This half hour video from the University of Toronto was broadcast on TV Ontario (Canadian Public Television) in 2004, as the 12th of a 13-part series dealing with mythology and neuroscience. It is based on the book, Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Belief (www. mapsofmeaning.com).

Theme: Because life is uncertain, complex and terrifying, people require a shield or substantive individual strength. Culture and social identification provide a shield. Voluntary contact with the chaotic, unknown and terrifying, by contrast, provides specifically redemptive information, and helps the personality develop enough genuine strength to overcome existential terror, vengeful response to that terror, and the pathologies of ideological identification.