The Somatic Conjuror A Treatise On Natural And Scientific Magic Etc

A monthly register of the most important works published in North and South America, in India, China, and the British colonies: with occasional notes on German, Dutch, Danish, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Russian books.

This book shows that many of our understandings about scientific thought can be corrected once we realise just how "unnatural" science actually is. Quoting scientists from Aristotle to Einstein, the author argues that scientific ideas are, with rare exceptions, counter-intuitive and that common sense often makes no sense at all. A passionate advocate of the beauty and importance of science, the author examines a range of issues, including why science and technology are quite different, why psychoanalysis is not properly scientific and why philosophers and sociologists have made so little contribution to understanding science's true nature. He demonstrates the folly of holding scientists responsible for many of society's problems, and the equal folly of looking to science for a miracle cure.

One of the foremost experts on magic, religion, and the occult in the ancient world provides an unparalleled exploration of magic in the Greco-Roman world, giving insight into the shifting ideas of religion and the divine in the ancient past and in the later Western tradition.