Superstitions exist for a reason. Maybe they’re even good for us. (Photo by Djalma Paiva Armelin from Pexels)

When my big brother was just old enough to drive, he took me to the Illinois State Fair, which was about two hours from where we lived then, and won me a rabbit’s foot at one of the midway games. I carried it on my belt loop, where it was surely a factor in my astonishing victory at the third grade spelling bee.

It’s not clear why we think rabbits bring us good luck. Some scholars say that ancient Celts believed that the time a rabbit spent underground gave it special communion with spirits there, though nobody explains why voles and groundhogs didn’t thus acquire a similar reputation. Others suggest that it’s the fecundity of the species — rabbits do a lot of a good thing, you know — that imbues them with the promise of prosperity by association.1

Yet it’s one of those superstitions that linger, even though we smart 21st century folks know that there’s no rational explanation for…