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Magical thinking is a term used by historians of religion to describe one kind of non-scientific causal reasoning. Scholars like James George Frazer and Bronislaw K. Malinowski emphasized that magic is more like science than religion, and that societies with magical beliefs often had separate religious beliefs and practices. Like science, magic is concerned with causal relations, but unlike science, magic often attributes correlation to causation. For example, someone may believe a shirt is lucky if he had won a bowling competition in it. He will continue to wear the shirt to bowling competitions, and though he continues to win some and lose some, he will chalk up every win to his lucky shirt.

Overview

According to Frazer, magical thinking depends on two laws: the law of similarity (an effect resembles its cause), and the law of contagion (things which were once in physical contact maintain a connection even after physical contact has been broken). These two laws govern the operation of what Frazer called "sympathetic magic", the idea that the manipulation of effigies or similar symbols or tokens can cause changes to occur in the thing the symbol represented. The use of voodoo dolls is a typical example of sympathetic magic. Others have described these two laws as examples of "analogical reasoning" (rather than logical reasoning).

Typically, people use magic to attempt to explain things that science has not yet explained, or to attempt to control things that science cannot. The classic example is of the collapsing roof, described in E. E. Evans-Pritchard's Witchcraft, Magic, and Oracles Among the Azande, in which the Azande claimed that a roof fell on a particular person because of a magical spell cast by another person. The Azande did understand a scientific explanation for the collapsing room (that termites had eaten through the supporting posts), but pointed out that this scientific explanation could not explain why the roof happened to collapse at precisely the same moment that the particular man was resting beneath it. Thus, from the point of view of the practitioners, magic explains what scientists would call "coincidences" or "contingency". From the point of view of outside observers, magic is a way of making coincidences meaningful in social terms. Carl Jung coined the word synchronicity for experiences of this type.

Adherents of magical belief systems often do not see their beliefs as being magical. In Asia, many coincidences and contingencies are explained in terms of karma in which a person's actions in a past life affects current events.

A common form of magical thinking is that one's own thoughts can influence events, either beneficially, by creating good luck, or for the worse, as in divine punishment for "bad thoughts". Freud reflected on these phenomena in his essay, "The Uncanny". Some categorize the belief that prayer influences a deity to alter the course of events, as an example of this kind of thinking.

Another form of magical thinking occurs when people believe that words can directly affect the world. This can mean avoiding talking about certain subjects ("speak of the devil and he'll appear"), using euphemisms instead of certain words, or believing that to know the "true name" of something gives one power over it, or that certain chants, prayers or mystical phrases will change things.

Magical thinking exists in most people

Noting the great similarity of magical thinking in all types of human societies and eras of recorded history, some cognitive scientists suggest that these ways of thinking are intrinsic to humanity. Many articles in neuroscience have shown that the human brain excels at pattern matching, but that humans do not have a good filter for distinguishing between perceived patterns and actual patterns. Thus, people often are led to see "relationships" between actions that don't actually exist, creating a magical belief.

There is much current scientific research in cognitive science that supports this view. For example, people tend to seek confirmation of their hypotheses, rather than seeking refutation as in the scientific method. This is another example of confirmation bias. People are also reluctant to change their beliefs, even when presented with evidence, and often prefer to believe contradictory things rather than change pre-existing beliefs. This phenomenon is known as cognitive dissonance.

Members of the general public rarely have a deep understanding of statistics. For instance, statistically, it is unavoidable that there will be one day in a year when the most car accidents happen. There will also be a day in the year when the least accidents happen. People, however, may focus on the day the most accidents happen and conclude it must be 'jinxed'. Probability, or chance, is also generally poorly understood. It can be calculated that if 23 people are chosen randomly, the chance that two have their birthday on the same day is about 50%. Yet this "birthday paradox" seems counter-intuitive to most people.

Magical thinking in mental illness

Magical thinking is often intensified in mental illnesses such as obsessive-compulsive disorder or clinical depression. In each it can take a different form peculiar to the particular illness. In OCD, it is often used in ritual fashion to ameliorate the dread and risk of various dangerous possibilities, regardless of whether it has real effects on the object of fear. It contributes more to peace of mind, in that the person now feels they can engage in a risky activity more safely. This is not unlike magical thinking in non-afflicted individuals; lucky garments and activities are common in the sports world. It begins to interfere with life when those activities deemed risky are routine and everyday, such as meeting others, using a public toilet, crossing a busy intersection, or eating. It is important to note, however, that not all people with OCD engage in a strict form of magical thinking, as many are fully conscious that the rationalizations with which they justify their obsessions or compulsions to themselves and others are not 'reasonable' in an ordinary sense of that word.

In depression, examples are generally more of the good luck charm variety, where the magical thinking is used to create confidence. Self-confidence is one of the first casualties in depression, so a surrogate object is invoked to bolster confidence. Additionally, a more aggressive associative magic can be used to curse others, often to vent frustration and give the individual some feeling that they have acted against a perceived aggressor.

Magical thinking in alternative medicine

Phillips Stevens writes "Many of today's complementary or alternative systems of healing involve magical beliefs, manifesting ways of thinking based in principles of cosmology and causality that are timeless and absolutely universal. So similar are some of these principles among all human populations that some cognitive scientists have suggested that they are innate to the human species, and this suggestion is being strengthened by current scientific research..." Some of the principles of magical beliefs described above are evident in currently popular belief systems. A common example is homeopathy; the fundamental principle of its founder, Samuel Hahnemann (1755-1843), similia similibus curentur ("let likes cure likes"), in which it is supposed as an explicit expression of a magical principle, of the sort called sympathetic magic by Sir James Frazer's The Golden Bough.

Science and magical claims

Any scientific analysis of magical claims will be dogged by problems related to causality, coincidence and statistical validity.

Personal experience

When looking at the possible effects that magical thinking or actions may have purely on the individual concerned, science needs to be most careful. Issues related to self-confidence and other psychological influences on a person's body, mind or behavior can be very complex. It is very difficult to entirely discount possibilities that magical thinking is capable of having quite profound and measurable effects on the practitioner him or herself.

Self-fulfilling prophecy, including the placebo effect, is an example of this in practice.

See also

References

  • Barrett, Stephen. 1987 "Homeopathy: Is it medicine?" Skeptical Inquirer (12)1, Fall: 56-62.
  • Bonser, Wilfrid. 1963 The Medical Background of Anglo-Saxon England: A Study in History, Psychology, and Folklore London: Oxford University Press.
  • Beyerstein, Barry L. 1997 "Why bogus therapies seem to work" Skeptical Inquirer (21)5, September/October: 29-34.
  • Diaconis, P (1985) "Theories of data analysis: from magical thinking through classical statistics", in Hoaglin et al., (eds) Exploring Data Tables Trends and Shapes, Wiley
  • Dubisch, Jill. 1981. "You are what you eat: Religious aspects of the health food movement" in The American Dimension: Culture Myths and Social Realities, edited by Susan P. Montague and W. Arens. Second edition. Palo Alto, California: Mayfield. ISBN 0882840304
  • Frazer, James George. 1911-1915 The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion Third edition. London: Macmillan. ISBN 0684826305
  • Gardner, Martin. 1989 "Water with memory? The dilution affair" Skeptical Inquirer 12(2):132-141.
  • Hand, Wayland D. 1980. "Folk Magical Medicine and Symbolism in the West." In Magical Medicine Berkeley: University of California Press, pp. 305-319.
  • Krippner, Stanley, and Michael Winkler. 1996. The "Need to Believe." In Encyclopedia of the Paranormal Gordon Stein, ed. Amherst, New York: Prometheus Books, pp. 441-454. ISBN 1573920215
  • Linde, Klaus, Nicola Clausius, Gilbert Ramirez, Dieter Meichart, Florian Eitel, Larry V. Hedges, and Wayne B. Jonas. 1997. "Are the clinical effects of homeopathy placebo effects?" The Lancet 350:834-843; erratum 351, Jan. 17, 1998, p. 220.
  • McTaggart, Lynne, "The Field" Harper Paperbacks; Reprint edition (August 1, 2003)
  • Shermer, Michael. 1997. Why People Believe Weird Things New York: W.H. Freeman. ISBN 0805070893
  • Stevens, Phillip, Jr. "Magical Thinking in Complementary and Alternative Medicine". Skeptical Inquirer. Nov/Dec 2001.
  • Thomas, Sherilyn Nicole. 1999. Magical Ideation in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder Ph.D. dissertation, Dept. of Psychology, SUNY at Buffalo.
  • Zusne, L., and W.H. Jones, editors, Anomalistic Psychology: A Study of Magical Thinking, Second edition, Erlbaum, Lawrence Associates, Incorporated, 1989, Hillsdale, New Jersey, trade paperback 328 pages, Anomalistic Psychology: A Study of Magical Thinking, ISBN 0805805087

Further reading

  • Serban, George. The Tyranny of Magical Thinking. E. P. Dutton Inc., New York 1982. ISBN 052524140X This work discusses how and why the magical thinking of childhood can carry into adulthood, causing various maladaptions and psychopathologies.

External links

Magic | Psychological adjustment

Pensamiento mágico

 

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