Sunday Notes (10.23.22)
Plus a slightly retro look at Tarot and parapsychological research . . . .
In keeping with my fondness for the number 22, I’d been planning a post for yesterday. But the reason I didn’t write it then is Tarot-adjacent, so here’s a brief explanation.
I decided to attend an Open Studios art show—something I haven’t done in quite a while. At the end of 2018, about a year before Covid became a major global event, Dallas’s historic Continental Gin ended its long life as an arts space. For decades, the building had kept its architectural roots as a cotton gin, repurposed to house a warren of artist studios.
“The Gin” was a wonderful space, brimming with creative energy. It was enlivened by a revolving cast of interesting personalities, who showcased their work twice yearly. These events provided a welcome counterpoint to a somewhat snobby Dallas gallery scene.
You’ve probably guessed already that the Continental Gin building is now an upscale, mixed-use, “experiential venue” where you can shop, sip, and rent a co-working space. It’s basically indistinguishable from dozens (hundreds?) of similar complexes.
I was lucky enough to have a studio space at the Gin during its best days. There followed a problem period during which most of the “serious” artists left—me too, though I was more of a social comrade than a serious artist.
But during the teens of this century, a more professional management team brought the space back to its better days, and it was thriving in late 2018, when the plug was pulled.
Well, fast forward to yesterday. Between the loss of that common creative space, and the isolation of the pandemic, I lost connection with some of the artists I most liked. In fact, my life drifted far away from that part of my past, and I hadn’t given it any thought until I saw by chance that some of my Gin-friends had migrated to a new area, and their reforumlated Open Studios event was taking place on that magic day, the 22nd.
So I decided to go. Here we’re getting toward the Tarot-adjacent part of this story. There are two parts, actually, but for now the topic is serendipity. Because I had completely dropped out of Dallas life, I only knew about this event because of a note on LinkedIn. I visit LinkedIn only when I have to, and rarely look at the feed—I just go straight to whatever practical requirement has brought me there.
This time I was looking for background info on someone prior to a meeting. But by “chance,” when LinkedIn opened up, the most obvious thing on the page was a Dallas West Art Walk post.
And as it turned out, I had some completely unexpected—and important—experiences at the event.
About which, more later. But I’m going to close this excursion with a practical tip. Several weeks ago I created a table in Notion that would make it easy to keep a weekly record of events that might be worth recalling in future.
I’ve kept similar notes for a long time, but until now I had never thought of adding a column for “Signs.” By which I mean unexpected occurrences and meaningful events that come and go so quickly that it’s easy to miss them. However . . . if you regularly look back at the day that just happened, you may spot things that seem out of the ordinary. Are they signs of something?
You might not know what they signify until much later. But making note of them in real time can reveal otherwise invisible patterns.
Just a thought!
I’ll have more to say in the next post about art and Tarot, serendipity and signification. But meantime, I’ve come across a draft post written a few months ago, and put on hold. At the time, it struck me as a bit dull—and maybe it is! Nevertheless, it seems worth sharing . . . .
Psychic vs Psychological
I’ve been looking through my digital folder of academic material on Tarot—in which some interesting items have accumulated. From 2007, we have “Tarot Cards: A Literature Review and Evaluation of Psychic versus Psychological Explanations,” by Itai Ivtzan.
It’s an overview of questions that (almost) no one asks anymore—and though I don’t agree with some of its basic premises, I think it’s worth a read. Here are a few highlights:
When examining the phenomenon of tarot cards, two juxtaposing approaches regarding its popularity might be taken: the first approach, the paranormal one, claims that indeed some paranormal forces are at work as a reading takes place. The second approach, the nonparanormal one, claims that there is nothing mysterious in the process of tarot reading and the whole phenomenon can be explained by examining simple psychological effects.
The paranormal perspective might be explained in two different ways: ESP [extrasensory perception] or PK [psychokinesis]. One explanation might be that the reader is using ESP to read the client’s mind and is therefore able to comment accurately on the client’s issues. The second option is that these situations involve PK, in which the client’s mind is influencing either the choosing of the cards or the reader’s mind so that his or her own inner issues are expressed. Under this hypothesis, for example, it might be claimed that the process of choosing the cards is PK-based; therefore the cards in the layout are not random but are coherent expressions of the client’s inner workings. It might also be that both ESP and PK are integrated in the process of tarot reading.
Nonparanormal approaches focus on psychological processes and possible fraud when explaining the popularity of tarot reading. One of the most emphasized factors is the Barnum effect, i.e., the tendency to interpret general statements as applying specifically and accurately to one’s own unique circumstances. . . . A wider nonparanormal explanation to divination’s success might be found in the “cold reading” techniques. “Cold reading” is a set of deceptive psychological techniques which are used in the psychic reading to create the impression that the reader has paranormal ability.
Ivtzan goes on to give a useful overview of cold reading techniques, then provides summaries of three experiments that were designed to test possible paranormal aspects of Tarot divination.
I’m not fond of the the term “paranormal,” as it’s typically based on a narrow interpretation of normalcy. And Iztvan’s construction assumes the apparent meaningfulness of a Tarot reading must be either:
a delusion (self-created or fraudulently perpetrated)
in some sense “paranormal”
So it’s oversimplified at best—but at least it proposes some ideas.
Generally speaking, I think the studies discussed in the paper (and the paper itself) lack a genuine attunement to the practice of Tarot. However! I like this passage:
According to a variety of writers working with tarot (e.g., Bartlett, 2006; Sams & Childers, 1991) tarot cards allow the reader to deeply penetrate the meaning of the moment for a client by creating more awareness regarding its potentials and influences. In this context we need to shift our understanding of the word “moment” away from the Western perspective of it being restricted by the constraints of time and move toward the understanding of the moment on a qualitative level. Here the “moment” is viewed as an expression of all that the individual is, on any possible level, conscious and unconscious, connected with any past event and influencing any future one.
That last part is worth pondering.
But just to let you know—there was another reason I missed posting yesterday. Competitive international figure skating!
And if you think I can’t possible relate that to Tarot . . . stay tuned.
Thanks for reading, and see you soon. C