Why does truth no longer seem to matter? In this episode, we explore the philosophical and psychological roots of today's crisis of reality. Drawing on Jean Baudrillard’s theory of hyperreality and Carl Gustav Jung’s concept of the Shadow, I unravel how modern society’s obsession with materialism, the proliferation of simulations, and the repression of symbolic, non-material dimensions of human experience have led to the current breakdown of truth. We will examine how Baudrillard’s insights reveal a world where images no longer reflect reality but replace it entirely, and how Jung’s warning about the dangers of ignoring the unconscious has manifested in distorted, collective forms. Together, these perspectives illuminate why facts are increasingly dismissed in favour of emotionally compelling narratives. Finally, I propose a path forward: a reintegration of critical thinking and symbolic imagination as essential tools for restoring our relationship with reality and cultivating a culture where truth matters once again. Join me as we delve into the death of the real — and how we might yet reclaim it.

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RECOMMENDED READINGS 📖

REFERENCES 📚

Arendt, H. (1967). "Truth and Politics." The New Yorker, 25 February 1967.

Baudrillard, J. (1981). Simulacres et Simulation. Paris: Éditions Galilée.

Cassirer, E. (1944). An Essay on Man: An Introduction to a Philosophy of Human Culture. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Fricker, M. (2007). Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Jung, C.G. (1933). Modern Man in Search of a Soul. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Jung, C.G. (1951). Aion: Researches into the Phenomenology of the Self. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

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This episode explores the role of protection magic as a historically grounded response to war, oppression, and systemic violence across diverse cultural and temporal contexts.

Drawing on peer-reviewed academic sources, it examines how magical practices—rituals, talismans, verbal formulae, and spirit invocations—have been used as forms of spiritual defence and political resistance. From Mesopotamian anti-witchcraft rites and Greco-Roman defensive curses to medieval Christian amulets, Renaissance grimoires, and the Magical Battle of Britain, the lecture situates protection magic within broader religious, social, and cosmological frameworks.

Special attention is given to non-Western and postcolonial contexts, including the ritual technologies of Haitian Vodou during the revolution, Obeah in the British Caribbean, Yoruba warrior rites, and Andean protective ceremonies. The discussion also considers contemporary expressions of magical protection, including digital activist magic, Chaos Magic, and the esoteric disciplines of Damien Echols under carceral conditions.

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RECOMMENDED READINGS 📖

REFERENCES 📚

Abusch, T., & Schwemer, D. (2011). Corpus of Mesopotamian Anti-Witchcraft Rituals

Betz, H. D. (Ed.). (1992). The Greek Magical Papyri in Translation, Including the Demotic Spells. University of Chicago Press.

Christian, W. A. (1981). Apparitions in Late Medieval and Renaissance Spain. Princeton University Press.

Davies, O. (2003). Cunning-Folk: Popular Magic in English History. Hambledon and London.

Davies, O. (2012). Magic: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press.

Dayan, J. (1995). Haiti, History, and the Gods. University of California Press.

Desmangles, L. G. (1992). The Faces of the Gods: Vodou and Roman Catholicism in Haiti. University of North Carolina Press.

Fanger, C. (2012). Invoking Angels: Theurgic Ideas and Practices, Thirteenth to Sixteenth Centuries. Penn State University Press.

Faraone, C. A. (1991). Binding and burying the forces of evil: The defensive use of “voodoo dolls” in ancient Greece. Classical Antiquity, 10, 165–205.

Handler, J. S., & Bilby, K. M. (2012). Enacting Power: The Criminalization of Obeah in the Anglophone Caribbean, 1760–2011. University of the West Indies Press.

Hazzard-Donald, K. (2013). Mojo Workin’: The Old African American Hoodoo System. University of Illinois Press.

Kieckhefer, R. (2000). Magic in the Middle Ages. Cambridge University Press.

Klaassen, F. (2013). The Transformations of Magic: Illicit Learned Magic in the Later Middle Ages and Renaissance. Penn State University Press.

Olupona, J. K. (2014). African Religions: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press.

Oppenheim, A. L. (1977). Ancient Mesopotamia: Portrait of a Dead Civilization. University of Chicago Press.

Pasi, M. (2014). Aleister Crowley and the Temptation of Politics. Acumen.

Paton, D. (2015). The Cultural Politics of Obeah: Religion, Colonialism and Modernity in the Caribbean World. Cambridge University Press.

Pócs, É. (1999). Between the Living and the Dead: A Perspective on Witches and Seers in the Early Modern Age. Central European University Press. [...]

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This interview offers an insightful discussion with anthropologist Tanya Luhrmann, whose pioneering scholarship has significantly advanced our comprehension of magic, esotericism, and witchcraft. In this academic interview, we critically examine Luhrmann's influential notion of "interpretive drift"—the incremental cognitive process by which individuals progressively adopt and internalise magical beliefs and practices.

We engage with her seminal ethnographic research on contemporary magical and esoteric communities, investigating how practitioners utilise rituals, visualisation techniques, and imaginative practices to foster potent experiential encounters. Luhrmann elucidates the psychological and sociocultural mechanisms that underpin and sustain belief in magic and witchcraft, illuminating how rational actors negotiate and integrate esoteric practices within their quotidian existence.

Employing ethnographic case studies and rigorous theoretical analyses, we explore the broader implications of Luhrmann's findings for understanding the endurance and attractiveness of magical thought within contemporary secularised societies. Scholars, practitioners, and those intrigued by the enduring relevance of magical belief will find this discussion academically stimulating, providing nuanced insights into humanity’s enduring inclination to engage with the transcendent and extraordinary.

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ABOUT OUR GUEST

anya Luhrmann is a professor of anthropology at Stanford University, specialising in the study of spiritual experiences and their relation to religious practices. In her research, she analyses the ways in which people in various religions and spiritualities ‘kindle’ experiences of invisible others like gods, spirits and demons. Among the groups she has studied are evangelical Christians, Contemporary Pagans, magicians, Zoroastrians, Catholics, Santeria initiates, and newly orthodox Jews. She links their experiences to a variety of practices like prayer, ritual, storytelling and the cultivation of the inner senses.

She was named to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2003, received a John Guggenheim Fellowship award in 2007, and was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 2022. Her book ‘When God Talks Back’ was named a ‘New York Times’ Notable Book of the Year and a ‘Kirkus Reviews’ Best Book of the Year. It was awarded the $100,000 Grawemeyer Prize for Religion by the University of Louisville. She has published over thirty op-eds in ‘The New York Times’, and her work has been featured in ‘The New Yorker’, ‘The New York Review of Books’, the ‘Times Literary Supplement’, ‘Science News’, and many other publications. She is the author of ‘Persuasions of the Witch’s Craft’, ‘The Good Parsi’, ‘Of Two Minds’, ‘When God Talks Back’, ‘Our Most Troubling Madness’, and ‘How God Becomes Real’, and is currently at work on a book entitled ‘Voices’.

If you want to participate in her research, reach out to her at

luhrmann@stanford.edu

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