ABSTRACT
A man grabs an axe-head, inserts its bit into the ground and addresses it, allegedly to ward o rain. Given how relatively straightforward it is to refute the claims of that action’s ecacy, we may legitimately wonder why people would foster long enough the counterintuitive beliefs needed to support the practice or should ever feel compelled to perform it at any particular time? Is this a simple case of erroneous assumptions about tools and their potential eects in the world? And why those actions?
