Divination a New Perspective

7/29/2019 Divination a New Perspective

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Divination-A New Perspective*OMAR KHAYYAM MOORE

Yale UniversityHE purpose of this paper is to suggest a new inter pr eta tio n of certainkinds of magical practices, especially d ivination. F irst, however, I shouldperhaps explain briefly the motivation for undertaking this analysis. Theinitial impe tus cam e from exp erime ntal investigations of the problem-solvingactivities of groups. These experiments quite naturally involved the studyand classification of ineffective problem -solving techniqu es, a nd it appearedth at fresh insight int o this whole m att er m ight be gained through exam ining

some classic cases of ineffective solutions to problems. Magic is, by defini-tion and reputation, a notoriously ineffective method for attaining the spe-cific ends its practitioners hope to achieve through its use. On the surface, a tleast, i t would seem t he n t h a t magical ritua ls ar e classic cases of poor solution sto problems, an d for this reason should be of theoretical inte res t fro m th esta nd po in t of research on hum an problem solving.Most, if not all, scientific analyses of magic presuppose that these ritualsas a ma tte r of fac t do n ot lead to th e desired results. If the carrying out of amagical rite is followed b y t he hoped for st at e of affairs, then this is to be ex-plained o n o the r grounds. Scientific observers, of course, emp loy th e criteriafurnished b y m odern science to judge th e probab le efficacy of magical activi-ties a s m etho ds for produ cing th e ends-in-view of magicians. One of th epuzzles mo st theo ries of mag ic seek to resolve is why hu m an beings cling sotenaciously to magic if i t does no t work. M an y contemp orary exp lanations ofthis puzzle mak e use of the concept positive la tent fu nctio n, th a t is, th ateven though magic fails to achieve its m anifest ends, except by accident orcoincidence, it serves its practitioners and/or their society in other criticaHyim po rtan t ways. Th e position developed here is compatible w ith th e viewpointth at magical rituals m ay be sustained b y numerous late nt functions. However,it conceivably could serve as a prophylaxis against the overelaboration ofthese functions; in a n y case, i t could serve as a sup plem enta ry explanation ofthe phenomena.Put baldly, the thesis to be advanced here is that some practices whichhave been classified as magic m ay well be d irectly efficacious a s techniques forattaining the ends envisaged by their practitioners. Perhaps the best way torender plausible this somewhat counter-intuitive proposition is to considerin some detail an actu al magical rite as it has been described b y a h ighly com-petent anthropologist.2

* This paper is an indirect outcome of a program of laboratory research on problem solvingand social interaction, sponsored by the Office of Naval Research, Group Psychology Branch.Thanks are due to Alan R. Anderson, Maurice R. Davie, and George P. Murdock, who readpreliminary drafts of this paper and made helpful suggestions which were incorporated into thefinal manuscript,

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70 American Anthropologist [59, 1957The Montagnais-Naskapi, most northerly of eastern Indian tribes, live inth e forests an d bar ren ground of t he interior plateau of t he Lab rad oria nPeninsula. Speck (1935) has conducted field studies of the N askap i an d in theaccount that follows, primary reliance is placed upon his reports. According

to Speck, The practices of divination embody the very innermost spirit ofth e religion of th e La bra do r bands. T heir s is alm ost wholly a religion of divina-tion (1935: 127). It is of inte rest to learn exactly how divin atio n is carried o u tand wh at ends the N aska pi expect to achieve throug h it.Animal bones an d various othe r objects are used in divination. T h e shoul-de r blade of th e caribou is held by th em to be especially tr uth ful. W hen it isto be employed for this purpose th e m eat is pared away, and the bone is boiledan d wiped c lean; i t is hung up to d ry, a nd finally a sm all piece of wood is splitand at tac hed to the bone to form a handle . I n the divinatory r i tual th e shoul-der blade, thus prepared, is held over hot coals for a short time. T h e heatcauses cracks and bu rnt sp ots to form, and these are then read. T h e Nas-kap i have a system for interpret ing the cracks and spots, and in this way th eyfind answers t o im po rt an t questions.* One class of ques tions for which shoul-der-blade augury provides answers is: What direction should hunters take inlocating game? This is a critical m atter , for the failure of a h un t m ay bringprivation or even death.W hen a shoulder blade is used to locate game, it is held in a predeterminedposition with reference to th e local topog raphy , i.e., it is directionally oriented.It may be regarded as a blank chart of the hunt ing te r r i tory . . . (Speck19353151). Speck states (1935:151) . . . as the bu rn t spots and c racks ap-pear these indicate the directions to be followed and sought. If there is ashortage of food, the shoulder-blade oracle m ay b e consulted as ofte n asevery three or four days and , of course, the directions th at the hu nt s tak e aredetermined thereby.Th ere are certain o ther relevant aspects of divinittion t ha t m ust be m en-tioned before turn ing to an analysis of the ritual. Speck explains (1935:lSO):

In divining with the burnt shoulder blade the procedure is first to dream. This, aswe shall see, is induced by a sweat bath and by drumming or shaking a rattle. Then,when a dream of seeing or securing game comes to the hunter, the next thing to do isto find where to go and what circumstances will be encountered. And since the dreamis vague, and especially since it is not localized, the hunter-dreamer canno t tell wherehis route is to lie or w h a t landmarks he will find. So he employs the shoulder blade.As one informant put it, the divination rite cleared up the dream. We generally usethe caribou shoulder blade fo r caribou hunting divination, the shoulder blade or hipbone of beaver for beaver div ination, fish-jaw augury for fishing, and so on. Drum-ming, singing, and dreaming, next divination by scapula, then, combine as the modusoperandi of the life-supporting hunt.It is well to pause a t this point to ta ke note of certain fea tures of these rites.T he Nask api do not control the exact pat tern ing of cracks an d sp ots inthe shoulder blade a nd, furth erm ore, i t would n ot b e in accord with their be-liefs abou t divinat ion to a t te m pt such control ; ra ther , they are interested in


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MOORE] Divination 71observing whatever cracks and spots appear. This means that the final deci-sion about where to hunt, for instance, does not represent a purely personalchoice. Decisions ar e based on t h e outcome of a process extrinsic to their voli-tion-and this outcom e is dep end ent upon the inter actio n of a num ber of rela-tively uncontrolled variables such as bone struc tur e, tem pe rat ur e of fire, lengthof time bone is exposed to he at , etc.I t m ay be clarifying to perform a m ental experiment in order to analyzesom e of th e possible consequences of ba sing a decision on the outc om e of a nimpersonal and relatively uncontrolled process. Imagine that the Naskapicarried out their divinatory rites as described with this exception; they didno t base their decisions on the occu rrence of cracks an d spots in th e bu rn tblade. Th ey dreamed, sang, dru m me d, burned a shoulder blade, b u t ignoredth e cracks and spots. U nder these hypo thetical circum stances, decisions stillwould h ave to be made a bo ut where to hu nt for game.One question which this mental experiment raises is: Would the Nas-ka pi be likely to enjoy mo re success in hu nt ing if they did n ot p er m it decisionsto rest upon th e occurrence of cracks an d sp ots ? Would it not be sounderpractice for them simply to decide where, in their best judgment, game maybe found and h un t the re? Of course, when the Naskapi do have informationab ou t the location of game, the y tend to a c t upo n it. Ordinarily, it is when t he yare uncertain and food supplies get low that they turn to their oracle forguidance.

It can be seen th a t divination based on the reading of cracks an d spots,serves to break (or weaken) the causal nexus between final decisions aboutwhere to hun t an d individual an d group preferences in this matter.$ W ith ou tthe intervention of thi s impersonal mechanism i t seems reasonable to supposeth at the outcome of pa st hu nts would play a more im po rtan t role in determin-ing present str ate gy ; i t seems likely their selections of hu ntin g routes wouldbe pat terned in a way related to recent successes an d failures. If i t ma y be as-sumed that there is some interplay between the animals they seek and thehun ts they undertake, such tha t the h unted and the hunters ac t and reac t tothe others actions an d po tent ial actions, then there ma y be a m ark ed ad-van tage in avoiding a fixed pa tte rn in hun ting. Unw itting regularities in be-havior provide a basis for anticip ator y responses. For instance, animals th atare o ve rhu nted are likely to become sensitized to hu m an beings an d hencequick t o tak e evasive action. B ecause th e occurrence of cracks and s po ts inth e shoulder blade an d the d istribution of game ar e in all likelihood indepen-de nt ev ents, i.e., the former is unrelated to the outcom e of p ast h un ts, it w ouldseem that a certain amount of irregularity would be introduced into theNaskapi huntin g pat tern b y this mechanism?

We can indicate the point of the foregoing discussion in th e following way.I n the first place, th e Nask api live a precarious life; their continued existencedepends on the success of their day -to-d ay hunting. A nd i t is prima facie un-likely t h a t grossly defective approaches to hu ntin g would h av e survival value.Like all people, they can be victimized by their own habits; in particular,


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72 A merican Anthropologist [59, 1957habitual success in hunting certain areas may lead to depletion of the gamesupply-it may lead, that is, to a success-induced failure. Under these cir-cumstances, a device which would break up habit patterns in a more or lessrandom fashion might be of value. The question is: To what degree, if any,does shoulder-blade augury do this?I t should be remembered that it is difficult for human beings to avoidpatterning their behavior in a regular way. Without the aid of a table of ran-dom numbers or some other randomizing instrument, it is very unlikely thata human being or group would be able to make random choices even if an at-tempt were made to do so. The essential soundness of the last sta tement isrecognized in scientific practice. Whenever, in the course of a scientific investi-gation, it is essential to avoid bias in making selections, every effort is made toeliminate the factor of personal choice. As Yule and Kendall (1948:337) havesuccinctly stated, Experience has, in fact, shown that the human being is anextremely poor instrument for the conduct of a random selection.Of course, it is not maintained here that the burnt shoulder blade is an un-biased randomizing device. It is likely that the bones would crack and formspots in certain ways more often than others. Regularity stemming from thissource may to some degree be lessened because the Naskapi change campsites,yet in the rituals they maintain the same spatial orientation of the bones (for,as previously mentioned, the bones are oriented map-like with reference tothe topography). Hence, a crack or spot appearing in the same place in thebone on a new occasion of divination a t another campsite, would send them ona different route. An impersonal device of the kind used by the Naskapi mightbe characterized as a crude chance-like instrument. It seems that the useof such a device would make it more difficult to anticipate their behaviorthan would otherwise be the case.I t is not possible on the basis of the available evidence to determine evenapproximately whether shoulder-blade divination as practiced by the Naskapiactually serves to increase their hunting success, although a plausible argumenthas been advanced indicating that this might be the case.

If the Naskapi were the only people who engaged in scapulimancy, thequestion of its efficacy would perhaps not be of general theoretical interest.However, scapulimancy was widely practiced (Andree 1906: 143-165) inNorth America and has been reported from Asia, India, and Europe. Thereare other divinatory rituals tha t also involve the use of impersonal chance-like devices in arriving a t decisions, for example, the ancient Chinese divina-tion by cracks in burnt tortoise shells. One hundred and twenty-five differentfigures formed by these cracks were distinguished for oracular purposes (seePlath 1862:819-827). All manner of objects and events have been used indivination.6 Some arrangements are perhaps not obviously chance-like, butprove to be so when analyzed, as for instance Azande divination (Evans-Pritchard 1937). The basic divinatory equipment associated with the Azandepoison oracle consists of poison, probably strychnine, and fowls. TheAzande have little control over the potency of the poison they administer to


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MOORE] Divinaliolz 73th e fowls since th ey do n ot m ake their own poison, an d n ot all fowls have t hesam e tolerance for this poison. T h e Azande ask qu estions of th e poison oraclean d base decisions on w hether the fowls live or die. T he y ha ve no way of know -ing in advance w ha t the ou tcom e will be.

T he heuristic analysis given here is potentially relevant to all situa tion s inwhich human beings base their decisions on the outcome of chance mech-anisms. It is obvious, however, t h at lig ht would be shed on th e ac tua l work-ab ili ty of these pro ced ures only in term s of a thorough-going investigation ofthe problems men face within the societal context in which these problemsoccur. Certainly t h e app ar en t irrelevance of such tec hniqu es is no gu ara nt ee oftheir inutility. On th e con tra ry , if shoulder-blade aug ur y, for example, ha san y worth a s a viable pa rt of the life-supporting hun t, then i t is because it isin essence a very cru de way of rando mizing hu m an behavior u nd er conditionswhere avoiding fixed patt ern s of activ ity m ay be an ad van tage . T he difficultyof providing an empirical test for this hypothesis points t o th e fac t th a t it isan open question.Years ago Tylo r (1924:80) noted t h at th e a r t of divination and games ofchance are so similar in principle th at the very sam e instrum ent passes fromone use to the other. Tylors observation is acute. H owever, it would appe arthat the relationship in principle is not between divination and games ofchance, b u t between divination an d games of st rateg y. It is only very recentlyth at the distinction between gam es of chance a nd gam es of s tra teg y has beendrawn clearly. We are indebted to von Neum ann a nd M orgenstern (1947: 143-165) for clarifying this. It is beyond th e scope of thi s paper to discuss the the or yof games of strate gy , bu t i t is worth pointing ou t t ha t th is theory makes evi-dent how some classes of interactional problems can be solved optimally bymeans of a mixed or statistical strate gy . I n order to employ a statisticalstrate gy it is necessary to have, ad ap t, or inve nt a suitable chance mechanism.Its being suitable is critical, for unless the chance device will generate ap-propriate odds for the problem a t han d, then i ts poten tial adva ntage m ay belost. It should go without saying th a t no one assumes th at pre litera te magiciansare in a n y position to get th e most o ut of their crude chance-like devices.Nevertheless, it is possible th a t through a long process of creative trial a n derror some societies have arrived a t some approxim ate solutions for recurringproblems.

SUMMARYI t is th e object of this pap er to suggest a new interp retat ion of someaspects of divination. It should be emphasized t ha t this interp retat ion is of-fered a s a supplem ent to existing theories of magic and no t a s a replacemen t.

An examination of many magical practices suggests that the utility of someof these techniqu es nee ds to be reassessed. It seems safe to assume thathu m an beings require a functional equivalent to a table of r and om num bersif the y are to avoid un w ittin g regularities in their behavio r which can be uti-lized by adversaries. Only a n extremely thorough s tu dy of the detailed st ruc -


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74 American Anthropologist [59, 19571ture of problems will enable scientists to determine to what degree some veryancient devices are effective.

NOTESUnder laboratory conditions groups can be observed working out adequate solutions to

problems and also becoming enmeshed in futile procedure. I wondered whether magical ritesmight not possess some of the same self-defeating patterns so often exhibited under experimentalconditions, e.g., cycling, introduction of extraneous material, etc. (See Moore and Anderson1954a: 15160; 1954b: 702-14.)

* The Human Relations Area Files proved to be a great help in facilitating my investigationinto magical practices.

There are differences among the various bands of the Naskapi (and among persons withinbands) with respect to the system used for interpreting the pattern of cracks. The importantpoint is that every interpreter has a system which is independent of any particular occasion ofdivination.

4 The act of interpreting cracks and spots provides an opening through which personal prefer-ences may enter, especially if the signs are of a mixed character. However, according to Speck,they do not cheat in reading the cracks and spots any more than we would in reading a tableof random numbers. The sacred character of the ritual and the fact that there are conventionalagreements about the meanings of cracks and spots serve as some guarantee against purely per-sonal interpretations. In any case, preferences have less opportunity to influence decisions thanthey would if the Naskapi did not make use of bones in this way.

6 The interplay between the actions of hunters and the game they hunt is no doubt muchmore sluggish than the interactional relations between men in conflict. When men are in con-flict the relative advantage to be gained by avoiding fixed patterns of behavior is potentiallymuch greater than in the conflict between men and animals.

0 I t is interesting to reflect upon the difficulties ocial scientists face in trying to predict thebehavior of people who themselves sometimes use chance devices in deciding what to do.7 Incidentally, their manner of framing questions-they use complex conditionals-so as to

obtain as many definitive answers while sacrificing as few fowls as possible, would do credit to alogician.

REFERENCES CITEDANDREE, R.

1906 Scapulimantia. Boas Anniversary Volume. New York, G . E. Stechert and Com-pany.

1937 Witchcraft, oracles and magic among the Azande. Oxford, The Clarendon Press.1954a Modern logic and tasks for experiments on problem solving behavior. The Journal

of Psychology 38: 151-60.19.5413 Search behavior in individual and group problem solving. American Sociological

Review 19: 702-14.PLATE,. J.

1862 Die Religion und der Cultus der alten Chinesen, Pa rt 1.Abhandlungen der Bayer-ischen Akademie. Munchen, Verlag der K. Akademie.Naskapi. Norman, University of Oklahoma Press.Primitive culture. Volume I. New York, Brentanos.Theory of games and economic behavior. Princeton, Princeton University Press.An introduction to the theory of statistics. London, C. Griffin and Co., Limited.

EVANS-PRITCHARD,. E.MOORE, . K. and S. B. ANDERSON

SPECK, . G .TYLOR,. B.VO N NEUMANN,. and 0. ORGENSTERNYULE,G . and M. G . KENDALL

1935192419471948

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Divination a New Perspective