I did a 'swim with sharks' thing at Sea World (or whatever the Queensland equivalent is) with a few human-safe species of sharks, a few rays, and a selection of other fish. One of the other fish was, as far as I recall, some kind of giant grouper which, as far as my memory tells me, was huge, unmoving, and had it's mouth open the whole time, and it's mouth hole would have been big enough to put my entire head inside (this is according to my memory anyway).

I was nervous beforehand, but once I was in (and had accepted the inevitability of my own death) it was surprisingly calm / calming floating around and having these frickin' aquatic alien species just going about their dailies around me. I went close to the massive grouper just to get the scale right (not that I can really remember, it was 26 years ago). I even looked through the perspex so I could see the non-human-safe sharks in the tank next door.

After the (awesome) experience, I went and looked at the grouper from the outside (one of those underground big perspex viewing rooms) and I was back to being awed / scared by its size, and somewhat refusing to believe that I'd been in there with it. The memory of it is scarier to me than what I remember feeling when actually doing it. It's weird.

If somebody feels no fear while zooming towards a black hole, their brain has some strange wires crossed.

Strongly recommend Outer Wilds. Falling into the black hole the first time was one of my most scared moments in gaming. I was totally panicking lol

To be fair, is there anyone alive who wouldn't be afraid of a black hole? It's a celestial body so gargantuan its gravity bends the light passing around it like a lens. Anyone who gets too close to one will literally never be seen again, ever.

> Melanoheliophobia

Tangential, but this being a nearly word-for-word translation of “black hole fear” made me realize how odd it is that we insist on latinizing these things.

I can't play Outer Wilds specifically because of this. Specially because of the black holes.

> Melanoheliophobia, which is fear of black holes

Thank you for mentioning this. I am an avid space nerd. One day I decided to try Space Engine, and one of the first thing I did was get warped to a black hole. Seeing a literal hole in space time appear in front of my screen was one of the most terrifying things I've experienced. I Alt-F4'd, and never opened that application again.

It's like every single atom, nay, every single subatomic carrier of information in my body was telling me to stay the hell away from that.

I'm exactly the same. This one really give me the ick: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usYC_Z36rHw

Thanks for sharing – as someone who studies black hole environments daily, I didn't even think of such a phobia existing!

I wonder if some tricks, adjustments are feasible, to minimize the effects of these phobias? I see these visualizations as a pathway to make understanding such a complicated, unintuitive object more accessible – and would be great to make it even more accessible, if it makes sense... Happy to chat more, brainstorm some solutions.

For anyone that experiences the same, how do you feel about this picture? https://antichamber.fandom.com/wiki/Eye_Wall?file=Eye.png

It has always scared me and I believe it's for the exact same reason. It's possible it invokes no feelings on you if you haven't seen it in context (in the game it's from) so I'd like to test this

Same. Especially with circular objects. Placing the black hole in my room using the AR mode was very distressing for me

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/melanoheliophobia

Okay, so this appears to be a neologism that may not be found outside of science fiction dialogue. But I can appreciate the humorous derivation here.

Wiktionary defines this as an "irrational fear" which is in-line with other irrational fears known as phobia. So, is it possible to have a rational or healthy fear of black holes? Is it rational to be unafraid of them?

I am unafraid of personally meeting the Flying Spaghetti Monster whilst not wearing a colander on my head, and I am not irrationally afraid that Azeroth will be invaded by Kardashians. I am not afraid that a dragon will bite my head off.

It seems rationally to be respectfully "fearful" of the capabilities and awesome astrophysical properties of black holes, but it would be irrational to be afraid that I could fall into one, or be personally harmed in any way by one. If someone begins "seeing" black holes at the end of their suburban cul-de-sac, then probably get some professional help.

Sorry but a word for fear of black holes is ridiculous. Black holes are scary period. Anyone not feeling a deep sense of fear during that VR experience is missing something.