Essay presenting the notion of paradigms in magick and the issues surrounding them. Written 9-25-23.
‘Explain this happening!’
‘It must have a ‘natural’ cause!’
‘It must have a ‘supernatural’ cause!’ } Let these two asses be set to grind corn.
May, might, must, should, probably, may be, we may safely assume, ought, it is hardly questionable, almost certainly—poor hacks! let them be turned out to grass!
Proof is only possible in mathematics, and mathematics is only a matter of arbitrary conventions.
And yet doubt is a good servant but a bad master; a perfect mistress, but a nagging wife.
“White is white” is the lash of the overseer: “white is black” is the watchword of the slave. The Master takes no heed.
The Chinese cannot help thinking that the octave has 5 notes.
The more necessary anything appears to my mind, the more certain it is that I only assert a limitation.
I slept with Faith, and found a corpse in my arms on awaking; I drank and danced all night with Doubt, and found her a virgin in the morning.” -Aleister Crowley, “The Book of Lies”, Ch. 46: “Chinese Music”
In the postscript to his seminal work “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions”, Thomas Kuhn (1962, 2012) defines the word “paradigm” in two different ways, both of which are important to our discussion.
“On the one hand, it stands for the entire constellation of beliefs, values, techniques, and so on shared by the members of a given community.”
“On the other, it denotes one sort of element in that constellation, the concrete puzzle-solutions which, employed as models or examples, can replace explicit rules as a basis for the solution of the remaining puzzles of normal science.”
The first use of “paradigm” should be familiar to chaotes (practitioners of chaos magick) from the works of Peter J. Carroll, Phil Hine, et al. This definition describes a system of foundational beliefs, values, and techniques that informs both the theory and practice of magick and guides the interpretation of magickal events. To the degree that these foundational beliefs can be stated clearly and distinctly (by which I mean the system of axioms, definitions, symbols, and rules can be listed completely by some procedure), this is the denotative definition of the word “paradigm”, and thus “cashes out” part of the word’s total meaning. This definition of the word “paradigm” can be used in logical systems to denote the definitions, symbols, axioms, and transformation rules of the system.
However, it is important to note that such logical systems can never be complete, as proven by Kurt Gödel (1931). Any logical system sufficiently complex to say all the sorts of things we want to be able say in it will always include possible true statements that are unprovable within the system. In addition to this, no logical system can be used to prove its own consistency…that consistency must always be shown via a “metasystem” that stands outside/above the logical system in question, and of course the metasystem can only itself be proven consistent by a second metasystem for the first metasystem, and so on. This presents a fundamental logical limitation in any paradigm we choose. To a certain degree, our use of paraconsistent logic aids us in this issue, but the nasty issues at the heart of logic still remain, rendering any logical system we can devise necessarily limited in its scope.
The second usage of the word “paradigm” is, at least in my opinion, the more interesting. This usage presents paradigmatic shared examples that allow for a connotative definition (which “cashes out” the rest of the meaning of the word). We can’t state clearly and distinctly the notions contained in a paradigm using this definition. Instead we use our intuitions of similarity, of “family resemblance”, to recognize other similar examples that “fit” with our paradigmatic shared example.
Another important notion that Kuhn discusses is the “incommensurability” (which means “lacking a common unit of measurement”) of different paradigms. I will use two examples from the physical sciences taken from Kuhn’s text to express this sort of problem.
Consider the notion of “gravity” as used by Aristotle in his “On The Heavens” (~350 BCE, 2020) versus the usage by Isaac Newton in his “Principia” (1687, 2016). Aristotle’s concept was that massive objects had an intrinsic property which caused them to fall towards the center of the (geocentric) universe. It was their “nature” to fall in this way. As usual, Aristotle saw the issue teleologically…when he saw a falling rock, he saw an object moving towards its natural goal, the center of the universe. Newton, on the other hand, saw gravity as attraction between all massive bodies. When Newton saw a falling rock he saw two objects, the rock and the Earth, one much more massive than the other, being attracted to each other in proportion to their respective masses and the distance between them. Thus while the situation they observe is empirically nearly identical (one rock falling on Earth is much like another), their respective interpretations derived via their respective paradigms are different. Notably, both paradigms are empirically adequate in their shared contexts. Both describe the physical events addressed accurately and both will make similar predictions about falling rocks on Earth. But once the scale increases and we start talking about planets and stars instead of rocks on Earth, Aristotle’s predictions and Newton’s predictions will begin to differ in ways that make clear the differences in their respective notions of gravity.
Now let us consider the notion of “mass” used by Newton in his “Principia” (typified by the formula f=ma) versus the notion of mass used by Einstein in his “On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies” (1905) (typified by the formula E=mc²). For Newton, mass is conserved…the mass of an object does not change without some sort of equivalent physical change to the object (e.g. it is made hollow, cut in half and one half disposed of, or somehow changed into a lighter substance through chemical change). For Einstein, mass is relativistic; as it is accelerated towards the speed of light it converts to energy. Again, within their shared contexts (masses accelerated only to very small fractions of the speed of light) the descriptions and predictions of both systems will be more or less identical and empirically adequate. But once a new context is considered, that of accelerations of larger fractions of the speed of light, it is clear that two different notions of “mass” are really being talked about.
Notice two details here:
The paradigms and theories compared each use the same terminology and concepts to express their ideas, but they actually mean different things. Aristotle’s gravity is not that of Newton, and Newton’s mass is not that of Einstein. Compare the usage of the word “spirit” in different occult communities operating under different magickal paradigms.
The effectiveness and empirical adequacy of the compared theories are equal in some contexts but different in others. Aristotle’s theory holds true as long as your paradigm assumes a geocentric universe, but once the “Copernican Revolution” came along, suddenly the Earth was just one of many planets, and subsequently that model of gravity no longer explained the observations made by astronomers under the new paradigm. This created new problems and an accompanying change in the underlying paradigm, setting the stage for Newton to come along with a new model to explain massive bodies in motion under gravitation with each other. Similarly, Newton’s theory of mass only holds true beneath certain speeds, becoming unable to solve the problem of what happens when acceleration reaches sizable fractions of the speed of light. Thus it is clear that a change in perspective or the context of the issue under consideration can lead to a paradigm shift, which creates new sorts of problems to be solved by the field of study. The new sorts of problems can’t be solved under the theories developed under the old paradigm, so the stage becomes set for a new theory that will allow for solutions of the new problems.
An important consequence of the incommensurability of differing paradigms is that it is impossible to make a principled choice between two given paradigms that are both empirically adequate. This is because the arguments each side will give for why their paradigm is correct will be built on different assumptions, use different definitions of important terms, differ in their practice, and refer connotatively to different paradigmatic shared examples. This means we must use values from outside the paradigms in question to help us choose between those paradigms (more on these values in the section of this work on “Paradigmatic Values”), essentially creating a metaparadigm (a paradigm to talk about paradigms).
However, we are faced with the same logical problem given above…if I use a metaparadigm to justify my choice of paradigms, how do I justify my choice of metaparadigms? This problem is, as far as I know, insoluble. It is just turtles all the way down, with one metaparadigm justifying the next in the series forever. However, since each step in the series does in fact effectively ground the step after it, in my opinion the regress is not vicious any more than the summation of an infinite series is vicious just because we can never fully list the series. In any case, this problem is the same for any and all such logical systems, which means all of mathematics, science, and analytic philosophy has this problem, yet proofs are still proven, transistors still work, and P is still equal to P, so I think we will be alright here in the realm of magick.
In magick, paradigmatic differences are often expressed by the term “tradition”, but this is not quite correct, as several traditions (such as the constellation of traditions commonly called “witchcraft” in “Western” anglophone communities) can share a common paradigm and communities from within the same tradition (e.g. ceremonial magick) can actually turn out to be operating from very different paradigms. In fact, we often observe two members of the same tradition and community actually operating from very different paradigms that both happen to be equally empirically adequate within their respective contexts, and occasionally we find the same person operating from different paradigms at different times or, like some chaotes, engaging in purposeful manipulations of paradigms to pursue operational goals.
Thus, within magick, the behavior we actually observe is different from what we observe in the sciences (especially the physical sciences). What we instead observe is a distinction between what I will call paradigms of belief versus paradigms of practice. A paradigm of belief is a set of grounding ideas behind why and how magick works. A paradigm of practice is a set of operational beliefs that are used to accomplish magickal goals.
One paradigm of belief might, for example, hold that “The spirits of the Goetia are portions of the human brain.” (Aleister Crowley, 1904, 1995) while another may hold that spirits are a type of “discarnate intelligence” (Aleister Crowley, 1929, 1979), but people who operate within either paradigm of belief (or both at different times) may actually operate within the same paradigm of practice (in this case the standard evocation procedures common within ceremonial magick traditions descended from the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn on the one hand and the Grimoire Tradition/goetia on the other).
Conversely, different people who share the same paradigm of belief (e.g. magickal realism, where spirits and deities are actually spirits and deities and magick actually causes changes in the world) may operate within various paradigms of practice (e.g. the various methods of casting a magickal circle and creating sacred space practiced by the traditions of witchcraft descended from Gardnerian witchcraft versus the equivalent methods of ceremonial magicians descended from the Golden Dawn). This distinction between these two distinct kinds of magickal paradigms will prove important as we further develop our philosophy of magick.
This kind of variety of paradigmatic beliefs existing within a single field of study is typical of what Kuhn calls “pre-paradigm” periods of science. During these periods Kuhn claims practitioners within the overall community are forced to go back to basic principles again and again, thus limiting the possibility of progress within that field of study. Kuhn argues that what makes the progress within the physical sciences that has been observed within “Western” cultures over the centuries possible is that entire scientific communities have fallen in line—for various reasons both principled and pragmatic—behind a given paradigm, thus leaving the “pre-paradigm” state and entering the state of “standard science”. Under Kuhn’s analysis, the idiosyncratic nature of magick means that it would be very difficult for us (mages at large) to make significant progress in our field of study. However, I do not believe that this is the case. I think the idiosyncratic nature of magick is a feature, not a bug, and in the next section I will argue for why I believe this is the case.
Works Cited:
Thomas S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, (The University of Chicago Press, 1962, 2012)
Kurt Gödel translated by B. Meltzer, On Formally Undecidable Propositions of Principia Mathematica and Related Systems, (Dover Publications, New York 1962, 1992)
Aristotle translated by J. L. Stocks, On The Heavens, Retrieved from http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/heavens.2.ii.html
Isaac Newton translated by I. Bernard Cohen, Anne Whitman, and Julia Budenz, The Principia: The Authoritative Translation and Guide, (University of California Press 2016)
Albert Einstein, On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies, Retrieved from https://users.physics.ox.ac.uk/~rtaylor/teaching/specrel.pdf
Aleister Crowley, The Initiated Interpretation of Ceremonial Magic, published as part of The Goetia: The Lesser Key of Solomon the King, (Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC 1995)
Aleister Crowley, The Confessions of Aleister Crowley, (Routledge and Keegan Paul, 1979)