Wonderland: Technology, Movies and Hucksterism

In my second post of Steven Johnson’s Wonderland, I will discuss Chapter 4. The chapter is titled “Illusion: The Ghost Makers” and its main theme traces the rise of the Phantasmagoria and its connection to other forms of mass public entertainment today. Today’s horror-movie genre has its roots in these “fantasy” shows.

Johnson traces the history of these “ghost” shows starting with Schropfer in Germany. Subsequently Philidor in France raises the spectacle to a new art form with “three new contributions to the genre. First, he began rear-projecting the spectral images on a thin, semitransparent curtain that was otherwise invisible to the spectators… [He] also pioneered the technique of placing the magic lantern on wheels [thereby creating] the illusion that the specters were growing larger as they approached the terrified spectators. [Finally] he gave his spook show a name, one that would haunt the imagination of Europeans for decades to come: The Phantasmagoria.”

As to why people are attracted to such spectacles, I leave that up to your imagination. I personally don’t see the point of paying money to feel fear viscerally even though my mind knows that what I’m seeing isn’t real. There might be a sociobiological narrative purporting to “explain” this phenomenon, but clearly our imaginations allow us to immerse ourselves in the story. One doesn’t need a live show or an IMAX movie experience. A good book is sufficient. In Sold on Language, Sedivy and Carlson write have a section titled “The Leaky Insulation of Fiction.” Here’s a quote from their book.

“Fiction acts as a protective layer around an invented world that keeps certain actions from getting out into the real world… [but] what makes fiction really interesting and really useful are the ways in which the real and the unreal have a way of bleeding together. The [leaks in the wall] give fiction a power that goes well beyond mere amusement… We know that the events happening in the pretend world aren’t happening in the real world. But this doesn’t stop us from feeling as if they were real… You’ve experienced this if you’ve ever stayed up all night because you couldn’t put down the detective novel you were reading, or if you groaned in frustration when your favorite TV series ends in a cliffhanger. You were gripped by the need to know what happens next.”

But let’s get back to Johnson’s story. In the early nineteenth century, a Scottish scientist (and ordained minister) named David Brewster became very interested in the Phantasmagoria. (Apparently he invented the kaleidoscope, the “PlayStation of the late Georgian era”.) Why did he go to the West End to view these spectacles? Johnson writes: “He was there in part as a debunker, a skeptic discerning the secret craft behind the spectacle. But he also sensed that something profound was lurking in the trickery, that the showmen were exploiting the quirks in the human sensory system… He was [also] there to [take] notes for a book that he would come to call Letters on Natural Magic.”

As a scientist who enjoys thinking about history, religion, and magic, I think I would have enjoyed chatting with Brewster. These topics weave in and out of my blog posts. (I also discuss higher education, because I’m steeped in that milieu.) The version of Sherlock Holmes played by Robert Downey Jr. and directed by Guy Ritchie explores the intersection between science and magic through a modern action movie lens. The alchemist scientist-sorcerers are another example in the era where the wall between science and magic was blurred. This reminds me that I should really get around to writing my Potions book or Theory of Magic book. But I digress.

Here’s what I thought was most interesting about Johnson’s chapter. “Brewster had realized that, just as Enlightenment science had unlocked many doors for creating magical distortions of reality, it had also unlocked doors for detecting the laws behind that reality. The ability to understand the world advanced at roughly the same pace as the ability to deceive.” I had to stop and re-read that last sentence several times until it sank in. Let me repeat it, slightly paraphrased.

The ability to understand the world advances at roughly the same pace as the ability to deceive.

Indeed, it seems that with every technological advance made by well-meaning humans, hucksters are right there trying to take advantage with deception. The ability to make photographs also brought fake photos. When photos went digital, so did the doctoring of photos. When paper money started circulating, so did fake paper money. When coins were minted for currency, there were folks trying to make imitations using a cheaper material.

In my chemistry for non-science majors class, I regularly discuss Penta water. As the technology to “process” water advanced and the market for bottled water products increased, so did products such as Penta water. The scientific claims are nonsensical to a chemist, but would the general public recognize such hucksterism? Water products are a magnet for hucksters to ply their wares, the latest of these being Hydrogen water. I’m not going to provide a link to such nonsense. I’ll simply say that adding molecular H₂ to your water product will not get it in your system when you drink the “water”. Even if a tiny amount did, it would diffuse out so quickly as to make no difference. If for some reason H–H bonds of H₂ started breaking and reacting in your body with anything, you’ve got much bigger problems. Enough said.

The last thing I want to mention is Johnson’s discussion of showmen “exploiting the quirks of the human sensory system”. He points out that the entire TV and movie industry is based on our inability to separate images faster than twelve frames per second. Instead of seeing separate still images, we perceive continuous motion. I enjoy watching movies in the cinema. It’s an immersive experience, but one that relies on both the limits of human perception and the leaky wall in fiction that bursts into our imaginative lives. A Wonderland, indeed!