Year Of The Ox – Charming Tradition Or Load Of Bull?

The third day of the Lunar New Year is traditionally regarded as unlucky to visit other people’s homes. So people turned up in droves at the Che Kung temple in Sha Tin to spin the wheels and bang the drums in the hopes of gaining good luck in the Year of the Ox. Police estimated 74,000 people had visited the Sha Tin temple by 5.30pm. -- ‘Temples Packed But Fewer Get Their Fortunes Read’ -- The Standard, January 29th.

Although my favorite title for an academic paper on paranormal belief is still ‘The tooth, the whole tooth and nothing but the tooth: how belief in the Tooth Fairy can engender false memories‘, there are some very useful papers on Chinese beliefs in fortunes and superstition that sprang to mind after a friend who lives in Hong Kong alerted me about Chinese New Year. Thanks very much, Christopher!

Mind, ‘The bra-strap injury: should men have lessons?’ found in the British Journal of Plastic Surgery (want to be in the control group, guys?) and ‘A Christmas tree in the larynx’ (which happens to be a study from my local hospital!) are great titles and interesting studies too. The Ignobel Awards, naturally, are just stacked with great paper titles. I will, however, firmly direct you towards Digital Cuttlefish’s blog, who regularly posts about academic papers and puts them to verse with pith and humor -- more recently with What Do Women Want (A Valentine’s Day Poem).

But what about all this Year Of The Ox and fortune-telling? From The South China Morning Post:

Hongkongers have been urged to remain united and confident about the future despite the Year of the Ox being defined by the worst possible fortune stick during a Taoist ceremony yesterday at Sha Tin’s Che Kung temple.

…With yesterday’s fortune stick interpreted as signifying possible conflicts between the government and its people, fung shui master James Lee Shing-chak called on the administration to communicate with people to avoid misunderstandings. The government should also listen to community views, particularly when it involved construction of major infrastructure projects, Mr Lee said.

“Che Kung’s predictions are very accurate,” Mr Lau said. “It is a warning to all of us that only a harmonious society with people staying united can enable us to get through our challenges.”

But Secretary for Development Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor said she hoped people would not take the fortune-telling too seriously. “What is important for us is to stay confident and be optimistic about the challenges ahead,” she said.

You can see the unlucky fortune stick in the picture above. But what else can we see in this report?

Firstly, that the Secretary for Development is being very canny. And you can probably understand why. Even if a politician was skeptically-minded and spent the day at the beach rather than waiting in packed lines to visit a temple -- they are forced to recognise that it was probably pushing over a million people who did go. Your constituency is superstitious. Deal with it.

Are such superstitions damaging? I had an interesting find on ThinkQuest, a site that collects materials for online study and reference. ‘Chinese Beliefs and Superstitions: Its Fast Fading Existence?’ is a site that argues that losing connection with Chinese traditions is a concern (after doing what is admittedly, a rather limited online survey):

Some say that this trend is good, as it shows that more people nowadays are becoming more aware of scientific truths rather than myths. However, do the positive aspects outweigh the negative aspects? Judging from the response we received from the people whom we surveyed and interviewed, the answer is ‘no’. What are the negative impacts?

• Erosion and undermining of Chinese culture
• Loss of Chinese traditional values such as filial piety and respect for elders
• Chinese festive occasions becoming less well-known
• Chinese people becoming less Chinese in their way of life

But are these necessarily linked to superstitious behaviour? Can festive occasions (such as Western-world skeptics enjoying Halloween) be maintained without being necessarily about spiritual belief? Can respect for elders be encouraged for other reasons?

Certainly historical precedence of adherence to superstitions indicate that this isn’t anything new. George Bernard Shaw (1903) described English society in the decades prior to the First World War as:

…superstitious, and addicted to table-rapping, materialisation seances, clairvoyance, palmistry, crystal-gazing and the like to such an extent that it may be doubted whether ever before in the history of the world did soothsayers, astrologers and unregistered therapeutic specialists of all sorts flourish as they did during this half century of the drift to the abyss. (Man and Superman, Act IV).

Today, you can watch Richard Dawkins (2007) introduce the documentary ‘Enemies of Reason’ with the following:

Science has sent orbiters to Neptune, eradicated smallpox, and created a supercomputer that can do sixty-trillion calculations per second. Science frees us from superstition, and dogma and enables us to base our knowledge on evidence… well, most of us… Yet today, reason has a battle on its hands. I want to confront the epidemic of irrational, superstitious thinking. It’s a multi-million pound industry that impoverishes our culture and throws up new-age gurus that exhort us to run away from reality. As a scientist, I don’t think our indulgence of irrational superstition is harmless. I think it profoundly undermines civilization… We live in dangerous times, when superstition is gaining ground and rational science is under attack.

So I guess I’m interested in the balance between maintaining tradition and cultural links -- and yet not allowing it to promote anxiety or hysteria. I’ve traveled in Japan and watched people collect ‘lucky charms’ just for the charm -- rather than the practical application. The beauty of color can be questioned and lead to people recognising how they can be manipulated for financial gain -- ‘Are You Feeling Lucky? How Superstition impacts Consumer Choice’:

Kramer and Block (2008) found in a previous study that Taiwanese consumers were more likely to purchase a radio priced at $888 than one priced at $777 — a 15 percent increase in price. In this study, the researchers expand on their prior work with superstitious beliefs. They reveal that, following product failure — specifically, a rice cooker that burnt the rice — Taiwanese consumers expected to be more disappointed if the rice cooker was red, a lucky color in Chinese culture, as opposed to green, a neutral color.

However, when consumers were made conscious of superstitions beforehand through a questionnaire discussing cultural awareness, they were equally disappointed with the red and green rice cookers.

I’ll be continuing to look at whether ‘positive’ superstitions are being maintained and ‘negative’ ones are downplayed after the unfortunate ‘fortune’ that was produced. In the meantime, people will continue to celebrate Chinese New Year. I would, however, suggest that you avoid getting USB-delivered wine for any party you might choose to throw:

Select Reference:

Kramer, T., & Block, L. (2008). Conscious and Nonconscious Components of Superstitious Beliefs in Judgment and Decision Making Journal of Consumer Research, 34 (6), 783-793 DOI: 10.1086/523288

Tagged as: Chinese, consumer choice, culture, fortune, George Bernard Shaw, homeopathic wine, horoscope, humor, IgNobel Awards, luck, research, Richard Dawkins, Skepticism, superstition, Taiwan, USB wine, Year of the Ox