This is so beautiful… I’ve been deeply wanting to be a Bethany in my life. Her garden and oils are just the mini joys that give us witches great pride and joy. When we hear one of our little herbs or oils have helped someone, it just makes all the judgements worth it.
I am so glad you like Bethany. When you hear of those sad witch cases from the height of the witch trial period, so many were like Bethany, the person who the villagers would turn to for help, then the power of the church was brought down upon them. It is only fairly recently when people have looked into the cures they used that it is realised they knew what they were doing. They had a knowledge and affinity with plants that was so valuable, but because of the beliefs of those times they were looked upon with superstition and fear.
This is so very true. Anyone who knew how to do home remedies was definitely labeled as a witch and harmed. They were our original scientists 🥹! And healers.
My great grandmother was the town healer like Bethany with herbs and helped so many folks in the rural side of Brazil. So many folks hear that and immediately think negatively.
It is the same everywhere. Different words perhaps, but the same story. Healers with knowledge about plants would of course be a challenge, a threat, to those who gain their wealth or power from controlling the common people, the churches and medicine men. It was one of the few things women could do to have any sort of status, so that is another reason why they had to be challenged, and in Brazil as well as Europe, that would be done by spreading fears about witchcraft in a negative way. It still happens today in many parts of the world.
Absolutely! It’s still such a taboo thing in the real world. I think it’s because learning to be one with with nature and holistic. Medicine is bad for capitalism 😭.
This story gives a little insight into my views on witches, and those who write me off as a sceptic do so at their intellectual peril.
On a slightly related note, if you find yourself at a loose end for a moment sir, I would love to know your views on what is a psychic experience? Anything you like, straight off the top of your head.
I have just had to answer that in detail for my parapsychology course, and would value the opinion of somebody of the more creative type, who obviously thinks about such things rather than glibly dismissing or accepting them.
You don’t have to answer if you are busy with some steam powered legs at the moment, just if you feel like it.
I probably have (indeed) hold similar views to yourself. Before it got a bit too handwavingly ‘right on’ I used to buy Fortean Times. I always liked the idea of being a benign sceptic.
Just because I don’t believe doesn’t mean I’m not fascinated. I love fantasy worlds. And I love speculation. But if you ask me as to what happens in the real world - I have to take the best logical pathway. It doesn’t mean I’m not open to new ideas.
With regard to psychic experiences. Hmmm…tricky. If we look purely at say ‘mind powers’ there are no structures in the brain that could be co opted for this. There are no energy readings - and for the powers to work you’re going to need energy. If your mind could move a glass on the table then some force will have to make it move. It will have to overcome gravity and/or friction. Measurable.
Same holds true for telepathy re: energy and transceiver. No structures. No measurable power. And then how to translate this info in the brain to workable information? Qualia? The mind boggles (pun intended).
And if any of these things were real..then evolution would have selected for it. Which does not seem to be the case (looking at history and cultures).
But I did wonder if perhaps the mind is moving outside 3D space. And that might hold an avenue. But 4D (geometrically) can’t be comprehended but perhaps could be used. I’m still umming on this.
As to peooples’ experiences. It depends. I’m sure many believe they have had these experiences. And many believe they are psychic. I don’t consider them nuts or con artists. But there nuts people and there are many many con artists. My view would be that every single professional medium or psychic is a con artist. There are no ghosts giving them information. Nobody’s gran is telling them that the ring is behind the desk/down the sofa. That the son died in a red sports car. Etc etc. Forer statements/Barnum statements. Cold reading and warm reading. In a lot of cases ‘being a bit psychic’ makes people feel special. ‘I’m sensitive’ with the implication you are not.
But does the above true in all situations? I’d argue no. But it might not be what people think. And some will be self spooking (another strand to discuss - and separately).
There is such things as numinous experiences. The religious rapture. This is likely temporal lobe epilepsy. You can induce with transcranial magnetic stimulation.
So…does the above take away the magic? The wonder? No. But it does mean we have to be careful who we trust. And what people think. Subjective experience can easily be wrong. The brain likes to make narratives to fit its presence in reality. We can see this from split brain research (Gassanager and Sperry for example - can’t remember which one did the experiment that showed communciation between the hemispheres now. I do remember there is an older structure called the anterior commisure that provides some connectivity when the corpus collosum is cut).
In summary, psychic experiences are perceptions rather than reality?
I agree about mediums. It is an industry with a long history of fakery, although Daniel Dunglas Home still has a lot of people baffled. There are also mediums who genuinely believe in what they imagine, but imagine is the word doing all the heavy lifting in that statement.
I had a feeling you might have an interesting insight or two, which is why I asked.
yes. It’s perception. Without proper measurements and the ability to replicate it will not be ‘real’. I am aware of Home. From memory he had one feat of levitation. Recorded. But it is easy to fool people. And easy to have stooges. My view is that if someone could levitate…then others could. And we would have genuine records and not stories. Walk on water?
But what is perception? Well…a bloody fascinating area. I loved studying it. It’s worth learning the sight and hearing pathways (the biology and cognitive neuroscience with this).
But…I have one experience that I struggle to explain easily. I have to go with false perception and the fear centres of my brain enacted.
I was at my Grandmother’s house. Large victorian terrace. 3 floors. I knew the house well. On the first floor. Right you came up thirteen steps if you include the landing. To your left the loo. Ahead and to the left the bathroom. Then directly ahead a small bedroom. Turn left and left (the loo now on your right) there are three stairs. There is 15 feet ahead a door. And to its right (at 90 degrees) another door. Two rooms.
The door to the right is not flush against the wall where the room straight ahead. Is there perhaps a foot gap. On the wall are three victorian light switches (possibly 1930s). I know those switches. I could be blindfolded and put my hand to my right and with a simple wave find them.
So…what happened? Came back from the pub. It was early evening but dark. Perhaps winter then. I had maybe 2 or 3 pints. No sesh.
I walk up stairs. Turn left and go up the three steps. The room directly ahead had its door open. At the time it was an upstairs living room. The curtains in that room were thin. With street lamps etc it was never black. You could always see furniture or something.
This time…hmmmm….the doorway was pitch black. Like someone had hung a velvet curtain. Everything was off. I remember sorta going into a kind of karate crouch. And I was not going to be intimidated by the wrongness.
I kept my eyes on the pitch black and crept forward. A kind of sidle but forward. Pathetic. But eyes were locked.
I got very close and put my hand to my right for the bloody light switches. That I can not miss. But I did. I could feel the wall but not the switches. Silly fool. I ran my hand up and down. Couldn’t feel a thing. I then pushed my hand forward. That is slid it forward to the wall infront of me (where the door ahead was fixed to). It is about a foot tops. But no. My hand kept going forwards.
I effing sprang back. Down the three steps and hit the loo lights. And the velvet blackness ‘melted away’.
I didn’t tell anyone for ages. But did eventually my Gran. She told me that the floor above (with two bedrooms) that her son had had an experience where the room shape changed (directly above where my hand kept going foward). My brother had that room for a bit (around same time) and told my gran he kept walking forward. At the time his mate was sleeping over and started yelling ‘where did you go’. I only found out as he told my Gran.
So…my view now is that I had a perceptual misalignment. Perhaps my gran conflated stories. And over time these have linked (and thus become stronger). I can’t say. But for my experience to be true would mean rewriting physics.
But if I told that story with full belief. And I kept on telling it…it would become lore with some people. But there was no proof.
Yup, that sounds like a perception issue, but that then raises the question that crops up so many times: Why do so many people experience the same (unreal) perceptions in the same place? Some of them can undoubtedly be put down to environmental factors, but some cannot.
This is a very condensed version of my own unexplainable incident:
I heard somebody walk down the stairs and out of the front door while I was in the kitchen and thought nothing of it at that time. A few minutes later my mother walked into the kitchen, saying she was surprised to see me because she had heard me walk downstairs and go out of the front door. Because we were the only people in the house I obviously started thinking burglar. Had somebody nipped in for a scoot about?
While I was thinking this I rewound what I had heard to make sure I had definitely heard somebody, and that is when I got that ice cold feeling of something not right. While I was still trying to think how I could put into words what I was thinking, my mother beat me to it.
‘Oh my god, I heard the old front door.’
That is what I had been wanting to say without sounding completely mad. The old front door, porch, everything, had been demolished a couple of years before because it was beyond being fixed. The old front door made a very distinctive noise, with a broken brass letterbox that clanged like a gong, and you really had to shove the door to close it. The new front door was almost silent.
Both of us had heard, or thought we had heard, somebody go down the stairs and out of a door that was no longer there. How could that be possible?
I remember being in my gran’s house. Upstairs sitting room. I was watching tv. About 30 mins (maybe an hour) earlier she asked me if I wanted a bacon sandwich. Yes!
Engrossed in the programme I heard the door open. Her eyes weren’t great. And the door closed. And I heard footsteps up to third floor. Now she was old I did not want her trundling up to find me (where I was not) So I yelled ‘I’m here’. Nothing. So I got up. And ran upstairs. No gran. So went downstairs and she was asleep.
She woke as I entered the room. I had to ask ‘did you come up stairs with the sandwich’. She started to apologise. I cut her off. No problem. But I could have sworn. She said she was thinking about it. Clearly had dozed off.
So what happened? Did part of my brain expect this and then a sound (old house) made me think of a stair creak? Then her asleep and ‘covering’ (unnecessary) for not making it? Or did her astral body wander up?
All these stories morph over the years. I do remember the experience but how much changed in the retelling? Memory is written in clay and not stone. It is easy to change memories.
Rather than look for rational explanations…we make up things to make us right. To find a narrative that covers the situation. Magic/Spirits/Religion is an easy answer to explain away the ‘odd’.
That’s not to say some odd things don’t occur. But many (if we had evidence) would resolve to the mundane.
Thank you. I enjoyed it, and the story created by Marissa was such a good starting point that all the hard work had already been done before I started. I merely had to add one character to a world that already existed.
I may have a go at writing something as a starting point one day. It all depends on the right idea arriving from somewhere.
Bethany looks very sweet. Barnaby is very happy with his decision to sell those void kittens to someone so lovely!
What a comforting read. I really love your depiction of Bethany. I feel like I've met women like her and they are incredible people!
This is so beautiful… I’ve been deeply wanting to be a Bethany in my life. Her garden and oils are just the mini joys that give us witches great pride and joy. When we hear one of our little herbs or oils have helped someone, it just makes all the judgements worth it.
I am so glad you like Bethany. When you hear of those sad witch cases from the height of the witch trial period, so many were like Bethany, the person who the villagers would turn to for help, then the power of the church was brought down upon them. It is only fairly recently when people have looked into the cures they used that it is realised they knew what they were doing. They had a knowledge and affinity with plants that was so valuable, but because of the beliefs of those times they were looked upon with superstition and fear.
Bethany is nobody to be afraid of.
This is so very true. Anyone who knew how to do home remedies was definitely labeled as a witch and harmed. They were our original scientists 🥹! And healers.
My great grandmother was the town healer like Bethany with herbs and helped so many folks in the rural side of Brazil. So many folks hear that and immediately think negatively.
It is the same everywhere. Different words perhaps, but the same story. Healers with knowledge about plants would of course be a challenge, a threat, to those who gain their wealth or power from controlling the common people, the churches and medicine men. It was one of the few things women could do to have any sort of status, so that is another reason why they had to be challenged, and in Brazil as well as Europe, that would be done by spreading fears about witchcraft in a negative way. It still happens today in many parts of the world.
Absolutely! It’s still such a taboo thing in the real world. I think it’s because learning to be one with with nature and holistic. Medicine is bad for capitalism 😭.
A perfect follow up!
This story gives a little insight into my views on witches, and those who write me off as a sceptic do so at their intellectual peril.
On a slightly related note, if you find yourself at a loose end for a moment sir, I would love to know your views on what is a psychic experience? Anything you like, straight off the top of your head.
I have just had to answer that in detail for my parapsychology course, and would value the opinion of somebody of the more creative type, who obviously thinks about such things rather than glibly dismissing or accepting them.
You don’t have to answer if you are busy with some steam powered legs at the moment, just if you feel like it.
Thank you.
I probably have (indeed) hold similar views to yourself. Before it got a bit too handwavingly ‘right on’ I used to buy Fortean Times. I always liked the idea of being a benign sceptic.
Just because I don’t believe doesn’t mean I’m not fascinated. I love fantasy worlds. And I love speculation. But if you ask me as to what happens in the real world - I have to take the best logical pathway. It doesn’t mean I’m not open to new ideas.
With regard to psychic experiences. Hmmm…tricky. If we look purely at say ‘mind powers’ there are no structures in the brain that could be co opted for this. There are no energy readings - and for the powers to work you’re going to need energy. If your mind could move a glass on the table then some force will have to make it move. It will have to overcome gravity and/or friction. Measurable.
Same holds true for telepathy re: energy and transceiver. No structures. No measurable power. And then how to translate this info in the brain to workable information? Qualia? The mind boggles (pun intended).
And if any of these things were real..then evolution would have selected for it. Which does not seem to be the case (looking at history and cultures).
But I did wonder if perhaps the mind is moving outside 3D space. And that might hold an avenue. But 4D (geometrically) can’t be comprehended but perhaps could be used. I’m still umming on this.
As to peooples’ experiences. It depends. I’m sure many believe they have had these experiences. And many believe they are psychic. I don’t consider them nuts or con artists. But there nuts people and there are many many con artists. My view would be that every single professional medium or psychic is a con artist. There are no ghosts giving them information. Nobody’s gran is telling them that the ring is behind the desk/down the sofa. That the son died in a red sports car. Etc etc. Forer statements/Barnum statements. Cold reading and warm reading. In a lot of cases ‘being a bit psychic’ makes people feel special. ‘I’m sensitive’ with the implication you are not.
But does the above true in all situations? I’d argue no. But it might not be what people think. And some will be self spooking (another strand to discuss - and separately).
There is such things as numinous experiences. The religious rapture. This is likely temporal lobe epilepsy. You can induce with transcranial magnetic stimulation.
So…does the above take away the magic? The wonder? No. But it does mean we have to be careful who we trust. And what people think. Subjective experience can easily be wrong. The brain likes to make narratives to fit its presence in reality. We can see this from split brain research (Gassanager and Sperry for example - can’t remember which one did the experiment that showed communciation between the hemispheres now. I do remember there is an older structure called the anterior commisure that provides some connectivity when the corpus collosum is cut).
But again…does this hold true in all situations?
Blimey, that is a comprehensive answer thank you.
In summary, psychic experiences are perceptions rather than reality?
I agree about mediums. It is an industry with a long history of fakery, although Daniel Dunglas Home still has a lot of people baffled. There are also mediums who genuinely believe in what they imagine, but imagine is the word doing all the heavy lifting in that statement.
I had a feeling you might have an interesting insight or two, which is why I asked.
yes. It’s perception. Without proper measurements and the ability to replicate it will not be ‘real’. I am aware of Home. From memory he had one feat of levitation. Recorded. But it is easy to fool people. And easy to have stooges. My view is that if someone could levitate…then others could. And we would have genuine records and not stories. Walk on water?
But what is perception? Well…a bloody fascinating area. I loved studying it. It’s worth learning the sight and hearing pathways (the biology and cognitive neuroscience with this).
But…I have one experience that I struggle to explain easily. I have to go with false perception and the fear centres of my brain enacted.
I was at my Grandmother’s house. Large victorian terrace. 3 floors. I knew the house well. On the first floor. Right you came up thirteen steps if you include the landing. To your left the loo. Ahead and to the left the bathroom. Then directly ahead a small bedroom. Turn left and left (the loo now on your right) there are three stairs. There is 15 feet ahead a door. And to its right (at 90 degrees) another door. Two rooms.
The door to the right is not flush against the wall where the room straight ahead. Is there perhaps a foot gap. On the wall are three victorian light switches (possibly 1930s). I know those switches. I could be blindfolded and put my hand to my right and with a simple wave find them.
So…what happened? Came back from the pub. It was early evening but dark. Perhaps winter then. I had maybe 2 or 3 pints. No sesh.
I walk up stairs. Turn left and go up the three steps. The room directly ahead had its door open. At the time it was an upstairs living room. The curtains in that room were thin. With street lamps etc it was never black. You could always see furniture or something.
This time…hmmmm….the doorway was pitch black. Like someone had hung a velvet curtain. Everything was off. I remember sorta going into a kind of karate crouch. And I was not going to be intimidated by the wrongness.
I kept my eyes on the pitch black and crept forward. A kind of sidle but forward. Pathetic. But eyes were locked.
I got very close and put my hand to my right for the bloody light switches. That I can not miss. But I did. I could feel the wall but not the switches. Silly fool. I ran my hand up and down. Couldn’t feel a thing. I then pushed my hand forward. That is slid it forward to the wall infront of me (where the door ahead was fixed to). It is about a foot tops. But no. My hand kept going forwards.
I effing sprang back. Down the three steps and hit the loo lights. And the velvet blackness ‘melted away’.
I didn’t tell anyone for ages. But did eventually my Gran. She told me that the floor above (with two bedrooms) that her son had had an experience where the room shape changed (directly above where my hand kept going foward). My brother had that room for a bit (around same time) and told my gran he kept walking forward. At the time his mate was sleeping over and started yelling ‘where did you go’. I only found out as he told my Gran.
So…my view now is that I had a perceptual misalignment. Perhaps my gran conflated stories. And over time these have linked (and thus become stronger). I can’t say. But for my experience to be true would mean rewriting physics.
But if I told that story with full belief. And I kept on telling it…it would become lore with some people. But there was no proof.
Yup, that sounds like a perception issue, but that then raises the question that crops up so many times: Why do so many people experience the same (unreal) perceptions in the same place? Some of them can undoubtedly be put down to environmental factors, but some cannot.
This is a very condensed version of my own unexplainable incident:
I heard somebody walk down the stairs and out of the front door while I was in the kitchen and thought nothing of it at that time. A few minutes later my mother walked into the kitchen, saying she was surprised to see me because she had heard me walk downstairs and go out of the front door. Because we were the only people in the house I obviously started thinking burglar. Had somebody nipped in for a scoot about?
While I was thinking this I rewound what I had heard to make sure I had definitely heard somebody, and that is when I got that ice cold feeling of something not right. While I was still trying to think how I could put into words what I was thinking, my mother beat me to it.
‘Oh my god, I heard the old front door.’
That is what I had been wanting to say without sounding completely mad. The old front door, porch, everything, had been demolished a couple of years before because it was beyond being fixed. The old front door made a very distinctive noise, with a broken brass letterbox that clanged like a gong, and you really had to shove the door to close it. The new front door was almost silent.
Both of us had heard, or thought we had heard, somebody go down the stairs and out of a door that was no longer there. How could that be possible?
I remember being in my gran’s house. Upstairs sitting room. I was watching tv. About 30 mins (maybe an hour) earlier she asked me if I wanted a bacon sandwich. Yes!
Engrossed in the programme I heard the door open. Her eyes weren’t great. And the door closed. And I heard footsteps up to third floor. Now she was old I did not want her trundling up to find me (where I was not) So I yelled ‘I’m here’. Nothing. So I got up. And ran upstairs. No gran. So went downstairs and she was asleep.
She woke as I entered the room. I had to ask ‘did you come up stairs with the sandwich’. She started to apologise. I cut her off. No problem. But I could have sworn. She said she was thinking about it. Clearly had dozed off.
So what happened? Did part of my brain expect this and then a sound (old house) made me think of a stair creak? Then her asleep and ‘covering’ (unnecessary) for not making it? Or did her astral body wander up?
All these stories morph over the years. I do remember the experience but how much changed in the retelling? Memory is written in clay and not stone. It is easy to change memories.
Rather than look for rational explanations…we make up things to make us right. To find a narrative that covers the situation. Magic/Spirits/Religion is an easy answer to explain away the ‘odd’.
That’s not to say some odd things don’t occur. But many (if we had evidence) would resolve to the mundane.
Thank you. I enjoyed it, and the story created by Marissa was such a good starting point that all the hard work had already been done before I started. I merely had to add one character to a world that already existed.
I may have a go at writing something as a starting point one day. It all depends on the right idea arriving from somewhere.
Got to post office. They say package returned to sender. Bloody hell.
It is going so well.
I assume I did put my address on then so will see if it ever turns up at this end.
We will get there eventually.