Sigmund Freud Measures Human Progress

"What progress we are making. In the Middle Ages they would have burned me. Now they are content with burning my books." 

Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) 

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Alan: It is human nature to "take things for granted." And so we ignore homo sapiens' epochal emergence from The Swamp of Superstitition into the high-and-dry Light of Reason. The Enlightenment also engendered Liberal Democracy, best summarized by Winston Churchill's famous dictum:  "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried." Not only does Winnie's dictum provide a brilliant summary of politics, it also points to the superiority of imperfection over the seductive enticement of promised perfection. For years, friend Fred lived and worked in East Africa, where he realized that superstition and witchcraft were the matrix of life. Dick Gordon's "The Story" describes this matrix and its paralyzing effect on human psyches and human societies.

For Accused Witches, A Last Resort

When Leo Igwe was a child in Nigeria, he saw his father get beaten for being accused of witchcraft. Igwe has made it his life’s work to help people accused of being witches and visits the camps where they take refuge.

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