New Age Cargo Cults - Part 3

This is part three of a three part article on New Age Cargo Cults and the use of Critical Thinking. Part 3 deals exclusively with critical thinking skills that can help occultists keep their rational balance dealing with an irrational process.

Use of Critical Examination

The first consideration is that all premises and assumptions should be carefully examined in an objective and careful manner. Does the claim make sense, and does it seem rational and readily accessible to the seeker? Are the tenets verifiable by independent experimentation or actual spiritual experiences? Are there requirements that force the adherents to suspend judgment or accept doctrines and practices purely on faith? Does the organization seem more interested in getting their fees and donations up front than allowing their beliefs and practices to be tested in an objective manner, thereby determining their authenticity?

There are also some important tests and considerations that the student can apply to any occult or spiritual belief system. I have found that the best mechanism for determining the truthfulness of spiritual claims is to apply some of the skeptical tests that have been promoted by the philosophic movement of atheism. The author Michael Shermer has written a book “Why People Believe Weird Things,” and also published a website called “How Thinking Goes Wrong - Twenty-five Fallacies That Lead Us to Believe Weird Things.”  You can find the website here.

While I am not an advocate of atheism by any stretch of the imagination (as Michael Shermer has abundantly declared himself to be), ironically, some of his written arguments are actually quite important for the measuring of objective truth and authenticating spiritual beliefs. I feel that we can examine some of them here to help us define a methodology for examining spiritual claims in an objective fashion, and so allow us to make judgments about the veracity of any given spiritual system. Therefore, I have included twelve of the most pertinent ones below.

The first thing that we need to keep in mind is that all spiritual experiences are necessarily subjective, but this fact should not in any way discount them as being invalid or merely the products of the imagination. The way in which subjective spiritual experiences are validated is through the process of peer review and experimental corroboration. While it may at times be difficult to corroborate a person or group’s spiritual claims, we can also use some rational tests as well, and this is where Michael Shermer’s writings come in handy. We should also keep in mind that occultists and spiritual teachers often use the “what if” metaphorical approach to creating concepts and building explanations for experiences that are, by definition, inexplicable. When I use the word “inexplicable,” what I mean is that certain concepts can’t be reduced to rational thought.

The second thing that we need to consider is that the spiritual realm of consciousness cannot be apprehended by the senses alone, nor can it be encapsulated by the mind as rational theories or models. Spiritual consciousness and its associated subtle phenomena can only be apprehended and realized when an individual is within the proper altered state of consciousness. Spiritual truths must always be determined by the methods that were used to establish the associated state of consciousness Not to do this is to take a spiritual truth or perspective out of its spiritual context. We can then say with a certain degree of confidence that spiritual claims which are able to be measured by the senses or by rational examination can be determined to be true or false. Other claims or experiences have to corroborated by performing the corresponding technique or practice. If a shaman claims to be able to physically transform himself into a wolf, then he would be subjected to same rigorous requirement of proof that any scientist would undergo making the same claim. Where problems arise in spiritual discourse and the testimony of spiritual experiences is where metaphors become confused for literal things or are taken out of their spiritual context.

We should also be aware that when occult tenets or beliefs bracket both the spiritual and physical worlds, then at least the aspect or part that affects the physical world should be able to be proven in an empirical manner. If a group believes in physical reincarnation, then the physical aspect of being reborn should have physical evidence that can be examined, tested and either verified or refuted. In such a situation, merely examining something as being logical or rational is not sufficient to verify it as truth, since what is being proposed should be able to be proven as a fact using the traditional scientific method.

Shermer’s document begins with an examination of “Hume’s Maxim,” which I am also quoting here for our examination. David Hume was a Scottish philosopher who lived during the middle of the 17th century. He states in his writings:

“That no testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous than the fact which it endeavors to establish.”

What Hume means by this statement is that a testimony or subjective experience should be able to be examined in the light of natural phenomena or judged as unsubstantiated fancy, and that the greater miracle should be rejected for the lesser, more rational, explanation. Of course, this logical analysis would be used to examine any spiritual claim that involved some kind of physical phenomenon. Yet it could also be used indirectly to determine truth in regards to spiritual tenets or doctrines as well. The important consideration is that any claim should have within it the means or mechanism through which it can be examined and potentially corroborated or refuted. Unsubstantiated claims must always be treated with a certain degree of skepticism. If the entire set of doctrines or tenets of a spiritual tradition are unsubstantiated, then the seeker should be extremely cautious of that tradition.

The following twelve points should help anyone critically analyze claims made within a spiritual community, group or promoted within some New Age or occult tradition. It is important to understand that metaphors which describe spiritual experiences are not to be confused as claims for objective truth; just as poetry or fictional stories are to be enjoyed for their own sake, and one need not take them literally.

1. Anecdotes are not scientific: The recounting of experiences, although interesting and perhaps even insightful, does not make them a fact. All statements and claims must be supported by corroborative evidence, usually from other independent sources, in order for anecdotal evidence to be accepted as truth. Just because someone says it’s so doesn’t necessarily mean that it must be so.

2. Using scientific language does not make something scientific: The use of jargon or the clothing of claims in scientific language does not make those claims scientific. What makes something scientific is the precise manner that the premise is stated and thoroughly tested by evidence. One example that comes to mind is Creationism, which appears to be scientific because it is written using scientific terminology. However, Creationism has not presented any corroborative evidence that would make it in fact a scientific theory and not a theological premise dressed up in scientific clothing.

3. Using bold statements to make a claim does not make that claim true: Someone can claim to have discovered the greatest new idea since the discovery of fire or the wheel, but that does not make it so. Rather, all claims need to be backed up by supporting evidence instead of emotionally charged exclamations.

4. Heretical claims are not a sign of truth: A claim that is ridiculed or violently opposed does not mean that the claim is necessarily valid. Many scientific theories have been proposed without any ridicule or opposition, but they have been verified or falsified based on the supporting evidence. Often heretical thoughts or claims are a sign of poor science or political grandstanding rather than radical or revolutionary thought.

5. The burden of proof is on the one making the claim: Those who are making the claim must supply the evidence to support that claim, not those to whom the claim represents a contradiction of established fact. For instance, those who claim that the holocaust did not occur must supply the proof for their claim. It is not up to those historians who have already presented the mountain of evidence that the holocaust did indeed occur to disprove the claim that it didn’t. Similarly, the proponents of the theory of evolution do not need to prove that the theory of Creationism is false. It is the task of the proponents of Creationism to validate their counter-theory using corroborative evidence and prove that evolution is false.

6. Rumors do not equate reality: If we hear a claim reported from unsubstantiated sources, then it must be considered an unsubstantiated rumor and not a fact. This is how urban myths are created and spread by gossip and opinion. All claims must be properly substantiated or they remain untrustworthy sources of information, and can even be disguised misinformation. The internet has seen to it that urban myths not only continue to tenaciously exist; but that they spawn other spurious beliefs and seem to have an independent life and volition.

7. The unexplained is not inexplicable: Just because something occurs that can’t be explained due to insufficient data or lacking objective proof does not mean that it is an unresolvable mystery, evidence of paranormal activity or proof of the supernatural. It is important to accept some things as unexplainable phenomena, perhaps requiring further experimentation and more data to ultimately explain it. This is so, despite the fact that human nature dislikes not having a neat and useful explanation for everything. We also need to be careful when labeling something as paranormal or supernatural. Operationally, all things that occur in the higher strata of consciousness have this quality of being paranormal, but they often do not produce physical phenomena that could be measured or recorded except as anecdotal subjective accounts or narratives. Occultists also use the word “mystery” or “inexplicable” to represent the fact that spiritual experiences can’t be communicated in a rational and objective fashion.

8. The failure to prove a claim is rationalized or ignored: Often this represents an excuse for why the claim can't be proven or shown to be true under all circumstances and situations. A psychic or prophet might complain that he or she is unable to envision or profess because the time of day isn’t right, it's the wrong phase of the moon, there are bad vibes, or the setting isn’t auspicious. Also, failures may be altered through data tampering or even entirely omitted, ensuring that the claim is always shown to be true. In science, negative results are considered as important as positive ones, since it indicates that either the claim is wrong or that some other factor is causing the results to be skewed. Spiritual claims that prove to be false are often rationalized by the faithful as being true; but only under certain (indefinable) circumstances.

9. After-the-fact reasoning is used to explain nearly everything: This is a fancy term for superstition. A bowler has a victorious night bowling, and attributes it to his lucky bowling shoes. A gambler can have a lucky key ring, and a baseball player, a lucky mitt. This also produces such beliefs as the wearing of lucky charms, keeping a rabbit's foot in one's pocket, wearing a St. Christopher medal, avoiding the number 13, avoiding black cats, the evil eye, not stepping on a crack on the sidewalk or walking under a ladder, etc. We can look at such beliefs and easily see their foolishness, but it's human nature to ascribe the cause of an event or situation after it has already occurred. Ask someone to determine the cause of an event before it happens, and they will seldom predict such an outcome better than chance.

10. Coincidence is happenstance: Often times what seems like a miraculous coincidence is actually within the realm of probability. We color these relationships as meaningful to us when they are just happenstance. We seek meaningful relationships between events even when none exist. Synchronicity is an often ill used term, invented by C. G. Jung to describe the quality of meaningfulness and connectivity that one feels when two unrelated events occur and are perceived as being related. This does not mean that the sense of connectivity and meaningfulness that one feels is indicative of some kind of causal link between them.

For instance, a man meets a woman friend at a concert in an arena, and amongst several thousand attendees her seat ends up being right next to his, even though the occurrence was accidental and unplanned. They might consider such an occurrence auspicious, perhaps indicating that they should get to know each other or to become lovers, since this “sign” has indicated a connection between them. Actually, the event is within the realm of probability, even though it seems singularly auspicious and meaningful to them.

11. Contrasting representativeness determines the difference between typical or unusual occurrences: We must always understand the context in which an unusual event or claim occurs. We should analyze it for the representativeness of its class of phenomena, and establish a comparative baseline for usual or explainable phenomena. If the unusual occurrence fits with the usual or explainable phenomenon that acts as a baseline, then that unusual event is actually part of the class of explainable phenomena.

A good example is a reputed haunted house, which seems to abound in strange sounds and paranormal events. These seem less remarkable when compared to the base line of usual sounds that an old house might make, such as the groaning of out of square joints, the knocking or rattling of old plumbing, the scratching sounds of mice burrowing in the walls, the settling of old foundations, etc.

12. Miscellaneous Points: Other mistakes that can skew or cause us to make false judgments or claims are listed as the following points below. A lack of evidence does not prove or disprove a claim; it makes it unverifiable or unknown. A case in point is the proof that God exists because there is no evidence to prove that he does not exist, or, that God does not exist because there is no evidence to prove that he does exist.

Hasty generalizations: usually scientists err on the degree of caution before making a generalization about a given claim or phenomena; but the average individual seems to have no problem in making judgments even on the slimmest of evidence. This is also called prejudice. For instance, a few Muslims are found to be terrorists; therefore, all Muslims must be potential terrorists.

An over reliance on authorities: If someone has a PhD next to their name, they have become an unquestioned authority even in areas beyond their specialization. Talk radio and cable news are full of so-called experts who offer their opinions as facts, even if there is no independent supporting evidence or sources. It used to be that a news item could be reasonably verified if there were at least three independent sources to corroborate it. Unfortunately, this is no longer true, since getting the scoop is now more important in the internet age than producing news that has a certain degree of factual integrity.

Circular reasoning or tautology: This is where a conclusion or claim is merely a restatement of one of the premises. For instance: God exists because the Bible proves it, and the Bible is true because it is the inspired word of God.

Conclusion

If we avoid the above mistakes in logic and seek to verify spiritual claims in a rational and objective fashion, then we can avoid falling for spurious teachings and being duped or coerced into believing and accepting things as fact when they are actually false, unsupported or unverifiable suppositions. Any legitimate esoteric or spiritual tradition offers the mechanism for verifying their tenets or doctrines and never requires anyone to merely believe and accept them as unqualified facts. Also, any legitimate esoteric or spiritual tradition allows for an open examination of its beliefs and practices, and uses a form of peer review to ascertain if subjective spiritual experiences are valid or not.

We would be well advised to shun any group or organization that resists an honest examination of their beliefs and doctrines. We should be wary of any organization that forces its members to accept unqualified doctrines and unsubstantiated truths in order to effortlessly acquire godlike abilities or powers for money. We should be dubious of anyone who claims to have achieved godlike powers or abilities with little or no effort, and we should be very cautious of any teacher or spiritual leader who refuses to be accountable for their actions. Through a sober consideration of all claims, creeds and tenets, we can avoid the pitfalls of cults and the interference of false prophets and teachers, and thereby not lend support to the ever burgeoning growth of various New Age or Occult cargo cults.

While we can discuss the spiritual ramifications of spiritual matters to our hearts content, when it comes to the physical world, science is more able to determine the nature and even origin of life than any form of occultism. So for this reason I have dropped any occult theory or system that attempts to explain physical reality.

I have to admit that I am biased in favor of occult beliefs because I am a practicing occultist and ritual magician. My occult studies and magickal practices are therefore confined to the domain of spirit and mind, which seems to be the most fertile area for my work. I talk about magical powers and dealing with angels, daemons, gods, goddesses, etc. However, I am referring entirely to the domain of spirit. Where things happen in the material world through the art of my magick, I would say that it was my magick that caused it; but I wouldn’t attempt to prove such an hypothesis in a scientific manner.  I highly recommend that other occultists follow my example.

What I do is to keep those things that are spiritual in the context of the spiritual world, and I don’t attempt to make elaborate models and theories to determine what is happening. I consider these phenomena to be metaphysical occurrences. They involve spiritual revelations, but they are not something that I can empirically prove. I don’t need to. Instead, I leave the ultimate judgment of my work to my peers who are qualified to work the same rituals and see what the results produce. But from a scientific point of view, my results are subjective and anecdotal, which means that they could not be used as any kind of logical or rational proof.

For this reason, I prefer to call my magickal practice an art and not a science. It may have rules and structures, but it can’t stand up to an empirical analysis, so it should not be confused with other things that can be proven in this manner. I have so much respect for science and what it has discovered that I am unwilling to dispute it. I will allow scientists to find out the truth about the physical world, but I will work on what I consider to be spiritual truths that are within the provenance of my understanding.

Frater Barrabbas

New Age Cargo Cults - Part 2

Heaven's Gate Founder

This is part two of a three part series on New Age Cargo Cults and Critical Thinking.

Cargo Cult by Extension

Although the term cargo cult was used by anthropologists to describe a very specific cultural phenomenon, it found its way into the common vernacular to describe other phenomena not associated with the effects of a superior culture affecting a more primitive culture. The term began to represent any people who imitate a process or a system in a superficial fashion without understanding either its structure or the underlying substance.

The key point is that the islanders reversed the logical sequence of causation, mistaking a “necessary condition” (building an artificial representation for the receiving points of cargo) for a “sufficient condition” (building the infrastructure to actually manufacture cargo).    

What is indicated in the more general use of this term is that something is being promoted as true but is actually using a flawed model of causation. This more general definition has been used to describe poor scientific research methods as well as business models, plans and even software engineering.

I have now used it to describe erroneous methods and ideas that are promoted in the New Age and occult communities. The term generally has the meaning of a shallow imitation or attempting to gain true spiritual effects and personal transformation without applying any of the actual work or effort. Belief systems are usually not put to any kind of rational examination or testing, so at times even the most absurd concepts and ideas can be held as some kind of sacred truth, and in time, produce disastrous results.

An example is the New Age fascination with the book and the movie called “The Secret,” which has popularized the dubious “Law of Attraction.” I have already dealt with this issue in regards to the practicalities of magick, and you can find that article here. However, the Law of Attraction basically states that merely by projecting positive and empowering self affirmations, the desired state will somehow miraculously manifest. It belies the old adage that if you want something, you need to plan and work for it. Another example is the UFO cult Heaven’s Gate, whose members thought that by imitating the appearance and behavior of aliens they could attract a UFO to come down and take them away. As you can see, both of these examples are guilty of reversing causation, and thereby acting in a manner very similar to the cargo cults of the islanders.

One of the truisms of the New Age, which is actually quite misleading, is that people have the power to make their own reality. Of course, the opposite is also true and important, that reality shapes the minds and actions of individuals. By proposing one perspective and ignoring the other, people can act as if they have unlimited power to determine their fate, which is a false assertion. Actions are always limited by circumstance, which is obvious to most people, but the New Age would turn that bit of logic on its head. The lesson here is that critical thinking will automatically force someone to examine more than one possibility, and to see things in a practical manner - an important criteria for success. 

In the discipline of magick, flawed models of causation seem to abound, and many individuals appear to take quite literally what is, after all, a kind of imaginary speculation that is used to put the mind in places where it normally wouldn’t be able to go. This is what I call the “as if” paradigm of magickal operations; but just because someone uses a mental tool to gain a different perspective, it doesn’t follow that the underlying assumption represents a physical reality.

For instance, astral travel can be likened to a kind of visualization exercise, and at times can have a powerful and even physical kind of manifestation and corroboration. That doesn’t mean that operators who practice this technique can actually levitate or fly. It is an “as if” mechanism to aid the mind in its perception, and therefore, not to be taken literally.

Another example can be found in the list of attributes associated with Goetic demons, whose evocation will produce all sorts of miraculous occurrences, particularly those that can enrich the operator with unearned wealth. Although more complex and involved than the New Age maxim of the Law of Attraction, using Goetic evocation to somehow attract or acquire unearned wealth is just as erroneous. Still, many magicians ardently believe that their kind of magick is superior to New Age thought and will produce the desired results, even though they are actually making the same error of causation. 

(These are some of the same points that John Michael Greer has made in his class on pagan ceremonial magick, regarding certain cautionary issues confronting adherents of this path. He covered these points without giving any extensive examples, but I was on the same wave-length as him and have followed up with a more in-depth discussion. Thus, I have added these points to this article, but I must credit him for making them more apparent to me.)

Often imaginary speculation, which can be a powerful mental tool if properly used, can produce all sorts of unsubstantiated claims, all of which would be easily resolved and shown to be false if only they were subjected to a kind of rigorous examination and peer review. Since this does not typically occur, and in fact it is often harshly rejected as a kind of negative or offensive criticism, some very foolish notions and silly ideas seem to be shamelessly promoted by would-be enlightened hucksters. These will-o-wisps are then gobbled up by the unsuspecting masses, who think that they’re going to experience a wondrous change. Should we then find it so strange that the press has a field day with the practices and beliefs of cultists and their leaders? This bad press has the corollary effect of making the public suspicious of the research and experimental work of occultists who are legitimate.

The New Age has its own cargo cults, and in fact these organizations seem to abound, since they promise so much and require so little effort. Perhaps some common sense should tell us that if a proposition sounds too good, then it probably is. If someone wants to sell me a Rolex for $50, then I should be on my guard for a possible fake impersonating the real thing. Similarly, if some guru claims that he can help us attain perfect enlightenment without much in the way of work or effort, we should be just as skeptical if not outright scornful. What these scams do offer us is much more like the proposition of “just putting down your money and suspending your analytical faculties, and everything will be blissfully fine.” The odds are good that it will fail. 

Carefully examining the documentation and lore for legitimate spiritual paths has shown that any amount of self transformation, not to mention actual enlightenment, requires a lifetime of work and devotion. There are no shortcuts to this ultimate goal and nothing is certain.

Perhaps a useful analogy is the discipline required to become an athletic contender for any major sport. A person dedicates their life to the training and regimen and even then, there is no guarantee that he or she will defeat all other competitors and become preeminent. There are also the elements of innate talent, physical genetics and luck.

What I am proposing is that the process of becoming an enlightened sage should incorporate the same considerations as those impacting a professional athlete. Even a person who devotes their entire life to this work may do no better than anyone else who is not so intently engaged. The path of spiritual enlightenment is not like the Special Olympics, where everyone gets an award no matter how they perform. If anything, spiritual paths to enlightenment are probably a bit more like the real Olympics; for every winner there are a multitude of losers.

What makes the bogus promoters of a New Age cargo cult so appealing to average individuals is that they appear to guarantee their results, and that makes the harsh reality of living in a competitive world more palliative and easily swallowed. It mitigates the need for self examination or admitting one’s flaws, as well as celebrating the virtues. In a word, it creates a false and superficial understanding of ourselves and the world we live in. It creates a cargo cult of our life and our spiritual path, and in the end, all such activity is doomed to fail expectations.

However, not every modern spiritual path or undertaking is a cargo cult. Even the most popular trend may be indicative of an actual proven methodology that works. What is needed are a set of tools for measuring truth and validating that some technique or practice is indeed real and authentic. What I am going to attempt next in this article is to propose a set of steps that anyone can take to verify that a trend or spiritual technique is valid and authentic. However, keep in mind the old adage that “the proof in the pudding is in the eating.” Experience should be used to measure the efficacy of any spiritual system. Therefore, experiment, test, and then objectify what has been experienced!

(To be continued..)

Frater Barrabbas

New Age Cargo Cults

This is part one of a two part series on New Age Cargo Cults and Critical Thinking, both of which I think are quite relevant topics for us to ponder.

I wrote this article a few years ago for an anthology, and it was summarily rejected. It’s not that it was a bad article, but it just didn’t fit into the subject matter very well. Now, I have decided to dust it off and re-work it since it seems appropriate to the line of discussion that I have been engaged in for the last couple of months.

The real issue for anyone practicing magick is to deal with the contrast of rational and critical thinking against the odd and often strange phenomenon of magick. We can go too far and try to make magick fit our expectations and act as if it were a scientifically objective phenomenon, but that often has its own risks. If we approach magick with “tunnel vision” and reject certain approaches or perspectives because they don’t fit our paradigm, then we will have determined a magick that is as artificial and scripted as any religious dogma. Magick, as I have maintained, has an element of mystery and irrationality, and we should be open to allow for many different perspectives, even ones that contradict our own opinions.

That being said, I think that it is unwise to promote an irrational approach to magick, or just to engage in really sloppy and uncritical thinking. Magicians should avoid being too credulous, and they should demand a certain degree of testing and verifying any theory or hypothesis, as well as supposed sacred tenets and enshrined belief systems. To accept any and everything without discrimination is to create what I have fondly called a “cargo cult.” Occultism should never be so blatantly irrational that it becomes ridiculous to outsiders, so critical thinking is important in any spiritual system. 

Introduction

We live in an age where anything is possible in the popular media, any idea, plausible, and any pretext of spirituality however dubious, seems to be potentially authentic. The internet is the doubtful mechanism that seems to disperse even the oldest urban myths and disproved misinformation everywhere, simultaneously. It manages to serve up stale and moldy ideas as new groundbreaking discoveries, except those who have any degree of critical thinking can pierce the new wrappers covering the old fallacies.

Unfortunately, we don’t correspondingly live in an age of critical thinking or discriminating tastes, so many individuals, blogging pundits, groups and organizations seem to gobble up and spew out much of the obvious (and not so obvious) urban myths and misinformation, furthering its dissemination and so attempting to re-establish its legitimacy. What is true in the secular and politicized worlds of the internet is also true for spiritual organizations, occult groups, blogsphere authors, and various adherents of the New Age. While many have shown caution and restraint, a few others have gone in the opposite direction, losing their credibility in the process.

It’s my opinion that the New Age collectively appears to gleefully gather together all sorts of rubbish along with valid information and promote it all seemingly without any discrimination whatsoever, building trendy new-thought paradigms that have the quality of a superficial fad rather than a revealed truth. Perhaps it wasn’t enough for these aficionados of the trendy and obscure to rob and pilfer from the graveyard of discredited New Thought writings, but now they seem intent on just making stuff up for the sake of their supposedly superior viewpoints. I won’t get into the particulars, but when a poorly written book like the “Celestine Prophecy” becomes a best seller, it is nothing less than sadly incredible.

In our current age of instant information and high speed propagation, we often accept empty spiritual platitudes, meaningless slogans and obvious irrational and illogical beliefs without any desire to corroborate or examine them in a rational and scholarly manner. A person can be forced into the situation of being either a believer and accepting the whole of a New Age fad tradition, or labeled a cynic or an unbeliever, a harbinger of negative “vibes” to be avoided at all costs by the host of pious (but credulous) believers.

What is being confused by the pundits and proponents alike is that in the present age all spiritual paradigms should be subject to testing and validation, and nothing should be taken merely on faith. The age of belief and the quest for social legitimacy has been replaced by one of experience and authenticity. Anyone can make a claim about their spirituality, we just don't have to accept that claim until it is, in some way, operationally verified. However, many New Age groups attempt to circumvent this important measure of validity and instead require its followers to be believers, blindly accepting their doctrine in order to realize the secret truths and powerful underlying teachings behind their newly minted traditions.

While I could write several books about many New Age organizations who seek to short-circuit a proper validation of their doctrines and dogma, this is not the purpose of this article. I have often said that some aspects of the New Age tradition (but not all of them), remind me of a Cargo Cult. Now this comment has earned me a few laughs, a smile or even a knowing nod or two; but only a few probably knew what I was talking about. A couple of my learned friends have actually criticized my use of the term, saying that I am probably misusing it. So I have decided to examine exactly what the term means and clarify what exactly I am saying.

History of Cargo Cults

As one can easily imagine from just listening to the combination of words, a “cargo cult” is a phenomenon that has been studied and documented as occurring amongst primitive tribes living in the south pacific, most notably in New Guinea and other nearby isolated islands located in an area called Micronesia. This is a part of the south pacific where the islanders have very dark skin and supposedly at one time indulged in head hunting and cannibalism. Comparing an anthropological phenomenon that occurred amongst very primitive peoples to proponents of the New Age may seem whimsical or perhaps even denigrating to either party, yet I feel that there is some justification for it. I have found the following definition of a cargo cult and will use this definition to build my case. (I have consulted the Wikipedia page on Cargo Cults to help research this article, so you can find it here. All quotes are from that article.)

So, exactly what is a cargo cult? The anthropological definition of a cargo cult is that it is a religious movement that appears in tribal societies when they are exposed to technologically advanced non-native cultures. The focus of a cargo cult are the products of the advanced culture, such as the sophisticated supplies of food, clothing, and other manufactured materials, which the more technologically primitive tribal culture seeks to acquire. However, the manner of seeking to acquire this “cargo” relies on a system of magical thinking, religious rituals and practices instead of the more direct and slower route of building up their world to manufacture these items themselves. The natives are typically partitioned and isolated from the technologically dominant culture, so they use the “tools” of their own world to somehow enter into and acquire the wealth of cargo that they have witnessed but not understood. There is also an additional belief that the wondrous materials of the cargo are from the gods or ancestors (not the foreigners who are using it), and that this cargo was actually intended for the tribe, but somehow purloined or stolen from them.

From this definition we can deduce that a cargo cult occurs wherever a primitive culture encounters a superior one, and the equipment of that superior culture, as well as its goods and other material items, become coveted signs of the beneficence of the tribal deities and ancestors. The equipment and goods of the superior culture are perceived as having been created by magic, since the mechanisms for its manufacture and production are not understood. In fact, the vast infrastructure that produces such goods isn’t even conceivable to the members of the primitive society. They believe that the goods and gear come from the gods and ancestors, and that it is somehow either stolen or mistakenly granted to the foreigners. The object of the cargo cult is to find a magical means of restoring the cargo to its rightful owners, the natives themselves.

Using the logic from the perspective of the tribal people, the cargo cult seeks to overcome the dominance of the foreign visitors and their material wealth by performing rituals that imitate key behavior that they observed amongst those who attract and possess the desired goods. Their assumption is that these rituals and practices will somehow influence their ancestors and deities to give the desired cargo to their own people. Thus, members of the cult develop an elaborate religious and magical system, along with specific spiritual intermediaries to help them acquire the valuable materials of the foreign people.

Members of a cargo cult will appropriate the symbols of the superior culture, often out of context, and make primitive facsimiles and use them in ritual and ceremonies as fetishes and instruments to magically acquire the coveted cargo. The driving idea behind this is that a properly performed rite with all of the right symbols and fetishes will produce the desired results. Sometimes even individuals from the superior culture can become a godlike personage, such as the cult personality of “John Frum” on the island of Tanna, of the Vanuatu group. Godhead personages represent the individuals who were responsible for bringing the cargo for the foreigners, so they are invoked as a means of securing cargo for the natives.

Cargo cults began to appear in the late 19th century when explorers, colonizers and missionaries visited the remote islands and jungle villages in the south pacific, but saw a startling increase during the Second World War, when the invading Japanese and the conquering Americans and their allies flooded the area with a huge surplus of manufactured goods, weapons and equipment.

“The earliest recorded cargo cult was the Tuka Movement that began in Fiji in 1885. Cargo cults occurred periodically in many parts of the island of New Guinea, including the Taro Cult in Northern Papua New Guinea, and the Vailala Madness that arose in 1919 and was documented by F. E. Williams..”

By the time of the Second World War, the phenomenon of cargo cults was already established; but the enormous amounts of equipment and supplies, first deployed by the Japanese and then by the Americans and their allies, were unprecedented. The influence of all these materials had a profound impact on some of the islands and areas of New Guinea. Long after the end of the Second World War, cargo cults were still in evidence, and the phenomenon lasted for seventy years before finally disappearing, with exception of the John Frum cult on the island of Tanna.

Cargo cults typified behavior that imitated what the natives saw the soldiers and sailors do when cargo was either air dropped by parachute, landed by plane or debarked from ships. Natives would carve earphones out of wood and occupy deserted or fabricated radio shacks or control towers; they would build radios out of cocoanuts, bamboo and straw, imitate landing signals at deserted runways, send out light signals to the shipping lanes at night with fabricated signaling devices, and even built planes out of bamboo and straw. All of these efforts that used forms of sympathetic magic were done with the expectation that it would cause the flow of cargo to return.

Unfortunately, not only did the newly developed and practiced magical religion of the cargo cult not produce any of the desired manufactured items, but it also had the terrible effect of erasing all of the older and indigenous religious practices and beliefs, along with much of the original tribal culture. Cargo cults also had the effect of eviscerating the government, systems of exchange and many other traditional beliefs and practices amongst the tribes, making them culturally poorer in the aftermath, when the cult had run its course.

The native cultures that were impacted during the Second World War never recovered, since being powerfully affected by the more sophisticated Japanese and American material cultures had both eradicated and irrevocably changed them in a distorted manner. Although life continued on for these native peoples, they had given up their indigenous religious practices and spiritual beliefs to practices the cargo cult, and afterwards, had then lost whatever cult they had developed to attract cargo.

Anthropologists have shown that this kind of contact between cultures where the differences in technology are vast can have terrible consequences, especially when the technologically inferior culture has been isolated from the rest of the world. The dominant culture often unwittingly causes a great degree of destructive change and suffering to the inferior one, and afterwards, it is impossible to mitigate or rectify the impact of those changes even by the ministrations of the dominant culture.

(To be continued..)

Frater Barrabbas