormal, has just published a fascinating article at Reality Sandwich about the history of anthropological approaches to making sense of anomalous and seemingly supernatural experiences. In addition to tracing the long legacy of strategic decisions by various scholars and thinkers that led to the…
Author: The Teeming Brain
The Teeming Brain is a blog magazine exploring the intersection of religion, horror, the paranormal, creativity, consciousness, and culture. It also tracks apocalyptic and dystopian trends in technology, politics, ecology, economics, the arts, education, and society at large.
Recommended Reading 28
This week: posthumously offered words of warning and encouragement to an America in decline from Ernest Callenbach, author of the 1975 classic Ecotopia; insightful meditations on the intrinsic value of the humanities and their inherent resistance to being explained (as in, explained away) by quantitative scientific methodologies and approaches; a 1908 essay by a French…
Addicted to screens: What cinema has done to us
In his new book The Big Screen: The Story of the Movies, film historian David Thomson seriously poses the question of whether our collective and alienating addiction to the multitude of screens (televisions, phones, tablet computers, etc.) that increasingly keep us buffered from the existential reality of the world and people around us may not…
I, Pet Goat II (SHORT FILM)
The mind boggles at this stunning animated film, released in summer 2012, that tells “A story about the fire at the heart of suffering. Bringing together dancers, musicians, visual artists and 3d animators, the film takes a critical look at the events of the past decade that have shaped our world.” With a “cast” that…
Recommended Reading 27
This week’s recommended reading covers Morris Berman’s diagnosis of, and prognosis for, the waning of our modern age of capitalism; the end of economic growth due to peak oil; a call from Jaron Lanier to recognize the wizard’s trick of delusion that we’re all pulling on ourselves with technology; a reflection on the soul tragedy…
Lies, damned lies, and political consulting: Birth of an industry
If you read just one bit of journalism to illuminate what’s going on during the current season of political campaigning in the United States, make it this one. Jill Lepore, writing for The New Yorker, incisively traces the birth and history of the political consulting industry to reveal its dramatic (and dreadful) impact on American…
Horror, religion, Lovecraft, sleep paralysis, creativity, reality: Matt Cardin interviewed
Horror, religion, Lovecraft, sleep paralysis, fantasy, science fiction, consciousness, creativity, reality, the dystopian hazards of an uber-online lifestyle — these are all topics broached in an extensive new interview with Teeming Brain founder and editor Matt Cardin by fellow idea-driven horror writer Ted E. Grau at The Cosmicomicon. (Ted is also, of course, the author…
Book Recommendation: “Exploring the Edge Realms of Consciousness”
Readers of The Teeming Brain will find something of more than passing interest in the just-released nonfiction anthology Exploring the Edge Realms of Consciousness: Liminal Zones, Psychic Science, and the Hidden Dimensions of the Mind. This is indicated not only by the book’s heady subtitle, and not only by fact that it is co-edited by…
Recommended Reading 26
This week’s recommendations include: a thoroughly disturbing expose — written by a medical doctor — of the unsafe conditions in America’s hospitals that frequently lead to permanent injury, destruction of health, or even death; an examination of the possibly shaky foundations of medical science; a review essay on “the oldest self-help book,” a 19th-century grimoire…
The Gloaming (SHORT FILM)
It may be giving away too much in advance to describe this short masterpiece of visionary animation as a religious metaphor that channels and encompasses not just the entire history of human civilization but its possible future as well. Or maybe not. Judge for yourself. Indie film site Directors Notes included “The Gloaming” among its…