Joe Velikovsky's Blog, page 20

NIGHT COWS - a new experience in bovine terror

That's it. It's over. You can relax now. Everything is going to be okay.*



* Well; unless it's not.

But - either way, the ` NIGHT COWS' experience is definitely: over.

Okay... so, to explain:

I just wanted to demonstrate a point about Communication**, with this non-movie-poster, above.

** `The word communication will be used here in a very broad sense to include all of the procedures by which one mind may affect another. This, of course, involves not only written and oral speech, but also music, the pictorial arts, the theater, the ballet, and in fact all human behavior... The language of this memorandum will often appear to refer to the special, but still very broad and important, field of the communication of speech; but practically everything said applies equally well to music of any sort, and to still or moving pictures, as in television." - The Mathematical Theory of Communication, (Shannon & Weaver 1949, pp. 3-4).

And this raises the same point I made, here: StoryAlity #59 – Examining the Loglines of the Top 20 RoI Films 
Namely that: storytelling with movies, is transmedia storytelling .


First, we may well become aware of a movie title, that we have not heard of, before, (e.g. `NIGHT COWS', or, say, `Star Wars', or, whatever). Then, later on, we may well see the movie-poster, and we then absorb all of that information... Maybe next, we also see a movie trailer... Then, we maybe go see the movie, and we absorb all that information. But - it's all the one story...

- Those are at least three separate channels of information (1. Speech, 2. Poster (including the Tagline, e.g. "It's night. And there's cows."), and 3. The Movie) - but, all of them, storytelling the same `unit of culture'.



e.g.: As far as the initial `speech' (word-of-mouth) part, goes: with the movie Title alone, consider the following:

------------------------
Two random Humanimals stand within earshot of each other, both holding alcoholic beverages. They seem to be having a conversation, taking drugs (ingesting alcohol), and generally having a great time. As we get closer, we can now overhear their dialogue:

Humanimal #1: [shrugs] ...I mean... seriously - is that all there is-?

Humanimal #2: Yeah - that's what she said-!!!

(They laugh together. Nobody in the audience knows what the heck that was all about. But, anyway.)

Humanimal #1: "Hey - so, you seen `NIGHT COWS' yet-?"

[Now, let's look closely at `what just happened', there. A unit of information, namely a meme, namely also a unit of culture was just transmitted - from a Sender [Humanimal #1], to, a Receiver [#2]]

Humanimal #2: "No-?! [chuckles, puzzled] ...What the hell is `NIGHT COWS'-?"

[Note: A unit of information, also known as a meme has clearly been transmitted to, namely replicated in, another humanimal brain. The unit, in this case, is the Title: `NIGHT COWS'.]

Humanimal #1: [chuckles to self] "Oh, it's just a poster that looks like it's from a movie, but there is no movie. - There never was a movie. It's just: the poster itself. That's: NIGHT COWS."
Humanimal #2: (unsure, still trying to process and make sense of all this new information, i.e.  this unit of culture) "...Riiiight...?"
Humanimal #1: "I'll send you the link."

Humanimal #2: (still unsure, but now with lots of assumptions and expectations, and also some FOMO, i.e. Fear Of Missing Out) "...Okay?" 

Curtain Falls. The End.

-------------------------
Or - sometimes, we may even read, what seems like a play, written to convey a message.

Like, you just did then.

But - Now, what if I told you...

This whole blog-post, was just an excuse to get you to read, this other blog-post:

StoryAlity #59 – Examining the Loglines of the Top 20 RoI Films

A bit like, this, really:

1001% Pure Clickbait.
Follow the white rabbit... down the rabbithole...*


(* Or, just read my PhD online, or, whatever.)

-----------------------------Dr. Joe T. Velikovsky, Ph.D. (Communication & Media Arts)

`The word communication will be used here in a very broad sense to include all of the procedures by which one mind may affect another. This, of course, involves not only written and oral speech, but also music, the pictorial arts, the theater, the ballet, and in fact all human behavior... The language of this memorandum will often appear to refer to the special, but still very broad and important, field of the communication of speech; but practically everything said applies equally well to music of any sort, and to still or moving pictures, as in television." - The Mathematical Theory of Communication, (Shannon & Weaver 1949, pp. 3-4).

& Transmedia Writer-Director-Producer:
Movies, Games, TV, Theatre, Books, Comics
Transmedia Writing Blog: http://on-writering.blogspot.com.au/

& Bio-Culture (Science & the Arts) & Transmedia Researcher
Academia link: https://aftrs.academia.edu/JTVelikovsky

& (High-RoI) Story/Screenplay/Movie Analyst and Evolutionary Systems Theorist
See: https://storyality.wordpress.com/

See also:
IMDb: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/joeteevee

------------------------------------------

Know This (by John Brockman, 2017)

Here's a great book:


Know This: Today's Most Interesting and Important Scientific Ideas, Discoveries, and Developments (Ed: John Brockman, 2017)

From Amazon :

`Today's most visionary thinkers reveal the cutting-edge scientific ideas and breakthroughs you must understand. 

Scientific developments radically change and enlighten our understanding of the world -- whether it's advances in technology and medical research or the latest revelations of neuroscience, psychology, physics, economics, anthropology, climatology, or genetics. And yet amid the flood of information today, it's often difficult to recognize the truly revolutionary ideas that will have lasting impact. 

In the spirit of identifying the most significant new theories and discoveries, John Brockman, publisher of Edge.org ("The world's smartest website" -- The Guardian), asked 198 of the finest minds:  

What do you consider the most interesting recent scientific news? What makes it important? 

Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Guns, Germs, and Steel Jared Diamond on the best way to understand complex problems * author of Seven Brief Lessons on Physics Carlo Rovelli on the mystery of black holes * Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker on the quantification of human progress * TED Talks curator Chris J. Anderson on the growth of the global brain * Harvard cosmologist Lisa Randall on the true measure of breakthrough discoveries * Nobel Prize-winning physicist Frank Wilczek on why the twenty-first century will be shaped by our mastery of the laws of matter * philosopher Rebecca Newberger Goldstein on the underestimation of female genius * music legend Peter Gabriel on tearing down the barriers between imagination and reality * Princeton physicist Freeman Dyson on the surprising ability of small (and cheap) upstarts to compete with billion-dollar projects. 

Plus Nobel laureate John C. Mather, Sun Microsystems cofounder Bill Joy, Wired founding editor Kevin Kelly, psychologist Alison Gopnik, Genome author Matt Ridley, Harvard geneticist George Church, Why Does the World Exist? author Jim Holt, anthropologist Helen Fisher, and more.'

Source: Amazon (2017) .  
I also cite Professor Jared Diamond a lot, in my PhD thesis (2016). (I'm a huge fan of his book Guns, Germs and Steel (1999) .)

Here's what Diamond says, in the above book: (excerpted from the Edge website)

Jared Diamond 

Professor of Geography, University of California Los Angeles; Author, The World Until Yesterday 

`The Most Important X...Y...Z...
  In many fields one hears questions in the format, 

“What is the most important X…Y…Z…, etc.?”  

For instance, what is the most important factor accounting for artistic creativity? or competitive biological success? or a happy marriage? or military success? or scientific creativity? or successful child-rearing? or a sustainable economy? or world peace? 

In our complicated, multi-factorial world, the correct answer to such a question is almost always in the format: 

“The most important consideration is: not to search for the most important consideration.”  

Instead, there are normally many considerations, none of which can be ignored. 

For instance, marital therapists have identified about 19 independent factors essential to a happy marriage: compatibility about sex, money, religion, politics, in-laws, child-rearing, styles of arguing, and 12 other factors.  

If a couple agrees about 18 of those factors but can’t resolve a disagreement just about sex (or just about money, or just religion, or…etc.), they are in deep trouble.  

Hence, if you hear a newly-married couple ask you in all seriousness, “What is the single most important requirement for a happy marriage?” you can bet that that marriage will end in divorce.' 

(Diamond, in Edge.org, 2017, bold emphasis mine)
This is also known as The Anna Karenina Principle...

It applies to: how you create a successful movie, or novel, or song, or - lots of things...

In Guns, Germs and Steel, Diamond (1997) writes:

`We tend to seek easy, single-factor explanations of success. For most important things, though, success actually requires avoiding many separate possible causes of failure.' 

(Diamond, 1997, p. 157).

See my PhD (free, online) for more on that!

- I'm also a huge fan of Edge.org's annual question, as asked by John Brockman... I always feel smarter having read the book that results each year!

Another one of my favourite books in this ongoing Edge.org series edited by Brockman is, this one:


This Will Change Everything: Ideas That Will Shape the Future  (Edge Question Series, ed: Brockman 2009)

Here are some of my favourite quotes from that book:

             Artificial Self-Replicating Meme Machines - Susan Blackmore
`Susan Blackmore is a psychologist and the author of Consciousness: An Introduction.
`I like to think of our planet as one in a million, or one in a trillion, of possible planets where evolution begins. This requires something (a replicator) that can be copied with variation, and selection. As Darwin realized, if more copies are made than can survive, then the survivors will pass on to the next generation of copying whatever helped them get through. This is how all design in the universe comes about.’ 

(Blackmore in Brockman 2010, p.135)
And this quote: 
`The End of Analytic Science – Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.
The idea that will change the game of knowledge is that it is more important to understand events, objects and processes in their relationship with one another than in their singular structure. Western science has achieved wonders with its analytic focus, but it is now time to take synthesis seriously… How shall this breakthrough occur? Current systems theories are necessary but not sufficient, as they tend not to take values into account. Perhaps after this realization sets in, we shall have to rewrite science from the ground up.’ 

(Csikszentmihalyi in Brockman 2010, pp. 348-9)
And this one:
`Evolution Changes Everything – Scott Sampson.
Scott Sampson is adjunct professor of geology and geophysics at the university of Utah and the host of Dinosaur Planet.
Evolution is the scientific idea that will change everything within the next several decades. 
I realize that this statement may seem improbable. If evolution is defined as simply change over time, the above statement borders on meaningless. If it is regarded in the narrower, Darwinian sense as descent with modification, any claim for evolution’s starring role also appears questionable – particularly given that 2009 is the hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the publication of On The Origin Of Species. Surely what Daniel Dennett has called Darwin’s “dangerous idea”, however conceived, has made its mark by now. Nevertheless I base my claim on evolution’s probable effect in two spheres: human consciousness, and science and technology. 
Today the commonly accepted concept of evolution is extremely narrow, confined largely to the realm of biology and a longstanding emphasis on mutation and natural selection. 
In recent decades, this limited perspective has become further entrenched by the dominance of molecular biology and its “promise” of human-engineered cells and lifeforms. Emphasis has been placed almost entirely on generating diversity, a process referred to as `complexification’, reflecting the reductionist worldview that has driven science for four centuries. 
Yet science has also begun to explore another key element of evolution: unification, which transcends the biological to encompass the evolution of physical matter. The numerous and dramatic increases in complexity, it turns out, have been achieved largely through a process of integration, with smaller wholes becoming parts of larger wholes. 
Again and again, we see the progressive development of multipart individuals from simpler forms. 
Thus, for example, atoms become integrated into molecules, molecules into cells, and cells into organisms. 
At each higher, emergent stage, older forms are enveloped and incorporated into newer forms, with the end result being a nested, multilevel hierarchy. 
At first glance, the process of unification appears to contravene the second law of thermodynamics, by increasing order over entropy. 
Again and again during the past fourteen billion years, concentrations of energy have emerged and self-organized as islands of order amid a sea of chaos, taking the guise of stars, galaxies, bacteria, gray whales and (on at least one planet) a biosphere. 
Although the process of emergence remains somewhat of a mystery, we can now state with confidence that the epic of evolution has been guided by counterbalancing trends of complexification and unification. 
This journey has not been an inevitable, deterministic march, but a quixotic, creative unfolding in which the future could not be predicted.’ 

(Sampson in Brockman 2010, pp. 1-2)
More on all that (unification and complexification) here, if of interest:

StoryAlity #132 – The holon/parton structure of the Meme, the unit of culture – and the narreme, or unit of story – book chapter (Velikovsky 2016)

And - here is a diagram, of what Sampson (above) refers to as "a nested, multilevel hierarchy": (aka a holon/parton).





For more, see:

StoryAlity #132 – The holon/parton structure of the Meme, the unit of culture – and the narreme, or unit of story – book chapter (Velikovsky 2016)

--------------------------
I also love - The 1999 Edge.org Question: 


WHAT IS THE MOST IMPORTANT INVENTION IN THE PAST 2,000 YEARS?
Here is one of my favourite answers, from that year:

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
Psychologist; Director, Quality of Life Research Center, Claremont Graduate University; Author, Flow
Professor of psychology and education at the University of Chicago 

`I always liked Lynn White's story about how the stirrup revolutionized warfare and made feudal society and culture possible. Or Lefebre des Noettes' argument about how the invention of the rudder made extensive sailing and the consequent expansion of Europe and its colonization of the world possible. But it's sobering to realize that it took us over one thousand years to realize the impact of these artifacts. 

So I am not at all sure we have at this time a good grip on what the most important inventions of the past millennia have been. 

Certainly the contraceptive pill is a good candidate, and so is the scientific method. 

I am also intrigued by the effects of such inventions as the flag — a symbol of belonging that millions will follow to ruin or victory independently of biological connectedness; or the social security card that signifies that we are not alone and our welfare is a joint problem for the community; or the invention of civil rights which however abused and misused is pointing us towards a notion of universal human dignity that might yet eclipse in importance all the technological marvels of the millennium.' 

(Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Edge.org, 1999, online, bold emphasis mine)

...In my opinion, the scientific method is it! (Best invention of the past 2,000 years). 
Why?

...It solves problems! (Yay!)
Then again - since all life (anything, that is: alive) is: doing science (see: All Life is Problem Solving, Popper 1999) -- as I understand it, science was actually invented by: the first lifeform... anything that is alive is constantly (1) having theories, (2) testing the current theory, and (3) correcting errors.

(i.e., Theory, Trial and Error, and [if need be] Error-correction.) 
But - humans became conscious of it (that method of discovering and testing knowledge), only in: the last 2,000 years. (Starting in: Ancient Greece.)
...Anyway, so - what about you-? 

What do you feel is the greatest invention of the past 2,000 years...?

And: why so?

-----------------------------Dr. Joe T. Velikovsky, Ph.D (Communication)

`The word communication will be used here in a very broad sense to include all of the procedures by which one mind may affect another. This, of course, involves not only written and oral speech, but also music, the pictorial arts, the theater, the ballet, and in fact all human behavior... The language of this memorandum will often appear to refer to the special, but still very broad and important, field of the communication of speech; but practically everything said applies equally well to music of any sort, and to still or moving pictures, as in television." - The Mathematical Theory of Communication, (Shannon & Weaver 1949, pp. 3-4).

& Transmedia Writer-Director-Producer:
Movies, Games, TV, Theatre, Books, Comics
Transmedia Writing Blog: http://on-writering.blogspot.com.au/

& Bio-Culture (Science & the Arts) & Transmedia Researcher
Academia link: https://aftrs.academia.edu/JTVelikovsky

& (High-RoI) Story/Screenplay/Movie Analyst and Evolutionary Systems Theorist
See: https://storyality.wordpress.com/

See also:
IMDb: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/joeteevee

------------------------------------------

Predicting the Success of Movies & TV

Predicting the Success of Movies & TV

One of my areas of research interest is: Examining why certain units of culture (e.g. movies, books, TV series, words, jokes, transmedia, or indeed - any unit of culture) spread faster, and further than others.

Along these lines, Starling Hunter and colleagues are doing excellent work in Empirical Approaches to predicting TV and movie success:

TV Development from Kindea Labs on Vimeo.

Some very-impressive recent papers on the above topic, include:

Hunter, S. D., & Breen, Y. P. (2017). Predicting the Success of New Cable Series from Their Pilot Episode Scripts: An Empirical Approach. Business and Management Studies, 3(3), 1-9.

Abstract: `In this study we develop an empirical model to explain failure rates of new television series. Specifically, we test the ability of three factors to predict the success of new dramatic series appearing on 31 cable networks over the last 10 years. Those factors are the originality of the story, the track record of its creator(s), and the cognitive complexity of its pilot episode script—all of which are known well in advance of a network’s decision to greenlight a new series. As predicted, we find that all three variables—both individually and in combination—strongly predict the success rate of new dramatic series in their first two seasons.'

(This paper explained for me, among many other things, why for example LOST had 26 eps per season, while Game of Thrones had 10 eps per season!)

And another paper:

Hunter, S. D., & Breen, Y. P. (2017). W(h)ither the Full Season: An Empirical Model for Predicting the Duration of New Television Series’ First Season. Advances in Journalism and Communication, 5, 83-97. doi: https://doi.org/10.4236/ajc.2017.52005

Abstract: `Television seasons have gotten shorter and shorter over the past few decades. This has been especially true for new dramatic television series where the norm has dropped to thirteen episodes from almost double that figure twenty years ago. Somewhat surprisingly, there is a dearth of empirical research on this question. In this study, we build on recent research in the field of cultural economics to test the effect of three factors on the duration of new television series’ first season—the originality of the series’ premise, the track record of its creators, and the cognitive complexity of the pilot episode script. As expected, we find that in a sample of 165 new dramatic series debuting in the nine most recently completed seasons, these three factors—both individually and in combination—positively impact both the number of episodes of a new series and the likelihood that new series gets a “full” first season.'

And

Hunter, S. D., Smith, S., & Singh, S. (2016). Predicting box office from the screenplay: A text analytical approach. Journal of Screenwriting, 7(2), 135-154. doi: 10.1386/josc.7.2.135_1

Abstract: `Empirical studies of the determinants of box office revenues have mostly focused on post-production factors – that is, ones known after the film has been completed and/or released. Relatively few studies have considered pre-production factors – that is, ones known before a decision has been made to green-light a film project. The current study directly addresses this gap in the literature. Specifically, we develop and test a relatively parsimonious, pre-production model to predict the opening weekend box office of 170 US-produced, English-language feature films released in the years 2010 and 2011. Chief among the pre-production factors we consider are those derived from the textual and content analysis of the screenplays of these films. The most important of these is determined through the application of network text analysis (NTA) – a method for rendering a text as a map or network of interconnected concepts. As predicted, we find that the size of the main component of a screenplay’s text network strongly predicts the completed film’s opening weekend box office.'

Of course, I suggest reading the entire article, but two points from the great Journal of Screenwriting (2016) article above that stood out (for me) were:

`...the romance and thriller genres were positively associated with performance and we found that the drama genre was negatively and significantly associated with performance. Taken together, both studies affirm the long-standing finding that genre matters for box office.' (Hunter, Smith & Singh, 2016, p. 147)

and the point that -

`Taken together, both studies broadly support another long-standing finding – that
is, content matters for box office performance.' (Hunter, Smith & Singh, 2016, p. 147) 

My own 2016 PhD research study also arrived at similar findings to the above, in examining differences in the top 20 and bottom 20 RoI movies. The bottom 20 RoI movies are dominated by the drama genre; while the genres of horror, sci-fi, comedy and rom-com are among the dominant genres of the top 20 RoI movies... (The great book Great Flicks: Scientific Studies of Cinematic Creativity (Simonton 2011) also summarized similar prior study findings, in the area of movie genre. All very fascinating, for writers!)

----------------
Also - as Fight Club (1999) (along with many Stanley Kubrick movies) is among my personal favourite films, I also very much enjoyed the article:

Hunter, S. D., & Singh, S. (2015). A Network Text Analysis of Fight Club. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 5(4), 737-749. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.17507/tpls.0504.09

Abstract: `Network Text Analysis (NTA) involves the creation of networks of words and/or concepts from linguistic data. Its key insight is that the position of words and concepts in a text network provides vital clues to the central and underlying themes of the text as a whole. Recent research has used an inductive or bottom-up approach to the question of theme extraction. In this paper we take a top-down or deductive approach in that we first establish prior expectations as to the key themes to be found in the text. We then compare and contrast the results of our network analysis with the results of literary and cultural analyses of the film Fight Club as reported in over four dozen other peer-reviewed publications. While our results are remarkably consistent with and complementary to results in those studies, our analysis permits something the others do not—an analytical framework for relating those underlying and central themes to one another.'

So, I highly recommend that great article, as well...

Great to see these previously-neglected areas of research being examined, for the benefit of creatives and producers alike!

Some other links, that may also be of interest:

StoryAlity #127 – The Science of Cinema articles – at WIRED.com

StoryAlity #136 – Pop Culture in Asia and Oceania (2016)

StoryAlity #6 – What is Creativity and How Does It Work?

StoryAlity #144 – The structure of the meme, the unit of culture (in: The Encyclopedia of Information Science & Technology, 2017)

And, along simialr lines to Starling Hunter's papers above, the book:

Kaufman, J. C., & Simonton, D. K. (Eds.). (2014). The Social Science of Cinema . New York: Oxford University Press.

Comments, always welcome.

-----------------------------Dr. Joe T. Velikovsky, Ph.D. (Communication & Media Arts)

`The word communication will be used here in a very broad sense to include all of the procedures by which one mind may affect another. This, of course, involves not only written and oral speech, but also music, the pictorial arts, the theater, the ballet, and in fact all human behavior... The language of this memorandum will often appear to refer to the special, but still very broad and important, field of the communication of speech; but practically everything said applies equally well to music of any sort, and to still or moving pictures, as in television." - The Mathematical Theory of Communication, (Shannon & Weaver 1949, pp. 3-4).

& Transmedia Writer-Director-Producer:
Movies, Games, TV, Theatre, Books, Comics
Transmedia Writing Blog: http://on-writering.blogspot.com.au/

& Bio-Culture (Science & the Arts) & Transmedia Researcher
Academia link: https://aftrs.academia.edu/JTVelikovsky

& (High-RoI) Story/Screenplay/Movie Analyst and Evolutionary Systems Theorist
See: https://storyality.wordpress.com/

See also:
IMDb: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/joeteevee

------------------------------------------

FLIGBY, The Leadership Game - and Flow Theory

FLIGBY®  (FLOW is Good Business™) - The Leadership Game

I was recently fortunate enough to be invited to play FLIGBY - The Leadership Game .


FLIGBY®  ( FLOW is Good Business™ ) - The Leadership Game (ALEAS Simulations) 
Quite simply: FLIGBY is one of the best sims I've experienced. In my view, every company manager should play it.

...An employee who is in Flow is: a happy employee.

A whole company in flow is: a successful company.

And, one of the biggest problems, for anyone in business?

...Finding - and keeping - good people-!

i.e. How to ensure that your business is not only profitable, but: humane, ethical, and sustainable-?

(In business: How to gain profits - without losing your soul...?)

==========================
Also - Some Backstory from me, about Flow: 

As a successful professional creative (a Transmedia writer: movies, TV, videogames, theatre, songs, comics, etc, for over two decades), I've been a longtime advocate of Professor Mihály Csíkszentmihályi's FLOW theory - ever since I did a Videogame Design course at the AFTRS in 1995...

[Flow diagram]*
(Side Note: Flow is crucial in effective game design... When players enjoy playing any game, it's because they're in Flow when they play it. It is the Game Designer's main job to design the game so that the player can enter - and ideally, stay in - the Flow state)! 

Or: "Time flies when you're having fun-!"

So, using Flow Theory as a core design principle underpinning my work, I've Game-Designed & Written million-selling games; I also created a sim (a `serious game') as part of my PhD work, to explain Creative Practice Theory (my synthesis of Csíkszentmihályi's creativity theory, and Pierre Bourdieu's practice theory).

It was also Professor Csíkszentmihályi's work - in his landmark study of 91 eminent creative professionals in Creativity (1996) - that led me (over the next 20 years of grappling with the problem, before finally, solving it) to discover: The structure of the meme - the unit of culture (Velikovsky 2016).

So - my own intellectual debt to Csíkszentmihályi's work on creativity - and also Flow Theory - is huge. I've also published scholarly articles on Flow (2014), and, my PhD on successful movie screenwriting and filmmaking (2016) also uses Flow Theory (and - its elaboration, in Narrative Transportation Theory). (For more on my creative background, if of interest, see: my online C.V.)

But - enough Backstory..! Suffice to say: I understand FlowTheory. 

(As an aside - as a professional creative, I have also personally been fortunate, to be in the Flow State, for much of my creative career - i.e., as a professional: writer, game designer, film director, actor, artist, musician and so on).  


==========================      
So... What is FLIGBY-? 

The trailer perhaps explains it best:




Official  FLIGBY®  Trailer  (5 minutes) - ALEAS Inc.
A description of FLIGBY, from the “FLOW is Good Business™” (FLIGBY®) website:

`FLIGBY leadership simulation is Csikszentmihalyi’s official FLOW program. 

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi has co-produced FLIGBY, teaching how to generate FLOW at the workplace.Designated by experts as the globe’s top business simulation game (Gold Medal Prize, International Serious Play Awards, Seattle, 2012).FLIGBY measures 29 management/leadership skills.Employs real-life business simulation, in an interactive, movie-like setting; teaching how Flow can be promoted at the workplace. Aspiring as well as experienced managers will identify with it and learn from it.FLIGBY is the “gamification” of the Flow-based leadership development process.Although FLIGBY is Flow-based, the managerial challenges and the options it presents are fully compatible with a wide range of leadership theories, enhancing them all.'

Source: https://www.fligby.com/quick-facts/ (ALEAS, 2017) 
==========================
The sim also includes tutorials on Flow Theory:

Csíkszentmihályi explains Flow Theory (still-image from a tutorial-video, in FLIGBY®) (image copyright ALEAS Simulations, 2012)
==========================

The game brilliantly incorporates concepts from 3 of Csíkszentmihályi's works:





==========================The above 3 works are all excellent - and of course, are recommended reading...

But - reading a book is one way to absorb knowledge; a simulation (such as FLIGBY ) allows the user to use the knowledge in practice, and to see how it works... Just like using flight-simulators to train pilots...  
So - in short, I can't recommend the  FLIGBY  simulation highly enough, for: anyone in business!

Also, my congratulations to the producers of FLIGBY, on creating a truly great sim. - It deserves not just one, but many awards. It features great conception and also execution – namely: the concept, the screenwriting, the casting, the acting, the directing, the sim design, the interface, the `look & feel’, and the entire user-experience! In short: Bravo. (It even immerses the user in the fascinating reality of managing a winery!)**

For more, see: https://www.fligby.com/

And, for more on Flow, see also: StoryAlity #6B – Flow Theory, Creativity and Happiness


-----------------------------
Dr. Joe T. Velikovsky, Ph.D (Communication)

Transmedia Writer-Director-Producer:
Movies, Games, TV, Theatre, Books, Comics
Transmedia Writing Blog: http://on-writering.blogspot.com.au/

& Bio-Culture (Science & the Arts) & Transmedia Researcher
Academia link: https://aftrs.academia.edu/JTVelikovsky

& (High-RoI) Story/Screenplay/Movie Analyst and Evolutionary Systems Theorist
See: https://storyality.wordpress.com/

See also:
IMDb: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/joeteevee

------------------------------------------

NOTES

* [Flow diagram]* image above, adapted from the Wikipedia article (2017) on Flow.

** For even more on wine history, see: First Vintage (McIntyre 2013).

Joseph Campbell's bliss as Flow Theory

So, Joseph Campbell is probably the most famous academic scholar in the domain of comparative mythology:


In 1949 he published The Hero With A Thousand Faces (Campbell, 1949) in which he identified the same seventeen (17) narrative steps (and, Jungian character archetypes) within thousands of popular `hero’ myths including religious narratives - a story algorithm also known as the `monomyth’.*

(None of this is Breaking News... it was 1949, and also we were all given Joe Campbell to read, 20 years ago at Film School...)


The monomyth underpins many popular narratives across many media (movies, novels, going waaay back to: The Epic of Gilgamesh, The Odyssey of Homer) and not least, a lot of good (and also some bad) Hollywood movies, since Chris Vogler's** great book:


At any rate, there's a Call For Papers in the Journal of Genius and Eminence, for a Special Issue of the journal, a tribute to Joseph Campbell, on the 30th anniversary of his death. - Yay!

One of the books about Campbell's work I particularly admire is - this one:


Here are some quotes from it... This first one is from the Editor's Introduction, by Diane K. Osbon,

`As we love ourselves, we move toward our own bliss, by which Joseph Campbell meant our highest enthusiasm. The word entheos means “god-filled”. Moving toward that which fills us with the godhood, that place where time is not, is all we need to do to change the world around us.’ (Osbon, 1991, pp. 8-9)

Campbell's mantra from his study of mythology became "Follow Your Bliss."

`Live from your own center. Your real dutyis to go away from the community to find your bliss.
The society is the enemyWhen it imposes its structuresOn the individual. On the dragon there are many scales.Every one of them says “Thou Shalt.”Kill the dragon “Thou Shalt.”When one has killed the dragon One has become The Child.
Breaking outIs following your bliss pattern,Quitting the old place, Starting your hero’s journey,Following your bliss.'
                                    (Campbell in Osbon, 1991, p. 21)
What's fairly obvious to scientific scholars of creativity is that the `bliss' that Campbell refers to so often, equates to flow theory.

Namely, finding activities of meaning where you enter the flow state.

For what `flow' is, see this post on Flow Theory, Creativity and Happiness.

(Also the `Theory' in "Flow Theory" is like the one in "Evolutionary Theory". It's not "just a theory". It's a working scientific model of: how stuff actually works. Gravitational Theory is not "just a theory" either. - It works.)

For those who aren't aware of (or haven't yet found) what puts them in the flow state, Campbell suggests to ask yourself:

`What did you do as a child that created timelessness, that made you forget time? 

There lies the myth to live by.’ (Campbell in Osbon, 1991, p. 181)

When we look at the 9 characteristics of the flow state, Campbell is here referring to #8, below:

(1) There are clear goals every step of the way… 

(2) There is immediate feedback to one’s actions… 

(3) There is a balance between challenges and skills… 

(4) Action and awareness are merged… 

(5) Distractions are excluded from consciousness… 

(6) There is no worry of failure… 

(7) Self-consciousness disappears… 

(8) The sense of time becomes distorted… [or: `time flies when you’re having fun’]
and(9) The activity becomes autotelic…’ , [or: worth doing for its own sake, as the process is so  enjoyable]
(Csikszentmihalyi 1996, Creativity)
[text inside square brackets are my inclusions – JTV]

This is how you should feel when you're writing. Or painting. Or dancing. Or - whatever it is, that puts you in flow. It could even be: reading a great book. If all the above things are happening, you're probably in the flow state. i.e., bliss.

This phenomena (i.e., flow) is also Why videogames are so addictive are so addictive for so many players, as, one of the first things they teach you, when you become a Videogame Designer is all about flow theory, and the flow state.

- It's the state every player (in fact, every person) longs to be in, and videogames (just as an example) are purposly designed (by: Game Designers) to maximize it. (This, for example, is why game-levels deliberately increase slightly in difficulty, as the game progresses.)

- It's also (sadly) why corporations (which are essentially: psychopaths, yikes!) aim for the gamification of well, everything.

(...Game theory is originally derived from Evolutionary Theory. The science of Creativity is also explained by: Evolutionary Theory. Geology, Biology, Psychology, Sociology, Anthropology and Culturology is also explained by Evolutionary Theory... Go figure.)

For more on all that, maybe see:

StoryAlity #100 – The Holon-Parton Structure of the Meme – the Unit of Culture (Velikovsky 2013, 2014, 2016)and
StoryAlity #100A – The 3 Universal Laws of Holon/Partons (Velikovsky 2015)At any rate, Campbell's (1949, mein gott, that's a long time ago) main message is that: most people don't think for themselves, and, just do what society tells them to do, and so they're unhappy, and feel their life has no deep meaning, or purpose, and so...

They live, what he calls "inauthentic" lives. And he (Campbell) calls that: "the waste land"...

In essence, they're not following their heart's desire; they're doing either what (a) they think society expects them to do, or, (b) what they've been told - or read - someplace, that they `should' do.

i.e., They follow the rules, conform, and accept, without first: questioning everything.

As an example, Campbell says:

`In the Grail legends, the land of people doing what they think they ought to do or have to do is the wasteland.  

What is the wasteland to you?

I know damned well what the wasteland would be to me: the academic approach to my material; or a marriage to someone who had no thoughts or feelings for me or my work. Living with such a person would be the wasteland.

I find working for money to be the wasteland – doing something that somebody else wants, instead of the thing that is my next step. 

I have been guided all along by a strong revulsion from any sort of action that does not correspond to the impulse of my own wish… 

The crucial thing to live for is the sense of life in what you are doing, and if that is not there, then you are living according to other peoples’ notions of how life should be lived.’ (Campbell in Osbon, 1991, pp. 72-73)

And Campbell also suggests:

`The normal way is to fake it, to feel oneself to be inadequate, to pretend to believe, to strive to believe, and to live, in the imitation of others, an inauthentic life. 

The authentic creative way on the other hand, which I would term the way of art as opposed to religion, is, rather, to reverse this authoritative order. 

As in the novels of Joyce, so in those of Mann, the key to the progression lies in the stress on what is inward… 

In the words of Joyce’s hero: “When the soul of a man is born in this country there are nets flung at it to hold it back from flight. You talk to me of nationality, language, religion. I shall try to fly by those nets.” 

For what to the soul are nets, “flung at it to hold it back from flight”, can become for the one who has found his own center the garment, freely chosen, of his further adventure...   

What kind of action and life experience would be appropriate for one who has had this fulfilling moment of the Grail experience? 

There are no rules for what you do. 

Buddha came back and taught for fifty years...  

My experience is that I can feel that I’m in the Grail Castle when I’m living with people I love, doing what I love. I get that sense of being fulfilled.' (Campbell in Osbon 1991, pp. 75-6)

Campbell also says:

`Follow your bliss.
The heroic life is living the individual adventure.'  (Campbell in Osbon 1991, p. 22) 
But he also notes - the hero's journey is not for everyone...! (And in fact, therapist Maureen Murdock wrote a whole book about it from a female perspective. She even wrote, a workbook.)

Campbell also notes:

            `The great problem is bringing life back into the wasteland,where people live inauthentically.' (Campbell in Osbon, 1991, p. 77)
And - here's one I love, that Campbell quotes from American Indian mythology:

`As you proceed through life,Following your own path,Birds will shit on you.
...Don’t bother to brush it off.’ (Campbell in Osbon 1991, p. 20) 
(I love that last one so hard... funny!***)

At any rate, most of Campbell's stuff is a fun read, although The Hero With a Thousand Faces (1949, 2008) is a bit heavy-going in places, for a general audience.

One of the memorable quotes from it, is this one (including the Hamlet quote):

`The whole sense of the ubiquitous myth of the hero's passage is that it shall serve as a general pattern for men and women, wherever they may stand along the scale. Therefore it is formulated in the broadest terms. The individual has only to discover his own position with reference to this general human formula, and let it then assist him past his restricting walls. Who and where are his ogres? Those are the reflections of the unsolved enigmas of his own humanity. What are his ideals? Those are the symptoms of his grasp of life.The crux of the curious difficulty lies in the fact that our conscious views of what life ought to be seldom correspond to what life really is. Generally we refuse to admit within ourselves, or within our friends, the fullness of that pushing, self-protective, malodorous, carnivorous, lecherous fever which is the very nature of the organic cell. Rather, we tend to perfume, whitewash, and reinterpret; meanwhile imagining that all the flies in the ointment, all the hairs in the soup, are the faults of some unpleasant someone else.
But when it suddenly dawns on us, or is forced to our attention, that everything we think or do is necessarily tainted with the odor of the flesh, then, not uncommonly, there is experienced a moment of revulsion: life, the acts of life, the organs of life, woman in particular as the great symbol of life, become intolerable to the pure, the pure, pure soul. 

O, that this too too solid flesh would melt,Thaw and resolve itself into a dew!Or that the Everlasting had notfix'dHis canon 'gainst self-slaughter! 0 God! God!So exclaims the great spokesman of this moment, Hamlet:How weary, stale, fiat, and unprofitableSeem to me all the uses of this world!Fie on't! ah fie! 'tis an unweeded garden,That grows to seed; things rank and gross in naturePossess it merely. That it should come to this! 

...The seeker of the life beyond life must press beyond her, surpass the temptations of her call, and soar to the immaculate ether beyond.' (Campbell, 2004, pp. 111-112)

He's suggesting stop thinking about the `baser' evolutionary urges (like, say: just getting laid) and get on with your own hero's journey... so, go into `the forest' - away from the wasteland - go find a boon (an Elixir), and bring it on back, to the big-ole world.

Hey - here's something I discovered, while doing my PhD... People seem to like it.

Hey, and going back aways - after writing a whole bunch of movie scripts using The Writer's Journey template (thanks Chris!) - just for fun, I also wrote a satirical comedy novel about (well, among other things) what happens to the 9-out-of-10 would-be `heroes' who accidentally have a bad Mentor - and end up accidentally getting eaten by the dragon instead of rescuing the princess... Because those guys have a story too, and, it deserves to be told.

Or not.

Thanks to evolution, we all tend to suffer from the cognitive bias known as survivorship bias. We remember the heroes - and forget the also-rans - and attribute their success to: the `classic' traits of heroism. See How The Mind Works (1997), by Steven Pinker.

But hey, maybe sometimes, the heroes also got lucky, and maybe the `also-rans' had some unluck...

The scientific research on creativity (i.e., success in artistic domains, such as: movies, novels, painting, bog-snorkelling and so on) shows there are 4 different (separate) kinds of luck.

...More on that, to follow.... soon!

(On the 4 kinds of luck, not on: bog-snorkelling)

Meantime: as you were...

Well; unless, you're different now.

...You may well have evolved or something, who knows. Hard to say.

- Hey, but you know what else's a great book?

Well, lots of them, but especially, this one.

Hey also, did you know the latest theory of how universes are created? Two other universes (or else, branes) combine, to form a new universe. See the 5-min Michio Kaku video, here. Which means the laws of Evolution operate at macro and micro scales. Funny that. Not funny ha-ha, just funny-weird. It's almost like, Evolution explains, pretty much everything. Hey wait...

And hey, guess what, if "President" Trump gets impeached soon - like all right-thinking persons hope he does, then his VeeP steps up as Prez, and: he's a Creationist. 


Now that's: funny. Here come The Dark Ages, again... Somebody really needs to read All Life Is Problem Solving by Sir Karl Popper. And maybe all these books. Science (which includes: Evolution) explains everything much less worse than Non-Science does.

Hey - while we're at it, here's another great book!


Hey - which brings us back to Geniuses, and, to Joseph Campbell.
...See what I did there.
(...Phew! And just in the nick of time, as, this blog post was just about to end. Man, that was close.)
Then again "authenticity" is also just a cheesy buzzword - and one that's so `last millennium'. But it sure sucks a lot of people in... Marketing Departments use it a lot. Like the current widespread move to rebrand `Human Resources' to `People and Culture'. (If you're a corporation, you're probably still a psychopath. destroying the environment - and destroying people - for profit.)

"...clearly notions of authenticity and identity are closely interlinked. What one is (or wants to be) cannot be ‘inauthentic’, whatever else it is. Authenticity is definitely not a property of music, musicians and their relations to an audience…Instead we should see ‘authenticity’ as a discursive trope of great persuasive power. It focuses a way of talking about music, a way of saying to outsiders and insiders alike ‘this is what is really significant about this music’, ‘this is the music that makes us different from other people’" (Stokes 1994, p. 6).

See: Stokes, M. (1994) Ethnicity, Identity and Music: The Musical Construction of Place,(Oxford: Berg Publishers).

So; yeah. Don't try to be `authentic'. Cut the `Marketing' B.S.

Just find your bliss, and follow it.

It could turn out to be a heroic adventure.

(Well; or not.)

`The goal of the hero’s journey is yourself , finding yourself .’ (Campbell in Osbon, 1991, p. 154)

-------------------------------

JT Velikovsky, PhD
Evolutionary Systems Theorist,
Narratologist, 
& Transmedia Guy

NOTES:

* It should maybe be noted just how close Campbell's monomyth is to Propp's Morphology of the Russian Folk Tale. It's real close. See also: The Feature Film Screenwriters' Workbook (Velikovsky 1995, 2011), which is a work of `comparative Screenplayology' - and is used to teach screenwriting in many universities and film schools.

** (The great Chris Vogler was one of my teachers at film school 20 years ago, and actually gave me a 100% mark for his class... so, I like the guy :)

*** Also, but don't forget: that bird might be on a hero's journey himself, and maybe his `boon' was bringing back to his community, the idea of: crapping on random people, just for shiggles. And that makes me think of The Simurgh, which Jorges Luis Borges talks about. Aw man, Borges is the best. Especially since his first name rhymes with his last name. (When you pronounce it `Hor-hay Bor-hay'. But don't try this at home. Also see what the great Dan Dennett says about Borges's Labyrinths in this book below, which is also: another utterly brilliant book. Actually, they both are. See what Dan says about `memes', i.e. units of culture, in there, too. Memes are what creative people: create!.)


Also I better finish on a Joe Campbell quote.

`“What is the meaning of life?’” Joseph was often asked, and he would respond, “There is no meaning. We bring the meaning to it.” Like Carl Jung, he saw the approach of old age, not as mere diminution of life, but as a time of blooming.’ (Osbon, 1991, p. 10)   

(So - in other words, if you're on a `spiritual' journey, you're probably wasting your time, looking for something that isn't actually there... It's like all these folks who get tricked into thinking they've found a guru. Read Candy or something by Terry Southern.... Then, go read some Dan Dennett or something!

i.e., You have to look inside, to find your bliss (or, for what puts you in flow) you schmuck - instead of looking outside, for some guru. Read lots of these books. No really! ...I mean even Joe Campbell misunderstood C P Snow and `The Two Cultures'. Sheesh!)

...Nah, just kidding. Read Joe Campbell. Because he read all these other `spiritual' books (even the Upanishads, jeez - they're really long), and then he interpreted the meaning for you, so that you don't have to go read them all. ...I mean you can, you can do what you like, what do I care. (But, shame that he also used so much Freudian Theory, which was really big back in 1949, but sadly, is now: outdated. - It was superseded by Evolutionary Psychology. Go figure. Weird how: Science keeps getting it right...?!)

(...And - hey, don't get mad at me - I don't make up the facts, I just report 'em. ;)

Maybe just re-read this quote:

`The crux of the curious difficulty lies in the fact that our conscious views of what life ought to be, seldom correspond to what life really is.' (Joseph Campbell, in Osbon 1991)

Well, for some folks, anyway.

Also - Spoiler Alert: Joe Campbell says Religion is hogwash, the closest to reality (e.g. Science) is Buddhism.

Where: you're the Buddha...!

`It seems impossible today, but people actually believed all that as recently as half a century or so ago: clergymen, philosophers, government officers and all. Today we know - and know right well – that there never was anything of the kind: no Garden of Eden anywhere on this earth, no time when the serpent could talk, no prehistoric “Fall”, no exclusion from the Garden, no universal Flood, no Noah’s Ark. The entire history on which our leading Occidental religions have been founded is an anthology of fictions. But these are fictions of a type that have had – curiously enough – a universal vogue as the founding of other religions, too. Their counterparts have turned up everywhere – and yet, there never was such a garden, serpent, tree, or deluge.’ (Campbell in Osbon, 1991, pp. 30-31)

But: Buddhism defers to Science anyway. And - Buddhism is just an intuitive stab at what is far better explained by Systems Philosophy and Systems Science. (I'm not making this up. Read Joe Campbell. It's in there.)

But meantime, yeah.

Creativity Theory: Follow your bliss. Find what puts you in the flow state, and make your life: a hero's journey.

...Or not. (Hey, it's not for everyone. Some folks actually like it out there in the wasteland. And frankly, they're welcome to it...)

And -- with that...

...Here endeth the sermon.

And, I didn't even talk about Positive Psychology. (Or, how people with lives of meaning actually do it. It's not that hard.)

But hey, there's a great chapter on how it started, and why, here:


i.e. See specifically, the chapter:

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2014). `The Systems Model of Creativity and Its Applications'. In D. K. Simonton (Ed.), The Wiley Handbook of Genius (pp. 533-545). Chichester, West Sussex: John Wiley & Sons Ltd.  

And, here is a quote from it taken entirely at random, and which proves nothing:

`In fact, the Greeks eventually concluded that it was possible for men to achieve some sort of immortality because of their actions. A brave warrior, an illustrious statesman, or even a great poetcould aspire to have their feats remembered generation after generation, and as longas their achievements were still in the memory of their descendants, they were notreally, entirely stone dead.' (Csikszentmihalyi in Simonton 2014, p. 534)

Or wait, maybe that refers to: memes, the units of culture. Well, whatever.

...See what I deliberately and accidentally didn't do, there...

And also then there's this:

StoryAlity #73 – The Heros Journey: It’s Not What You Think




(And yes, I'm: the Buddha. And so can YOU. )

Einstein's God

Einstein's God

Here's 7 minutes of `Einstein on God' (narrated by Richard Dawkins):


I've been reading this excellent book (which was kindly loaned to me by a friend)

 Einstein’s God:
Conversations About Science and the Human Spirit (Tippett 2010)It features interviews, mostly with scientists, about spirituality. These interviews came from Tippett's radio show `Speaking of Faith'. (See also her more recent podcasts, at On Being . Brainpickings also had an interesting post on the book.)

At any rate - below are some quotes I particularly liked from the book:

`Paul Davies: Einstein was the person to establish this notion of what is sometimes called block time - that the past, present and future are just personal decompositions of time, and that the universe of past, present and future in some sense has an eternal existence. And so even though individuals may come and go, their lives, which are in the past for their descendants, nevertheless still have some existence within this block time. Nothing takes that away... Your life is still there in its entirety.' (in Tippett 2010, p. 38)

Freeman Dyson: [Einstein] had a marvellous sense of humour, and that's a very important part of life. The fact is that scientists have, on the whole, cultivated a sense of humour because so much of science is a history of failures. If you're a creative person, you know it's true in other kinds of creative life, but more so in science as so much of science ends up to be wrong, You do something, you spend weeks and months, and finally the whole thing collapses. You need to have a sense of humour, otherwise you couldn't survive. And Einstein, I think, understood that particularly well. (in Tippett 2010, pp. 26-7)

Freeman Dyson: What really happens in the universe is that nature finds all these extraordinarily complex structures which have their own rules. So, for example, the whole of biology is an example of that. (in Tippett 2010, pp. 24-5) 

Tippett also notes in the Introduction to the book:

`The religious impulse is animated at its core by questions of purpose: What does it mean to be human? Where do we come from? Where are we going? How to love? What matters in a life? What matters in a death? How to be of service to one another and to the world?' (Tippett 2010, p. 8)

So, Religion gives the sorts of answers that people like to hear, Science - on the other hand - could care less about your feelings or your beliefs, as Reality (truth) is quite happy to crush you like a steamroller.
Basically, almost all of Nature totally wants to murder you.
(Jump into a lion-cage at the zoo if you want to test this out sometime.)

A skeletal mount of an African lion attacking a common eland
on display at The Museum of Osteology, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
Image: Sklmsta at English Wikipedia [Public domain],
via Wikimedia Commons- It's a `miracle' you're alive, but not a religious miracle; a scientific miracle, namely it's just incredibly improbable, but still quite possible.

Frankly, you, personally, are a miraculous statistic.
One of 7 billion statistics (humans currently alive).
More, if you include all the other plants and animals currently alive.
There are also over 4 thousand Gods,
(They all want to murder each other too, read all their books,)

Anyway here's another quote from this great book (Tippett's) that agrees with what I just said, above:

Moore: [Charles Darwin] was a very shrewd guy, and he'd stared more deeply into the abyss, which is his view of nature at war, than perhaps any person of his day. And he brings you up short, bang, against the world as it really is in his vision, not the world that we would like it to be...' (in Tippett 2010, p. 120)  

See, that's what's so great about Science, it doesn't care what you think. It's always right.
Well until it isn't (i.e., until a better [read: more accurate] scientific truth comes along).

Science always gets better.
(Religion always gets worse.)
The Moral: You don't have to be a scientist to be deeply spiritual, but, it sure helps.

Religion is, basically, Spirituality For Dummies. It's (religion) also horrifically sexist, racist and homophobic. And outdated.
But - other than all that, it's great.
 - If you like that sort of thing. I guess.
Anyway - thankfully Science is winning the war against Religion (and other utter Non-Science) - and that looks like it will continue. (Well unless some religious suicide-bomber gets ahold of a nuke.)

Humans are good at being wrong about things.

Mainly as we tend to use intuition rather than reason and logic and evidence. Also we're not naturally good at understanding statistics, probability, algorithms, and evolution. (See the great book: Thinking Fast & Slow , Kahneman 2011) for why, and how to fix it in yourself.
We don't like seeing ourselves as statistics.
Evolution makes us intuitively think of ourselves as `wholes - that need to survive', regardless of the cost to anything else.
Intuitions are shortcuts for thinking rationally.

Levin: ...our intutions are based on our minds, our minds are based on our neural structures, our neural structures evolved on a planet, under a sun, with very specific conditions. We reflect the physical world that we evolved from. It's not a miracle.' (in Tippett 2010, p. 157)

On the whole, we're good at surviving and reproducing (and - at taking revenge, and sometimes, at forgiving) - but that's about it.
If you want to get specific, about 1% of the whole are really creative.
The other 99% needs: the creative 1%.
e.g. The scientists curing cancer. And the brilliant writers and artists,

And, the scientists are trying to warn Donald Trump about climate change.
(But Trump is stupid.)

Einstein famously said:

`Two things are infinite: the ... the universe, and human stupidity, and I am not yet completely sure about the universe.' (Einstein)

Here's a cool exchange from the book: (it also agrees with everything I just said, i.e. this whole post. It also reflects my attitude to reality.)

Tippett: ...how does the messiness of experience, of all of us, not just what we can know but how life unfolds, how does that impinge on the ultimate reality of what we can know and achieve through logic and through science?

Levin: I would argue that we should never turn away from what nature has to show us. We should never pretend we don't see it just because it's too difficult to confront it. That's something that I don't understand about other attitudes that want to disregard certain discoveries just because they don't jell with their beliefs. 

One of the painful but beautiful things about being a scientist is being able to say "It doesn't matter what I believe. I might believe that the universe is a certain age, but if I'm wrong, I'm wrong." There's something really thrilling about being committed to that. (in Tippett 2010, p. 159)    

This is me, too:

Tippett: Does it make you react to simple things differently in your life, because you are closer to that cutting edge of knowledge right now?

Levin: Well I will often look at what people feel is very important, and not identify with what they think is very important. I have a hard time becoming obsessed with internal social norms, how you're supposed to dress or wear your tie or who's supposed to... for me, it's so absurd, because it's so small. It's this funny thing that this one species is acting out on this tiny planet in this huge, vast cosmos. So it is sometimes hard for me to participate in certain values that other people have... things totally constructed by human beings I have a hard time taking seriously. And things that seem to be natural phenomena, that happen universally, I take more seriously, as more significant... We're animals that organize in a certain way... a lot of the things we are acting out are animalistic, consequences of our instincts. They aren't... as meaningful to me as the things that will live on after our species comes and goes... I'm really pained by what's going on in the world. But my perspective is to look on it as animals acting out ruthless instincts and unable to control themselves - even though other people think that they're being very heady and intellectual... 

...stars burn and shine, and they make carbon in their cores and then they throw them out again. And that carbon collects and forms another planet and another star, and then amino acids evolve and then human beings arise. That, to me, is a really beautiful narrative. (in Tippett 2010, pp. 162-5)        

 See also, Janna Levin's novel:  A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines (Levin 2007).

McCullough: Anger in response to injustice is as reliable a human emotional response as happiness is to winning the lottery, or grief is to losing a loved one. And if you look at the brain of somebody who has just been harmed by someone - they've been ridiculed or harrassed or insulted - we can put those people into [fMRI] technology that allows us to see what their brains are doing. We can look at what your brain looks like on revenge. It looks exactly like the brain of someboy who is thirsty and is just about to get a sweet drink or is hungry and is about to get a piece of chocolate to eat.

Tippett: It's like the satisfaction of a craving?

 McCullough: It is exactly like that. It is literally a craving. What you see is high activation in the brain's reward system... The desire for revenge does not come from some sick dark part of how our minds operate. It is a craving to solve a problem and accomplish a goal. (in Tippett 2010, p. 178)  

And here's some more good stuff: (the book is full of good stuff. Read it! :)

Tippett: One of the things you seem to be talking about [in Beyond Revenge: The Evolution of the Forgiveness Instinct, McCullough 2008] is reclaiming the normalcy of both revenge and forgiveness as part of human nature. I'd like to talk about revenge first, if we could - why revenge is in us and what purpose it has served even in evolutionary terms.

McCullough: Here's what you see all throughout the animal kingdom - and this is where I really got interested. One study that really got my attention was a study on chimpanzees, which showed that if a chimpanzee is harmed by an individual that it's living with, it has the ability to remember who that individual is and target aggression back at that individual in the ten minutes, twenty minutes, hour later. I was surprised to know that chimpanzees had those kinds of mental abilities. I had to learn more. I wanted to know where else you see this in the animal kingdom. It turns out that you see it in other kinds of primates, such as one type of monkey that I like a lot, a monkey called the Japanese macaque. Japanese macaques are very status-conscious individuals.

Japanese macaques nitpicking in a hot spring
By user:Fg2 derivative work: user:bukk
(JapaneseMacaqueM2262.jpg) [Public domain],
via Wikimedia Commons

`McCullough [cont.]: They're very intimidated by power, let's just put it that way. So if you're a high-ranking Japanese macaque and you harm a lower-ranking Japanese macaque, that low-ranking individual is not going to harm you back. It's just too intimidating. It's too anxiety-provoking. What they do instead, and this still astonishes me, is they will find a relative of that high-ranking individual and go seek that low-ranking cousin or nephew out and harm him in retaliation.

Tippett: That does sound like human behaviour, doesn't it? [JTV - It actually sounds exactly like: the mafia, LOL. Note that: movies about the mafia usually do very badly.]

McCullough: Right. And here's the kicker: when they're harming this nephew, most of the time they're doing it while the high-ranking individual is watching. They want the high-ranking individual to know that I know you're more powerful than I am. But rest assured, I know how to get at what you care about and what you value.' (in Tippett 2010, p. 176-7)           

Anyway - so the book (Tippett 2010) is excellent.

Also - if you don't like Science, you're being pretty stupid - as anyone or anything that is alive is doing science all of the time. Whether they're aware of it, or not.

i.e. Everything operates, via:

Expectation (or: `Theory'); then Trial and Error, and, (if needed) Error-correction. 

...Seriously.

Read Popper's All Life Is Problem Solving (1999). It's also: GREAT.

-----------------------

Joe T Velikovsky

Transmedia Writer-Director-Producer:
Movies, Games, TV, Theatre, Books, Comics
Transmedia Writing Blog: http://on-writering.blogspot.com.au/

& Bio-Culture (Science & the Arts) & Transmedia Researcher
Academia link: https://aftrs.academia.edu/JTVelikovsky

& (High-RoI) Story/Screenplay/Movie Analyst and Evolutionary Systems Theorist
See: https://storyality.wordpress.com/

IMDb: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/joeteevee

& Random Guy

------------------------------------------

P.S. - And, if you don't believe in Evolution, it's not your fault that Evolution made you so stupid. All you needed to do was survive and possibly even reproduce, (and maybe take revenge now and then) for Evolution to let you off the hook. - It's actually a miracle.

Why only a woman could have written Mary Shelley's `Frankenstein: or the Modern Prometheus' (1818)

Why only a woman could have written Mary Shelley's `Frankenstein: Or, the Modern Prometheus' 

Mary Shelley (Image: public domain)
Well; because women are the best writers, for one thing - and, frankly, it's just a great book.

Also `Mary' is a woman's name, so that also totally explains it. There's a smoking-gun, if-ever.

And here are some quotes, extracted from this utterly-fantabulous book.
(You really should read it. Really. It's great!)

`I have thus endeavoured to preserve the truth of the elementary principles of human nature, while I have not scrupled to innovate upon their combinations. 

The Iliad, the tragic poetry of Greece- Shakespeare, in the Tempest and Midsummer Night's Dream - and most especially Milton, in Paradise Lost, conform to this rule; and the most humble novelist, who seeks to confer or receive amusement from his labours, may, without presumption, apply to prose fiction a licence, or rather a rule, from the adoption of which so many exquisite combinations of human feeling have resulted in the highest specimens of poetry.' (Preface, Shelley, 1818, p.15)

And:

`Before this I was not unacquainted with the more obvious laws of electricity. On this occasion a man of great research in natural philosophy was with us, and excited by this catastrophe, he entered on the explanation of a theory which he had formed on the subject of electricity and galvanism, which was at once new and astonishing to me. All that he said threw greatly into the shade Cornelius Agrippa, Albertus Magnus, and Paracelsus, the lords of my imagination; but by some fatality the overthrow of these men disinclined me to pursue my accustomed studies. It seemed to me as if nothing would or could ever be known. All that had so long engaged my attention suddenly grew despicable. By one of those caprices of the mind which we are perhaps most subject to in early youth, I at once gave up my former occupations, set down natural history and all its progeny as a deformed and abortive creation, and entertained the greatest disdain for a would-be science which could never even step within the threshold of real knowledge. In this mood of mind I betook myself to the mathematics and the branches of study appertaining to that science as being built upon secure foundations, and so worthy of my consideration.  

Thus strangely are our souls constructed, and by such slight ligaments are we bound to prosperity or ruin. When I look back, it seems to me as if this almost miraculous change of inclination and will was the immediate suggestion of the guardian angel of my life—the last effort made by the spirit of preservation to avert the storm that was even then hanging in the stars and ready to envelop me. Her victory was announced by an unusual tranquillity and gladness of soul which followed the relinquishing of my ancient and latterly tormenting studies. It was thus that I was to be taught to associate evil with their prosecution, happiness with their disregard.' (ibid, p. 61)

And this is what I say to the Modern Prometheus - I mean the Modern Postmodernists: (see bold bit)

`The next morning I delivered my letters of introduction and paid a visit to some of the principal professors. Chance–or rather the evil influence, the Angel of Destruction, which asserted omnipotent sway over me from the moment I turned my reluctant steps from my father’s door–led me first to M. Krempe, professor of natural philosophy. He was an uncouth man, but deeply imbued in the secrets of his science. He asked me several questions concerning my progress in the different branches of science appertaining to natural philosophy. I replied carelessly, and partly in contempt, mentioned the names of my alchemists as the principal authors I had studied. The professor stared. “Have you,” he said, “really spent your time in studying such nonsense?”

I replied in the affirmative. “Every minute,” continued M. Krempe with warmth, “every instant that you have wasted on those books is utterly and entirely lost. 

You have burdened your memory with exploded systems and useless names. Good God! In what desert land have you lived, where no one was kind enough to inform you that these fancies which you have so greedily imbibed are a thousand years old and as musty as they are ancient? 

I little expected, in this enlightened and scientific age, to find a disciple of Albertus Magnus and Paracelsus. My dear sir, you must begin your studies entirely anew.”

So saying, he stepped aside and wrote down a list of several books treating of natural philosophy which he desired me to procure, and dismissed me after mentioning that in the beginning of the following week he intended to commence a course of lectures upon natural philosophy in its general relations, and that M. Waldman, a fellow professor, would lecture upon chemistry the alternate days that he omitted.

I returned home not disappointed, for I have said that I had long considered those authors useless whom the professor reprobated; but I returned not at all the more inclined to recur to these studies in any shape.' (ibid, pp. 68-9)

And see this:

`Such were the professor’s words–rather let me say such the words of the fate–enounced to destroy me. As he went on I felt as if my soul were grappling with a palpable enemy; one by one the various keys were touched which formed the mechanism of my being; chord after chord was sounded, and soon my mind was filled with one thought, one conception, one purpose. So much has been done, exclaimed the soul of Frankenstein–more, far more, will I achieve; treading in the steps already marked, I will pioneer a new way, explore unknown powers, and unfold to the world the deepest mysteries of creation.

I closed not my eyes that night. My internal being was in a state of insurrection and turmoil; I felt that order would thence arise, but I had no power to produce it. By degrees, after the morning’s dawn, sleep came. I awoke, and my yesternight’s thoughts were as a dream. There only remained a resolution to return to my ancient studies and to devote myself to a science for which I believed myself to possess a natural talent. On the same day I paid M. Waldman a visit. His manners in private were even more mild and attractive than in public, for there was a certain dignity in his mien during his lecture which in his own house was replaced by the greatest affability and kindness. I gave him pretty nearly the same account of my former pursuits as I had given to his fellow professor. He heard with attention the little narration concerning my studies and smiled at the names of Cornelius Agrippa and Paracelsus, but without the contempt that M. Krempe had exhibited. He said that “These were men to whose indefatigable zeal modern philosophers were indebted for most of the foundations of their knowledge. They had left to us, as an easier task, to give new names and arrange in connected classifications the facts which they in a great degree had been the instruments of bringing to light. The labours of men of genius, however erroneously directed, scarcely ever fail in ultimately turning to the solid advantage of mankind.” I listened to his statement, which was delivered without any presumption or affectation, and then added that his lecture had removed my prejudices against modern chemists; I expressed myself in measured terms, with the modesty and deference due from a youth to his instructor, without letting escape (inexperience in life would have made me ashamed) any of the enthusiasm which stimulated my intended labours. I requested his advice concerning the books I ought to procure.

“I am happy,” said M. Waldman, “to have gained a disciple; and if your application equals your ability, I have no doubt of your success. Chemistry is that branch of natural philosophy in which the greatest improvements have been and may be made; it is on that account that I have made it my peculiar study; but at the same time, I have not neglected the other branches of science. A man would make but a very sorry chemist if he attended to that department of human knowledge alone. If your wish is to become really a man of science and not merely a petty experimentalist, I should advise you to apply to every branch of natural philosophy, including mathematics.”' (ibid, pp. 72-3)

OMG, this is gold. Mary Shelley knew her stuff.

`Two years passed in this manner, during which I paid no visit to Geneva, but was engaged, heart and soul, in the pursuit of some discoveries, which I hoped to make. 

None but those who have experienced them can conceive of the enticements of science. In other studies you go as far as others have gone before you, and there is nothing more to know; but in a scientific pursuit there is continual food for discovery and wonder. 

A mind of moderate capacity, which closely pursues one study, must infallibly arrive at great proficiency in that study; and I, who continually sought the attainment of one object of pursuit, and was solely wrapped up in this, improved so rapidly that, at the end of two years, I made some discoveries in the improvement of some chemical instruments which procured me great esteem and admiration at the university. When I had arrived at this point, and had become as well acquainted with the theory and practice of natural philosophy as depended on the lessons of any of the professors at Ingolstadt, my residence there being no longer conducive to my improvement, I thought of returning to my friends and my native town, when an incident happened that protracted my stay.

One of the phenomena which had peculiarly attracted my attention was the structure of the human frame, and, indeed, any animal endued with life. Whence, I often asked myself, did the principle of life proceed? It was a bold question, and one which has ever been considered as a mystery; yet with how many things are we upon the brink of becoming acquainted, if cowardice or carelessness did not restrain our inquiries. I revolved these circumstances in my mind, and determined thenceforth to apply myself more particularly to those branches of natural philosophy which relate to physiology. Unless I had been animated by an almost supernatural enthusiasm, my application to this study would have been irksome, and almost intolerable. To examine the causes of life, we must first have recourse to death. I became acquainted with the science of, anatomy: but this was not sufficient; I must also observe the natural decay and corruption of the human body. In my education my father had taken the greatest precautions that my mind should be impressed with no supernatural horrors. I do not ever remember to have trembled at a tale of superstition, or to have feared the apparition of a spirit. Darkness had no effect upon my fancy; and a churchyard was to me merely the receptacle of bodies deprived of life, which, from being the seat of beauty and strength, had become food for the worm. Now I was led to examine the cause and progress of this decay, and forced to spend days and nights in vaults and charnel-houses. My attention was fixed upon every object the most insupportable to the delicacy of the human feelings. I saw how the fine form of man was degraded and wasted; I beheld the corruption of death succeed to the blooming cheek of life; I saw how the worm inherited the wonders of the eye and brain. I paused, examining and analysing all the minutiae of causation, as exemplified in the change from life to death, and death to life, until from the midst of this darkness a sudden light broke in upon me -- a light so brilliant and wondrous, yet so simple, that while I became dizzy with the immensity of the prospect which it illustrated, I was surprised, that among so many men of genius who had directed their inquiries towards the same science, that I alone should be reserved to discover so astonishing a secret.

Remember, I am not recording the vision of a madman. The sun does not more certainly shine in the heavens, than that which I now affirm is true. Some miracle might have produced it, yet the stages of the discovery were distinct and probable. After days and nights of incredible labour and fatigue, I succeeded in discovering the cause of generation and life; nay, more, I became myself capable of bestowing animation upon lifeless matter.

The astonishment which I had at first experienced on this discovery soon gave place to delight and rapture.' (ibid, pp. 76-9) 

And now it goes off the rails: (this is bad Life Advice, but she's using it for dramatic effect)

`A human being in perfection ought always to preserve a calm and peaceful mind, and never to allow passion or a transitory desire to disturb his tranquillity. I do not think that the pursuit of knowledge is an exception to this rule. If the study to which you apply yourself has a tendency to weaken your affections, and to destroy your taste for those simple pleasures in which no alloy can possibly mix, then that study is certainly unlawful, that is to say, not befitting the human mind. 

If this rule were always observed; if no man allowed any pursuit whatsoever to interfere with the tranquillity of his domestic affections, Greece had not been enslaved, Caesar would have spared his country; America would have been discovered more gradually; and the empires of Mexico and Peru had not been destroyed.

But I forget that I am moralising in the most interesting part of my tale; and your looks remind me to proceed.' (ibid, pp. 84-5)

And then this: (this bit is: really-scary)

`IT WAS on a dreary night of November that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils. With an anxiety that almost amounted to agony, collected the instruments of life around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my feet. It was already one in the morning; the rain pattered dismally against the panes, and my candle was nearly burnt out, when, by the glimmer of the half-extinguished light, I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it breathed hard, and a convulsive motion agitated its limbs.

How can I describe my emotions at this catastrophe, or how delineate the wretch whom with such infinite pains and care I had endeavoured to form? His limbs were in proportion, and I had selected his features as beautiful. Beautiful! -- Great God! His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath; his hair was of a lustrous black, and flowing; his teeth of a pearly whiteness; but these luxuriances only formed a more horrid contrast with his watery eyes, that seemed almost of the same colour as the dun white sockets in which they were set, his shrivelled complexion and straight black lips.

The different accidents of life are not so changeable as the feelings of human nature. I had worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an inanimate body. For this I had deprived myself of rest and health. I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart. Unable to endure the aspect of the being I had created, I rushed out of the room, continued a long time traversing my bed chamber, unable to compose my mind to sleep. At length lassitude succeeded to the tumult I had before endured; and I threw myself on the bed in my clothes, endeavouring to seek a few moments of forgetfulness. But it was in vain: I slept, indeed, but I was disturbed by the wildest dreams. I thought I saw Elizabeth, in the bloom of health, walking in the streets of Ingolstadt. Delighted and surprised, I embraced her; but as I imprinted the first kiss on her lips, they became livid with the hue of death; her features appeared to change, and I thought that I held the corpse of my dead mother in my arms; a shroud enveloped her form, and I saw the grave-worms crawling in the folds of the flannel. I started from my sleep with horror; a cold dew covered my forehead, my teeth chattered, and every limb became convulsed: when, by the dim and yellow light of the moon, as it forced its way through the window shutters, I beheld the wretch -- the miserable monster whom I had created. He held up the curtain of the bed and his eyes, if eyes they may be called, were fixed on me. His jaws opened, and he muttered some inarticulate sounds, while a grin wrinkled his cheeks. He might have spoken, but I did not hear; one hand was stretched out, seemingly to detain me, but I escaped, and rushed down stairs. I took refuge in the courtyard belonging to the house which I inhabited; where I remained during the rest of the night, walking up and down in the greatest agitation, listening attentively, catching and fearing each sound as if it were to announce the approach of the demoniacal corpse to which I had so miserably given life.

Oh! no mortal could support the horror of that countenance. A mummy again endued with animation could not be so hideous as that wretch. I had gazed on him while unfinished he was ugly then; but when those muscles and joints were rendered capable of motion, it became a thing such as even Dante could not have conceived.' (ibid, pp. 86-7)

Let's also not forget that Shelley cites The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Coleridge:

`Like one who, on a lonely road,  

Doth walk in fear and dread,  

And, having once turned round, walks on, 

And turns no more his head;  

Because he knows a frightful fiend 

Doth close behind him tread.' (ibid, pp. 89-90, citing Coleridge)

But creativity is always just: a mashup. i.e. Combine two old elements in a new way (see: Martindale 1989).

Martindale, C. (1989). `Personality, Situation and Creativity.' In J. A. Glover, R. R. Ronning & C. R. Reynolds (Eds.), Handbook of Creativity: Perspectives on Individual Differences (pp. 211-232). New York; London: Plenum.

This is just a lovely passage:

`By very slow degrees, and with frequent relapses that alarmed and grieved my friend, I recovered. I remember the first time I became capable of observing outward objects with any kind of pleasure, I perceived that the fallen leaves had disappeared, and that the young buds were shooting forth from the trees that shaded my window. It was a divine spring; and the season contributed greatly to my convalescence. I felt also sentiments of joy and affection revive in my bosom; my gloom disappeared, and in a short time I became as cheerful as before I was attacked by the fatal passion.' (ibid, p. 94)

Then, this is wonderful too:

`My journey was very melancholy. At first I wished to hurry on, for I longed to console and sympathise with my loved and sorrowing friends; but when I drew near my native town, I slackened my progress. I could hardly sustain the multitude of feelings that crowded into my mind. I passed through scenes familiar to my youth, but which I had not seen for nearly six years. How altered everything might be during that time! One sudden and desolating change had taken place; but a thousand little circumstances might have by degrees worked other alterations, which, although they were done more tranquilly, might not be the less decisive. Fear overcame me; I dared not advance, dreading a thousand nameless evils that made me tremble, although I was unable to define them.

I remained two days at Lausanne, in this painful state of mind. I contemplated the lake: the waters were placid; all around was calm; and the snowy mountains, "the palaces of nature," were not changed. By degrees the calm and heavenly scene restored me, and I continued my journey towards Geneva.' (ibid, pp. 112-3)

This is great writing:

`We entered the gloomy prison-chamber, and beheld Justine sitting on some straw at the farther end; her hands were manacled, and her head rested on her knees. She rose on seeing us enter; and when we were left alone with her, she threw herself at the feet of Elizabeth, weeping bitterly. My cousin wept also. 

"Oh, Justine!" said she, "why did you rob me of my last consolation? I relied on your innocence; and although I was then very wretched, I was not so miserable as I am now."

"And do you also believe that I am so very, very wicked? Do you also join with my enemies to crush me, to condemn me as a murderer?" Her voice was suffocated with sobs. 

"Rise, my poor girl," said Elizabeth, "why do you kneel, if you are innocent? I am not one of your enemies; I believed you guiltless, notwithstanding every evidence, until I heard that you had yourself declared your guilt. That report, you say, is false; and be assured, dear Justine, that nothing can shake my confidence in you for a moment, but your own confession." 

"I did confess; but I confessed a lie. I confessed, that I might obtain absolution; but now that falsehood lies heavier at my heart than all my other sins. The God of heaven forgive me! Ever since I was condemned, my confessor has besieged me; he threatened and menaced, until I almost began to think that I was the monster that he said I was. He threatened excommunication and hell fire in my last moments, if I continued obdurate. Dear lady, I had none to support me; all looked on me as a wretch doomed to ignominy and perdition. What could I do? In an evil hour I subscribed to a lie; and now only am I truly miserable."

She paused, weeping, and then continued -- "I thought with horror, my sweet lady, that you should believe your Justine, whom your blessed aunt had so highly honoured, and whom you loved, was a creature capable of a crime which none but the devil himself could go have perpetrated. Dear William! dearest blessed child! I soon shall see you again in heaven, where we shall all be happy; and that consoles me, going as I am to suffer ignominy and death."' (ibid, pp.132-3)

This is great and powerful stuff:

`When I reflect, my dear cousin," said she, "on the miserable death of Justine Moritz, I no longer see the world and its works as they before appeared to me. Before, I looked upon the accounts of vice and injustice that I read in books or heard from others as tales of ancient days or imaginary evils; at least they were remote and more familiar to reason than to the imagination; but now misery has come home, and men appear to me as monsters thirsting for each other's blood. Yet I am certainly unjust.' (ibid, p. 142) 

And how poetic is this-?!

`Sometimes I could cope with the sullen despair that overwhelmed me: but sometimes the whirlwind passions of my soul drove me to seek, by bodily exercise and by change of place, some relief from my intolerable sensations. It was during an access of this kind that I suddenly left my home, and bending my steps towards the near Alpine valleys, sought in the magnificence, the eternity of such scenes, to forget myself and my ephemeral, because human, sorrows. My wanderings were directed towards the valley of Chamounix. I had visited it frequently during my boyhood. Six years had passed since then: I was a wreck -- but nought had changed in those savage and enduring scenes.' (ibid, pp. 144-5)

I love how the monster relates this experience:

`"IT IS with considerable difficulty that I remember the original era of being: all the events of that period appear confused and indistinct. A strange multiplicity of sensations seized me, and I saw, felt, heard, and smelt, at the same time; and it was, indeed, a long time before I learned to distinguish between the operations of my various senses. By degrees, I remember, a stronger light pressed upon my nerves, so that I was obliged to shut my eyes. Darkness then came over me, and troubled me; but hardly had I felt this, when, by opening my eyes, as I now suppose, the light poured in upon me again. I walked, and, I believe, descended; but I presently found a great alteration in my sensations. Before, dark and opaque bodies had surrounded me, impervious to my touch or sight; but I now found that I could wander on at liberty, with no obstacles which I could not either surmount or avoid. The light became more and more oppressive to me; and, the heat wearying me as I walked, I sought a place where I could receive shade. This was the forest near Ingolstadt; and here I lay by the side of a brook resting from my fatigue, until I felt tormented by hunger and thirst. This roused me from my nearly dormant state, and I ate some berries which I found hanging on the trees, or lying on the ground. I slaked my thirst at the brook; and then lying down, was overcome by sleep.

"It was dark when I awoke; I felt cold also, and half-frightened, as it were instinctively, finding myself so desolate. Before I had quitted your apartment, on a sensation of cold, I had covered myself with some clothes; but these were insufficient to secure me from the dews of night. I was a poor, helpless, miserable wretch; I knew, and could distinguish, nothing; but feeling pain invade me on all sides, I sat down and wept.' (ibid, p. 158-9)

 And now comes the curse of knowledge:

`"My days were spent in close attention, that I might more speedily master the language; and I may boast that I improved more rapidly than the Arabian, who understood very little, and conversed in broken accents, whilst I comprehended and could imitate almost every word that was spoken.

"While I improved in speech, I also learned the science of letters, as it was taught to the stranger; and this opened before me a wide field for wonder and delight. 

"The book from which Felix instructed Safie was Volney's Ruins of Empires. I should not have understood the purport of this book, had not Felix, in reading it, given very minute explanations. He had chosen this work, he said, because the declamatory style was framed in imitation of the eastern authors. Through this work I obtained a cursory knowledge of history, and a view of the several empires at present existing in the world it gave me an insight into the manners, governments, and religions of the different nations of the earth. I heard of the slothful Asiatics; of the stupendous genius and mental activity of the Grecians; of the wars and wonderful virtue of the early Romans -- of their subsequent degenerating -- of the decline of that mighty empire; of chivalry, Christianity, and kings. I heard of the discovery of the American hemisphere, and wept with Safie over the hapless fate of its original inhabitants. 

"These wonderful narrations inspired me with strange feelings. Was man, indeed, at once so powerful, so virtuous and magnificent, yet so vicious and base? He appeared at one time a mere scion of the evil principle, and at another as all that can be conceived of noble and godlike. To be a great and virtuous man appeared the highest honour that can befall a sensitive being; to be base and vicious, as many on record have been, appeared the lowest degradation, a condition more abject than that of the blind mole or harmless worm. For a long time I could not conceive how one man could go forth to murder his fellow, or even why there were laws and governments; but when I heard details of vice and bloodshed, my wonder ceased, and I turned away with disgust and loathing.
"Every conversation of the cottagers now opened new wonders to me. While I listened to the instructions which Felix bestowed upon the Arabian, the strange system of human society was explained to me. I heard of the division of property, of immense wealth and squalid poverty; of rank, descent, and noble blood. 

"The words induced me to turn towards myself. I learned that the possessions most esteemed by your fellow-creatures were high and unsullied descent united with riches. A man might be respected with only one of these advantages but, without either, he was considered, except in very rare instances, as a vagabond and a slave, doomed to waste his powers for the profits of the chosen few! And what was I? Of my creation and creator I was absolutely ignorant; but I knew that I possessed no money, no friends, no kind of property. I was, besides, endued with a figure hideously deformed and loathsome; I was not even of the same nature as men. I was more agile than they, and could subsist upon coarser diet; I bore the extremes of heat and cold with less injury to my frame; my stature far exceeded theirs. When I looked around, I saw and heard of none like me. Was I then a monster, a blot upon the earth, from which all men fled, and whom all men disowned?

"I cannot describe to you the agony that these reflections inflicted upon me: I tried to dispel them, but sorrow only increased with knowledge. Oh, that I had forever remained in my native wood, nor known nor felt beyond the sensations of hunger, thirst, and heat!

"Of what a strange nature is knowledge! It clings to the mind, when it has once seized on it, like a lichen on the rock. I wished sometimes to shake off all thought and feeling; but I learned that there was but one means to overcome the sensation of pain, and that was death -- a state which I feared yet did not understand. I admired virtue and good feelings, and loved the gentle manners and amiable qualities of my cottagers; but I was shut out from intercourse with them, except through means which I obtained by stealth, when I was unseen and unknown, and which rather increased than satisfied the desire I had of becoming one among my fellows. The gentle words of Agatha, and the animated smiles of the charming Arabian, were not for me. The mild exhortations of the old man, and the lively conversation of the loved Felix, were not for me. Miserable, unhappy wretch!

"Other lessons were impressed upon me even more deeply. I heard of the difference of sexes; and the birth and growth of children; how the father doated on the smiles of the infant, and the lively sallies of the older child; how all the life and cares of the mother were wrapped up in the precious charge; how the mind of youth expanded and gained knowledge; of brother, sister, and all the various relationships which bind one human being to another in mutual bonds.

"But where were my friends and relations? No father had watched my infant days, no mother had blessed me with smiles and caresses; or if they had, all my past life was now a blot, a blind vacancy in which I distinguished nothing. From my earliest remembrance I had been as I then was in height and proportion. I had never yet seen a being resembling me, or who claimed any intercourse with me. What was I? The question again recurred, to be answered only with groans.

"I will soon explain to what these feelings tended; but allow me now to return to the cottagers, whose story excited in me such various feelings of indignation, delight, and wonder, but which all terminated in additional love and reverence for my protectors (for so I loved, in an innocent, half painful self-deceit, to call them)."' (ibid, pp. 183-7)

And this speech reminds me of Roy Batty's death-scene in Blade Runner:

`I lay at the bottom of the boat, and, as I gazed on the cloudless blue sky, I seemed to drink in a tranquillity to which I had long been a stranger. And if these were my sensations, who can describe those of Henry? He felt as if he had been transported to Fairyland, and enjoyed a happiness seldom tasted by man. 

"I have seen," he said, "the most beautiful scenes of my own country; I have visited the lakes of Lucerne and Uri, where the snowy mountains descend almost perpendicularly to the water, casting black and impenetrable shades, which would cause a gloomy and mournful appearance, were it not for the most verdant islands that relieve the eye by their gay appearance; I have seen this lake agitated by a tempest, when the wind tore up whirlwinds of water, and gave you an idea of what the waterspout must be on the great ocean; and the waves dash with fury the base of the mountain, where the priest and his mistress were overwhelmed by an avalanche, and where their dying voices are still said to be heard amid the pauses of the nightly wind; I have seen the mountains of La Valais, and the Pays de Vaud: but this country, Victor, pleases me more than all those wonders. The mountains of Switzerland are more majestic and strange; but there is a charm in the banks of this divine river, that I never before saw equalled. Look at that castle which overhangs yon precipice; and that also on the island, almost concealed amongst the foliage of those lovely trees; and now that group of labourers coming from among their vines; and that village half hid in the recess of the mountain. Oh, surely, the spirit that inhabits and guards this place has a soul more in harmony with man than those who pile the glacier, or retire to the inaccessible peaks of the mountains of our own country."' (ibid, pp. 242-3)

And this revenge bit is great:

`Liberty, however, had been an useless gift to me had I not, as I awakened to reason, at the same time awakened to revenge. As the memory of past misfortunes pressed upon me, I began to reflect on their cause -- the monster whom I had created, the miserable daemon whom I had sent abroad into the world for my destruction. I was possessed by a maddening rage when I thought of him, and desired and ardently prayed that I might have him within my grasp to wreak a great and signal revenge on his cursed head.' (ibid, pp. 310-1)

This is awesome:

`The deep grief which this scene had at first excited quickly gave way to rage and despair. They were dead, and I lived; their murderer also lived, and to destroy him I must drag out my weary existence. I knelt on the grass and kissed the earth and with quivering lips exclaimed, “By the sacred earth on which I kneel, by the shades that wander near me, by the deep and eternal grief that I feel, I swear; and by thee, O Night, and the spirits that preside over thee, to pursue the daemon who caused this misery, until he or I shall perish in mortal conflict. For this purpose I will preserve my life; to execute this dear revenge will I again behold the sun and tread the green herbage of earth, which otherwise should vanish from my eyes forever. And I call on you, spirits of the dead, and on you, wandering ministers of vengeance, to aid and conduct me in my work. Let the cursed and hellish monster drink deep of agony; let him feel the despair that now torments me.” I had begun my adjuration with solemnity and an awe which almost assured me that the shades of my murdered friends heard and approved my devotion, but the furies possessed me as I concluded, and rage choked my utterance.

I was answered through the stillness of night by a loud and fiendish laugh. It rang on my ears long and heavily; the mountains re-echoed it, and I felt as if all hell surrounded me with mockery and laughter. Surely in that moment I should have been possessed by frenzy and have destroyed my miserable existence but that my vow was heard and that I was reserved for vengeance. The laughter died away, when a well-known and abhorred voice, apparently close to my ear, addressed me in an audible whisper, “I am satisfied, miserable wretch! You have determined to live, and I am satisfied.”' (ibid pp. 316-7)

And finally I love this in the Epilogue:

`“That he should live to be an instrument of mischief disturbs me; in other respects, this hour, when I momentarily expect my release, is the only happy one which I have enjoyed for several years. The forms of the beloved dead flit before me, and I hasten to their arms. Farewell, Walton! Seek happiness in tranquillity and avoid ambition, even if it be only the apparently innocent one of distinguishing yourself in science and discoveries. Yet why do I say this? I have myself been blasted in these hopes, yet another may succeed.”

His voice became fainter as he spoke, and at length, exhausted by his effort, he sank into silence. About half an hour afterwards he attempted again to speak but was unable; he pressed my hand feebly, and his eyes closed forever, while the irradiation of a gentle smile passed away from his lips.' (ibid, p. 340)

Anyway it's an amazing novel. You should totally read it.

Hopefully these bits haven't spoiled it but rather whetted the appetite, and, warmed the cockles,

Thank you Mary Shelley, for pretty much inventing: science fiction. You are amazeballs.

...And here's some stuff on consilience.

See also `Frankenstein's Synesthesia' in Psychology Today.

And see: ` Life, Consciousness and Existence' quotes - from Frankenstein (Schmoop) .


-----------------------

Joe T Velikovsky

Transmedia Writer-Director-Producer:
Movies, Games, TV, Theatre, Books, Comics
Transmedia Writing Blog: http://on-writering.blogspot.com.au/

& Bio-Culture (Science & the Arts) & Transmedia Researcher
Academia link: https://aftrs.academia.edu/JTVelikovsky

& (High-RoI) Story/Screenplay/Movie Analyst and Evolutionary Systems Theorist
See: https://storyality.wordpress.com/

IMDb: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/joeteevee

& Random Guy

`Bathurst Remembers' Project - Film Awards Night (Oct 2016)

The `Bathurst Remembers - 200 Years' Project - Gala Film Awards Evening (2016)


Bathurst Remembers - 200 Years - Gala Film Awards Evening, BMEC, Bathurst
So, the `Bathurst Remembers' project...

Had a Gala Film Awards Evening at BMEC on 11th October 2016...

And here's some Background Info about the Bathurst Remembers Filmmaking Competition... (...If you like that sort of thing.)


And here's some video, shot on the night at BMEC: (probably, best to watch `FULLSCREEN' on YouTube... 
well; if you like that sort of thing...)

`Bathurst Remembers' Filmmaking Comp Gala Awards Evening 2016 (17 mins)


And - it was an honour and a privilege to receive not one, but two prizes in the competition:
2nd Prize - Bathurst Remembers Film Comp (2016):
for
` Runaway Chainsaw '
&
` Charles Darwin in Bathurst 1836 'So - actually - to be precise, it was two honours, and,  two privileges... (!!)

Thanks again to the whole Bathurst Remembers team -- including, but not limited to: Bruce and Helen Ryan, Christine Sweeney, Steve Semmens, Mayor Gary Rush, Ruth Jansen, Lawrance Ryan - and, anyone I may have accidentally forgotten.

And, a big Congratulations to all the other Prize and Certificate winners - there were lots of them!

It felt like all the glitterati of Bathrust was there, in the one room.

Dave Bowman has an epiphany in 2001: A Space Odyssey (1969)
directed by Stanley Kubrick,
Screenplay co-written by Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C Clarke 
And hey - you know who was there?
...Roving Leo! From `Roving Leo' in Bathurst City Life !
And he even totally makes a cameo appearance, in the video above, at about 5 mins 23 seconds.
He also does some more roving at 5 mins and 45 seconds. (Seriously.) Anyway - so, yeah; he was totally there too.

Also I was really glad Tracy Sorensen won First Prize - her documentaries are amazing.

...and, anyway - if of interest - here are the 2 x short films that both won 2nd-Prize:

Charles Darwin in Bathurst - 1836 (14 mins)
(again - probably best to watch this one `FULLSCREEN' on YouTube, too...)



See, also: Darwin Down Under  (a historical-comedy play about Charles Darwin's visit to Bathurst in 1836...)
And -- the other film...

Runaway Chainsaw in Bathurst (14 mins)
(hmm, probably best to, er, watch `FULLSCREEN' ...on... YouTube...)






And for stihl more - see also: RUNAWAY CHAINSAW - The Movie  (90 mins)



And - for even more, maybe see:

the Runaway Chainsaw FaceBook page .



But wait - there's more.


For even still more, see: http://www.bathurstremembers.com/
And see: https://www.youtube.com/user/BathurstRemembers200/videos
(you can see all of the films here)
And see: http://on-writering.blogspot.com.au/2015/07/runaway-chainsaw-in-bathurst-short.html
(though - there is not much to see there, that you haven't already seen, here...)
And maybe even see: http://on-writering.blogspot.com.au/
-----------------

Anyway - so I'd encourage anyone and everyone to enter the Bathurst Remembers Filmmaking Competition next year. All you need is a phone-camera & a computer with Windows Movie-Maker. That's all I shot & cut these 2 x movies on. (And - they won a prize! And, prolly, so can you-!)
Hmmm... I see a whole genre of ` RUNAWAY [insert-inanimate-object-here]' movies, in the future... 
e.g. Runaway-Toaster... Runaway Power-Drill... Runaway Busted-Shopping-Trolley. ...etc. *
...Have at it-! (Just make sure, if you enter the comp, that it has something to do with: Bathurst!)

* (and You can totally steal that idea - no credit or thanks ever needed; plenty more where that came from :) ...Runaway Garden-Gnome...  Runaway Ride-On-Lawnmower... Runaway Wheely-Bin... ...Runaway Letterbox... Runaway Dust-Buster...  etc etc etc
-----------------------

Joe T Velikovsky

Transmedia Writer-Director-Producer:
Movies, Games, TV, Theatre, Books, Comics
Transmedia Writing Blog: http://on-writering.blogspot.com.au/

& Bio-Culture (Science & the Arts) & Transmedia Researcher
Academia link: https://aftrs.academia.edu/JTVelikovsky

& (High-RoI) Story/Screenplay/Movie Analyst and Evolutionary Systems Theorist
See: https://storyality.wordpress.com/

IMDb: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/joeteevee

& Random Guy

Recent publication:

Velikovsky, J. T. (2016), `The Holon/Parton Theory of the Unit of Culture (or the Meme, and Narreme) in Science, Media, Entertainment and the Arts' - book chapter in
A. Connor & S. Marks (Eds.), "Creative Technologies for Multidisciplinary Applications", New York: IGI Global. See: https://storyality.wordpress.com/2016/04/06/storyality132-the-holon-parton-structure-of-the-meme-the-unit-of-culture/

Home The holon/parton structure of the Meme, the unit of culture (and `narreme’, or the unit of story)

I have a chapter in the new book: Creative Technologies for Multidisciplinary Applications (2016).Velikovsky, J. T. (2016). `The Holon/Parton Theory of the Unit of Culture (or the Meme, and Narreme): In Science, Media, Entertainment and the Arts‘, in: A. Connor & S. Marks (Eds.), Creative Technologies for Multidisciplinary Applications. New York: IGI Global.

Chapter Abstract
A universal problem in the disciplines of communication, creativity, philosophy, biology, psychology, sociology, anthropology, archaeology, history, linguistics, information science, cultural studies, literature, media and other domains of knowledge in both the arts and sciences has been the definition of ‘culture’ (see Kroeber & Kluckhohn, 1952; Baldwin et al., 2006), including the specification of ‘the unit of culture’, and, mechanisms of culture. This chapter proposes a theory of the unit of culture, or, the ‘meme’ (Dawkins, 1976; Dennett, 1995; Blackmore, 1999), a unit which is also the narreme (Barthes, 1966), or ‘unit of story’, or ‘unit of narrative’.The holon/parton theory of the unit of culture (Velikovsky, 2014) is a consilient (Wilson, 1998) synthesis of (Koestler, 1964, 1967, 1978) and Feynman (1975, 2005) and also the Evolutionary Systems Theory model of creativity (Csikszentmihalyi, 1988-2014; Simonton, 1984-2014). This theory of the unit of culture potentially has applications across all creative cultural domains and disciplines in the sciences, arts and communication media.(Velikovsky in Marks & Connor 2016, p. 208)

See also: the post about this, on StoryAlity

`RUNAWAY CHAINSAW - in Bathurst' (short historical comedy movie)

`RUNAWAY CHAINSAW - in Bathurst'
So - this is a short (14 minute) historical-comedy movie (Rated `G') - about, a runaway chainsaw in Bathurst - made for the Bathurst Remembers competition.




Feel free to click `Like' on YouTube, if you like it.

And - visit, the: RUNAWAY CHAINSAW in Bathurst web page, for much more information. 

Comments welcome -


JT Velikovsky
StoryAlity