From: mcgrath@cs.uiuc.edu (Robert McGrath)
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic,alt.magick,alt.pagan
Subject: Book Review 'Persuasions of the Witch's Craft' (longish)
Date: 14 Aug 92 19:12:17 GMT
Article-I.D.: m.1992Aug14.191217.3191
Reply-To: mcgrath@cs.uiuc.edu
Organization: University of Illinois, Dept of Computer Science

The review attached below appeared in a slightly different and
shorter form in _Skeptical Inquirer_, Spring 1992.  I have received
"vibrations" that indicate that this is the correct moment to post 
this.  (Also, my boss isn't back from Europe yet, so things are 
a bit slack around here this Friday PM. :-))

-- 
  Robert E. McGrath
  Urbana Illinois
  mcgrath@cs.uiuc.edu

Review of "Persuasions of the Witch's Craft:  Ritual Magic in Contemporary 
England."
By T. M. Luhrmann.   
Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1989.  
382 pp.   Paper  $12.95  (Cloth $25.00).

Reviewed by Robert E. McGrath

     This book is an ethnography of a sub-culture of contemporary 
England -- magicians.   Following the traditional anthropological method of 
participant observation, the author joined several groups practicing "real" 
ritual magic in England in the 1980s.  The observations collected over some 
fourteen months led to a doctoral dissertation for the Department of Social 
Anthropology at the University of Cambridge, and to this book.   The result is 
a thoughtful, questioning, skeptical, and unusually well-informed 
examination of one contemporary group of believers in the "irrational".

     The main theme is "Why do people find magic persuasive?" (p. 8) 
Luhrmann does not "believe" in magic, and argues that most of the magicians 
studied did not "believe" in magic at first.  But through time the magicians 
became convinced of the effectiveness and validity of magic.  This is all the 
more remarkable because:

     Magicians are ordinary, well-educated, usually middle-class people.  
     They are not psychotically deluded, and they are not driven to 
     practise by socioeconomic desperation.  By some process, when they 
     get involved with magic -- whatever the reasons that sparked their 
     interest -- they learn to find it eminently sensible. (p. 7) 

What are these ordinary folks doing, and how did they come to believe 
in it?

     The magical beliefs in question are themselves difficult to rationally 
define.   The groups studied can be characterized as following various flavors 
of "neo-paganism" or "witchcraft".   The common thread among the disparate 
individuals and groups is the actual practice and belief in ritual magic.  For 
this reason, Luhrmann refers to them collectively as "magicians" (specifically 
not meaning "conjurers" like James Randi and Uri Geller).  

     The magicians practice a wide variety of rituals using an extremely 
eclectic set of ideas and symbols.  However, all share the core concepts: 

     that mind affects matter, and that in special circumstances, like ritual, 
     the trained imagination can alter the physical world. (p. 7)  
     Besides ritual, the magicians also share a core technology:  meditation, 
     training in visualization, the development and skilled manipulation of 
     complex symbol systems.   Magicians also seem to share similar experiences 
     with and feelings toward the practice of ritual magic.

     One of Luhrmann's important findings is the actual effectiveness of 
the magical technology.  As part of the investigation, the author studied the 
correspondence courses and participated in other forms of training 
commonly given to recruits for these groups.   Luhrmann describes the 
exercises in meditation, guided visualization, "path working" (a structured 
exercise in visualization, often done in groups), training in various occult 
symbologies and in how to "perceive" relations between symbols and 
between events and symbols. 

     Through the use of the magician-s training practices the author was 
not only able to learn a lot of jargon and theory, but was actually able to 
experience some very real psychological effects.  Luhrmann describes 
experiencing some rather unusual subjective states, such as very real visual 
hallucinations.  The author also developed a facility in vivid, controlled 
visual imagery, for seeing "connections" between events, and an increase in 
highly symbol laden dreams.  These kinds of subjective experiences are 
widely reported and are often considered mystical or spiritual experiences 
by the person.   Naturally,  when these subjective experiences occur, 
magicians tend to take them as evidence of the "reality" and power of magic.   
It is interesting to read, though, of the deliberate use of these apparently 
effective techniques for increasing the frequency and intensity of such 
experiences.

     A second key finding is that, for these magicians, belief follows action 
rather than producing action.  Magicians begin to study and participate in 
magic for many reasons, usually not because they believe it "works".  As 
they become more involved, they begin to develop facility with the jargon 
and symbol sets, and the practice becomes important to them.  Eventually, 
many become convinced that magic is "real" and "really works".  Luhrmann 
calls this "interpretive drift," and relates it to the process by which people 
become a specialist in any field:  

     Modern magicians are interesting because they are a flamboyant 
     example of a very common process:  that when people get involved in 
     an activity they develop ways of interpreting which make that 
     activity meaningful even though it may seem foolish to the 
     uninvolved. (p. 7)

It is, Luhrmann says, "what happens as an undergraduate turns into a 
lawyer." (p. 7)  

     The reasons for this shift to belief are not clear.  The experience 
of one or more unusual, subjective, "mystical," events can be very convincing.  
The practice of ritual magic may also have some very real therapeutic or 
psychological value to some participants.  And one should not forget the 
sheer fascination of manipulating complex symbol systems, and the feeling 
of control which that may give.  That, after all, is one of the fun things 
about becoming a scientist!   For whatever reasons, as the practice of ritual 
becomes important to the magician, the "belief" grows.

     When questioned by a skeptical outsider, the convinced magician may 
deploy many arguments in defense of the belief.   In the section entitled 
"Justifying to the sceptics", Luhrmann describes these arguments:

     There seem to be four primary rationalizations of magical claims 
     themselves, four different ways of intellectualizing the idea that 
     rituals produce results.  I call these approaches realist, two worlds, 
     relativist, and metaphorical.  The realist position says that the 
     magician-s claims are of the same status as those of Tscience-;  the two 
     worlds position says that they are true, but cannot be evaluated by 
     rational means; the relativist position says that it is impossible even to 
     ask questions about their Tobjective- status; and the metaphorical 
     position asserts that the claims themselves are objectively false but 
     valid as myth.  (pp. 283-284)

These arguments are probably familiar to readers of Skeptical Inquirer, but 
Luhrmann's careful dissection of them might be useful reading for skeptics. 

     An important point to note, however, is that these arguments are 
more in the nature of rationalizations than real reasons for the activity.  
Luhrmann says that, although magicians practice magic for many and varied 
reasons,  they believe in magic because they practice it.  This idea is put in 
perspective in a scholarly discussion of the nature of belief, commitment, 
and irrationality.   Some of the argument here is probably accessible only to 
a professional social theorist, which I am not.

     Besides the admittedly academic content, this book contains a wealth 
of detail about contemporary magical practice in England.  Among other  
information, Luhrmann gives the reader descriptions of rituals and their 
"meaning", a "Who's who" of magicians in the London area, a description of 
some aspects of the social organization of magicians and a bibliography of 
"what witches read".   Most importantly, I think, this book provides a shining 
example of rational inquiry:  a well-informed, skeptical, and yet gently 
sympathetic examination of a very human behavior.  Despite the unrelenting 
critical evaluation, you will not find a harsh word about the magicians in 
this entire book.

     Skeptics might note the reality and power of the technology used by 
magicians.  There appear to be real and powerful psychological forces at play 
that are little understood and little studied.  If, as Luhrmann suggests, the 
frequency and intensity of these interesting (and compelling) subjective 
experiences can be increased by training, this claim deserves serious 
psychological investigation.

     If Luhrmann is correct in the description of "interpretive drift", and 
that belief follows practice, then it is clear that rational argument is not 
likely to sway the believer in this type of irrationality.  If the real 
rationale for magical practice is the practice itself, no amount of argument, 
no demolition of the rationalizations offered will change the practitioner's 
personal commitment to magic.  This, perhaps, explains some of the 
frustration a skeptic may feel when attempting to debunk some kinds of 
deeply held, but not clearly justified, beliefs.

     If, indeed, belief follows practice there is a lesson for teachers of 
scientific and critical thinking:  get people to do it, and to enjoy doing it, 
and they will come to value and believe in it.  Watching science on television 
or reading about it in a magazine will never convince as well as actually doing 
science and having fun doing it.  Critical thinking cannot be a spectator 
sport, everyone has to play it themselves.   Make skepticism fun and cool, 
and it will flourish.
Newsgroups: sci.skeptic,talk.origins