Self deception

In a comment in in the General Feedback Thread, louis syfer asked, in reply to my page "About the Joy of Satan system of respectful demon evocation": "HOW CAN YOU DECEIVE YOURSELF, OR HARM YOURSELF IF IT IS YOU THAT YOU ARE ESSENTIALLY WORKING WITH?"

First off, the Joy of Satan people do not believe that "it is you that you are essentailly working with." They believe that they are having 2-way conversations with the Demons/Gods -- who are seen as advanced anthropomorphic space aliens who are believed to have a genetic relationship to humans and who are believed to spend a lot of their time astrally projecting themselves to Earth and talking to humans.

Second, people deceive themselves all the time -- even in the mundane world. See the list of cognitive biases in Wikipedia. And much of magick is essentially self-hypnosis, which can be a valuable mental discipline but can certainly also be used in ways that deceive oneself.