Quasi-magical refers to something that appears to possess magical qualities or abilities but is not actually magical in nature. It is an adjective used to describe phenomena, objects, or actions that may resemble magic or have an effect similar to magic, but can be explained through scientific or natural means. In literature and fantasy genres, the concept of quasi-magical elements often appears. These elements can include enchanted objects, mystical creatures, or spell-like abilities that are not explicitly magical but exhibit extraordinary abilities or characteristics. Quasi-magical items, such as talking mirrors or invisibility cloaks, add an enchanting and mystical element to a story while remaining within the realm of plausibility. In some cases, quasi-magical phenomena can also be attributed to advanced technology or scientific explanations.
Ta-Da! Magical Thinking Explained
Magical thinking involves the belief that you can influence real-world events with certain actions or rituals. It’s not necessarily a cause for concern, but it can cause distress for some people.
Magical thinking refers to the idea that you can influence the outcome of specific events by doing something that has no bearing on the circumstances.
It’s pretty common in children. Remember holding your breath going through a tunnel? Or not stepping on sidewalk cracks for the sake of your mom’s back?
Magical thinking can persist into adulthood, too.
You’ve probably come to terms with the fact that monsters don’t live under the bed, but you might still check (or do a running jump into bed), just in case.
Or maybe you have a lucky outfit you wear when you’re hoping things go your way.
Generally speaking, there’s nothing wrong with following rituals or superstitions. Sometimes, though, magical thinking can be a sign of a mental health condition.
Magical thinking pops up everywhere. Some examples are pretty universal, while others might be unique to a certain culture.
Rituals and traditions
- knocking on wood to prevent misfortune
- wearing a lucky item of clothing
- making a wish on a dandelion, wishbone, or birthday candles
- skipping the 13th floor or room number in building design
These are all examples of magical thinking. You do these things to cause a specific outcome.
Superstitions and old wives’ tales
Magical thinking doesn’t always focus on making things go well.
These common superstitions are also examples of magical thinking:
- Walking under a ladder brings misfortune.
- Breaking a mirror will cause 7 years of bad luck.
- Bad things come in threes.
- A black cat crossing your path brings bad luck (plenty of cat owners worldwide would beg to differ).
Associations
Another type of magical thinking involves linking specific outcomes to something that can’t directly cause them.
- You shouted at your sister, so she fell down and hit her head.
- Restarting your phone will make that text you’ve been waiting for show up.
- Your old car will finally, finally start, if you just beg it hard enough.
Some people consider religion a form of magical thinking. However, it’s important to consider the context of someone’s background when it comes to this debate.
Sure, some people have beliefs that seem like magical thinking to those who don’t belong to the same culture or religion. To an atheist, for example, prayer might seem like a form of magical thinking.
But magical thinking generally involves doing things you know — deep down — won’t affect the final outcome of something. Most religious people arrive at their beliefs through emotional experiences, so religion isn’t necessarily an example of magical thinking.
So, why do people practice rituals and put stock in superstitions, especially if they know there’s no logical basis for them?
Comfort
These practices and beliefs can offer a sense of comfort in a largely unpredictable world. Magical thinking might help you feel more in control of things you really have no way of managing.
When you have nothing else to cling to, superstitious beliefs can reduce distress or frustration, even if they don’t actually have power.
If the situation does turn out the way you hoped, this usually reinforces your belief in the superstition. You aced that exam you were worried about? Of course you did. You were using your lucky pencil.
Optimism
The power of positive thinking can also be considered magical thinking, in a way. There’s no scientific support for the idea that thinking good thoughts can cure physical health conditions like depression or cancer.
Evidence does suggest, however, that staying positive can change your outlook and help you manage stress and depression more easily.
Increased optimism can also make it easier to notice good things around you, which can help relieve emotional distress. Even if your health may not improve physically, an improved outlook can sometimes help you feel a bit better, all the same.
It can also help you reach a mindset where you feel better equipped to take concrete steps to address issues you’re experiencing.
Confidence
Research also suggests superstitions could have a positive impact on performance.
Keeping your fingers crossed, holding a lucky charm, or wishing someone luck by saying “Break a leg!” can help boost confidence, which can lead to better performance.
All those benefits aside, magical thinking can have some drawbacks.
If you put all your faith into superstitions and rituals without considering other possibilities or making effort of your own, you may have a hard time achieving success.
Avoiding science-backed treatments in favor of magical thinking can also have serious consequences if you’re dealing with a severe or life threatening health issue.
Magical thinking can get especially tricky when it involves an object. Think back to that lucky pencil. Even though you studied for several hours, you didn’t feel capable of acing the test without your pencil.
But what if you misplace the pencil? During a test, you might worry you lost it forever. This fear, in turn, could make it hard to concentrate on the actual test.
When you fail the test, you blame it on not having your lucky pencil — not considering the other, more likely cause: Your stress sabotaged your performance.
Sometimes, magical thinking can serve as a symptom of an underlying mental health condition. This type of magical thinking usually feels uncontrollable and creates a lot of distress.
Here’s a look at how magical thinking can pop up in different conditions.
Obsessive-compulsive disorder
Magical thinking (also called magical ideation) commonly occurs as part of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). People with OCD typically engage in specific rituals, or compulsions, to quiet the obsessive thoughts they experience.
Someone might believe, for example, they’ll get into a car accident unless they tap the hood of their car three times.
While some people with OCD perform these rituals without really believing they have power, others have a strong conviction that failing to perform the ritual would have negative consequences.
Anxiety
People with anxiety often have high levels of magical thinking.
For example, you might:
- spend a lot of time worrying about outcomes that are less likely or realistic
- believe planning for every possible negative outcome can protect you against those outcomes
- find it hard to take concrete action because of your worries
Schizophrenia
Magical thinking has also been linked to schizophrenia spectrum disorders.
One 2014 study found support for a strong association between magical thinking and auditory hallucinations in people living with schizophrenia.
People with schizophrenia might:
- believe they have special powers
- believe they must take specific actions to protect against evil
- attach deep or significant meaning to everyday happenings
If you’re wondering what separates ordinary magical thinking from magical thinking that might pose cause for concern, it might help to think of it in terms of severity.
Here’s one example: Many people believe in aliens, or extraterrestrial life forms. Someone experiencing problematic magical thinking might take this a little further, believing:
- Aliens do exist.
- They reside in human bodies and plan to eventually inhabit all of humanity.
- Wearing a specific color or type of metal offers some protection against the aliens.
As a result, they may only wear that specific color and always keep some of that metal in their pocket. This causes problems when they have to walk through a metal detector or wear a uniform for work.
They might also experience a lot of anxiety if they lose that piece of metal while out for a walk and don’t have an immediate replacement.
Know the signs
In general, it’s a good idea to talk to a therapist about magical thinking when:
- It causes distress.
- It affects daily life.
- You can’t control your thoughts.
- Your thoughts trigger urges to hurt yourself or others.
- Your feelings seem unusual and persistent.
Quasi-magical thinking and the public good
Cooperation is a puzzle because it is not obvious why cooperation, which is good for the group, is so common, despite the fact that defection is often best for the individual. Though we tend to view this issue through the lens of the prisoner’s dilemma, Artem recently pointed me to a paper by Joanna Masel, a mathematical biologist at Stanford, focusing on the public goods game [1]. In this game, each player is given 20 tokens and chooses how many of these they wish to contribute to the common pool. Once players have made their decisions, the pool is multiplied by some factor m (where mn > 1) and the pool is distributed equally back to all players. To optimize the group’s payoff, players should take advantage of the pool’s multiplicative effects by contributing all of their tokens. However, because a player’s share does not depend on the size of their contribution, it is easy to see that this is not the best individual strategy (Nash equilibrium). By contributing nothing to the common pool, a player gets a share of the pool in addition to keeping all of the tokens they initially received. This conflict captures the puzzle of cooperation, which in this case is: Why do human participants routinely contribute about half of their funds, if never contributing is individually optimal?
As Masel points out, various attempts at explaining human cooperation in this context have failed. The proposal that players have not understood the game is contradicted by the finding that cooperation perseveres when subjects play for extended periods, and even resets to high levels when a new round is started [2]. The argument that players cooperate in an attempt to evoke reciprocity also falls flat because subjects who play anonymously, and with no knowledge of their partners’ contributions, not only continue to cooperate, but do so at equal [3, 4] or even higher levels [5]. A final proposal of particular interest to us is the suggestion that players are using a utility function (i.e., considering a payoff matrix) that deviates from objective reality. In other words, they are considering subjective factors such as fairness, the group’s payoff, the rewarding nature of contributing, and so on.
To explain the data and yet stray as little as possible from the assumption of rationality, Masel proposes that human reasoning may be captured by the idea “what if everyone else thought like me?” Specifically, even though players understand there is no causal link between their own behavior and that of others, they may nevertheless recognize that a correlation exists, and this realization may be sufficient motivation to contribute. Famously proposed by Shafir and Tversky [6], this phenomenon is known as quasi-magical thinking and involves acting as if one erroneously believes (without actually believing) that one’s actions affect the behavior of others. This principle may best be captured by the sentiment often expressed by voters, who individually have very little influence on the outcome of any given election, “if I don’t vote, then who will?” In this case, players contribute because they are acting as if they believe that contributing makes others more likely to contribute.
Let’s just hope they think like me and cooperate.
(As an aside, Artem points out that this idea resembles Douglas Hofstadter’s concept of superrationality, a type of decision making where individuals assume that, in a symmetric game, both parties will arrive at the same answer. Because unilateral actions are off limits, this results in cooperation instead of defection, since cooperation is the best mutual strategy. The difference, in this case, is that players do not assume that others will mirror their actions; rather, they are simply sensitive to the fact that their behavior is likely to be correlated to some degree with the behavior of others.)
To test this idea, Masel considers agents using a Bayesian update scheme to estimate how much others contribute and how much these contributions vary. This would ordinarily result in a race to the bottom, with agents converging to the Nash equilibrium (no one contributing any of their tokens). Masel avoids this by having agents treat their own expected contribution as a data point akin to other players’ contributions. This expected contribution is weighted more heavily initially, while an agent’s confidence in its estimate of the average contribution is low, and becomes weighted less heavily relative to external data as time goes on and confidence grows. As a result, agents can increase their estimate of the average contribution simply by expecting to contribute more themselves, particularly when not enough reliable data has been collected to disagree.
In principle, such a bias seems reasonable. It would encourage cooperation, despite cooperation not being individually optimal, and avoids strongly violating the assumption of rationality by explaining the tendency to cooperate as a consequence of what data is used to predict others’ behavior. This broadly agrees with the finding that making choices influences expectations [7] and, conversely, that estimating others’ actions prior to making a choice leads to reduced contributions [8]. In short, leveraging the knowledge that “I am like them” may explain, in rational terms, seemingly irrational cooperation in the public goods game.
References
- Masel, J. (2007). A Bayesian model of quasi-magical thinking can explain observed cooperation in the public good game. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 64 (2), 216-231 DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2005.07.003
- Isaac, R. M., Walker, J. M., & Thomas, S. H. (1984). Divergent evidence on free riding: An experimental examination of possible explanations. Public Choice, 43(2), 113-149. doi: 10.1007/bf00140829
- Brandts, J., & Schram, A. (2001). Cooperation and noise in public goods experiments: applying the contribution function approach. Journal of Public Economics, 79(2), 399-427. doi: 10.1016/s0047-2727(99)00120-6
- Weimann, J. (1994). Individual behaviour in a free riding experiment. Journal of Public Economics, 54(2), 185-200. doi: 10.1016/0047-2727(94)90059-0
- Andreoni, J. (1988). Why free ride? Journal of Public Economics, 37(3), 291-304. doi: 10.1016/0047-2727(88)90043-6
- Shafir, E., & Tversky, A. (1992). Thinking through uncertainty: Nonconsequential reasoning and choice. Cognitive Psychology, 24(4), 449-474. doi: 10.1016/0010-0285(92)90015-t
- Dawes, R. M., McTavish, J., & Shaklee, H. (1977). Behavior, communication, and assumptions about other people’s behavior in a commons dilemma situation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 35(1), 1-11.
- Croson, R. T. A. (2000). Thinking like a game theorist: factors affecting the frequency of equilibrium play. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 41(3), 299-314. doi: 10.1016/s0167-2681(99)00078-5
Quasi magical
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In some cases, quasi-magical phenomena can also be attributed to advanced technology or scientific explanations. For example, in science fiction stories, futuristic gadgets or superhuman abilities may be depicted as quasi-magical because they defy current scientific understanding. These quasi-magical elements blur the line between science and magic, creating an otherworldly atmosphere within the narrative.
Furthermore, the term quasi-magical can also be used metaphorically to describe experiences or events that evoke a sense of wonder and awe, akin to the feeling of witnessing magic. This can include breathtaking natural landscapes, extraordinary human achievements, or transformative moments of connection and understanding. These experiences may not possess any literal magical properties but elicit a similar emotional response, making them quasi-magical in their own right. Overall, quasi-magical refers to anything that appears magical or mystical but can be explained through scientific, natural, or metaphorical means. It adds an element of enchantment and wonder to narratives, experiences, and objects without necessarily relying on literal magic. Quasi-magical elements invite readers and observers to suspend their disbelief and engage with the extraordinary possibilities of the imagination..
Reviews for "Quasi-Magic and Virtual Reality: Creating Immersive Experiences"
1. James - 2 stars
I recently read "Quasi magical" and I must say, I was not impressed. The story lacked depth and the characters felt flat and one-dimensional. The plot felt predictable and I found myself losing interest halfway through. The writing style was also quite unremarkable, with cliched phrases and repetitive descriptions. Overall, I was disappointed with this book and would not recommend it to others.
2. Sarah - 1 star
I truly regret wasting my time on "Quasi magical". The storyline was confusing and all over the place. The author seemed to throw in random plot twists without any proper explanation, leaving me frustrated and unable to connect with the story. The characters were poorly developed, and their actions and motivations were inconsistent. The writing itself was mediocre at best, with frequent grammatical errors and awkward sentence structures. I found myself skimming through the pages just to finish it, and I would not recommend this book to anyone.
3. Rebecca - 2 stars
"Quasi magical" fell short of my expectations. The world-building was lacking, leaving the setting feeling vague and unconvincing. The magic system was poorly explained and felt inconsistent throughout the story. The pacing was also a problem - it felt too slow in some parts and rushed in others. The dialogue was unnatural and the character interactions felt forced. Overall, I was disappointed with this book and wouldn't recommend it to fans of the fantasy genre.
4. Michael - 1 star
I couldn't finish "Quasi magical". The writing was dull and the characters were uninteresting. The protagonist lacked any depth or compelling qualities, and the supporting characters were forgettable. The plot dragged on without any clear direction or purpose, and I couldn't find any motivation to continue reading. As an avid reader, I found this book to be a complete waste of time, and I would not recommend it to anyone looking for an engaging story.
Quasi-Magic in Nature: How Animals Use Illusions for Survival
- Arts and Humanities