Magic and Dawkins

"Magic" (see below for summary) is a play by G.K. Chesterton which answers so many of Dawkins critiques of magical thinking. Chesterton makes two very strong points in the play:

 

a) the existence of a forged note does not mean that all notes are forged, in other words, science cannot generalise from exposing some magic as trickery to saying that all is therefore trickery. In Popper's terms, numerous observations of white swans do not prove that black swans do not exist. Dawkins seems unable to grasp this.

 

b) believing everything and doubting everything are twins: you have on the one hand, religious mania, and on the other irreligious mania. One may appear superstitious, and one scientific, but in terms of psychology, both are flawed approaches to life.

 

 

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"Magic", one of the few plays which Chesterton wrote, begins with an encounter with a mysterious stranger (who we later learn is a conjuror) who declaims:

 

Daughter of men, if you would see a fairy as he truly is, look for his head above all the stars and his feet amid the floors of the
sea. Old women have taught you that the fairies are too small to be seen. But I tell you the fairies are too mighty to be seen. For they are the elder gods before whom the giants were like pigmies. They are the Elemental Spirits, and any one of them is larger than the world. And you look for them in acorns and on toadstools and wonder that you never see them.

 

The sceptic, Morris, comments on the art of the conjuror:

 

MORRIS. Ah, most mysteries are tolerably plain if you know the apparatus. [_Enter_ DOCTOR _and_ SMITH, _talking with grave faces, but growing silent as they reach the group._] I guess I wish we had all the old apparatus of all the old Priests and Prophets since the beginning of the world. I guess most of the old miracles and that were a matter of just panel and wires.

But Morris doesn't get it all his own way; there is a diverting discussion on the nature of falsity:

 

SMITH. I object to a quarrel because it always interrupts an argument. May I bring you back for a moment to the argument? You were saying that these modern conjuring tricks are simply the old miracles when they have once been found out. But surely another view is possible. When we speak of things being sham, we generally mean that they are imitations of things that are genuine. Take that Reynolds over there of the Duke's great-grandfather. [_Points to a picture on the wall._] If I were to say
it was a copy....

 

MORRIS. Wal, the Duke's real amiable; but I reckon you'd find what you call the interruption of an argument.

 

SMITH. Well, suppose I did say so, you wouldn't take it as meaning that Sir Joshua Reynolds never lived. Why should sham miracles prove to us that real Saints and Prophets never lived. There may be sham magic and real magic also.

 

     [_The_ CONJURER _raises his head and listens with a strange air of      intentness._

 

SMITH. There may be turnip ghosts precisely because there are real ghosts. There may be theatrical fairies precisely because there are real fairies. You do not abolish the Bank of England by pointing to a forged bank-note.

 

MORRIS. Well, let's have the argument first, then I guess we can have the quarrel afterwards. I'll clean this house of some encumbrances. See here, Mr. Smith, I'm not putting anything on your real miracle notion. I say, and Science says, that there's a cause for everything. Science will find out that cause, and sooner or later your old miracle will look mighty mean. Sooner or later Science will botanise a bit on your turnip ghosts; and make you look turnips yourselves for having taken any. I say....

 

But then Morris is challenged by a series of conjuring tricks, culminating in an impossible one, changing a lamp from red to blue and back again:

DOCTOR. [_In a low voice to_ SMITH.] I don't like this peaceful argument of yours. The boy is getting much too excited.

 

MORRIS. You say old man Reynolds lived; and Science don't say no. [_He turns excitedly to the picture._] But I guess he's dead now; and you'll no more raise your Saints and Prophets from the dead than you'll raise the Duke's great-grandfather to dance on that wall.

 

     [_The picture begins to sway slightly to and fro on the wall._

 

DOCTOR. Why, the picture is moving!

 

MORRIS. [_Turning furiously on the_ CONJURER.] You were in the room before us. Do you reckon that will take us in? You can do all that with wires.

 

CONJURER. [_Motionless and without looking up from the table._] Yes, I could do all that with wires.

 

MORRIS. And you reckoned I shouldn't know. [_Laughs with a high crowing laugh._] That's how the derned dirty Spiritualists do all their tricks. They say they can make the furniture move of itself. If it does move they move it; and we mean to know how.

 

     [_A chair falls over with a slight crash._

 

     [MORRIS _almost staggers and momentarily fights for breath and      words._

 

MORRIS. You ... why ... that ... every one knows that ... a sliding plank. It can be done with a sliding plank.

 

CONJURER. [_Without looking up._] Yes. It can be done with a sliding plank.

 

     [_The_ DOCTOR _draws nearer to_ MORRIS, _who faces about,      addressing him passionately._

 

MORRIS. You were right on the spot, Doc, when you talked about that red lamp of yours. That red lamp is the light of science that will put out all the lanterns of your turnip ghosts. It's a consuming fire, Doctor, but it is the red light of the morning. [_Points at it in exalted enthusiasm._] Your priests can no more stop that light from shining or change its colour and its radiance than Joshua could stop the sun and moon. [_Laughs savagely._] Why, a real fairy in an elfin cloak strayed too near the lamp an hour or two ago; and it turned him into a common society clown with a white tie.

 

     [_The lamp at the end of the garden turns blue. They all look at it      in silence._

 

MORRIS. [_Splitting the silence on a high unnatural note._] Wait a bit! Wait a bit! I've got you! I'll have you!... [_He strides wildly up and down the room, biting his finger._] You put a wire ... no, that can't be it....

 

DOCTOR. [_Speaking to him soothingly._] Well, well, just at this moment we need not inquire....

 

MORRIS. [_Turning on him furiously._] You call yourself a man of science, and you dare to tell me not to inquire!

 

SMITH. We only mean that for the moment you might let it alone.

 

MORRIS. [_Violently._] No, Priest, I will not let it alone. [_Pacing the room again._] Could it be done with mirrors? [_He clasps his brow._] You have a mirror.... [_Suddenly, with a shout._] I've got it! I've got it! Mixture of lights! Why not? If you throw a green light on a red light....

 

     [_Sudden silence._

 

SMITH. [_Quietly to the_ DOCTOR.] You don't get blue.

 

DOCTOR. [_Stepping across to the_ CONJURER.] If you have done this trick, for God's sake undo it.

 

     [_After a silence, the light turns red again._

 

MORRIS. [_Dashing suddenly to the glass doors and examining them._]  It's the glass! You've been doing something to the glass!

 

     [_He stops suddenly and there is a long silence._

 

CONJURER. [_Still without moving._] I don't think you will find anything wrong with the glass.

 

MORRIS. [_Bursting open the glass doors with a crash._] Then I'll find out what's wrong with the lamp.

 

     [_Disappears into the garden._

Morris is unable to find any rational exlanation for this last trick, and his mind, already on the edge of madness, tips over the edge, which we discover in the next scene when the doctor is discussing his breakdown, and commenting on the hereditary weakness in the family. The priest comments to him that doubt can also be a madness:

 

DOCTOR. Weren't there as many who believed passionately in Apollo?

SMITH. And what harm came of believing in Apollo? And what a mass of harm may have come of not believing in Apollo? Does it never strike you that doubt can be a madness, as well be faith? That asking questions may be a disease, as well as proclaiming doctrines? You talk of religious mania! Is there no such thing as irreligious mania? Is there no such thing in the house at this moment?

 

DOCTOR. Then you think no one should question at all.  You are a Pragmatist.

SMITH. That is what the lawyers call vulgar abuse. But I do appeal to practise. Here is a family over which you tell me a mental calamity hovers. Here is the boy who questions everything and a girl who can believe anything. Upon which has the curse fallen?

Morris, in his delerium, is desparate to know the trick. But the Conjuror tells the others it is no trick, but real magic. Finally, for the sake of Morris' sanity, and at the pleading of a lady, Patricia, he manages to do what the others have not done, which is to think of a natural way in which the trick might have been performed, which he whispers to Morris. But, as he explains before he leaves, no one will now think the trick was real magic at all:

 

Enter_ PATRICIA, _still pale, but radiant._

PATRICIA. Oh, Morris is ever so much better! The Conjurer has told him such a good story of how the trick was done.

     _Enter_ CONJURER.

DUKE. Professor, we owe you a thousand thanks!

DOCTOR. Really, you have doubled your claim to originality!

SMITH. It is much more marvellous to explain a miracle than to work a miracle. What was your explanation, by the way?

CONJURER. I shall not tell you.

SMITH. [_Starting._] Indeed? Why not?

CONJURER. Because all this would not avail. If I told you the lie I told Morris Carleon about how I did that trick....

SMITH. Well?

CONJURER. YOU would believe it as he believed it. You cannot think [_pointing to the lamp_] how that trick could be done naturally. I alone found out how it could be done--after I had done it by magic. But if I tell you a natural way of doing it....

SMITH. Well?...

CONJURER. Half an hour after I have left this house you will be all saying how it was done.