The Four Horsemen, episode 1

[CH] Now I think all of us around this table have probably enhanced, or improved, our own capacities as reasoners.

[RD] Yes, but I mean, there are plenty of other things to reason about. Having won the battle against religion, we can go back to science, or whatever it is we practice. And we can argue and reason about that, and there's plenty of arguments, really worthwhile arguments to be had.

[CH] But it'll always be the case that some will attribute their presence here to the laws of biology, and others will attribute their presence here to a divine plan that has a scheme for them. And you can tell a lot, in my view, about people, from which view they take. And, as we all know, only one of those views makes sense. Well how do we know that? Because we have to contrast it with the opposite one, which is not going to disappear.

[SH] Well let me make an analogy here. 'Cause you could've said the same thing about witchcraft at some point in recent history. You could say that every culture has had a belief in witches, a belief in the efficacy of magic spells. Witchcraft is ubiquitous, and we're never going to get rid of it, and we're fools to try. Or we can try only as a matter of dialectic, but witchcraft is going to be with us. And yet witchcraft has, almost without exception … I mean, you can find certain communities where …

[CH] Not at all, not at all.

[SH] No, I mean real witchcraft, not witchcraft as in its religious …

[CH] Witchcraft is completely ineradicable; it spreads like weed, often under animist and Christian religions.

[SH] No, no, I don't mean …

[DD] But not in the western world.

[SH] I mean frank witchcraft,

[CH] The Washington Post …

[SH] The witchcraft of the evil eye, and instead of medicine, you have the …

[CH] You think you've gotten rid of that?

[SH] I think fundamentally we've gotten rid of that, yes.

[RD] But in any case …

[CH] Not at all.

[RD] don't you want to get rid of it?

[CH] Not at all. There's currently a campaign to get Wiccans registered to be buried in Arlington Cemetery.

[SH] Well, modulo the Wiccans …

[DD] But Wiccans are to witchcraft as Unitarians are to … (laughter)

[SH] Right, they're not real. What I'm talking about a willingness to kill your neighbour, because you think that there is some causal mechanism by which they, through their evil intent, could have destroyed your crops psychically, you know, or cast an evil eye upon your … I mean it comes in ignorance of medical science. I mean, you don't know why people get sick, and you suspect your neighbour of ill-intent, and then witchcraft fills the void there.

[CH] No, I wouldn't say in such a case that one didn't wish to be without it, that we'd have lost something interesting to argue with.

[SH] But, we are effectively … I mean, we're not dealing with the claims of witches intruding upon medical - and don't go to alternative medicine and acupuncture here - I'm talking about real witchcraft, you know, medieval witchcraft.

[CH] Well I was about to deal with that very thing, and The Washington Post publishes horoscopes every day.

[SH] Astrology is yet another …

[DD] Yes, and that is …

[CH] You think … I'm …

[DD] Astrology is a pale …

[CH] Astrology is not going to be eradicated, even after I stop reading my horoscope.

[SH] Okay, but it doesn't need to be eradicated.

[RD] No, but you're confusing whether it's going to be eradicated and whether you want it to be eradicated. And it sounds as though you don't want it to be eradicated, because you want something to argue against, and something to sharpen your wits on.

[CH] Yes, I think that is, in fact, what I …

[DD] But in fact, instead of thinking about eradication, why not think about it the way an evolutionary epidemiologist would, and say what we want to do is we want to encourage the evolution of avirulence. We want to get rid of the harmful kinds, and … I mean, I don't care about astrology, I don't think it's harmful enough. I mean it was a little scary when Reagan was reportedly using astrology to make decisions, but that, I hope anomalous, case aside, I find the superstition that astrology is important to be relatively harmless. If we could only do the same thing, if we could only relegate the other enthusiasms to the status of astrology, I'd be happy.

[SH] Right.

[CH] Well, look, you don't accept my - or you don't like my - answer, but I think the question should be, is going to be, asked of us. It was asked of me today actually, again on the TV: "Do you wish no one was going to church this morning in the United States?"

[SH] Right.

[DD] What's your answer?

[CH] Well, I've given mine, Richard's disagreed. Well, the answer I gave this morning was "I think people would be much better off without false consolation, and I don't want them trying to inflict their beliefs on me. They'd be doing themselves and me a favour if they gave it up. So, perhaps in that sense, I contradict myself, I mean I wish they would stop it, but then I would be left with no one to argue with.

[RD] (laughs) Well, I just don't …!