Magical Thinking in Complementary and Alternative Medicine

Many of today’s “complementary” and “alternative” systems of healing involve magical beliefs, manifesting ways of thinking based on principles of cosmology and causality that are timeless and absolutely universal. When we ask “why people believe in weird things” (as has Shermer, 1997), we might consider that at least some beliefs derive from a natural propensity to think in certain ways.

This article considers those aspects of belief that accord with the best anthropological meanings of “magic” and “magical thinking.” These words have a wide range of meanings, both among scholars and the general public. For example, “magic” can include the illusions of a stage magician: the ability to change form, visibility, or the location of something. It also includes things like spirit invocation and command, paranormal happenings, the occult, or anything mysterious or miraculous.

There is not general agreement as to what “magic” really is. However, there are distinct ways of thinking and corresponding ritual practices that are similar among all peoples in the world at all stages of recorded history. It appears that magic operates according to any of all of five basic principles:

1) Forces – Most people seem to believe in “forces” in nature that are separate from and operate independently of any spiritual beings, and they are also separate from those forces identified and measured by science.

2) Power - People believe that the forces, and everything else, are energized by a mystical power that exists in varying degrees in all things. In some belief systems, forces and power seem to merge.

3) A coherent, interconnected cosmos – It is widely believed that everything in the cosmos is actually or potentially interconnected, not only spatially, but also temporally – past, present and future.

4) Symbols – These are words, thoughts, things or actions that not only represent other things of action, but can take on the qualities of the things they represent.

5) Frazier’s Principles – Sir James George Frazer, in his monumental work on religion and kingship, The Golden Bough, explained his famous principles of sympathetic magic (3rd edition 1911-1915). Heir to the 18th century Positivist assumption of “laws” governing nature and society, Frazer said that sympathetic magic was of two types: “Homeopathic” magic – working according to the “law of similarity” – things or actions that resemble other things or actions have a causal connection. On the other hand, “Contagious magic” obeys the “law of contact” – things that have been either in physical contact, spatial or temporal association with other things retain a connection after they are separated.
These ideas of causality based on similarity and contact had been expressed by philosophers since Classical times.

Magic essentially involves the transfer of power in nature. Magic should be distinguished from supplication to a deity, as through prayer; but all scholars recognize that magical principles are intertwined with and complementary to religious ritual.

Homeopathy as a Magical Belief System

Some of the principles of magical beliefs are evident in currently popular belief systems. A clear example is homeopathy. Fallacies in homeopathic claims have been discussed by many scholars in this journal (Barrett, 1987; Gardner, 1989);, but it is curious that this healing system has not been more widely recognized as based in magical thinking. The fundamental principle of its founder, Samuel Hahnemann, similia similibus curentur, or “let likes cure likes” is an explicit expression of a magical principle. The allegedly active ingredients in homeopathic medications were “proved” effective against a particular disease when they produced in healthy people symptoms similar to those caused by the disease. Hahnemann also insisted that a “vital force” was present in both the human body and in the medications.

Three fundamental principles of magic are involved in homeopathy: similarity, power, and contact. According to a survey on alternative medicine reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association (Nov. 11, 1998), American’s use of homeopathic preparations more than doubled between 1990 and 1997 (Eisenberg, et al., 1998). Most modern homeopathic texts are careful to emphasize homeopathy’s limitations and to advise consultation with a physician if symptoms persist. But most insist that homeopathy accords with proven principles of science, citing its basis in experimentation, principles of vaccination, and parallels to discoveries in symptomatology and immunology and the body’s reactions to various stressors.

Various other “altnerative” and “New Age” beliefs are obviously magical; many are ancient and widespread. Crystals, for example, have long been believed to contain concentrated power. Colored crystals have specific healing effects, as certain colors are associated with different parts of the body. The magical healing power of colors seems universal.

Social-psychological explanations for people’s continued use of magic in an increasingly scientific and technological age agree that it gives individuals a sense of control. Neurobiological bases for magical thinking may lie in the mechanism of cognition. Frazer’s principle of similarity is the most basic. It is the basis for the universal and timeless beliefs in practices involving notions of resemblance.

But the vast majority of the world’s peoples, including many highly educated research scientists, obviously believe that there are real connections between the symbol and its referent, and that some real and potentially measurable power flows between them.

One researcher, Elisabeth Targ, M.D., and her colleagues recently had “a randomized double-blind study of the effect of distant healing.” The study was published in a leading American medical journal, the Western Journal of Medicine (Sicher et al. 1998). Dr. Targ received two million dollars of public funds from the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine of the National Institutes of Health for two studies of “distant healing.” While some scholars were outraged at the generous expenditure of funds to test “magic,” it is tempered by the fact that huge numbers of Americans consult “Alternative” and “Complementary” medical practitioners. Perhaps the government has an obligation to support research into the effectiveness of these practices.

(Summarized from the SKEPTICAL INQUIRER, Nov/Dec 2001 pp32-37; Article by Phillips Stevens, Jr. – used by permission of the SKEPTICAL INQUIRER, Amherst, NY.)