6 ms·

Why We Practice Magic

41 points by bindidwodtj 2y ago

rogual 2y ago
[flagged]
- FrustratedMonky 2y ago
  It's history. Long ago people believed the Sun revolved around the Earth. If someone today writes a history of those times, you are supposed to understand that the author doesn't actually believe the Sun revolves around the Earth, but that they are writing a history of that time period.
- KineticLensman 2y ago
  > This is the standard of writing that's coming out of Princeton these days? Well, per TFA, the author is actually Helen De Cruz [0], who is the Danforth Chair in the Humanities and professor of philosophy at Saint Louis University. [0] https://helendecruz.net/ https://helendecruz.net/
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- throwaway35777 2y ago
  What is the error there?
  - rogual 2y ago
    "However" isn't a conjunction. It should be "Not many academic philosophers discuss magic. However, five centuries ago..." Using "however" the way the author did will trip up a reader expecting correct English -- once you have "Not many philosophers discuss magic, however" you expect the sentence to end, but it doesn't and you have to go back and reinterpret.
    - D13Fd 2y ago
      Agreed. It should have been a period or or at least a semicolon before "however": "Not many academic philosophers discuss magic; however, five centuries ago . . ." In any case, I think the author really meant "although."
    - FrustratedMonky 2y ago
      This sentence trips you up? ""Not many academic philosophers discuss magic, however, five centuries ago, prominent Renaissance philosophers, such as Marsilio Ficino (1433–1499), Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463–1494), and Giordano Bruno (1548–1600), wrote extensive treatises on the topic"" I think you'll find a lot of people would breeze past this and not debate commas and semicolons. You are correct, by the letter of the law, according to the semicolon police this should be a semicolon. But that is like arresting people for jay walking. Yes, it's wrong, but come on.
      - marnett 2y ago
        I agree it isn’t going to trip many up, but also agree that the standards of writing coming out of an education institution should be grammatically correct.
        FrustratedMonky 2y ago
        Sure. But this is super low bar mistake. I would bet 90%+ of general population would not know this was an error at all. But, what is prevalent today, is to pile scorn on to educational bodies. So to take a really minor grammar error, in a rather small and niche paper, and extrapolate to a condemnation of the entire institute, is really obviously politically motivated.
- Shared404 2y ago
  I mean, it makes sense in the context of the next two sentences: > They conceived of magic as the ability to work wonders, and as such it merited close philosophical attention. > In Wonderstruck, I treat magic (like science and religion) as a cognitive technology that harnesses our sense of wonder.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
skybrian 2y ago
The bit about science not being elitist needs a caveat: anyone can try things and make observations, but that doesn't mean other people will believe them. Being trusted as a source of observations and getting them generally accepted is a social process. Consider nutrition, exercise, anything health related. How many people were in your study? Even then, there's no guarantee. Many papers are ignored. For some things, cameras help.
- troq13 2y ago
  Science is much older than that. The modern peer review process (as a way to decide which papers get "accepted" vs "rejected") began no earlier than the 1960's.
  - skybrian 2y ago
    Yes it is much older, but wasn't early science done by elite amateurs? The Royal Society, etc.
Log_out_ 2y ago
Anxiety control via rituals? Synthetic boosted ego?
epiccoleman 2y ago
I recently discovered the Weird Studies podcast (which I love), and it sent me down an interesting rabbit hole around "magic." Weird Studies covered a book called "Sex Secrets of the Black Magic Experts" (title is meant to be jokey, not serious), which outlines a sort of modern approach to thinking about "Magic." It doesn't advocate for magic in the sense of literally believing that some ritual or invocation has some physically measurable effect. Rather, it's more about the idea that the mindset inherent to "magical practice" - like the interpretation of omens, or making some plea to a "god" or "force" - can be a useful mindset, a sort of different lens to view the world through. As someone who spent a lot of time in my teens and early 20s consuming various rationalistic media (science books, New Atheist tracts, skepticism podcasts, etc), my knee jerk reaction to "magic" has mostly been disdain. But it's really interesting to consider it from this different angle and recognize that "magical thinking" has been a big part of the human experience for as long as we've been around. Maybe there's a baby in the bathwater there that we're throwing away, and maybe the notion of the "practice of magic" could be approached in a way that excises the dumb while keeping the good. (I've come to similar thoughts about religion and spirituality as I've gotten older). Plus, as a nerdy metalhead type, I have to admit to myself that some of this stuff is just cool, and so it's been kind of fun to "allow" myself to dig into some of the various literature out there on "magic". (The whole Chaos Magic thing is full of fun and wacky stuff, check out "Liber Null," for example). I think the Weird Studies pod I mentioned does a much better job than this post outlining the ideas in SSOTBME, and they covered another book, Technic and Magic, that has some similar thinking. Highly recommend the pod if that sounds even vaguely interesting. Links: SSOTBME podcast: https://www.weirdstudies.com/141 https://www.weirdstudies.com/141 Technic and Magic podcast: https://www.weirdstudies.com/134 https://www.weirdstudies.com/134
- empath-nirvana 2y ago
  Consciousness itself is a magic trick, of a kind.
- nico 2y ago
  Alejandro Jodoworwsky (from Jodorowsky's Dune https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jodorowsky's_Dune) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jodorowsky's_Dune) is a big proponent of something he calls "Psychomagic" For example, let's say you are anxious about money, maybe you are afraid of suddenly finding yourself with no money - so, a simple exercise to face that fear could be to leave the house, for the day, with no phone and no wallet, or have someone drop you off on the next town over and have to figure out on your own how to get back home The main concept is to create "rituals" that help you address the fears that hold you back, in a practical way
wlindley 2y ago
Much of the world apparently believed that wearing a muzzle and living like a hermit instead of outdoors, exercise, vitamins, and a normal lifestyle would prevent the common cold. Pure magic over rational science. One wonders what the next generation will think of the insanity of the past few years.

41 points by bindidwodtj 2y ago

rogual 2y ago

[flagged]

FrustratedMonky 2y ago
It's history. Long ago people believed the Sun revolved around the Earth. If someone today writes a history of those times, you are supposed to understand that the author doesn't actually believe the Sun revolves around the Earth, but that they are writing a history of that time period.
KineticLensman 2y ago
> This is the standard of writing that's coming out of Princeton these days? Well, per TFA, the author is actually Helen De Cruz [0], who is the Danforth Chair in the Humanities and professor of philosophy at Saint Louis University. [0] https://helendecruz.net/ https://helendecruz.net/
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
throwaway35777 2y ago
What is the error there?
- rogual 2y ago
  "However" isn't a conjunction. It should be "Not many academic philosophers discuss magic. However, five centuries ago..." Using "however" the way the author did will trip up a reader expecting correct English -- once you have "Not many philosophers discuss magic, however" you expect the sentence to end, but it doesn't and you have to go back and reinterpret.
  - D13Fd 2y ago
    Agreed. It should have been a period or or at least a semicolon before "however": "Not many academic philosophers discuss magic; however, five centuries ago . . ." In any case, I think the author really meant "although."
  - FrustratedMonky 2y ago
    This sentence trips you up? ""Not many academic philosophers discuss magic, however, five centuries ago, prominent Renaissance philosophers, such as Marsilio Ficino (1433–1499), Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463–1494), and Giordano Bruno (1548–1600), wrote extensive treatises on the topic"" I think you'll find a lot of people would breeze past this and not debate commas and semicolons. You are correct, by the letter of the law, according to the semicolon police this should be a semicolon. But that is like arresting people for jay walking. Yes, it's wrong, but come on.
    - marnett 2y ago
      I agree it isn’t going to trip many up, but also agree that the standards of writing coming out of an education institution should be grammatically correct.
      - FrustratedMonky 2y ago
        Sure. But this is super low bar mistake. I would bet 90%+ of general population would not know this was an error at all. But, what is prevalent today, is to pile scorn on to educational bodies. So to take a really minor grammar error, in a rather small and niche paper, and extrapolate to a condemnation of the entire institute, is really obviously politically motivated.
Shared404 2y ago
I mean, it makes sense in the context of the next two sentences: > They conceived of magic as the ability to work wonders, and as such it merited close philosophical attention. > In Wonderstruck, I treat magic (like science and religion) as a cognitive technology that harnesses our sense of wonder.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

skybrian 2y ago

The bit about science not being elitist needs a caveat: anyone can try things and make observations, but that doesn't mean other people will believe them. Being trusted as a source of observations and getting them generally accepted is a social process. Consider nutrition, exercise, anything health related. How many people were in your study? Even then, there's no guarantee. Many papers are ignored. For some things, cameras help.

troq13 2y ago
Science is much older than that. The modern peer review process (as a way to decide which papers get "accepted" vs "rejected") began no earlier than the 1960's.
- skybrian 2y ago
  Yes it is much older, but wasn't early science done by elite amateurs? The Royal Society, etc.

Log_out_ 2y ago

Anxiety control via rituals? Synthetic boosted ego?

epiccoleman 2y ago

I recently discovered the Weird Studies podcast (which I love), and it sent me down an interesting rabbit hole around "magic." Weird Studies covered a book called "Sex Secrets of the Black Magic Experts" (title is meant to be jokey, not serious), which outlines a sort of modern approach to thinking about "Magic." It doesn't advocate for magic in the sense of literally believing that some ritual or invocation has some physically measurable effect. Rather, it's more about the idea that the mindset inherent to "magical practice" - like the interpretation of omens, or making some plea to a "god" or "force" - can be a useful mindset, a sort of different lens to view the world through. As someone who spent a lot of time in my teens and early 20s consuming various rationalistic media (science books, New Atheist tracts, skepticism podcasts, etc), my knee jerk reaction to "magic" has mostly been disdain. But it's really interesting to consider it from this different angle and recognize that "magical thinking" has been a big part of the human experience for as long as we've been around. Maybe there's a baby in the bathwater there that we're throwing away, and maybe the notion of the "practice of magic" could be approached in a way that excises the dumb while keeping the good. (I've come to similar thoughts about religion and spirituality as I've gotten older). Plus, as a nerdy metalhead type, I have to admit to myself that some of this stuff is just cool, and so it's been kind of fun to "allow" myself to dig into some of the various literature out there on "magic". (The whole Chaos Magic thing is full of fun and wacky stuff, check out "Liber Null," for example). I think the Weird Studies pod I mentioned does a much better job than this post outlining the ideas in SSOTBME, and they covered another book, Technic and Magic, that has some similar thinking. Highly recommend the pod if that sounds even vaguely interesting. Links: SSOTBME podcast: https://www.weirdstudies.com/141 https://www.weirdstudies.com/141 Technic and Magic podcast: https://www.weirdstudies.com/134 https://www.weirdstudies.com/134

empath-nirvana 2y ago
Consciousness itself is a magic trick, of a kind.
nico 2y ago
Alejandro Jodoworwsky (from Jodorowsky's Dune https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jodorowsky's_Dune) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jodorowsky's_Dune) is a big proponent of something he calls "Psychomagic" For example, let's say you are anxious about money, maybe you are afraid of suddenly finding yourself with no money - so, a simple exercise to face that fear could be to leave the house, for the day, with no phone and no wallet, or have someone drop you off on the next town over and have to figure out on your own how to get back home The main concept is to create "rituals" that help you address the fears that hold you back, in a practical way

wlindley 2y ago

Much of the world apparently believed that wearing a muzzle and living like a hermit instead of outdoors, exercise, vitamins, and a normal lifestyle would prevent the common cold. Pure magic over rational science. One wonders what the next generation will think of the insanity of the past few years.