From: oispeggy@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu (Peggy Brown)
Newsgroups: alt.magick
Subject: Re: Magical Power(book)
Date: 13 Aug 92 14:32:00 GMT
Organization: University at Buffalo
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41

In article <83950121@otter.hpl.hp.com>, cal@otter.hpl.hp.com (Colin Low) writes...
>>[stuff deleted]
>>>...I much prefer to present
>>>the world with the lowest possible expectations, and occasionally exceed 
>>>them ;-)
>>> 
>>>Colin 
>>
>>Exactly.  So why call something magick when it could just as 
>>easily be called effective behavior?
> 
>>- Peggy -
>>----------
> 
>I'm not sure whether the point is being addressed to me or the world at large;

It was addressed to you.

>if at me, then I also have problems with the use of the word `magic(k)', and
>it is a convenient word to use in contexts where no-one wants to argue
>about its meaning, and an awful word to use when there is any doubt what
>it means.
> 
>I don't know whether magic can just as easily be called `effective behaviour'.
>You could wear a phenomenological hat and look at magicians as phenomena - 
>you have found a strange colony of animals in a jungle and you observe
>and catalogue their behaviours, you compare and contrast their behaviours
>with other colonies in the vicinity, the `neuro-linguistic programmers',
>the `EST/Forumites', the `Silva Mind Controllers', the `Dale Carnegie
>Positive Thinkers', the `how to acquire personal power management consultants',
>and so on. Who knows, you might conclude (phenomenologically) that magic
>is just another variation of something dubbed 'effective behaviour'.

All of the above (IMO) are also practicing effective behavior (or 
magic(k) if you prefer).  That is probably why I have so much 
difficulty in calling ordinary things magic(k)al.  I see people
doing it all the time.  I do it too.  For the past decade or 
longer I've had an elaborate way of making an intent and making things 
happen.  I draw circles, within circles, within circles; and 
starting at the outer orbit label the first step that must 
happen, then the 2nd, and so on, until I reach the middle circle 
- which I label with the goal.  Then I meditate on everything 
happening exactly the way I want from step one to the goal, and 
from time to time I pull the drawing out and meditate some more.  
I never could figure our why I did this, but it seems to help.  I 
never thought of it as magic(k).

Whether one calls it magic(k) or effective behavior (IMO) is a 
matter of preference, though I see no advantage to calling it 
magic(k) (and possibly a few disadvantages).  If I found it 
more effective to call it magic(k), then I'd switch.

>	On the other hand, you might be interested in the interior 
>experience of being a magician, and conclude something different. In my

I'm more interested in the interior experience.  (Reading a book 
on raja yoga now, which is fascinating.)  Whether or not I 
conclude something different - I'll see.

>notes on kabbalah I tried to avoid this kind of problem by saying that
>magic could be used as a label for distinguishing between the modes of
>causality appropriate to `normal consciousness', and the modes of
>causality appropriate to various abnormal states of consciousness. I realise
>that this still begs several questions.

It does beg more questions.  But I find it easier to think of 
different modes of causality corresponding to abnormal states of 
consciousness - and physical reality as it relates to these.

I have downloaded your kabbalah notes, but must get a unix 
account in order to decompress them.  Its on my list of things to 
do, though now I'll probably do it faster.:)

>Colin

- Peggy -