In place of a plethora of self-help books offering Seven Secrets of..., Ten Scientifically-proven Habits of ..., The Four-step Process to Complete and Utter... and so on, I am suggesting one simple solution as the answer to everything: do as you would be done by.
How boring.
But it’s surprising how a simple idea like that can ruffle people’s feelings. I will people your world with demons, angels, gods and spirits of all sorts and persuasions—if you really don’t mind that, then you may want to skip this first part. But I know that some people won’t be at all grateful for all this fun.
Indeed, some will say: “All this nonsense about demons is simply putting the clock back hundreds of years to an age of superstition, animism and gullibility.” (I think they mean “putting the calendar back”.)
So this chapter is especially for those who are worried about my approach to demons. People who are reading this book in order to get angry rather than enlightened will find that this introduction raises the stakes somewhat.
Cue for demonic laughter...
SLIPPING BACK? OR BOLDLY STEPPING FORWARD?
Aren’t we slipping back into outmoded superstition if we talk of demons instead of using proven scientific and psychological terms to describe what are, after all, no more than causal interactions however complex?
Do you think that? Or does a part of you think that?
If so savour the thought right now—re-read the question and live that doubt. Is there any hint of revulsion in the feelings it evokes? The slightest unease?
The phrase “slipping back” betrays a sense of linear progress, an idea that we have risen steadily from a dark ignorant past towards ever-increasing understanding and enlightenment. But what if that progress has been less direct: if, for example it took the form of a wave motion, like an incoming tide requiring occasional retreats into superstition in order to consolidate and realise each rational revelation? Is that not how nature herself evolves? Is not every Winter an apparent setback to the progress of Summer, though actually a time of reaping and thinning for the benefit of next year’s growth?
The author has a confession to make. It is not something that need reduce the value of this book, but it is something that the reader ought to know. I do not believe in that linear progressive view. Indeed I once parodied it in these terms1 :
When I was young the accepted wisdom was that our primitive forbears, being ignorant and brutish, used to do silly things. This we call ‘magic’. Through many millennia of doing silly things they learnt to do silly things rather well. Doing silly things well is what we call ‘art’. Through further millennia of doing silly things well, plus increasing civilisation, they learnt to do silly things with authority. This we call ‘religion’. Then at last, during the last five hundred years, we grew up and learnt to be sensible instead. This we call ‘science’.
What I noted was that—contrary to this common view—magic tends to come after, rather than before, science. Just as science tends to displace religion, so will magic usually displace science. And I am not claiming this as some great triumph of magic over science, any more than it is a great slide back into ignorance. It is simply the way things churn.
Taking myself as an example: after learning the truths and methods of science at school and university, I found myself not less, but more inclined to embrace the magical philosophy of Aleister Crowley. The same is true of the numerous Wiccans with degrees in computer studies. Taking a wider example: the 1950s were a time of extreme materialism and reverence for the power of technology and scientific endeavour, and yet we moved forward to a magical revival in the 1960s—just as the Victorian scientific revolution paved the way for a fin de siecle revival of magic and mystery. More seriously, perhaps, the rational philosophical enquiry of the classical era was followed by the so-called Dark Ages when magic flourished. Do we not hear anxious commentators even now fretting over the rising popularity of astrology, tarot reading and supernatural beliefs despite our widespread scientific education and frequent media de-bunking?
Have these examples persuaded you? Oh dear, I hope not! The idea is not to batter into submission that part of you that opposes my magical ideas, but rather to moderate its loneliness by conceiving a younger sibling, a new idea that a revival of magic might be one part of progress. Two distinct demons that can look forward to years of amusing and nourishing discussion, co-operation and conflict as they grow up together within the ecology of your mind.
PATTERNS AND CAUSES
Some people will be stuck at this point; stuck because I have not yet defined what I mean by ‘magic’.
My first real demonstration of magic will be to refuse to define what I mean by magic. For magic proceeds by recognition, not definition.
Instead of seeing magic as a well-defined area of activity, I see it as a direction of inclination. For example: whereas science looks at phenomena, classifies them by definition and seeks underlying causal connections, magic looks at phenomena and recognises patterns.
A naive example: if you notice that traffic lights are always red when you are in a hurry, you are thinking magically; and if you therefore calm yourself down before a journey in order not to suffer too many red lights, then you are doing magic. If instead you decide that there can be no connection between your mood and the behaviour of traffic lights then you are thinking scientifically; and if you decide to count the lights on each journey to confirm whether the results are purely random, then you are doing science2.
By the way: both these experiments work equally well. It is mental inclination, not effectiveness, that distinguishes science from magic.
Although I have not defined magic, I have now given something for the dogs of doubt to get their teeth into—pattern recognition. There have been a number of discussions recently about irrational human handling of luck and risk, and the usual conclusion runs along these lines:
One of the measures of intelligence is an ability to recognise subtle patterns. Not just visual patterns but also patterns of sound and patterns of events. This has significant survival value: for example, it allows a creature to sense and avoid a dangerous situation even before it has had time or data to work out precisely the nature of the danger. We humans have evolved enormous skills in this respect, and it has enriched our culture with the appreciation of pattern and interaction in music, art and drama, but we are sometimes too good at pattern recognition, and this is the basis of superstition and the follies of speculation. People, singly and en masse, see patterns in random events and gamble on the predicted outcome. In terms of group hysteria, these patterns can become self-fulfilling, as when everyone believes in the New Economy and it inflates as a result. But chance holds sway, and eventually these patterns are revealed for the illusion that they are. The bubble bursts or the gambler’s ‘run of luck’ collapses. We emerge bruised and not much the wiser.
That makes sense, doesn’t it? We’re too good at seeing patterns so, instead of encouraging and developing this skill we need to restrain and discipline it using our rational faculties. Register a hunch, maybe, but never act upon it before it has been critically analysed and tested against reality.
I don’t agree.
What is this talk of being ‘too good’ at something? Millions of years of evolution have led us to where we are, and I respect that fact. If we have exceptional talents as a result, then I believe we must learn to develop and work better with those talents rather than subjugate them to other abilities. When people get their science wrong, my answer is that they should improve their science, not reject it. By the same token, when we get our magic wrong, I believe we should improve our magic, not abandon it.
This book is intended to improve our magic as best it can. So it will be encouraging us to take a closer look at pattern recognition. Consider this example.
I take a stone, and I release it. It falls to the earth, every time I do it, in a quite predictable pattern.
The same happens with