[SL: This is my first column for British magazine 'The Skeptic'; I share 'Skeptic in the Courtroom' column-writing duties with Manchester barrister Geoff Whelan, which means my duties aren't too onerous (two or three times a year) and, I figure, once the magazine has been on the newstands for several months, I'm probably pretty safe to publish my previous column online (a new one, as the editor has just reminded me, is due).
That said, what I wrote some months ago has weirdly acquired renewed newsworthiness, in part thanks to this piece by Martin Robbins, and related pieces by 'Aphra Behn' and Hayley Stevens. I don't always agree with those authors, but I do think those of us who consider themselves skeptical or humanist or [insert name here] are going to have to sharpen up our thinking when it comes to the great variety of beliefs not sustainable by recourse to the evidence. This piece is meant to contribute to that process.]
As a general rule, organised skepticism is careful to draw a distinction between psychics and spiritualists of various stripes and the purveyors of organised religion. The former, the rough-and-ready rule of thumb goes, are only in it for the money, while Christians and Muslims and Hindus sincerely believe in the truth of their claims when one encounters them on street corners handing out free copies of the Qu’ran or Bible or Bhagavad Gita.
However, in the wake of the Daily Mail’s loss—and it is a loss, because the Mail agreed to pay the plaintiff’s costs as well as damages—in the ‘Psychic Sally Morgan’ matter, I submit that we skeptics may have to start taking belief, qua belief, more seriously. This is in part because ‘religion’ isn’t so easy to define any more. In days gone by, we all knew that Judaism was a religion but that people who dressed up like Ancient Romans and killed chickens by firelight on Calton Hill were not religious. Nowadays—with Druidism recognized by the Charity Commission and paganism resurgent—it is difficult to be so sure. Many of the practices that were traditionally legitimate targets for skeptics on the basis that they were scams or quackery are also a part of New Religious Movements worldwide. They’re also not particularly new. If—like I did in order to qualify in Scots law—one studies Roman law, one encounters lively debates among Roman jurists about astrologers, fortune-tellers, and ‘spiritualists’.
Pagan Romans were surprisingly rational: one doesn’t find allegations of witchcraft, for example, or animals being put on trial (a staple, alas, of medieval jurisprudence). Like modern skeptics, Roman lawyers tried to work out when people who made religious claims were a menace, in it to con the poor or ferment revolution, or actually useful to society as a whole. The fact that the jurists disagreed with each other (often quite profoundly) is indicative of a basic reality: when it comes to assessing people’s core beliefs, there are no easy answers.
When the Mail alleged that Morgan used an earpiece, one of the reasons it (and its skeptical supporters) foundered was thanks to the widespread idea that someone like Morgan could not possibly sincerely believe in her own psychic ability. She must, the reasoning goes, be in it to fleece audiences and thereafter laugh all the way to the bank.
Even in various post-mortem analyses of the case I’ve read from fellow skeptics, all I’ve seen by way of retreat is an acknowledgment that Morgan’s counsel were particularly skilful to keep the basis of her claim narrow: rather than forcing the Mail to prove that she wasn’t psychic (proving a negative, and in law, one of the most difficult things to do), they put the paper to the proof on the question of the earpiece. The idea that Morgan found the earpiece allegation particularly galling because she thinks she actually is psychic—in much the same way that the Pope genuinely believes he is the heir to St Peter—doesn’t seem to have occurred to anyone.
Of course, it is legitimate and fair to point out that reversing the onus of proof like this, thrusting it onto the defendant—as is the case in the English law of libel and slander and the Scots law of defamation—is fundamentally unfair and should be reformed. However, the alternative commonly proposed—an alteration of English and Scots law so that they more closely align with the relevant law in the United States—is not without its problems. Think, for example, of the relentless and quite demented campaign directed at President Obama over the authenticity of his birth certificate. No one can deny that this has been a real distraction, not only for the President himself but also to his Republican opponents, who surely have better things to do. In England or Scotland, the birth certificate story would have been swiftly put to bed by means of a libel or defamation suit. In the US, the weakness of the protections afforded to an individual’s reputation mean that it rumbles on, zombie-like, poisoning US political debate.
However, the substantive content of the law aside, acknowledging the genuineness of Morgan’s beliefs also puts skeptics—and anyone else faintly interested in the formation of public policy in this area, for that matter—in a difficult position. It means the traditional skeptical distinction between religion and charlatanry disappears in a puff of magic. We are thus confronted with the awful prospect of a serious fight with organised religion, for it often makes related claims from an identical basis of sincere belief. Like the Roman jurists—and their Empire evinced what can only be described as a religious supermarket, with its citizens utterly spoiled for choice—we may be forced to inquire into whether a given religious (or other) belief is harmful or not. We would then have to define ‘harm’ and argue accordingly. A belief’s truth or falsity—the traditional enquiry of skepticism—may be of less import. If it is any consolation, investigating consequences requires lots of empirical evidence, so skeptics would be advantaged on that score.
Famously, the majority of Rome’s jurists and administrators (although by no means all) decided that the ‘New Religion’ of Christianity was harmful. There was evidence supporting their view. There was evidence against their view. This topic—as most people know—is the subject of lively debate among classicists, theologians, lawyers, and historians. If you are gay or an educated woman, I suggest that you may come down on the side of Christianity’s ancient critics. If you are poor and struggle to hold down regular employment, you may come down in favour of Christianity.
And when it comes to a cool assessment of other sincere beliefs and their effects, I won’t pretend for a moment it will be easy.
