SCIENCE IS THE GLORY OF A FREE STATE
Science over superstition please. Keep your religious beliefs in your church.
What about superstition can one fine on Twitter (X) today? I thought I’d better check and report. Below is a good sample. Please note the manmade climate change naysayer using the word as well.
A new feature is to write a sonnet each day. Shakespeare has nothing to fear from this writer however, even if he were still around. I pledge not to give him competition.
We are in their holy sights
Superstition abounds in many a mind,
Christian Nationalists beating their large drum,
We are in their sights today and they are dumb,
Certainly Christians are likely to be kind,
No they’re not but aggressive as one might find,
Only wishing to pinch on us with their thumbs,
They are all rich as hell no eating of crumbs,
Their wish is to put all our heads in a bind.
What can we do about these aggressive folks,
They think their God anointed their every wish,
For they are sure they are tops in righteousness,
Their vicious prayer wheel has lost all its spokes,
It would be nice if they would learn tolerance,
But their God thrives only on their dominance.
First two quotes on superstition from an old book from the 1880s. I found these two quotes as being applicable to our 2024 America. Or at least somewhat on the topic for today.
“And what, O superstition, have been thy cruel triumphs! Thou hast selected thy victims from among the excellent of the earth; it is thy peculiar character to have reversed all the laws of nature, and of God; to have inflicted on men of the sublimest virtue, the tortures of the foulest villainy; to have rendered purity unsullied, and piety sweeter and more celestial than thou couldst comprehend, the certain prey of misery and death; thou hast fashioned to thyself a God stern and sullen, retiring in awful gloom from His creation not to be appeased but by blood! Thy worship has been worthy of thy idol; the dungeon has been thy chosen temple, instruments of torture thy means of instruction, the stake thy eloquence, and thy piety the abolition of all human sympathy.”
— Southwood Smith.
Thomas Southwood Smith (1788 – 1861) was an English physician and sanitary reformer. At 19 years old he was already showing the courage and independence of mind that were to characterise his life, however it led to a break with his parents who never spoke to him again. Over the following four years Smith turned to Unitarianism, influenced by William Blake, a minister at Crewkerne, Somerset: Blake put him in touch with John Prior Estlin* at Lewin's Mead, Bristol. Another friend, and Unitarian convert from Baptism who became a physician, was Benjamin Spencer. These associations and friendships drew him into the centre of 19th Century reform.
*John Prior Estlin (1747–1817) was an English Unitarian minister. He was noted as a teacher, and for his connections in literary circles.
“What crime has not superstition perpetrated against the virtue of the human race.”
— Olive R. Seward.
Olive Risley Seward (July 15, 1844 – November 27, 1908) was a writer and the adopted daughter of William Henry Seward, United States Secretary of State under Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson. Former Secretary of State William Henry Seward, widowed in 1865, took such an interest in Olive Risley beginning in 1868 that Gideon Welles* wrote in his diary: "There is much gossip in relation to a projected marriage between Secretary Seward and a Miss Risley. He is in his sixty-eighth year and she in her twenty-eighth. I give the rumor no credit.”
*Gideon Welles (July 1, 1802 – February 11, 1878), nicknamed "Father Neptune", was the United States Secretary of the Navy from 1861 to 1869, a cabinet post he was awarded after supporting Abraham Lincoln in the 1860 election.
I wished to add a little knowledge about the psychology of superstition from a rather recent paper. No word on was found in who this author was.
American Psychological Association
March 30, 2016
Believing Superstitions That You Know Aren't True
Cover of Psychological Review (small) Usually, when people recognize that a belief they hold is mistaken they try to correct it. But when it comes to superstitious beliefs, many people feel that they are "of two minds." Even those who claim not to be superstitious, for example, may be reluctant to utter the phrase "no-hitter" during the 8th inning of a baseball game or name their baby before he or she is born. How can people believe things that they know aren't true?
Traditionally, research on superstition has focused on people's cognitive shortcomings. But superstitions are not limited to individuals with cognitive deficits; there are many smart, educated, emotionally stable adults who have superstitions too. So why are superstitious beliefs pervasive and what can that tell us about the way that people think more broadly?
In a recent Psychological Review (2016) article (PDF, 263KB), Jane Risen makes two arguments.
First, she suggests that we can improve our understanding of superstition by considering the interaction between our "fast" and "slow" systems of thinking. Fast and slow, or "dual process models" of cognition, propose that one set of mental processes operates quickly and automatically to provide an initial intuitive judgment, while the other operates slowly and deliberately and is responsible for overriding intuitive judgments when it detects an error. A dual process account can help explain why superstitious thinking is widespread. It can also tell us why particular superstitions are formed and not others, and why superstitious beliefs are maintained even though they are not true.
Second, Risen suggests that to explain why superstitious beliefs are maintained even when people know they are not true, the existing model must be refined. People who hold superstitious beliefs and engage in actions that reflect those beliefs often realize — in the moment — that their thoughts and behaviors are irrational. Thus, the model must allow for the possibility that people can recognize that their intuitive judgment is wrong and believe it anyway.
Most models of judgment and decision making don't allow for this possibility — they assume that when an error is detected it will be corrected. Risen notes that this is not always the case. Sports fans wearing a lucky shirt in their living room, for example, may recognize that their shirt cannot affect play on the field and yet still feel more optimistic about the game when they wear it. Thus, she offers a modification to the model, explicitly separating error detection from error correction. With the modified model, sports fans can detect an error in their intuitive judgment, but fail to correct it nevertheless.
Although superstitious beliefs are often harmless, the argument for separating error detection and error correction applies beyond superstition. And, if people can benefit from correcting faulty beliefs, then it is important to recognize error detection and error correction as separate processes because fixing an error effectively depends on understanding where things are breaking down.
Sometimes the problem is not that people lack the information needed to recognize that they are making errors but that they are unable — or unwilling — to correct them.
So that is what I have for today. I hope you learned a little of something by reading my labor of love. Well, it approaches a labor of love at least. It’s better than doing nothing in worry over our democracy.
176th Posting, March 5, 2024.