When Magic Lost Its Magic
We don't believe in magic anymore. At least, most of us don't. But if you stop and think about it for a bit, you’ll hopefully notice why this disbelief is not a good thing. Remember where magic came from: It came from, among other reasons, a need to explain what was not explainable (dreams, mental illness, the weather, the meaning of life, etc.). Magic and luck were the answers to everything that didn’t have an answer. Similarly, religion came of the need to give meaning and purpose to life. Why are we here, who put us here, who holds power over our lives that we should fear Him or Her or Them? Magic drove our curiosity. It proved that, as a species, we thought about the world and tried to explain it, just like we do today. Only, I argue, we do less questioning and explaining than we used to. The fact that we no longer need these fantastical explanations scares me. We seem to think, as 2017 approaches, that there aren’t any more unexplainable phenomena in the universe. W