The Sage
“Superstition” is a brilliant song, but Stevie Wonder got it badly wrong when he sang, “When you believe in things that you don’t understand, then you suffer”. If only it were that easy. Superstition persists because believing in things that we just don’t understand is absolutely essential.
On the face of it, there is every difference in the world between superstitious and empirical, evidence-based thinking. Empirical thinking attributes events to their real causes, while superstitious thinking attributes outcomes to events which are entirely unrelated. So if you think the skill and hard work of engineers explains the successful launch of a rocket, you’re empirical. If you think it all hinged on the pilot wearing his lucky underpants, you’re superstitious.