UNDER THE MICROSCOPE: Anyone feeling off this week? Life Detective begins an investigation of the seen and unseen forces around us to find out why.
What’s Weird this Week?
May 8 to May 15, 2022: The week started with Mother’s Day, a chance to pay honor to the moms in our world. It also may have prompted us to think about the mothers and grandmothers in our families that are no longer physically with us. This pushed us to connect with our “sixth sense” and spiritual side. At the same time, Americans were absorbing the release of a Supreme Court decision on abortion, an emotional topic for most and one that splits an already divided nation. From daily reality to superstitions, we progressed through a week of stock market losses and a cryptocurrency crash heading to Friday the 13th. From the land of science, astronomers released photos of the black hole at the center of our galaxy. By tonight, May 15, much of the world will be able to observe a rare “super blood moon”, an eclipse of a full moon occurring when the earth and moon are particularly close to one another.
Down here on earth and in the land of the living, Life Detective has been feeling off the entire week. Things have felt weird for several years, especially since the pandemic started, but this week was even more strange. I had a dream about my deceased Father one night, then viewed a cardinal (a “spirit animal”) in my path the next day right when I was recounting the dream to my wife. At the same time, a thousand miles away, a cousin was posting a cardinal picture with a reference to her own father. The next night, I had a dream about stresses from a past job — the next morning an old friend from that job called me for this first time in ages. Others in my household seemed to be a bit off and expressed feeling unusual this week. On Saturday May 14, a senseless act of violence in my hometown region of Western New York forced many across the country to feel “off” as an 18-year-old with apparent racial motivations killed 10 people at a supermarket in Buffalo. Are the invisible forces causing us to feel off? Let’s unbundle a couple of these.
Friday the 13th
When the 13th day of any month falls on a Friday, many of us may feel slightly unnerved. Fridays and the number 13 are both commonly considered to be unlucky. The leading explanation for this comes from Jesus’ crucifixion on a Friday following the Last Supper with 13 in attendance. 13 is also unlucky as the normal number in a gathering of witches known as a coven. One researcher asserts that such superstitions come from a time when life was uncertain and “you felt you didn’t have control”. This would certainly have seemed to have been the case hundreds of years ago. For example, according to Monty Python comics, people of the Middle Ages believed that witches burned because they were made of wood.
In today’s world, it would seem to most observers that we humans are less superstitious than in centuries past. Nevertheless, it seems many are still a bit superstitious about Fridays and the number 13. For example, most skyscrapers still “skip” floor 13 (and even though we really know the 14th floor is really the 13th floor). In a science and data-driven world, studies have been done to disprove superstitions. There are studies which demonstrate that bad days on Wall Street and car accidents are no more prominent on Friday the 13th as compared to any other day. Sure – the rest of us know the data shows no increases in car accidents because we intentionally do less on Friday the 13th (wink, wink)! And step on a crack to risk damage to my mother’s back, forget it!
It Must be a Full Moon!
In terms of folklore, we all know that spooky stuff more commonly occurs under a full moon. For example, a full moon facilitates the transition of werewolves from human form into full wolves. What about impacts on regular humans? Well, let’s start with the word “lunatic” which is derived from the Latin word for moon, or “luna”. More specifically, “the word ‘lunatic’ originally referred to a kind of insanity that recurred according to the cycles of the moon.”
Modern scientific research has failed to clearly establish lunar cycles have specific impacts on humans. One study indicated that human subjects took five minutes longer to fall asleep and slept 2o minutes less overall during a full moon. However, these results could not be reproduced in later studies. Another researcher found a correlation between the moon’s cycle and manic and depression episodes of bipolar patients. Nevertheless, even the lead researcher doubts these effects were caused by the light of a full moon, but more likely the gravitational pull of the moon, if there were any connection at all.
One author definitively put to rest the theory of a full moon impacting human behavior in this quote: “In 1985, researchers conducted a meta-analysis of 37 studies comparing lunar cycles to instances of crisis center calls, suicides, crimes, and psychiatric issues. The results show no relation between the full moon and any increase in these occurrences.” Although conceding that our ancestors may have had more sleep issues related to the light of a full moon, the same article seems to conclude that any oddities occurring under a full moon are more likely self-fulfilling prophecies or merely persistent superstitions. Other sources reference studies that have linked solar activity to increases in heart attacks and strokes, epileptic fits, schizophrenia, and suicides, but find little evidence of a provable link between lunar cycles, and specifically full moons, to biological impacts on humans.
But it’s a Blood Moon
This month’s full moon is special. A total eclipse will cause the moon to appear red. This red moon is referred to as a “blood moon”. If the effects of full moons on humans have largely been dispelled, what about blood moons? Well, the bible has a few scary references to blood moons, all of which seem to suggest the blood moon is a sign the “end times” are near. This might well cause many of us to feel “off” this week. However, I suggest we consider relaxing. First, there have been blood moons reported by humans going back to 1137 B.C. Second, two Christian preachers promoted the idea that a series of four lunar eclipses in 2014 and 2015 foretold the end times were near. One of them even wrote a bestselling book on the topic. Yet, we are all still here.
Nevertheless, it has been a weird week and it coincides with some out of the ordinary events. It seems that superstitions around Friday the 13th, full moons, and lunar eclipses may in fact just be superstitions. For those committed to the real impact of these superstitions, the best I can do to justify your beliefs is to say that modern science just hasn’t figured out how to prove their existence. At present, the superstitions may merely be creations of our own minds. But as such, they can still be powerful impacts on our daily lives . . . it sure feels like it this week.
