digital paganism and cyber animism

I'm in the midst of a multi-month deep dive into Gnosticism that's starting to bridge into some more occult directions.

I've been a Christian my entire life, and still am, but up until recently I had been very forcibly kept from alternative belief systems within and outside of Christianity. As a kid through my teenage years, I was kept from these exterior beliefs by my very devout and very traditional parents. Since my adulthood began up until months ago, I kept myself from these belief systems, largely due to the superstitious nature through which conservative Christians instill control.

I've started reading TechGnosis by Erik Davis throughout these studies. TechGnosis is a book on how religion, occult and otherwise, has adapted to, reacted to, meshed with and interacted with technology over the centuries, and how magic and technology as ideas have developed. In the most recent chapter, the author covered Paganism and the animistic religion and magic that Pagans and neoPagans have developed.

The author does a great job at avoiding taking a hardline stance on most subjects in the book. In this section, he describes how postmodernism has lead many people to look down upon magic as being a silly game played by silly people, ignoring the very real sociological and anthropological effects that magic has. Even if there aren't literal spirits literally affecting the real world as directed by magic, many of the effects that are intended by the magical incantation do take place, because the sociological and anthropological effects of the magic do take effect in the real world.

No, praying to the spirits to enchant the land to increase farm yield probably does not bring down spiritual forces into the soil to multiply the crops... but it does animate the population of the community to be good stewards of the land, to sow generously, etc. The communal rituals that these people take part in are part of the animus to participate in these activities. They know that they cannot just pray to the spirits to bless the land and then sit at home and wait: they have to take material action alongside the "spiritual forces" blessing the land.

If there is a blight on the crops, the Pagans or premodern communities may believe that this was because the gods were angry at them, perhaps for mistreating another community, not treating the earth properly, not taking care of neighbors, etc. Oftentimes, their reaction to this superstition would have a material effect: they would take better care of their community or land, which would have a positive effect on future yield because the population is better taken care of.

Obviously, there are harmful superstitions as well. I'm not signing off on human or animal sacrifice here. But its interesting to view magic through the lens of "yes, maybe it is not literally taking place in the realm of the spiritual, but it is having the intended effects through other medium." The author points out that advertising, especially mass advertising like what we see on TV, is very much in the realm of "magic" in that it is, on a psychospiritual level, "enchanting" individuals to make certain actions. Propaganda, as an extension of marketing, is very much the same. We don't call it magic or enchantment because we have more precise or material words for it, but functionally it is the same.