When facing a baffling illness, people often turn to supernatural remedies like prayers or magical rituals — even if those explanations defy everyday logic.
But a new analysis of century-old Irish folk cures reveals that the human mind may favor supernatural explanations precisely when natural causes remain elusive, researchers report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The study draws on a vast collection of 3,655 traditional remedies documented in Ireland during 1937 and 1938, as part of a national folklore project. Schoolchildren interviewed elders about local cures for 35 ailments, ranging from warts and whooping cough to tuberculosis and broken bones. These remedies included naturalistic approaches, such as applying cobwebs to cuts, alongside supernatural ones, like burying a worm in a bottle to ease a toothache or using holy water with prayers for earaches.
To uncover patterns, the researchers enlisted two medical doctors to rate each disease based on factors like the clarity of its cause and underlying bodily processes, as seen by laypeople in the early 20th century. Diseases such as rheumatism or rickets scored high in uncertainty, with hidden mechanisms that would puzzle observers without medical training. In contrast, burns or sprains had obvious triggers and visible effects.
The analysis showed a clear link: ailments with unclear causes or mechanisms were about 50 percent more likely to inspire supernatural or religious treatments. “Diseases whose causes or bodily mechanisms would have eluded lay observers were around 50% more likely to attract religious or magical treatments,” the team writes.
Surprisingly, other factors did not sway the preference for supernatural cures. Severe diseases, like cancer or tuberculosis, which often led to death or intense pain in that era, showed no stronger tie to magical or religious remedies. Nor did ailments provoke high anxiety or require extensive care from others.
The findings align with long-standing ideas in anthropology and cognitive science. For instance, when everyday explanations fall short, people may seek out supernatural frameworks to restore a sense of control. “Why might people find supernatural cures more compelling when the etiology (causes of an illness) and pathology (symptoms and progression) are unclear?” the researchers ask. They suggest that opaque illnesses offer few straightforward natural fixes, prompting reliance on broader supernatural concepts, such as sympathetic magic or divine intervention.
Examples from the dataset illustrate this. Infectious conditions like mumps or whooping cough, whose invisible agents baffled lay understanding, often drew rituals such as passing under a donkey multiple times or having a posthumous child breathe into the patient’s mouth. By contrast, straightforward injuries like cuts attracted practical, material remedies.
The study also explored ritualistic elements, such as repeating steps several times, which appeared more in uncertain diseases but not necessarily in painful or anxiety-inducing ones. Overall, the results point to a human inclination to fill explanatory gaps with the supernatural.
“These findings suggest epistemic uncertainty may be a driver of supernatural thinking about health,” the authors conclude.
