Acknowledging a Supernatural Presence

General Information About Item:

  • Type of Lore: Customary, Superstition
  • Language: English
  • Country: United States
  • Informant: Anthe Roberts
  • Date Collected: 5/30/2020

Informant Data:

  • Anthe Roberts is a sophomore at Dartmouth College. She lives in California with her family.

Contextual Data:­

  • Cultural Context: The informant mentions that they first encountered this piece of folklore from one of their friends who “very much believes in ghosts.” Upon asking other friends if they believed in this superstition, many agreed that they practice it even if they are uncertain as to whether they believe it.
  • Social Context: The informant did not give examples of the social context this superstition would apply to, but all the examples cited of it implied the person using the superstition was alone.

Item:

  • When one encounters a phenomenon that one suspects might be supernatural in nature, one can avoid further supernatural harm by pretending that the phenomenon is not supernatural, coming up with a naturalistic explanation for it, and not attempting to disprove it.

 

Associated file (a video, audio, or image file):

 

Transcript:

  • “One (superstition) that I take fairly seriously just in the off chance that things like that (supernatural things) are real is you don’t acknowledge it. So like, for example, if I’m in like a basement and the lights start flickering, I’m just like “oh, that funny wiring.” So like, you don’t acknowledge that something could be… the result of some supernatural thing because acknowledging it gives it power.”

Informant’s Comments:

  • The informant gives an example – “suppose you’re in the shower, and the lights go off and you hear a noise… you’re just like “oh that silly cat of mine,” and you don’t look around to see if your cat is in the room to disprove it… you come up with an explanation and then you don’t try and disprove it.”
  • The informant mentioned that they practice this superstition as a contingency – even if ghosts are not real, the superstition is easy enough to follow and seems like a commonsensical way to avoid supernatural harm.

Collector’s Comments:

  • I found this superstition interesting, in that the informant suggested that they practice this superstition “just in case” there is a supernatural world with the power to harm humans. As with many other superstitions, belief is not required to gain the benefits of the superstition, only practice. In many ways, it reminded me of Pascal’s wager, the famous argument that one should convince oneself to believe in the Christian god through probabilistic considerations. If the Christian god is real, there is a significant payout for belief, but if he is not, religion doesn’t have costly enough drawbacks compared to the potential suffering of going to hell.

Collector’s Name: Ted McManus

Tags/Keywords:

  • Ghosts, Supernatural, Superstition