When Magic was Science and Science was Magic: John Dee, Nostradamus, and the shifting boundaries of knowledge

In the courts of Renaissance Europe, the line between “magician” and “scientist” was far thinner than we imagine today. Two men embody this paradox: John Dee, the advisor to Queen Elizabeth I, and Nostradamus, the famous French astrologer, astronomer and clairvoyant. Each was celebrated in their own time — but fascinatingly enough; the way we remember them has been reversed.

John Dee was an early day astronomer and mathematician - meteorologist perhaps as well. He was once seen as a conjurer, but now he is recognized for his proto-scientific genius. Nostradamus, once a respected astrologer, astronomer and physician, is often dismissed today as a prophet of superstition.

Their stories reveal a very interesting truth: What we call magic and what we call science are not fixed categories. They shift with time, culture, and the limits of human understanding.

John Dee: Magus or Meteorologist?

Born in 1527, John Dee was renowned for his vast intellect. He studied mathematics, astronomy, navigation, and what we would now call physics and chemistry. Yet to Elizabeth I, he was also her court “conjurer,” a man who gazed into crystal balls and conversed with angels through mysterious scrying sessions and told her what would happen in the future.

One tale captures this paradox beautifully: Dee is said to have predicted a horrible storm that scattered the Spanish Armada, saving the English fleet. To his contemporaries, this looked like prophecy, even divine magic. Today, we would call it early meteorology — a man trained to read the subtle signs of air, tide, and sky. What seemed mystical in the 16th century was, in truth, the seed of science.

Nostradamus: The Physician of the Stars

Michel de Nostredame (1503–1566), better known as Nostradamus, lived at nearly the same time as Dee. While today his name conjures images of cryptic prophecies, in his own lifetime he was a respected physician, astronomer and astrologer.

Astrology was no fringe pursuit. It was taught at Europe’s leading universities. Physicians cast horoscopes before prescribing treatments. Kings and queens consulted the stars as seriously as they consulted their generals. Nostradamus’s almanacs, full of planetary calculations, weather predictions, and medical guidance, were seen as the height of learned authority. And yet, in modern eyes, astrology has been relegated to the margins. Astronomy was elevated into science, while astrology was branded “pseudo-science.” Nostradamus, once honored as a scholar, is now remembered mostly as a prophet of doom.

The Fluid Border Between Magic and Science

Dee and Nostradamus indeed illustrate the fluidity of knowledge throughout history. Dee’s “magic” looks scientific to us now; Nostradamus’s “science” looks like magic to us now. What they both reveal is how fragile the boundary is between rationality and mystery.

We might ask: what practices of our age, dismissed as “magical" now, as psuedo-science, might be understood as science in 200 years?

• Pendulums may one day be mapped as tools of neuro-muscular micro-movements that connect unconscious knowledge with conscious awareness.

• Intuition, still called “a sixth sense,” may become a recognized cognitive process, measurable by neuroscience.

• Tarot and divination might be reframed as tools for mapping the subconscious, as psychology and AI research begin to chart symbolic pattern recognition.

  
  

The lesson is humbling: yesterday’s heresy can become today’s science. Yesterday’s respected art can become today’s superstition. Knowledge is always in motion.

Why This Matters for Us

As seekers, seers, readers, and practitioners of divination or herbal craft, we live and act in this liminal space. What we do may look like “magic” to some, but as Dee and Nostradamus remind us, magic and science are often two ways of describing the same pursuit: the search for hidden patterns that govern our world.

Perhaps the real question is not whether something is magic or science — but whether we remain open enough to see beyond the limits of our own time.

(So, the next time you shuffle a tarot deck or feel the unmistakable pull of your intuition, remember: you may be practicing the science of the future.)

Science or magic?