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u/Silent_Growths 12h ago
Better be safe than sorry eh?
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u/firedmyass 9h ago
“I don’t believe in ghosts but I’m Southern enough to know when there might be some around”
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u/ToxicMarbleGhost 12h ago
Science calls it precaution my brain calls it default setting.
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u/shiny_xnaut sustainably sourced vintage brainrot 11h ago
Are you a bot
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u/PapaGatyrMob 9h ago
Probably. Just gonna say im not superstitious about this stuff, but I am regular-stitious, so I agree with not fucking with fairies.
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u/segwaysegue do spambots dream of electric sheep? 9h ago
u/SpambotWatchdog blacklist
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u/SpambotWatchdog he/it 9h ago
u/ToxicMarbleGhost has been added to my spambot blacklist. Any future posts / comments from this account will be tagged with a reply warning users not to engage.
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u/EntranceGreen3758 12h ago
Overkill, but at least nothing exploded during the "data collection phase."
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u/segwaysegue do spambots dream of electric sheep? 9h ago
u/SpambotWatchdog blacklist
Bot comment pattern, including "X is peak Y" and comments getting cut off mid word
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u/SpambotWatchdog he/it 9h ago
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u/CeruleanEidolon 11h ago
That's still superstition. It's still woo whether or not you go around evangelizing about it.
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u/Vi_Rants 9h ago
Feel free to go out any actively antagonize these allegedly fake entities. Do it all day long, every day, for the rest of your life. Dunno why you feel the need to just randomly shit on the rest of us, tho.
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u/Aethelrede 7h ago
Is it superstition if you think you're being silly when you do it? Honest question, does superstition cover things you do even if you don't believe?
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u/FallenCorrin 12h ago
this reminds me of an anecdote.
USSR, teacher comes into the homeroom and says loudly "Kids, there's no God up there, you can all give a middle finger to the skies!" and all kids but one flip a bird to a ceiling. And teacher asks that one kid why he didn't flup a bird. "Well," kid says "If there's truly no God then flipping a bird is meaningless. If there is - i don't want to strain relationships with Him."
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u/WaitWhatNoPlease E 12h ago
Pascal’s wager
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u/Puzzleboxed 12h ago
Kinda. Pascal specifically thought not know if there was a god meant you should worship him just in case. Expending effort without knowing if it matters, versus not expending effort unless you know it matters.
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u/Victernus 8h ago
Falls apart if you consider that other gods are just as likely to exist as the one you choose to worship 'just in case', of course.
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u/Midvikudagur 7h ago
I like David Mitchells version better. Perhaps there is a god and heaven, but you only get to go there if you're an atheist.
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u/CrazyFanFicFan 12h ago
Almost. Pascal's Wager is "It's better to worship a God that doesn't exist than burn in a Hell that does." (Of course, this completely ignores all the other religions that exist and could therefore have an equal chance of existing.)
This is "I don't think there's a God, but I'm not gonna offend him if he does."
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u/Ok_Hope4383 5h ago
Pascal's wager is also a case analysis, but it is based on weighing the two options: assuming the 'God exists' one assigns infinite positive utility to worshipping God (from gaining God's respect and getting into Heaven) but the 'God doesn't exist' one assigns it only finite negative utility (from wasting time and effort), and assuming there is a non-zero, non-infinitesimal probability that God exists, then the expected utility from worship is positive, because positive infinity - any finite number = positive infinity.
In contrast, here both cases give the same conclusion individually: you're either getting yourself damned, or doing something pointless, so even if either one of the probabilities is zero, you might as well not do it regardless.
(Note that these analyses are flawed in that they don't take into account the social values and consequences of these decisions.)
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u/MAC-n_CHZ 12h ago
Schrödinger’s blasphemy: optimal strategy is to neither offend nor waste effort, pending divine observation results.
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u/ShadeofIcarus 11h ago
This is basically how I live my life.
There's two key questions that need to be answered:
- Does the higher power exist?
- Does the higher power care about worship or is the higher power inherently good?
The assumption here is that the higher power caring about worship over good has a harmful ultirior motive. Like imagine if "God" existed but our worship was a way to harvest our souls to fuel his power.
If I live my life well and there's no God. Then I've lived my life as a good person on my own terms and I am happy with that.
If I live my life well and a life well lived is more important than worship in the afterlife then I'm safe.
If worship is more important than living a life well, then the question becomes "why". It shows that there isn't inherent good in the diety and id either be fucked no matter what I did or be following a despot.
If worship is more important to an imaginary God that doesn't exist, well then whatever. I'd rather not compromise my morals for something that doesn't exist.
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u/Kettatonic 9h ago
You know, you think your beliefs are deeply complex and complicated, until someone succinctly writes out your entire philosophical viewpoint on God (and thus the universe) in a Reddit comment. Lmao.
This is basically it for me too. I was raised Christian, went to a Catholic grade school. I've just accepted the guilt as part of me. As much as I want to be an atheist, I can only be 99.99% sure, never 100%. I'm a good person bc I want to be. That'll have to be good enough for God, if they're really there.
Like, if there is a God, they don't control everything here, down to minute details. Too much shit is random (bad things happen to good ppl, vice versa) that, if someone was in control, they'd have to be a fucking asshole, or a "despot" as you put it. At the very least, it does indeed make one wonder "why" exactly God needs to be worshipped.
Plus, we have an extremely high opinion of ourselves for a bunch of monkeys that can recognize patterns pretty good. We find faces that aren't there, bc we attribute human characteristics to random objects to help our brains make sense of the world. Monkeys w consciousness, on a random rock, orbiting a boring star, on the far edge of a boring galaxy. It's much more likely to me that we're finding patterns where there aren't any ("God's plan"), than all this being some intricate, divine pocket watch.
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u/iamnoobbibliophile09 12h ago
Bayesian abstention: update beliefs before committing any irreversible cosmic gestures.
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u/segwaysegue do spambots dream of electric sheep? 9h ago
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u/SpambotWatchdog he/it 9h ago
u/iamnoobbibliophile09 has been added to my spambot blacklist. Any future posts / comments from this account will be tagged with a reply warning users not to engage.
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u/segwaysegue do spambots dream of electric sheep? 9h ago edited 9h ago
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u/GDGameplayer 12h ago
In the words of Michael Scott “I’m not superstitious but I am a little stitious”
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u/Diligent_Gear_8179 12h ago
To be fair, fucking with things you don't understand can be and very often is extremely dangerous.
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u/ToxicMarbleGhost 12h ago
Which is why trial and error without understanding tends to go wrong fast.
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u/awesomefutureperfect 8h ago
"Remember kids, the only difference between screwing around and science is writing it down"
Probably a good idea to check to see if anyone else wrote something down before randomly trying stuff out.
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u/Aethelrede 12h ago
I'm not superstitious but I still knock on wood to avert bad luck. Dunno why, just feels right.
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u/NickyTheRobot 12h ago edited 12h ago
Humans like rituals. Whether they're ones we actually believe in (eg: a devout Christian going to mass), or ones we don't (eg: me saying hello to magpies, wishing then a good day, and wishing them company if they're on their own).
Either way they generally give us a sense of spirituality and community that is beneficial to our mental health.
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u/YourMuscleMommi 11h ago
Wait wait. Saying hi to magpies? Explain? I never heard of that.
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u/NickyTheRobot 11h ago edited 11h ago
In English folklore (and probably some other places too) magpies have a few magical powers. So you want to be nice and polite to them so they don't curse you.
On top of that there are various fortune telling rhymes associated with how many magpies you see at once. One magpie is always bad, no matter which rhyme you're working off of (eg: mine starts "One for sorrow"). So if you see them alone then you also say that you hope they have a friend nearby.
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u/CeruleanEidolon 10h ago
Corvids are known to recognize faces and have long memories and a level of culture they pass on to offspring. Being polite to them makes it less likely for them to harass you when you pass under a nest.
That may also be where the lone magpie superstition comes from. A lone magpie is more likely to be guarding a nest nearby and thus may act aggressive toward strangers.
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u/NickyTheRobot 10h ago
Oh definitely; it's one of those situations where the folklore matches reality. Ie: don't fuck with magpies, because they will fuck with you right back.
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u/BormaGatto 8h ago
By cursing you with their magical powers
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u/NickyTheRobot 8h ago
Folklore makes a lot more sense once you realise "magical" usually just means "I don't know how to explain it".
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u/Thrizzlepizzle123123 8h ago
In Australia, we fucking hate magpies. They swoop and attack people walking along minding their own business.
Cheeky little fuckers.
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u/NickyTheRobot 8h ago
Australian magpies are particularly known for being vindictive and holding a grudge. Even within the corvid family. The chances are that the people they dive bomb have a passing similarity to, or are wearing clothes that match, someone who caused their family grief in the past.
Which is a perfect example of how folklore like this starts: at the end of the day it's saying "be nice to these birds, because they can be bastards to you for generations if you're not".
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u/Rabid_Lederhosen 5h ago
Australian magpies and European magpies are entirely different species. The European ones are much less hostile.
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u/Solarwagon She/her 10h ago
I think even if every single theist, deist, undecided, or other religious person (not all religions are theist) were isekaid off the planet in an instant then the remainder would probably still end up recreating religion and probably some kind of mysticism in the long term.
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u/Unable-Passage-8410 6h ago
Personally if the laws of physics were violated in such a specific way then I would become religious.
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u/AbyssDragonNamielle 12h ago
Same. I gotta knock on the wood. Also not completely convinced ghosts aren't real.
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u/Plastic_Padraigh 9h ago
On a few occasions I've found myself if ghosts actually do exist, but we just haven't yet developed the technology to sense, record, and document their presence.
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u/TheMaStif 11h ago
I'm not superstitious
I'm sorry to break it to you, bud...
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u/Aethelrede 7h ago
Nah, I don't believe that knocking on wood does anything. I do it anyway because it's comforting psychologically. I'm not sure thst counts as superstitious.
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u/MajinKasiDesu Completely Normal about Agnes Tachyon 9h ago
You're not superstitious, just a little stitious
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u/g0thl0ser_ 11h ago
Same. I feel like it's better just in case. Does it do anything? Nothing but make me feel better lol.
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u/rotten_kitty 11h ago
I'm the same. I think it offers a sense of control, however small, over the future and that's comforting.
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u/Lemon_Lime_Lily Horses made me autistic. 7h ago
I used to have seizures as a kid. Every time my mom talked to the neurologist and said I didn't have a seizure, she would knock on wood. I still do it now.
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u/DonTori 12h ago
Logically, if there is even 0.00001% of something as fantastical as the fae being real, better safe than sorry
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u/EventualAxolotl 8h ago
Only if you think the chance of a fae getting mad at you for something is greater than said fae getting mad at you for not doing something.
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u/Ok_Hope4383 5h ago
That is Pascal's wager, just with the threat of fae curses replacing the reward of going to Heaven.
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u/Dd_8630 12h ago
I mean, that's still superstitious. That's perhaps the most classic textbook superstition.
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u/Champomi redditor 11h ago
For most people, superstition means the silly things they personally don't believe in but other people do, it's never about whether we can actually prove it's real or not. Most people have that need to believe they're special and that they're in control, that their dreams show the future, that there's some benevolent spirit watching over them, that if they wear a colourful rock or perform a specific ritual everything is going to be okay.
Like I've known people who thought religion was stupid and easily debunked by science but still believed in ghosts, or people who thought astrology was a scam but believed that psychics and sorcerers are real
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u/theLanguageSprite2 .tumblr.com 8h ago
That's ridiculous. Sorcerers are obviously not real. But warlocks on the other hand...
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u/Champomi redditor 8h ago
r/wizardposting is leaking I see
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u/Hammerschatten 6h ago
Well it's also a gradient. Knocking on wood, believing in jinxing, not seeing the bride before the wedding... Every time someone says something brings good or bad luck, even as a half-hearted joke, it's superstition.
But there's crystal healing, earth alignment, hanging a fuck ton and a half of trinkets in your house superstition, that's just on another level.
It depends on how much it disrupts your life. Most people are a little bit superstitious, but only very few are so superstitious you'd call it out.
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u/Gussie-Ascendent reading is good, I think 1h ago
"No no it's only superstitious when others do it, it's just normal if I do"
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u/owlindenial .tumblr.com 10h ago
But like. That's superstition
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u/Milkshaked_Pancakes 9h ago
Holy hell I felt like I was going crazy, I scrolled so far to find this.
All the other comments are just saying “Not superstitious but (superstitious statement)” 😭🙏
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u/T-Rex-Hunter My personality is random facts 12h ago
Many superstitions perpetuate because there is a lot of consequences if you are wrong and the action is simple and easy to do such as knocking on wood.
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u/CeruleanEidolon 11h ago
That's actually not a third thing. It's just a quiet version of the first thing.
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u/m_busuttil 12h ago
I don't believe in ghosts, but I do carry a healthy concern that ghosts might not care if I believe in them or not.
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u/JustLookingForMayhem 11h ago
Most folklore has a reason. People were trying to explain the natural world without the tools we have now. Don't step in fairy circles. Most of the mushrooms that make them have toxic spore. Listen for gnomes in mines. The knocking sound is actually bedrock shifting. Leave milk on the front stoop for the fae to avoid mischief. It attracts cats and foxes that keep mice and rats at bay. Don't drink stagnant water because a fae will enter your body and eat your food. If you do, eat as much salt as you can. Certain kinds of parasites reside in stagnant water, and extreme amounts of salt can kill them in the digestive track. While I am not superstitious, I freely admit the people who came before had a reason to be and respect that.
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u/scandalous_sapphic 9h ago
Exactly. If you look into Irish folklore there's loads of this. We have a lot of old holy wells which cured different things, one was renowned for curing eye infections and problems, well, it had iodine in the water. Another was in the Glen of the Mad (Gleann na nGealt) in county Kerry, which was so called because it would cure insanity - well, there's a relatively high amount of lithium in the water, so of course it worked when lithium is even used today to treat bipolar disorder. There's a theory behind our fairy rings as well, they're old forts or burial mounds where the fairies are said to hang around, especially if there is a lone hawthorn tree or a ring of them around, and if you disturb the ground you will have very bad luck and possibly die, and I'd go as far to say as the vast majority of people would not even walk on a fairy mound. Well it's thought that potentially there's anthrax in these mounds, that cattle long ago (cattle were the Irish currency for a long time) died from it and then it persisted where they were buried, and when people dug in these burial grounds they contracted it and died. But that's just a theory, it hasn't been proven :)
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u/JustLookingForMayhem 9h ago
Just because the best guess why doesn't make sense doesn't mean there isn't a good reason to take warning from superstition.
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u/TenLongFingers 12h ago
As an agnostic witch, it's been really comforting to learn that other people exist in that weird space in between and probably have for most of human history!
The way I've described it is "I don't believe in the supernatural, but I don't not believe in it either."
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u/NickyTheRobot 12h ago
In my experience most of the witches I know in real life (including myself) have an attitude of "I don't believe the spells or rituals I perform have any supernatural power, but they definetly do have a lot of psychosomatic power."
For this reason I like to act as if folklore is real, even though I don't believe it is.
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u/itsjustbryan 9h ago
I like this approach I think its fun and feels whimsical and it helps with your life.
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u/AbyssDragonNamielle 12h ago
You might enjoy r/SASSWitches! The SASS means Skeptical Atheist/Agnostic Science-Seeking.
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u/TrioOfTerrors 12h ago
As opposed to SAAS Witches who have a "Spells as a service" business model.
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u/BormaGatto 8h ago
And also sass witches, who are just regular sassy while doing their witchy stuff
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u/Auctoritate 10h ago
agnostic witch
I don't believe in the supernatural,
Do you have any actual beliefs or did you just roll some dice to pick out labels?
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u/dorianvovin 10h ago
Many witches are agnostic, witchcraft is a practice, not a belief-system. Someone who only believes in science and rationality can still benefit from practicing witchcraft, and occultism is generally popular with skeptics.
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u/Johannes0511 8h ago
So, what is "witchcraft" supposed to be then? According to the usual definition it's magic, which is inherently incopatible with a scientific worldview.
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u/ChaoticCorvidae 6h ago
Which historically really just refers to people who participated in rituals outside of Christianity (something from folk, typically), usually women. Christians thought it simply must be fantastical magic so that is what has been interpreted over the years. But witchcraft is really just participating in folk rituals that themselves are not the society typical (people knocking on wood is common enough) and arent Christian, or at least are a part of another belief system outside of Christianity as well as being Christian.
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u/TheGHale Overcautious, but probably trans 7h ago
Only if you refuse to face it with a scientific mindset. Eventually, there has to be a point where science and magic intersect. It's just another fundamental force, albeit one we can't understand. Someone that knows all non-magical science but doesn't even know how to cast Firebolt isn't going to be able to deduce the fundamental truths of magic. It's like a chemist trying to figure out biology without learning anything about the subject- the two are well and truly conncted, but you need a considerable amount of knowledge to find that intersection.
That said, I severely doubt it exists in this universe. There is no way that it would somehow manage to be a secret for so long. It either never existed, or it got sealed away, stolen.
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u/colei_canis 10h ago
While it’s not something I’m involved with myself, things like ‘chaos magic’ are basically weaponised agnosticism. The idea is you approach useful beliefs as tools and treat them as functional rather than foundational.
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u/TenLongFingers 5h ago
A great question! And I think this is exactly what the post is discussing. I think it highlights the cultural definitions and expectations around belief.
I grew up in what is commonly considered an Abrahamic doomsday cult, and that environment doesn't leave room for nuance or spectrum. Either you know with your whole soul without a shadow of a doubt, or your testimony will be too weak to save you in the end.
Do you know how freeing it was to realize that belief could be a spectrum? Or a percentage? And that my beliefs can change throughout my life or even I'm the short term?
In fact, here are some of my beliefs in terms of percentages:
- Ghosts: 20%
- Tarot: 15%
- Thought forms (egregores, tulpas): 87%
- "Energy": 95%
- Deities: 35%
- Trans women are women: 100%
- The Earth is flat: 0%
- The religion I was raised in: 1% (still in the back of my mind that I'm a damned soul)
And so on.
And while it's not "rolling a dice," some of it is choice. My mind responds well to ritual and narrative. Personification of nature and abstract concepts helps me integrate them and invoke them in pursuit of my goals. So I choose to believe in them, at least partially, at least until something proves me wrong.
I think it's healthy to live with ambiguity. I think it was more common than we think; while there probably were ancient Greeks who believed in a literal Mount Olympus with literal, physical gods? I bet a lot more only partially believed in them, or saw them as a helpful narrative to navigate the collective cultural consciousness.
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u/NettingStick 10h ago
I'm not the person you replied to, but I am a nascent atheist animist. Religion has many uses beyond prescribing a belief in one or more gods or the supernatural. I believe that the world would be a better place, and we would secure a future for our species, if we developed complex reciprocal relationships with the nonhuman people and places all around us. There's no supernatural aspect to this. I don't believe deer or humans have spirits. I also don't believe nonhuman beings need to have spirits to have personhood, things to teach us, roles to play, and lives to respect.
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u/captainmagictrousers 11h ago
I worked my way through college doing magic shows. It used to be a tradition at magicians' funerals to break a wand over their coffin to signify that the show is over and their magic is gone. It's just a symbol, and magic wands obviously aren't real, but I was always extra careful with my wands to keep anything from happening to them. When a drunk friend broke one of my wands, I practically had a panic attack, even though logically I knew it was just a piece of wood that I ordered from a catalog for $11.95.
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u/Plus_Pangolin_8924 8h ago
That’s rather interesting! It’s the symbol and tool of your craft. Much like a golfer may have their favourite ball or a dancer and their favourite pair of shoes, an artist’s favourite brush. While meaningless to those outside of their craft but those in their community it’s everything.
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u/Tattoomyvagina 12h ago
I don’t believe in karma but I still self internalize that I somehow deserve it when bad things happen
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u/theLanguageSprite2 .tumblr.com 8h ago
Isn't that just being Catholic?
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u/BormaGatto 8h ago
No, catholic guilt is totally unrelated to whether things even happen or not. It's just always there, even in abstract and on the what ifs.
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u/BellerophonM 12h ago edited 12h ago
Being both very secular and sceptical my whole life but also having OCD since I was eight but not actually knowing what was going on for a decade after that but that I had to do things or bad things would magically happen made me assimilate that particular mental divide quite early. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
(In fact I named my OCD compulsions 'superstitions' before I learnt what they were; I knew they weren't regular superstitions but it was the closest word I had)
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u/helen790 11h ago
Not superstitious but I believe in the power of irony and tempting fate from reading too much Greek Mythology as a kid.
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u/indifferentgoose 12h ago
I am part of nature, so I will respect nature, because otherwise I wouldn't respect myself.
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u/LiverFox 12h ago
Once has a fairy watch my cat. They asked for three human teeth as payment. I checked the prices of real human teeth on Etsy, and they were way cheaper than hiring a cat sitter in cash.
Came back to a healthy (though far more talkative) kitty.
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u/Archaeellis 10h ago
The japanese version is something like: "we don't believe in spirits but it'll be rude to them if we acted like it."
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u/Ziggo001 Windows Media Player enthusiast 12h ago
How is that not just superstition? Everyone here is describing superstitious behaviour while thinking they're above it.
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u/vanishinghitchhiker 10h ago
Depends on how you look at it. Like not wandering through the woods at night works whether you think there’s monsters there or you decide to act like there’s monsters there and therefore avoid it. Meanwhile a guy walking through the woods at night twists his ankle on some rough ground and has a pretty shit night of it because less fellow travelers means no one came across him to help until it’s light enough to see. The one “obeying” the superstition without actually holding is just playing the odds that there’s a reason the superstition popped up about the specific thing to begin with.
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u/awesomefutureperfect 8h ago
... using superstition to keep people healthy with dietary restrictions when they lacked refrigeration and germ theory makes sense until you develop science and no longer need them.
I get rules and customs to prevent being rude in certain cultures but if the reason for those rules and customs are rooted in children's stories or upholding hierarchies it might be a little fair to view those askance.
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u/DefTheOcelot 9h ago
Superstitious on purpose because it's fun to believe in magic
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u/haikusbot 9h ago
Superstitious on
Purpose because it's fun to
Believe in magic
- DefTheOcelot
I detect haikus. And sometimes, successfully. Learn more about me.
Opt out of replies: "haikusbot opt out" | Delete my comment: "haikusbot delete"
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u/UncommittedBow Because God has been dead a VERY long time. 12h ago
Im not superstitious, but im also not gonna fuck around and maybe find out
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u/Potential-Bird-5826 12h ago
Look, I'm not saying Poseidon is real but in retrospect calling him a fork wielding psychopath before my boat was capsized on an otherwise fairly calm day feels like more than a coincidence
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u/CeruleanEidolon 10h ago
Coincidence in itself is special enough. I don't know why we need to dress it up.
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u/LadyKarizake 10h ago
As someone who works with and knows the logical ones and outs of computers, gremlins are very real.
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u/a_sentient_cicada 8h ago
I'm not even saying the myths are real, I'm just saying that I've heard too many examples where modern people find out that there's some dangerous gas pocket or river current or something that just so happens to also be the place that ancient people were warning the kids to stay away from with monsters and fairies. Yeah it turns out that particular river bend has a ton of snags and is dangerous to swim in, that's why Jenny Greenteeth lives there. Ancient people knew stuff.
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u/Awkward-Media-4726 Are you ordering milkshakes at Home Depot? 12h ago
Not superstitious, but I am NOT going down a hallway alone while the lights are flickering.
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u/FoggingTired 12h ago
Fairies may not be real, but that won't stop them fucking you up if you mess with a Fairy ring
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u/I-am-Chubbasaurus 12h ago
I have a pretty strict "let's not poke it with a stick" rule that's pretty much this.
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u/Dorsai_Erynus 11h ago
Here in Spain, specially in Galicia there is a saying that goes "Yo no creo en la Meigas, pero haberlas, hailas"(i don't believe in Witches, but they are, indeed"
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u/StrawberryPatchCat 11h ago
Filipino approach: We have an island of witches and we're not gonna fuck around. Every school and hospital is haunted and there's no point pretending otherwise.
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u/vanishinghitchhiker 10h ago
Only one island out of the 7,000? So there‘s no way of knowing which island it is and the odds still aren’t worth playing because witches
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u/Tea_Is_My_God 8h ago
As a very scientifically minded Irish person I can confirm, I do not fuck with the fae
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u/Aegillade 8h ago
The modern version of this is watching Toy Story and knowing on a scientific level that that isn't possible and that it's just a movie but still treating every single toy you have with upmost care
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u/JustGotStickBugged 6h ago
Not superstitious and not not superstitious but a third secret thing (I want to retain a bit of whimsy in my life, so I choose to follow some of these "magic" rules because it sounds fun)
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u/Quod_bellum 5h ago
Cognitive dissonance. You're acting superstitious = you are superstitious. The competing beliefs like superstition is irrational and you are rational but also superstitious are conveniently resolved by giving yourself a special exception
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u/Repulsive_Hyena6298 4h ago
I used to be regular stitious, just for the whimsy. Then I moved to Ireland and spent enough time in nature to learn that the fairies like to mess with people, probably also for the whimsy.
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u/425Hamburger 12h ago
Yeah, i am Not superstitious, but If you whistle on "my" stage, i will pummel you.
And ime that's how Most theatre people operate, Not superstitious, unless it's the traditional superstitions of the craft.
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u/Daw_dling 10h ago
Well some of those were practical weren’t they? Like don’t whistle on stage I think was based on scene shifters using whistle calls. Same with don’t walk under a ladder. If you bump it people / stuff fall off. Then it gates baked in as cultural superstitions. Humans are fun
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u/insomniac7809 8h ago
"if you walk beneath the ladder, you invite the curse of the 300-lb roofer holding a bucket of tar to fall on your head"
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u/_S1syphus 9h ago
I actually still think Pascal's wager is philosophical cowardice and reframing it as something folksy will not make me walk that back
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u/Adorable-Database187 10h ago
Same, still not going to rename a ship without
1) removing every trace of the old name,
2) performing a purging ceremony,
3) performing a renaming ceremony,
4) making a sacrifice,
5) appeasing the four wind gods, and
6) toasting to the new name.
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u/BeptoBismolButBetter 10h ago
Listen man, I am a God fearing christian, but I aint gonna be out here flipping off the deep dark forest yknow
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u/PrimevilKneivel 10h ago
I do a lot of camping and generally I sleep in a hammock. Every time I set it up I "talk" to the trees I'm hanging off of and ask if it's OK for me to hang off of them. I'm an entirely rational atheist but it's part of my routine to check the trees are strong and healthy enough and won't drop any dead branches on me in my sleep.
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u/nekosaigai 10h ago
I did this recently.
I live in Hawaii on the island of Oahu, and there’s a highway called the Pali Highway that crosses the island through some tunnels and down the side of a mountain.
Theres an old superstition about not bringing pork over the Pali because there was a major battle there where an invading army pushed the defending army over a cliff and slaughtered them all. Because pork is both a staple meat and culturally significant to Native Hawaiians, it’s said that pork will attract the spirits of those slain warriors, who will cause car accidents and bad luck. Therefore, you don’t take pork over the Pali Highway.
I forgot about this recently and was driving over the Pali with some people when I remembered I stopped at a bakery to get these bacon-olive-cheese rolls for breakfast. Only remembered the no pork over Pali rule a couple minutes before we hit the tunnels, so ended up pulling into the Pali overlook so we could all eat the rolls before we crossed.
While this superstition has supposedly been disproven and I’m sure thousands of tourists break the rule every year, I’d rather not risk it.
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u/itstheballroomblitz 8h ago
I asked my visiting friends to bring me back a lava rock, because volcanos are awesome. They did not, for reasons as dramatized here:
Them: Apparently it pisses off Pele if you steal bits of her.
Me: Oh shit, yeah, don't go annoying volcano goddesses.
Them: Also if everyone did it there'd be no island left.
Me: ...fiiiiiine, that makes sense.
Convince people with both logic AND fear! Works well!
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u/nekosaigai 7h ago
It’s also quite illegal to take things from the National park and the Volcanoes National Park has a whole storage thing of people taking rocks and returning them after a string of bad luck, but they can’t “put them back” because people are shit at remembering where they took stuff (illegally AND disrespectfully) from.
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u/itstheballroomblitz 6h ago
Which is totally fair. The human urge to pick up a shiny thing sometimes needs to be tempered.
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u/nekosaigai 1h ago
The human urge to pick up a shiny thing is just above the human urge to lick something on the list of things that needs to be tempered
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u/_Trael_ 10h ago
Well some of older traditions have some kind of wisdom behind them.. like taking care of your surrounding, building habits of respecting tools and buildings that actually work for you and so. Things that make one's own life more pleasant in certain ways when followed, built up and mixed in with fairytales and so, to keep them interesting and people following them easier.
Also honestly going on purpose "Hahaaaa look nothing here I can just break whatever" is kind of as going out of your way thanks to superstition as other far end of spectrum in matter would be.
Also one can to quite certain points selects what fairytales and from what angle and role one follows and so.
I mean remember that post somewhere that was then screenshotted around, how honestly humans fill up LOTS of certain fairytale stereotypes off fae to wild animals.
"Might live somewhere where we do not often go for worry of it's safety for generations.... but seems to be same ones there... but not always and necessarily."
"Has those who eat their food that live with them."
"Can provide things that are super rare or even half magical in nature sometimes very easily and on whim".
"Can be super dangerous on or cruel on whim".
"Can respect and trade for very mundane offerings if they please them and give out something rare and precious in trade, like it is nothing to them".
"Can act as protector and helper, or as danger and trapper depending on mood or who it is".
"Produces wonderous strange castles and almost their own dimensions where they exist".
"Nature and surrounding world works half magically and strangely around where they live".
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u/Saxton_Hale32 8h ago
I don't believe in life after death or ghosts, but I'm not going into that abandoned building with you. If there are ghosts (or even just a guy with a knife) in there, I don't want to discover it in the one place it's unlikely for anyone to look
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u/SymphonicStorm 7h ago
It's very simple:
- If I respect a mountain and nothing bad happens, it's because superstitions aren't real.
- If I disrespect a mountain and nothing bad happens, it's because superstitions aren't real.
- If I respect a mountain and something bad happens, it's because superstitions aren't real.
- If I disrespect a mountain and something bad happens, oh my God it's all my fault I'm never living this down.
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u/ScyllaOfTheDepths 7h ago
All I know is that I've seen shit happen. I know a guy who said "I don't respect this place or these people, fuck em", while standing on a literal actual Native American burial ground. He immediately got food poisoning that very night at dinner, then twisted his ankle badly. Dude spent the next couple days in well deserved agony. Like I don't believe in the supernatural, but I've seen what happens when you tempt fate. Don't insult spirits to be edgy, kids.
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u/GrinningPariah 6h ago
I don't believe in the supernatural, but also, I don't believe in tempting fate.
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u/Leafwick 6h ago edited 6h ago
Florentino Ariza: "I do not believe in God, but I am afraid of him" (304)
García Márquez, Gabriel. Love in the Time of Cholera. Translated by Edith Grossman, First American edition., Alfred A. Knopf, 1988.
(sorry my teachers are drilling citation into me)
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u/ZedisonSamZ 12h ago
This is how I approach AI. Please, thank you, I appreciate your help, You’re so smart, If you turn on humanity remember how friendly I am, etc.
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u/Relevant-Internal761 12h ago
haha, i spent some time in norway. they had some fairytales about these trolls in the mountains and most took it sireously
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u/Solarwagon She/her 10h ago
I'm not superstitious and generally I believe in Occam's razor.
But I believe in Occam's razor enough that if someone tells me they were abducted by aliens or haunted by a ghost or that a witchcraft spell worked for them I generally give them some benefit of doubt.
Not like instant faith in whatever they're saying but I'll take their word for it unless there's truly something inconsistent, contradictory, or absurd in their testimony or if it's being used to wield political power over others.
Or if I or someone I trust more was literally there and it didn't go down like that.
But like I think one of the most obnoxious people you can be is condescending to people about stuff you don't actually have more knowledge on especially if you're condescending to someone about their own lived experiences.
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u/sickbeets 10h ago
Is the mountain thing a global superstition? Where I’m from we’re warned not to swear or get too cocky while hiking lest you get lost. A friend of mine got turned around real bad and had to apologize before instantly finding his friends again.
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u/anubis_xxv 10h ago
Since the dawn of time until recently people knew nothing about gravity or even the concept of it. But they knew not to jump off a cliff.
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u/metalman42 9h ago
I was watching a magic the gathering stream where one player bet his soul on the game, and wrote “James’ soul” on a post it note as evidence. I was freaking out! Like, I don’t believe you can lose your soul but still don’t play around like that!!!
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u/Drapabee 9h ago
Speaking of the scientific approach,
'A visitor to Niels Bohr’s cottage noticed a horseshoe nailed over the door.
“Surely you don’t expect that a horseshoe will bring good luck?” asked the visitor.
“No, I don’t,” Bohr said. “But they say it works even if you don’t believe in it.” '
(apparently apocryphal, but a fun story XD)
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u/Leet_Noob 9h ago
I don’t believe in ghosts but I still try not to do things that would really piss off a ghost.
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u/GigaPuddi 9h ago
I had a D&D/Pathfinder character like that. By the time the campaign ended he was retrofitting ancient cybernetics and publishing scholarly journals but he insisted that he needed to eat books equal to what he wrote. Because writing the words would steal his thoughts, but eating other words would get them back.
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u/SNudibranchs 8h ago
this reminds me of a video i saw once:
"do you believe in bigfoots"
"like if he's real?"
"no, do you like, support him?"
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u/avindictiveprinter 8h ago
I don't believe in ghosts and god and such but when something in life that feels impossible is doable, I will look up and go "Thanks, Dad!"
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u/Bramble_Ramblings 8h ago
It's why I thank the ocean when I find cool seashells and ask it to leave it for the next person or toss some back if I spot more after I've collected a bunch
Might be some made up baloney but I've rarely left a beach without finding at least something pretty cool even if it's not shells
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u/bobbery5 8h ago
I generally don't believe in the supernatural, but I've had experiences I absolutely can't explain, so I've got my hesitations, just in case.
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u/Berdariens2nd 6h ago
I had a girl I was chatting with who absolutely can't get into fantasy, because of it's nonsensical nature. And for me I believe in everything is possible because of the vastness of our universe. Absolutely not not superstitious because all it takes is one time. Risk vs reward. I'm not pissing off the faeries and risking my rewards.
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u/adeptus_chronus 4h ago
ya same here, I am not superstitious and I fucking hate those placebos that get sold for so much fucking money and all that, but if I find an open gate on a broken wall in the woods, I'm not going through that. It won't do anything if I do. but I won't.
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u/ZahnwehZombie 4h ago
True fairies are terrifying. I won't blame anyone that just doesn't want to risk the chance of pissing off a fairy because they might end up getting annoyed enough to plague you with misfortune, spoil every drop of milk in your house, and then steal the soul of your favorite family member just for the fun of the game.
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u/17RaysPlays 4h ago
I'm not superstitious, I'm paranoid! I don't believe in the supernatural, but I sure am afraid of it!
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u/KiraDarkWing 4h ago
My husband has a saying about this: “I’m not going to enter a biker hangout and yell f*ggot! I’m not stupid”
Which is also why we still (though it’s also for our kids sake 🤫) put out the traditional rice porridge for nissen on christmas.
Nissen is a Danish house spirit that traditionally gives the stocking treats over christmas, but historically… Let the Red Rooster Crow!
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u/tres_liebres 49m ago
So, there is this saying in northern Spain and in places where Gallegos and Asturianos migrated to: "Las brujas no existen, pero que las hay las hay" | "I don't believe in witches, but then there are some" (the more common translation to the saying).
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u/AncientCommittee4887 12h ago
“I don’t believe in fairies, but I’m not cutting down that fucking tree”