Magical Thinking: Science vs. Spirit
Thursday, May 31st, 2007In 1937, E. E. Evans Pritchard published a seminal work of anthropology entitled Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic Among the Azande. Pritchard had been studying the Azande, a people living along the upper Nile, for eleven years. In it, he recorded the interesting case of someone who cast a death spell on another member of the tribe. The victim died soon afterwards, killed without warning by a collapsing roof.
The curious Pritchard soon discovered that this roof had been riddled with termites. When he brought this to the attention of the tribe, and asked whether they still believed the spell had worked, they replied, well, of course.
“But it wasn’t the spell that collapsed the roof!” said Pritchard. “It was termites!”
“Yes,” said the people of the tribe. “But how did it just happen to fall at that time, when the victim was under it?” (more…)
