Dueling superstitions
A survey from Baylor University finds that believers in the supernatural are less likely to believe in the paranormal, and vice versa:
The Baylor Survey found that traditional Christian religion greatly decreases credulity, as measured by beliefs in such things as dreams, Bigfoot, UFOs, haunted houses, communicating with the dead and astrology.
The ISR researchers found that conservative religious Americans are far less likely to believe in the occult and paranormal than are other Americans, with self-identified theological liberals and the irreligious far more likely than other Americans to believe.
It’s as if we have only so many superstitious brain cells, and if we fill them up with one kind of superstition, we crowd out other kinds of superstition. I’m not sure whether that’s good news or bad.