Science and Magick
Morgaine Swann has been the only supporter of GOD or NOT who is neither an atheist nor a Christian. Morgaine is a neopagan. More specifically, she is a High Priestess of Dianic & Aphrodesian Wicca. I recently sent her some comments on her submission to the last carnival. In turn, she pointed me to an essay she had written and asked for my feedback on it. I decided to offer that feedback in this forum because I think there are some interesting issues in the piece.
The essay is called Looking Toward a Bright Future: A Post Modern Priestess Looks at the New Wave of Non-Believers. It is primarily about The Brights, a freethought movement that I reject, primarily because of its pompous name. As Morgaine says in her essay, “They don’t want to sound smug or condescending. (I’m afraid that ship may have sailed.)” Indeed. When I think about the public image of atheists, I don’t think an absence of intellectual egotism is amongst our problems.
Morgaine says that she is generally in support of the Brights movement’s focus on rational discourse and opposition to the forces pushing us toward Christian theocracy in America. However, she feels that neopagans should not be grouped in with adherents of the “patriarchal” religions when freethinkers criticize faith. She sees Wicca and related systems as a special case, and in some sense, she’s right. I have said many times that my goal is the elimination of all religion, but that Christian Reconstructionism and Muslim Fundamentalism are the highest priorities. By the same reasoning, neopaganism is one of the lowest priorities. I’ll explain why using Morgaine’s words…
My religion does not require any sacrifice; Pagans don’t proselytize; we don’t seek control over anything but ourselves; there are no nationalistic, chauvinistic or militaristic elements. It would never occur to us to force our views on others, let alone try to legislate our beliefs to control your behavior. Most importantly, we believe in Science.
Does that last sentence take anyone by surprise? Morgaine, like most practitioners of the new-age, old-world arts, sees no conflict between magick and science. (For those of you who are unfamiliar with the terminology, “magic” = Penn & Teller, but “magick” = Merlin.)
They, like many Patriarchists, believe that Science and Religion are incompatible. They don’t have to be. One of my core requirements for my belief system is that it has to be consistent with Science. I consider evolution to be the birth process on a planetary scale. Earth, a.k.a. Gaia, gave birth to the life on her in a particular process that is mimicked in the development of the human fetus in the womb. In other words, ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny. No conflict.
Well, Haeckel’s recapitulation theory has been pretty thoroughly discredited for a century, but that’s another story. Morgaine makes science and religion fit together by only using science in one direction: backward. Anything science has proven or thoroughly demonstrated must be incorporated into her beliefs. In this way, her views are very much like the Dalai Lama’s. However, like Tibetan Buddhists, she is free to believe anything that science has not explicitly disproven. I think Morgaine would agree with point 2 from my Statement of (dis)Beliefs: “The concept of ’supernatural’ is absurd and meaningless. Anything that exists is completely and totally natural.” However, the meaning of this statement would be very different to her.
I don’t agree with their definition of religion. For example the ’supernatural’ tag is inaccurate. Yes, I believe in subtle forms of energy and spirit that they would label as being outside of nature. I consider these to be perfectly normal, natural phenomena. My own experinces [sic] tell me that humans and animals alike have at least 6 senses. Only humans stunt their intuitive gifts out of social training and political pressure. A fully functional human uses more than just the left frontal lobe in interacting with the world. It isn’t that my view is not ‘Naturalistic’, it’s that I define Nature differently. The fact that we don’t have instruments to measure a thing yet doesn’t mean there’s nothing there to measure. It just means we have more to learn.
There is no logical difference between this position and that of a theist who argues that belief in god is consistent with science because scientists can’t disprove god’s existence. As I’ve said before, I don’t think it’s possible to disprove the existence of god, and by the same token, it’s not possible to disprove the existence of “subtle forms of energy and spirit.” To have faith in that which is unfalsifiable with the caveat that you will stop believing in it if it is falsified is intellectually dishonest and logically indefensible.
Now, to be fair, Morgaine does raise a good point criticizing the application of science by some who seek to use it as a weapon.
P.E. I. Bonewits describes Scientolatry as “using science as religion”. The two defining elements of Scientolatry are that 1) it is not a religion and 2) all other religions are superstition. It has been my experience that many of the most vocal and best-educated Brights are firmly in this category.
Using science in this way can engender a kind of arrogance that makes it difficult for any real communication between religious and non-religious people. There’s a conceit in the attitude that we know everything through science. We’ve only begun to understand the universe. If you think we have all the answers, go read some of the latest discoveries in quantum physics. Quantum Mechanics work across time and space in ways that are turning the scientific community on its ear. If scientists really want to understand Entanglement, they’d be well advised to study magick.
It is very easy for us to fall into the trap of thinking that science has explained everything, and that nothing more exists beyond that which we have already learned. There are, without question, those atheists who have simply traded god for science without losing religion in the process. However, Morgaine and I diverge on a subtle semantic point that is critical to the relationship between science and magick. I would say that if scientists really want to understand magick, they’d be well advised to study entanglement. However, I believe a psychiatrist is better equipped to study that particular phenomenon than is a physicist.
So, while I will readily agree that most neopagans are harmless and even suggest that they might be good allies in the more pressing struggle against the Christian right in America, I don’t see much daylight between their beliefs and those of the patriarchal monotheists. On the positive side, from personal experience and anecdotal evidence, I would suggest that Wicca often serves as a “gateway religion,” ultimately leading to atheism. If Christianity is heroin, then Wicca is methadone. It’s not quite as addictive, not quite as dangerous, and it can help ease withdrawal, but it’s not a permanent solution. While the latter can help us eliminate the former, it too must ultimately be eliminated for mankind to recover completely.
~I AM~
November 16th, 2005 at at 3:50 pm
As a Non Theistic or Atheistic Witch, I would agree with your assessment to a degree, while I do not believe in anything that contradicts Science or the natural world-For example, I have no belief in subtle energies or spirits, I do not see why all forms of Paganism would/should have to be eliminated in time-I think that some paths are valid including mine which does not contradict reality.
Many Pagans are Pantheistic-Scientific Pantheists, Non Theists, Atheists, Naturalists and so on and so forth, I think one should judge them based on who they are and what they practice rather than the religious path as a whole.
I have known many Spiritual Atheists as well….Anyways, besides that I loved the article and the website as a whole is GREAT-Keep up the Great work-P.S. Many Witches spell Magic with a C and not a K……Magic is the raising and releasing of Positive (or good) and Negative (or bad) energy, energy does exist, releasing and raising this energy is possible, therefore Magic can be practiced
Blessed Be
T
November 16th, 2005 at at 4:03 pm
I AM,
I thought you’ve said before that all religions have the potential to become twisted and used to create artifical labels of “us” and “them” that can cause conflict. You mentioned Buddhism as an example. Who’s to say that Wicca(nism?)/Paganism, etc can’t be used for the same purpose? So, while right now they’re “harmless”, but given enough mutations, they can become something quite the opposite. Just wanted to know what your thought is on that.
November 16th, 2005 at at 4:11 pm
See, this is why I have to call myself “agnostic” instead of atheist: I don’t think that that science has or ever can completely understand the universe. There are some things that fall outside the realm of our current knowledge system, and to disregard them is ultimately dangerous. For instance, I do believe in such phenomeon as love and other emotions, and think them outside more than just a chemical response in our bodies (that scientists still don’t fully understand). So, yeah, there is some spirtual aspect to life.
Although, this is more of just a philosophical debate: I get a little bit more nervous with the practical applications, ie a religion deciding to impose their worldview, even if I agree with them.
November 16th, 2005 at at 4:36 pm
Hm, so these folks accept the findings of science, but are not keen on its methodology. They like the results of the methodology, but don’t feel like using it themselves. If they are defending the subjective experience and imagination, that’s fine; but if this is about the Bermuda Triangle or UFOs, then they are undermining science by supporting unprovable claims.
November 16th, 2005 at at 4:57 pm
Terren:
If you don’t accept any gods or goddesses, don’t believe in anything that contradicts science, and don’t believe in subtle energies or spirits, what makes you a witch? Aside from maybe medicinal herbs, what’s left?
franky:
Absolutely. I think I stated as much. I’m just saying that Wicca isn’t even on the radar when you’ve got Christianity and Islam to deal with first.
Antigone:
There are some things that fall outside the realm of our current knowledge system, and to disregard them is ultimately dangerous.
Correct. Scientists study things that are outside the realm of our current knowledge every day. That’s the point.
I do believe in such phenomeon as love and other emotions, and think them outside more than just a chemical response in our bodies (that scientists still don’t fully understand).
That’s where we disagree, unless you want to define “spiritual” as the stuff science hasn’t explained yet.
November 16th, 2005 at at 6:04 pm
I AM,
Ok, fair enough.
November 16th, 2005 at at 7:07 pm
The “not religious, but spiritual” label has always confused me. Spirituality means that you believe in spirits. What, exactly, is the difference? Somehow, “spirituality” has come to mean “passionate” or “emotional” or even “human”. It’s really just a reaction to the incredibly widespread stereotype of the atheist as “joyless robot who want to make everyone as miserable as they are”. When people describe themselves as spiritual, more often than not its a sort of shorthand for “Well, I don’t believe in this religious silliness, but I don’t want anyone to think I’m one of those horrible atheists!”
November 16th, 2005 at at 9:37 pm
I must reluctantly confess that I have a tiny soft spot for Wicca. That’s mainly because I wish it were true… I mean, really, wouldn’t it be cool if magick were real?
It’s also true that the Wiccans I’ve known have been… self-contained where their religious beliefs were concerned. However, I agree that even a seemingly benign religion has the potential to blow up into something extreme and dangerous.
November 16th, 2005 at at 10:01 pm
I don’t think atheists as joyless robots (hell, some I know are downright vivacious and hedonistic) and those “anyone” who would think I was a “horrible” atheist already don’t like me for being a “man-hating” feminist. I just think logic and the scientific method are not capable of mapping out the entirety of the world, nor do I think they are a complete view of the world. I don’t think science can fully explain the “why” of the human experience, even if they can explain the how. Not that I feel this spirtual aspect necessarily needs to derive from a omnipotent being or beings, it could be an entirely human thing, or from a human community, but since I don’t know, I’m keeping my options open.
I get really frustrated with this whole “logical positivism” thing that tries to reduce everything to the scientific method and logic. I suppose it’s because even logical builds have to be built upon accepted axioms that can’t be proven. But then again, I suppose I’m dipping into my philosophy memory too much.
November 17th, 2005 at at 5:14 am
I have to agree with the sentiment that I like Wiccans. If there were more Wiccans in this “Christian” society, things would be better. However, I’m also of the opinion that humans are over glorified chemical reactions that often confuse themselves. Because of this, I feel that explanations for things that are said to be supernatural get in the way of understanding and measuring any real phonomena since the explanations are usually arbitrary rather than based on rigorously tested hypothesis.
Can science explain everthing? No, humans have neither the brain capacity nor the tools to make it do so. Some things we may never be able to measure (like supposed wrinkles in space-time). This doesn’t mean that we should develop and perpetuate superstitious notions of how observed phonomena works.
Wearing a favorite shirt to an important event because its “lucky”, hardly increases understanding of what actually improves the results the event. Its merely a correlation made by the individual’s brain that comforts the wearer. This comfort may actually be the cause of the positive outcomes, but because the individual’s methods of measuring luck are arbitrary, we’ll never really know. When the wearer says the shirt is lucky because its green, then that’s when we’ve began to subvert any sort of real understanding and green shirts become the fashion for an entire country.
November 17th, 2005 at at 6:54 am
Nice reply! I know we will ultimately have to agree to disagree on some points, but I do want to address a few things. My post is here.
November 17th, 2005 at at 1:09 pm
Wow thats a good post. I like the heroin/methadone analogy, because it specifically relates to my deconversion. In my progression from fundamentalist Christian to militant atheist, I had a brief stint with Wicca. I read lots of Silver Ravenwolf books, bought an athame, and did a few spells. I even attended a Maypole ceremony with a local Wiccan group at the beach. It was fun!
So Wicca was like the methodone that allowed me to quit heroin. After about a year of Wicca-dabbling, I became a no-nonsense atheist. I became clean.
Perfect analogy, I AM.
November 17th, 2005 at at 1:21 pm
Great post, it’s hard to add much to it. There’s a difference between believing what the scientific process tells us and being scientific in your own thinking. And about understanding our world, I don’t know of any other tool at our disposal besides critical thinking and experiment.
November 17th, 2005 at at 3:28 pm
I cross posted more of this comment on Morgaine’s site, but since she brought up entanglement and time in her original post I thought it would be appropriate to include it here. I also posted yesterday in response to a comment and post of hers.
The notion that quantum entanglement must have a supernatural aspect because we don’t yet fully understand it, is no different than ancient man worshiping fire because it was not understood, yet offered great power.
Entanglement has properties that appear to test the limits of time, however there are other possibilities and none have been demonstrated as more or less likely than a mutable interpretation of time. Back in 1964 physicist John Bell imagined an experiment with detached pairs of entangled particles, that would be simultaneously measured by experimenters separated by a large distance and predicted the outcome based on three assumptions. First, given a choice of primary aspects “A or B” that the experimenters could choose freely which one to measure. Second, he assumed the experimental results will reflect some real, pre-existing property of the particles and their local environment. And third, that no influence can travel faster than light, so if the measurements take place at virtually the same time, what happens at one end cannot possibly affect what happens at the other.
Bell showed mathematically that, if these seemingly plausible assumptions hold true, then experimentation should support these assertions. However, experimentation has consistently done the opposite. Based on our current understanding of Quantum entanglement, at least one of these assumptions must be wrong. The ramifications are profound to say the least. Assumptions one and two touch on the possibility of determinism and whether we, really do have free will or not, assumption three flies in the face of Einstein and opens up all kinds of Sci-Fi possibilities like faster than light travel. None of them have been eliminated yet.
November 17th, 2005 at at 6:55 pm
Wicca was a “gateway religion” to atheism for me. I think it might have something to do with the fact that Wicca acknowledges that the gods/goddesses your worship are pretty arbitrary (sp?), that they don’t *really* exist, you just pretend they do to worship some sort of universal power that different people worship differently. From there it is a small step to say that the universal power doesn’t exist (in my case this came from my exposure to the writings of Carl Sagan and the philosophy of science), and therefore no gods exist.
November 17th, 2005 at at 7:26 pm
I’m not sure how you can even classify Wicca as a religion. It seems to be a wild-card, a “make your own religion” kit for surly teenage girls desperate to avoid conformity at all costs.
If they had some semblance of consistency I could be persuaded to take them more seriously as a coherent, legitimate religion.
November 18th, 2005 at at 12:38 am
Rambozo – So you don’t believe in religion, but you’ll presume to dismiss mine as less legitimate than another? Sorry, but that’s awfully presumptuous. I’m not a surly teen-aged girl. I’m a thoughtful, well-educated adult who has simply reached a different conclusion than you have. Like our fundamentalist bretheren, it would serve you well to remember that you MIGHT be wrong… Any position that claims to have the one and only truth is dangerous. The problem is not religion – the problem is fundamentalism/literalism. That median level of moral and ethical develpment that we should outgrow in our late teens, but which most people never do, is what makes it difficult for us all to get along.
Skinny Dwarf – sorry you came away from Wicce with such an inaccurate picture of the nature of Goddess. The names may vary, but the conscious force they address is quite substantial.
LBBP – You are citing science from 1964. I am citing science from 2004, specifically an article published by two Physicists at the University of Vienna, Drs. Caslav Brukner and Vlatko Vedral. Read more here. I don’t ascribe magickal properties to things which do not exist. I simply know that reality is more complex than our current sciences can measure or define, and I know that the underlying principle of magick- all space is here, all time is now – is true in the realm of quantum mechanics.
I see a marked tendency among posters here to assume that I haven’t done my research. I assure you, there is a basis for every position I take. Are you incapable of imagining that I might have a resource or an experience that you have not encountered? Or that two individuals might examine the same data and reach different conclusions? That there’s something you don’t know? To dismiss my ideas without considering the basis for them is poor science as well as poor manners. We won’t get anywhere if we don’t have a basic respect for each other.
October 29th, 2006 at at 12:22 am
[...] Then I found these articles: http://evangelicalatheist.com/2005/11/16/science-and-magick/ http://the-goddess.org/blog/2005/11/evangelical-atheist-science-and-magick.html http://www.the-brights.net/ [...]