Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin (1889–1977) is considered one of the first movie stars ever and made film history with his acting and his works. He is also one of the few artists who managed the transition from silent films to sound films.
Because of using archetypal imagery and symbols in his films, it is natural that the moon could also play a part somewhere. We found four references:
Selene is the Greek moon goddess, she is a daughter of Hyperion and Theia from the Titans, a race of deities. The two siblings of Selene are Eos (the goddess of dawn) and Helios (the god of the sun). These three, forge the bridge between day and night, the Sun and the Moon, masculine and feminine. Later, in Greek mythology, Selene has also been equated with Artemis, just like Apollo is linked with the sun god Helios.
Inspired by his trip to the coast of Maine, USA, the American artist and lithographer Fitz Hugh Lane (1804–1865) – aka Fitz Henry Lane – created the full moon painting »Fishing Party«, in 1855. He was a representative of the American luminism, a painting style characterized by a specific form of light-flooded landscapes in the 19th century (lumen = lat. light).
Does the full moon have anything to do with our weather? Does the weather change at full moon or at new moon? Is there actually more or less rain and does the temperature therefore drop or rise? A few questions that everyone has surely heard of in one or the other form …
»Moon blindness« (lat. morbus lunaticus) has nothing to do with the moonlight and luckily does not afflict humans. It is a disease of the eyes of horses, which recurs periodically. Due to an inflammation of the iris, which is caused by bacteria from food that has been contaminated by mice and rats, the cornea of the eye can cloud over. This leaves a bluish color, which gave the illness its name (even though the moonlight is not blue). If this inflammation continues to happen in an interval of months, it is possible that over the years it can lead to complete blindness of the animal. There is the option of an eye operation in the early stage of the illness, however, this is not straightforward.
Almost exactly 40 years ago, on 06.02.1971, Alan B. Shepard succeeded the furthest one-handed golf swing in history to date, as commander of the Apollo 14 mission. He did not accomplish this due to any extraordinary abilities as a golf player, but because he struck the golf ball on the moon. And because of the prevailing, scarce amount of gravity and the absent braking effect in the atmosphere, the ball flew extremely far.
Shepard had to strike the ball one-handedly, as the rigid space suit did not allow two-handed play. He undertook four attempts and struck two balls altogether. How far exactly they flew has not been documented, however, one can assume a couple of hundred metres. In the original audio material of NASA, you can hear Shepard saying jokingly, after his last tee off »Miles and miles and miles …«.
Buzz Aldrin (* 1930) is an American astronaut and the man, who, as part of the Apollo 11 mission on 21st July 1969, stepped onto the Moon as the second person, just after Neil Armstrong. He stood in the shadow of his colleague and one could assume that he may have suffered under these circumstances. But this was not the case, he did not really want to be in the spotlight and was satisfied coming second. After he set his feet into the dust 20 minutes after Armstrong did, he said: »Beautiful, beautiful. Magnificent desolation.«
The word “aggression” derives from the Latin verb “aggredi” which means »approach, attack«. This is interesting, because it does not only contain a destructive energy, but also a proceeding, solution-oriented energy. We also speak of tackling problems or approaching a task. During the course of the centuries, the component of attacking and destroying appears to have become dominant, so much so, that we judge aggression nowadays negatively and see the result to be destruction, violence and war. It is easily understandable now, why people are having such a difficult time to deal naturally with their aggressions that they express or restrain. We have put a negative mark on it. And we neither want to carry something negative inside us, nor do we want to voice it.
Like all natives of a country, the Native Americans, as inhabitants of the American continent, have a connection to the moon events and the full moon, too. It appears in mythology as much as in the relevant lifestyles. Instead of the term »Native American Indian« the term »indigenous peoples of the Americas« is generally used nowadays. It is strived for to be politically correct.
As already mentioned in our article about sleepwalking, a connection was made in the past between the moonlight and people, if their conduct was odd, crazy or threatening. One assumed that the moonlight caused this behaviour and spoke of “lunatic”, which derives from the Latin “lunatus” and means more or less “influenced by the moon”. In English, this terminology “lunatic” has been used for many forms of mental illnesses over many centuries. Because many of these disorders could not be explained for a long time (and there are still plenty of questions today), one was in need of a point of reference, a word that would accompany on the path of darkness. The Moon was very convenient.
The antlion is the larva of the myrmeleon, which belongs to the net-winged insects. This insect grows to be 0.6 inches and predominantly stands out because of its large jaw pincers, which let you anticipate its predatory disposition. The antlion is famous for its sophisticated method catching prey. It digs funnels in the sand that function like a trap for other insects (i.e., ants or spiders). When prey steps on the edge of the funnel, the antlion begins to throw sand on the animal from the bottom of the funnel. The thereby created movements, activate the slipping of the funnel walls and transport the prey directly into the fangs of the antlion, who then kills them with its poison.