For most, though certainly not for all, it is easy to see the philosophical weakness when all is concrete, as in the illustration above. But let theology or metaphysics get involved in the discussion, and this simple point of logic will often go out the window.

For example ... some claim to believe in the magical power of symbolic actions and the metaphors that guide their conception. We don't, but let us set that aside for a minute and ask what is a legitimate way of acting on such a belief? Some of these, who we overheard talking, spoke of the Wiccan "Great Rite" in which the priest and the priestess would have sex, in order to promote the fertility of the fields. The seed of the man going into the woman is analogous to the seed of a plant going into the soil. Thus, goes the argument, to have sex within the confines of the circle is to bring forth the life bearing power of the earth.

OK, let's say the Universe worked that way. What then?

A fierce argument raged as to whether or not the priest and the priestess should use condoms. To look at the assumptions behind the act, the answer is clear. They may not. Let us consider the analogy created. The woman's womb is as the earth, the man's sperm is as the seed that is planted. He puts on a condom. The sperm are now blocked from entering the womb and fertilizing it. If the universe were guided in its response by the power of metaphor, then its response would be to keep the planted seed from fertilizing the earth, much as the man's condom kept his seed from fertilizing the woman's womb. If you accept the premises, you can't avoid the conclusion. This would be a symbolic cursing of the harvest that would keep the seeds from germinating, much as the sperm had been kept from reaching the ovum. Far better that the priest and priestess should refrain from the ritual altogether, than that they should perform it in such a fashion.

Not surprisingly, what we overheard was not a discussion of Metaphysics. The pro-condom side just kept repeating "It prevents the spread of disease. It keeps unwanted pregnancies from occurring. Do you think it is responsible to be encouraging people to put themselves at unnecessary risk for AIDS and unwanted pregnancy with somebody they may barely know and not be in a committed relationship with? These are major life choices". Indeed they are, and this strikes us as being a very good argument against the priest and priestess engaging in the Great Rite at all, unless they are a couple trying to have a child. But that wasn't the position taken by the pro-condom people at all. (The anti-condom people were, more or less, being bullied into silence, so we're not quite sure what their argument was). Like the investors in the above story who wanted that corn silk light bulb, they were inflexibly sold on the form of the final solution. No going back to the blackboard for them! They were going to have their great rite. Like the investors, they patched up their solution after the fact, ignored the impact that patch job might have on the viability of the solution, and declared that it had to work. Anybody who felt otherwise, obviously didn't care about AIDS!

Nonsense. It's the same old fallacy, dressed up with a new, but analogous situation. They construct a form in keeping with the laws of reality as they imagine them, much as Edison constructed the lightbulb in keeping with the laws of Physics, as he could actually see them play out in his laboratory. Like the investors, at the last minute, they toss out the rules that guided the design, switch issues, and use a show of belligerence to keep the listener from noticing the incoherence of the proceedings. Sound reason requires that one not confuse oneself as to which step of the argument one is on.

The main difference is that Edison knew that the laws of Physics worked. Our Wiccan priests only believed that their laws of "Magick" did, and suspected that that which they created to deal with those laws, had been successfully tested. But if the reality underlying a design becomes suspect, we are not given cause to gain confidence in the resulting design, be it arbitrarily modified (from the standpoint of effectiveness) or left unchanged. The question we feel we must ask, at a moment like this, is "Do you actually believe in your stated premises or is this just a tidy excuse to have sex in front of an audience?" You either believe in your premises or you don't. You can't cling to them at one stage and then develop a convenient case of amnesia later on, if you wish to deserve to be taken seriously.

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