The Evil Eye

I am hyper-vigilant. I believe in the existence of evil. If that makes me paranoid, well, I'll handle it. My long range reading plan is driven by a hunger for a more fertile and abundant reality but not one without a good road map. For that reason I have intended for some time to re-read a great little book which clarifies somewhat the problem of the evil eye, something that hadn't disappeared from the culture during my formative years; it resonated in our village's nearby Italian neighborhood, and in my father's introjects of his dear illiterate Montenegrin Serb Mother.  It was for instance why he blessed himself when he went by our little Catholic Church, even though he never attended it. Someone was watching. The book is titled Mal Occhio, [evil eye], The Underside of Vision, the author is Lawrence Di Stasi, and I am re-reading it as we speak. 

Very quickly, in his short but profound book, Mr. DiStasi  makes the connection from the evil eye to envy*. Now, personally I've always thought that envy is one of the most under-rated of the seven deadly sins. A mother and her baby on a walk run in to a woman who gushes over the baby's beauty. The baby comes down with a fever and the old aunt is called in to enact the process of Mal Ochio, which involves olive oil in a bowl of water, (which the author explains in detail.) It is a process which works to counter the disease brought about by the evil eye. DiStasi also delves into the causes of the evil, as perceived by it's believers, in the history of the unwitting gazer.  One common cause is believed to be the result of a child being allowed to go back to nursing after having been weaned. This of course is primitive stuff, probably, we think, going back to the Paleolithic. 

 He then brilliantly relates the peasant superstition and/or mythology on the evil eye to the progression of theological concepts from recent Christianity back through the transition from the Goddess of the Mammoth hunters to the gradual changing of the guard from female led pantheon to Male led which he traces, with help from Joseph Campbell et. al., to the beginnings of the Bronze age.

What appeals to me though is that I tend to give the mythology credence in my own life, possibly owing to a mixture of existential influences from the culture in which I grew up, small town multi-cultural America, multi-culturally raised, somewhat superstitious father, and certain life particulars, such as; that I was a child model, a life situation I go into in some depth in my oft mentioned book, The White Fence. My father used photographs of my sister and me, as well as other people in town, local citizens who'd volunteer as models, and occasionally professional models from an agency in New York City, as part of his process of painting illustrations for fiction and advertising in magazines such as The Saturday Evening Post, Ladies Home Journal, Red Book, and the like.  Modelling was not an easy job. Film was not as fast 70 years ago as it is today. (When Tri-X film came out it was a blessing). And huge powerful lights were required, which burned the eyes. There was a kind of feeling of being coerced almost to the point of torture by the big brute of a father, who would also charm and bribe. I received money whenever I modeled, money according to a perceived going rate; something like five dollars when I was five, and ten when I was ten, and yes, I was still at it at twenty, when twenty bucks was a lot of beer money. 

The job itself was referred to as Posing for Dad, though when others did it it was called modelling. What was harder than the job itself, for me, was that it put undo attention on me in the eyes of the small town population.  As in, "I saw you in your Dad's illustration. You're so cute!" That from adults. My contemporaries among the children never mentioned it, but I sensed a certain resentment. I never thought about envy in those days, mostly I'm referring here to the 1950s, but, with the magazine exposure and the flamboyant family, the former model mother, and all;  in retrospect I feel I was "at the affect", of a heightened envy environment.   

The Saturday Evening Post, in particular, was important in mid 20th century America, as it had been since the days of the Declaration of Independence. I invite you to check out the following well done website..... https://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/history-saturday evening-post.

To follow this thinking about envy a little further, let's remember that what "catches the eye", is usually something of value, with value and attraction semantically closely tied. We value a beautiful child, gold, food, real estate, baubles, and many things; but with children the sense of value seems instinctive. All mammals seem particularly drawn to the babies of their species, and sometimes to other species.  We love puppies and kittens. Dogs seem to love and be extra gentle with baby humans. (See youtube.)  It even has a name;  Neoteny:  

 
From an article in the Scientific American, July 1, 2009, by Charles Q. Choi, titled; Being more infantile may have led to bigger Brains. The author is so concise that I can't see paraphrasing the whole article, so, ...quoting the author;

"For decades scientists have noted that mature humans physically resemble immature chimps—we, too, have small jaws, flat faces and sparse body hair. The retention of juvenile features, called Neoteny in Evolutionary Biology, is especially apparent in domesticated animals—thanks to human preferences, many dog breeds have puppy features such as floppy ears, short snouts and large eyes. Now genetic evidence suggests that neoteny could help explain why humans are so radically different from chimpanzees, even though both species share most of the same genes and split apart only about six million years ago, a short time in evolutionary terms.

In animals, Neoteny comes about because of delays in development, points out molecular biologist Philipp Khaitovich of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany. For instance, humans sexually mature roughly five years after chimps do, and our teeth erupt later. “Changes in the timing of development are some of the most powerful mechanisms evolution can use to remodel organisms, with very few molecular events required,” he explains.

To look for genetic evidence that neoteny played a role in the evolution of Homo sapiens, Khaitovich and his colleagues compared the expression of 7,958 genes in the brains of 39 humans, 14 chimpanzees and nine rhesus monkeys. They collected samples from the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex—a region linked with memory that is relatively easy to identify in the primate brain. These tissues came from deceased individuals at several stages of life, from infancy to middle age, enabling the researchers to see how genetic activity changed over time in each species.

In both humans and chimps, about the same percentage of genes changed in activity over time. But roughly half these age-linked genes in humans differed from chimps in terms of when they were active during development. Analysis of the 299 genes whose timings had shifted in all three species revealed that almost 40 percent were expressed later in life in humans, with some genetic activity delayed well into adolescence.

Although the specific function of many of these neotenic genes remains uncertain, they are especially active in the gray matter of the human brain, where higher thought occurs, the researchers note in the April 7 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA. [year?] They are now probing other parts of the brain in humans, chimps and macaques to see where neoteny might play a role.

Actually proving that neoteny helped to drive human evolution and brain size is difficult. Khaitovich suggests analyzing genetic activity in cases of faster-than-normal development in people, “which past research already shows can lead to a reduction in cognitive abilities,” he says.

Other experts certainly think that neoteny’s role is reasonable. The ability of the brain to learn is apparently greatest before full maturity sets in, “and since neoteny means an extended childhood, you have this greater chance for the brain to develop,” says molecular phylogeneticist Morris Goodman of Wayne State University, who did not participate in this study. In other words, human evolution might have been advanced by the possibilities brimming in youth.

Note: This story was originally printed with the title, "Juvenile Thoughts."

[Neoteny is a characteristic of domesticated animals, dogs, foxes, horses, cows, and etc. and may account for improved learning ability.]

And. Babies are cute, and they continue to be cute over a long period, in spite of being very messy. And young women, some more than others, are judged cute by many men of all ages. Women's magazines such as Vogue, Elle, Town and Country, print advertisements for expensive women's clothes, supposedly for women of marrying age, using fourteen year old models, many of whom look disturbingly like  Jon-Benet Ramsey.  


*I may have been primed for this book by another book which came into my life many years ago; and in an odd way. The book, titled Envy, A Theory of Social Behavior, by Helmut Schoeck;  ( b. 3 July 1922; d. 2 Feb 1993 ); was sitting on a friend's shelf for several years and my eye kept being drawn to the title on it's spine. I eventually peeked into it, and then, over time, I asked if I could borrow it, and my friend said, "Take it, it came with the house."  It is a scholarly tome, but fascinating. It is a survey of the forces of envy in primitive cultures throughout the world. His research illustrates clearly how envy shapes cultures, down to the ubiquitous feeling that anyone's eye can be envious and that envy inspires sorcery. Love thy neighbor? More like watch your neighbor very carefully. When I finally finished it I was convinced that envy is the engine that runs the world. The book has glowing blurbs from Karl Popper and Thomas Szasz. The author was a professor of Sociology, born in Austria, educated in Germany and the United States, post doctoral fellowship at Yale, and etc.