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Matthew
2008-06-01, 05:04 AM
So, in a moment of weakness, I derailed a perfectly good thread about lightsabers in D20 2e [4e] (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=81825). I thought the discussion was interesting enough to merit its own thread, as it speaks to a larger theme as to how people conceive of what 'magic' can be. A lot of this feeds into the 'difference' between 'magic' and 'psionics'. So, here's the conversation from the thread in question, let's see if there is more to say...



Clarke's law: Sufficiently advanced tech is indistinguishable from magic.



Similarly, sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology.



Actually, it doesn't work quite the same in reverse. Magic, by its very conception, can do stuff that technology simply cannot.



Well... it's indistinguishable from sufficiently advanced technology... but we're just splittin' hairs here



No, actually that's not true either, as such a view assumes that technology can overcome the laws of physics, which is impossible. Magic on the other hand, has no such restriction - that's what makes it magic . If technology were to overcome physics it would [I]be magic.



Ah, but we would CALL it Science!

it would be a NEW science, yes, but still Science. Historically people believed humans could never achieve flight, and so, anything that could fly would very easily be called "Magical" but once it happened, well, it did.

Breaking the Speed of Light could very much be like breaking the speed of sound. Though the nuances and mechanics of it are such that it would have to disprove a hitherto undisputed "Law".

I'm not saying it happened, but what I am saying is that "Laws" of science have been proven wrong before, and it's by testing the limits of said "laws" that we can manage to accidentally or purposefully surpass them.

Of course... Modern Physics are pretty solid, it'll take a WHILE before we can even THINK about beating that... Singularity level stuff you know?

Anyway, I think that I could imagine some theoretical super-future where people do stuff that I would think was downright freakin' Magical.


I mean, it CAN go the other way around, (Sufficient Magic indistinguishable from Tech) But I mean, we'd have to set the bar for Tech a little higher than it currently is, which I think is totally possible, if a little less feasible considering the upper-limit set by Magic is nigh-infinite, but here in "Reality" we like to put "Realistic" limits on things that we break in a few decades/centuries anyway... Not that we WILL break them, but we do have a track record of it...



I think you missed the point. Impossible things are not possible. Technology doing the 'impossible' is mere rhetoric, it is not possible. Magic doing the impossible is impossible because magic does not exist, the things it is capable of being only limited by the imagination. This is not true of technology, there are limits to what it can ever achieve.

You may disagree as to what the limits of technology are, but there are hard limits [i.e. not "we're not advanced enough" limits]. Or maybe you don't agree there are limits, I don't know. :smallwink:



Well... if something happens, it's possible isn't it? In that sense, it just meant that what was assumed to be the correct model of physics of the Universe was wrong. It's kind of nitpicky, but it seems to me that in a world with magic, any models of physics are going to take magic into account.

"Two objects fall at an equal rate regardless of mass, unless a wizard makes it so they don't."



Hence the entire plot behind Mage: the Awakening or whatever it calls itself now, (It's fun!) But I digress:

I suppose you're right. Technology CANNOT hit the upper limit posed by magic due to there not BEING an upper limit posed by magic. At least in some areas. There are situations where "Magic" is being utilized to perform mundane tasks which Technology can mimic perfectly, but the nature of technology IS such that it can't match the functional idea of Magic defined as "Something impossible made possible." Though some may define magic as "Something ludicrous made plausible" This isn't what we deal with in D&D. So how about I pose this one:

"Sufficient amounts of magic can be indistinguishable from technology. Though the upper limits of said magic surpass this distinction. "


As a side note on the Physics discussion: PHYSICS doesn't necessarily obey the laws of Physics in all cases. I mean, aren't quantum and atomic physics both incompatible? This means we're either wrong or missing something... so it COULD be conceivable that we can break what is currently defined as a Law of physics if it turns out we were wrong about that particular law... As I said, it's happened in the past, Heliocentric ism and all that.

Once again though: Conceivable doesn't mean anything REMOTELY near likely. It's just a thought I found interesting...



Sounds reasonable to me. I think another point about Clarke's law is that Clarke himself presupposes that magic does not exist, hence his postulation that anything that appears magical is in fact the result of technology. when people reverse the law, I think they miss the point, but we have probably derailed this thread enough already... where's Charity with the obligatory train derailment image?


You would have to ask somebody more learned on the subject than me (Dervag or Dan Hemmens, pehaps?). My understanding is that there is physics "the model" and physics "the reality", the former describes the latter and is undergoing a constant process of refinement and correction (and thus is in a state of minor flux on account of disagreement). Magic would not just contradict the description, but the reality.

That said, I think that very high level physics starts to interact with philosophical, theological and religious concepts in ways that I am not conversant with.



I think that's usually a limit as to what the practioners can do, rather than a limitation of magic as a concept. That said, I can certainly think of modern stories where a character claims that he has reached the limits of what magic can achieve, but that usually conveys some sort of moral message, I think.



Not to mention, Technology, if sufficiently advanced, can go FARTHER than magic ever can. For example, autodeath from being hit by an unsustainable black hole, or moving millions of miles in seconds. Or brutal strength.

Perhaps if you read a particular type of fiction that might be the case, but anything technology can do can be undone or made so it did not even happen through magic [and we're talking about the real limits of technology and the fictional limits of magic here]. There's no way that technology can do more than my imagination.



Magic can't do impossible things either; be definition, if it can be done then it is not impossible.

In fiction, there may or may not be limits on advanced tech, just like there may or may not be limits on magic; it doesn't really matter whether those limits are called the "laws of magic" or laws of physics"

None of this really has anything to do with Clarke's 3rd law or Niven's corollary to that law.

No, that is to misunderstand the nature of 'impossible' in this context. As I explained above, magic (as it is conceived here) creates a paradox in that impossible things occur. That they occur does not make them any more possible. To put it another way, I strongly disagree with Niven being used as an universal statement, but I don't disagree with Clarke.


Magic would not contradict the reality, as magic would be built into the reality of physics, as is everything else. It would merely be an area of physics we have not even begun to explore, nor have we discovered at all!

No, that is one interpretation of 'magic' and in that interpretation it is not really magic at all, but an aspect of science that we have yet to harness. That sort of magic is just man exploiting the natural laws of the universe and exactly what Clarke is talking about. What I am talking about are things that are unnatural or supernatural, things that by definition are in fact impossible.

There is a huge difference between things that occur within the laws of physics and things that are imagined to occur outside of those laws or independently of any laws.



/shrug

I like science.

Sure, me too, but I also like magic. I even like the scientific explanation for magic [i.e. if it happens it isn't impossible], but I like variation as well.

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 05:18 AM
The Incarnations series by Piers Anthony has both science and magic working side by side, and in fact competing on a worldwide basis as economic factors.

IIRC there were "magicons" that were the fundamental quanta of magic.

Tokiko Mima
2008-06-01, 06:09 AM
I would tend to agree, advanced magic and advanced science are on a similiar plane. The Laws of Physics are only as we understand them right now. Travel back far enough into the past when rules haven't been laid out for gravitation acceleration and aerodynamics and you can fly a jet fighter with magic or science and it will be treated the same way. There's no context for a contemporary person to understand how you flew a metal object faster than the speed of sound.

Magic does have rules of it own, otherwise any world it existed in would fall into chaos because anything could and would happen because magic would allow it to. These rules are of course a lot more flexible than the laws of physics and science, but they are laws wizards discover and refine for themselves and presumably pass down (otherwise, why write so many books?)

So I think the problem with the inverse of Clarke's Law in the D&D universe is that for some reason the state of magic knowledge doesn't really advance. Not many new spells are invented, new technigues of memorizing more spells, or other increases in magical 'technology' just don't seem to occur because the system doesn't really support it unless the DM happens to focus on this to the point of building the rules.

Johnny Blade
2008-06-01, 06:11 AM
Well, by definition, there's nothing magic can't do. But, there's also nothing it can do, since it only exists in our fantasy.

I mean, I could see a world where magic can achieve nothing but move objects via telekinesis. (The powers of lesser wizards would be less than overwhelming here. They'd probably end up as construction workers.)

Or a world where magic allows you to speak with the dead. (Very useful and profitable, I think. And it wouldn't exactly tell the laws of physics to sit down and shut up.)

I could also picture a world where the only use of magic is transforming the person who channels it into a fluorescent pink wombat with bat wings. (Magic would be a rather weird hobby in this world.)

And I could picture a world where wizards, after years of studying eldritch tomes and ancient mysteries in their sinister towers finally achieve a cosmic clarity, allowing them to peirce the veil of what lesser mortals perceive as reality and ascend to a state close to godhood, enabling them to alter space and time with mere thoughts. (And throw fireballs.)

And there could be a world where magic can do exactly what our current technology is currently capable of, although by other means. (Boring, but I guess that would be said 'sufficiently advanced' magic.)


What I basically mean is: The whole comparison of 'sufficiently advanced' magic and 'sufficiently advanced' technology relies on a specific definition of what magic can do and if these capabilities make it 'sufficiently advanced'.

(Unimportant nitpick: As soon as humans could master magic, it would become a part of their technology.)

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 06:16 AM
Which definition of the word magic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic) are we talking about here, exactly?

It matters.

Pronounceable
2008-06-01, 06:24 AM
Magic isn't something very well defined in the first place. For me it could be a branch of science that hasn't been discovered in this world, for you it could be anything impossible made possible and for him it could be whatever he can't do himself. In fiction, things get hairier.

There's no unifying idea on magic, its definition or abilities. Only thing we can agree on is it doesn't exist in our world (even then, some folks may insist to believe in magic).

NoDot
2008-06-01, 06:26 AM
Breaking the Speed of Light could very much be like breaking the speed of sound. Though the nuances and mechanics of it are such that it would have to disprove a hitherto undisputed "Law".I'm afraid you're quite wrong. Observation as the velocity of an object approach the Speed of Light show that you cannot go faster than light. (Merely reaching it requires infinite energy!) That's why Sci-Fi tends to use Hyperspace, Wormholes, or something like that-to bypass that.

More to the topic, science is about observation. If you present a scientist with something that irrefutably violates the known laws of physics, they would not discard it (unless they're an anti-science strawman of a scientist who values his "theories" above evidence). They'd be skeptic and run every test in the book to see if it was really true-and probably invent a few more for the book in the process-but they wouldn't discard it.

(Here's a good example: go back it time to 1940 and ask some scientists what powers the sun. They wouldn't say nuclear fusion as they hadn't discovered that yet. However, they wouldn't say a chemical reaction as the output of the sun had already been quantified and no known chemical reaction produced that sort of output.)

Science is about refining (not pulling out of whole cloth, but refining) an accurate, predictive model of the universe (with the fewest terms necessary (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occham%27s_Razor)). If magic existed and had any rules, no matter how vague or specific, it would have a place in the model.

Xuincherguixe
2008-06-01, 06:41 AM
Which definition of the word magic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic) are we talking about here, exactly?

It matters.

Any, I think apply, but lets assume that there's no theoritical limit on what magic can do.

Since it might be best to continue the discussion here, as to get that other thread back on track.


Let's assume for the sake of this argument, that for the magic in question, that they can literally do anything. Not just breaking the laws of physics, but outright insanity. So something simultaneously exists, but doesn't at the same time. So if you put your hand out to it, you would both feel it and not feel it.

Now, my thought on the matter is that if that's the case, is that there are laws of physics. And that is that anything is possible, (even that anything is not possible). If this is all confusing, that's because it is. It's a Universe that doesn't make sense.

But a Universe of infinite possibility is hard to talk about. So we'll assume that at any given moment things are at least consistent, and we don't have situations like that existing/not existing simultaneously thing.

There would be essentially two sets of physics. What the magic user wants things to work like, and another above that, which allows them to make everything different.

Not only that, but there's a possibility that another magician could come along and make it so magic DOESN'T work.


Also, even if it's understood, my thought is that it needs to be said. A games physics don't need to even remotely resemble our own. A world could exist where yelling at a rock with enough contempt may cause the rock to spontaneously grow eyes and start crying.


I guess what I'm trying to say is, there can exist worlds where magic IS it's physics, it's not just something that modifies it.


edit: Since I got Ninja'd and I'd like to comment...

What about a universe in which magic doesn't actually have any rules? My thought is that for such a place, a model of physics couldn't exist.


Incidentally, for an upcoming campaign I'm doing, something this messed up is from where the origins of reality came from. It's going to be weird ^_^

Matthew
2008-06-01, 07:31 AM
Which definition of the word magic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic) are we talking about here, exactly?

It matters.

Well, wikipedia definitions may throw up more problems than they solve, but probably Magic (Paranormal) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_%28paranormal%29) or Magic (Fantasy) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_%28fantasy%29). Really, though, we are here exploring something closer to the dictionary definition of magic (ignoring sleight of hand or illusionary tricks):

1 a: the use of means (as charms or spells) believed to have supernatural power over natural forces b: magic rites or incantations
2 a: an extraordinary power or influence seemingly from a supernatural source b: something that seems to cast a spell

bosssmiley
2008-06-01, 07:45 AM
Applied Phlebotium (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AppliedPhlebotinum) <--> Functional Magic (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FunctionalMagic)
Technobabble <--> Incantation
Lightsaber <--> brilliant energy weapon

Anything beyond that is just pointless f@nw@nk (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FanWank) that distracts from the game. :smallannoyed:

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 08:03 AM
1 a: the use of means (as charms or spells) believed to have supernatural power over natural forces b: magic rites or incantations
2 a: an extraordinary power or influence seemingly from a supernatural source b: something that seems to cast a spell

How do you define a spell? How do you define what supernatural is?

This is the problem... you can't just use other words that have no meaning in our world to define it, then you're right back where you started.

Basically, science and magic are two essentially mutually exclusive entities; once you throw magic into the equation (as in magic can do anything, and there is no way to define it), science gets thrown out the window, since science relies on definition and categorization.

Also, would this link (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MagicVersusScience) have been better? :smallsmile:

Fishy
2008-06-01, 08:05 AM
Any, I think apply, but lets assume that there's no theoritical limit on what magic can do.

Magic that has absolutely no limits makes for really boring fiction.

If Gandalf could have teleported the One Ring into the heart of the sun by snapping his fingers, there wouldn't be a book. If Yoda could have exploded the Death Star with the force without leaving his backyard, there wouldn't be a movie. If Vaarsuvius could have smacked Xykon in the face with a metamagic powered no-save-and-die... well, Rich would have come up with something.

So, since magic only occurs in fiction, and no one cares about boring fiction, there has to be a cost. There have to be laws and limitations that apply to magic- and in any world with humans, someone would eventually apply the scientific method and find out what they were, so they can make neat stuff out of them. Hence, my smart-alec remark.

Xuincherguixe
2008-06-01, 08:30 AM
Magic that has absolutely no limits makes for really boring fiction.

If Gandalf could have teleported the One Ring into the heart of the sun by snapping his fingers, there wouldn't be a book. If Yoda could have exploded the Death Star with the force without leaving his backyard, there wouldn't be a movie. If Vaarsuvius could have smacked Xykon in the face with a metamagic powered no-save-and-die... well, Rich would have come up with something.

So, since magic only occurs in fiction, and no one cares about boring fiction, there has to be a cost. There have to be laws and limitations that apply to magic- and in any world with humans, someone would eventually apply the scientific method and find out what they were, so they can make neat stuff out of them. Hence, my smart-alec remark.

I kind of agree, but what I was proposing was more of a theoretical exercise since there's an argument here about how in certain forms, magic breaks physics. My thought was that was a good place to discuss something like that.

I think that if magic is limited, then it would be part of a universe's physics.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 08:48 AM
How do you define a spell? How do you define what supernatural is?

You look em up in the dictionary. :smallwink: Seriously, though, paranormal/supernatural whatever, all are defined as being beyond natural. That makes them impossible, since nothing that happens can be considered to be truly unnatural. That's rather the point, though.


This is the problem... you can't just use other words that have no meaning in our world to define it, then you're right back where you started.

These words are all well defined.


Basically, science and magic are two essentially mutually exclusive entities; once you throw magic into the equation (as in magic can do anything, and there is no way to define it), science gets thrown out the window, since science relies on definition and categorization.

I strongly disagree with that assertion.


Also, would this link (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MagicVersusScience) have been better? :smallsmile:

Hah, no, probably not. I disagree with a lot of the things said on the Television Tropes website.


Applied Phlebotium (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AppliedPhlebotinum) <--> Functional Magic (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FunctionalMagic)
Technobabble <--> Incantation
Lightsaber <--> brilliant energy weapon

Anything beyond that is just pointless f@nw@nk (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FanWank) that distracts from the game. :smallannoyed:

Very helpful. :smalltongue:



Magic that has absolutely no limits makes for really boring fiction.

If Gandalf could have teleported the One Ring into the heart of the sun by snapping his fingers, there wouldn't be a book. If Yoda could have exploded the Death Star with the force without leaving his backyard, there wouldn't be a movie. If Vaarsuvius could have smacked Xykon in the face with a metamagic powered no-save-and-die... well, Rich would have come up with something.

So, since magic only occurs in fiction, and no one cares about boring fiction, there has to be a cost. There have to be laws and limitations that apply to magic- and in any world with humans, someone would eventually apply the scientific method and find out what they were, so they can make neat stuff out of them. Hence, my smart-alec remark.

Once again, those are not the limits of magic, but the limits of the practioners of magic. Gandalf, for instance, was actually debarred from using his full powers, most of which were in any case unavailable to him for 'cryptic and mystic' reasons.

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 09:04 AM
You look em up in the dictionary. :smallwink: Seriously, though, paranormal/supernatural whatever, all are defined as being beyond natural. That makes them impossible, since nothing that happens can be considered to be truly unnatural. That's rather the point, though.

Right. But then something that's impossible doesn't exist... so if magic exists, it's not impossible.

We could run around in circles all day here until you tell me what definition of magic you're using.


These words are all well defined.

See above.


I strongly disagree with that assertion.

Which assertion?


Hah, no, probably not. I disagree with a lot of the things said on the Television Tropes website.

I'm curious, what sorts of things do you disagree with from there? I find it one of the more entertaining websites I've come across.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 09:17 AM
Right. But then something that's impossible doesn't exist... so if magic exists, it's not impossible.

We could run around in circles all day here until you tell me what definition of magic you're using.

No, you see you're deferring to one view of magic there. As I said above, I am quite happy with that explanation as far as it goes and would agree that in that situation magic and technology could be equally limited. However, as I have also explained, the extreme view of magic is that it creates paradoxes by its very use, it is completely impossible.



Which assertion?

That magic and science are mutually exclusive.



I'm curious, what sorts of things do you disagree with from there? I find it one of the more entertaining websites I've come across.

It's entertaining alright, but it's often disagreeable (to me). A discussion of that, however, would take us off on a completely different tangent. If you were to push me for an example, it would be statements like "Catholicism is not well understood in Japan, which results in blah, blah, Nuns with guns", which runs entirely contrary to my experience. It's about as well understood in Japan as it is in Britain (which is to say, not very, but enough).

To put it another, the site is full of opinions. Some are well formed, others not so much (in my opinion).

Roog
2008-06-01, 09:20 AM
There's no way that technology can do more than my imagination.

Why do you say that?

Tequila Sunrise
2008-06-01, 09:21 AM
The difference between science and magic isn't what it can do--because what either can do is based purely on what fiction contains them--but on where they come from:

In the case of D&D wizarding magic, there is arguably no difference at all from science. You learn a bunch of "secrets of the universe" or "magic theory" or whatever, and then manipulate them to produce "magical" effects. The only thing really different from science is that you can only do it X times per day and only rarely have to worry about the amount of physical resources you consume.

In the case of other D&D magic and most other fictional magic, the difference from science is that the magic comes from a living source--the caster, a god or some other metaphysical force.

TS

Flickerdart
2008-06-01, 09:23 AM
(The powers of lesser wizards would be less than overwhelming here. They'd probably end up as construction workers.)
Haha, I can just imagine a greasy unshaved fat guy in a soiled undershirt and a yellow hard hat being a wizard. With a degree, too, because there'd be schools for this sort of thing.

Maybe they'd have pointy hard hats.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 09:25 AM
Why do you say that?

Because I can imagine impossible things [i.e. not just amazing things, but outright impossible things]. Of course, that depends on your definition of impossible. I have met people who believe that travelling backwards in time may one day be technically achievable. I think they are fantasists, but I am open to being proven wrong. The point is, I think there are limits to what any advancement in technology can achieve. If you don't think there are hard limits, then we'll never agree on that.



The difference between science and magic isn't what it can do--because what either can do is based purely on what fiction contains them--but on where they come from:

No, because technology is not defined by literature. It exists.

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 09:25 AM
No, you see you're deferring to one view of magic there.

Which view? The view that it is impossible?


As I said above, I am quite happy with that explanation as far as it goes and would agree that in that situation magic and technology could be equally limited. However, as I have also explained, the extreme view of magic is that it creates paradoxes by its very use, it is completely impossible.

Magic is impossible. If it were possible, it wouldn't be magic, it would be something else entirely, something natural in origin. You could call it magic, but that doesn't make it magic.


That magic and science are mutually exclusive.

Magic is an impossibility, and science at its core is the study of what is possible or probable.


It's entertaining alright, but it's often disagreeable (to me). A discussion of that, however, would take us off on a completely different tangent. If you were to push me for an example, it would be statements like "Catholicism is not well understood in Japan, which results in blah, blah, Nuns with guns", which runs entirely contrary to my experience. It's about as well understood in Japan as it is in Britain (which is to say, not very, but enough).

To put it another, the site is full of opinions. Some are well formed, others not so much (in my opinion).

Ah, well I don't go there for commentary on the real world; I go there for commentary on media. :smallsmile:

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 09:27 AM
I have met people who believe that travelling backwards in time may one day be technically achievable.

It is theoretically technically achievable, because theoretically every particle that runs forward through the time stream has an equivalent simultaneous anti-particle running backwards through the anti-time stream.

Though, to that anti-particle, it is the particle, and we are the backwards anti-particles.

This leads to one of my pet theories: if UFOs are indeed "real", they are Humans From The Future. :smallsmile:

Roog
2008-06-01, 09:33 AM
Any, I think apply, but lets assume that there's no theoritical limit on what magic can do.

Since it might be best to continue the discussion here, as to get that other thread back on track.


Let's assume for the sake of this argument, that for the magic in question, that they can literally do anything. Not just breaking the laws of physics, but outright insanity.

There is a problem with trying to have a discusion about something that explicitly denies logic.

That is - we need logic to hold a meaningful discussion.


e.g.
Assume magic exits.
Assume (as you say) "magic ... can literally do anything. Not just breaking the laws of physics, but outright insanity."

Therefore that magic can be used to do things that we no it cannot:
e.g. make magic exist in our world.

It can also be used to do things that we cannot discus meaningfully:
e.g. make magic only exist in worlds where magic does not exist

It can also be used to make our discusion meaningless:
e.g. it can be used to make every statement that you make about any and every world that you discuss false. (Even the one I just made one.)


If you want to discuss magic in a meaningful way, then it needs to be limited (at least to the point that it can only be used to create self-constent worlds).

Matthew
2008-06-01, 09:34 AM
Which view? The view that it is impossible?

The view that magic occuring would prove it was possible and therefore no longer impossible. Magic is paradoxial.



Magic is impossible. If it were possible, it wouldn't be magic, it would be something else entirely, something natural in origin. You could call it magic, but that doesn't make it magic.

See above.



Magic is an impossibility, and science at its core is the study of what is possible or probable.

Yes, but that's rather the point. You seek to rationalise magic (if it were to exist) and place it into a scheme of the natural order of things. I am saying that is a valid view, but it's not the only one. Magic wouldn't be magic if it could be rationalised in the way you're describing (to me, anyway).



It is theoretically technically achievable, because theoretically every particle that runs forward through the time stream has an equivalent simultaneous anti-particle running backwards through the anti-time stream.

Though, to that anti-particle, it is the particle, and we are the backwards anti-particles.

This leads to one of my pet theories: if UFOs are indeed "real", they are Humans From The Future. :smallsmile:

Yes, you're one of the folk that believes that theory. I reject that theory, but the point wasn't about one individual example of agreement/disagreement as to what is possible.


If you want to discuss magic in a meaningful way, then it needs to be limited (at least to the point that it can only be used to create self-constent worlds).

No it doesn't. You're confusing the actual potential of magic with what individuals within a world can do with it. When the aim of a villain is to gain unlimited power, he ain't talking about limitations (whether of technology or magic).

Roog
2008-06-01, 09:35 AM
Because I can imagine impossible things [i.e. not just amazing things, but outright impossible things].

So you think that technology can (potentialy) only do things that you can imagine?

Matthew
2008-06-01, 09:36 AM
So you think that technology can (potentialy) only do things that you can imagine?

Hardly. I am saying that technology cannot do some of things I imagine in the ways I imagine them.

Roog
2008-06-01, 09:39 AM
No it doesn't. You're confusing the actual potential of magic with what individuals within a world can do with it.

If magic can be used to create an self-inconsistent world, then we cannot discuss the self-inconsistent world that is created (because self-inconsistency makes all statements provably true). If we do not discuss the self-inconsistent worlds, then in effect we are discussing magic that is limited to the creation of self-consistent worlds.

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 09:40 AM
The view that magic occuring would prove it was possible and therefore no longer impossible. Magic is paradoxial.

How do you know if "magic" occurs? You don't, because it defies scientific proof. Therefore, anything that would be considered "magic" would either be identified as something else, or uncategorized.

So, even if magic happened, you wouldn't know it to be magic.


Yes, but that's rather the point. You seek to rationalise magic (if it were to exist) and place it into a scheme of the natural order of things. I am saying that is a valid view, but it's not the only one. Magic wouldn't be magic if it could be rationalised in the way you're describing (to me, anyway).

Exactly. It's not magic if it exists. Therefore, magic is impossible.


Yes, you're one of the folk that believes that theory. I reject that theory, but the point wasn't about one individual example of agreement/disagreement as to what is possible.

What are you talking about? Theories have no belief factor associated with them. It is a theory. It either will prove to be true, prove to be false, or simply be corroborated so many times empirically that it is assumed to be true. Those are the only three fates of theories.

Belief has nothing to do with it.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 09:42 AM
How do you know if "magic" occurs? You don't, because it defies scientific proof. Therefore, anything that would be considered "magic" would either be identified as something else, or uncategorized.

So, even if magic happened, you wouldn't know it to be magic.

It's imaginery. Not actual. That's the point.



Exactly. It's not magic if it exists. Therefore, magic is impossible.

yes, that's right. Magic is impossible. If it were to occur it would still be impossible.


What are you talking about? Theories have no belief factor associated with them. It is a theory. It either will prove to be true, or prove to be false, or simply be corroborated so many times empirically that it is assumed to be true. Those are the only three fates of theories.

Belief has nothing to do with it.

I don't particularly want to derail the thread here, but theories are untested speculations. They may have good grounding in fact, but they are not true until proven to be true. If you believe that they will be proven to be true, that is a belief.

Roog
2008-06-01, 09:43 AM
Hardly. I am saying that technology cannot do some of things I imagine in the ways I imagine them.

you said


There's no way that technology can do more than my imagination.

You agree that technology can do things that you can't imagine. You also say that you can imagine things technology cannot do. What makes one set larger than the other?

Matthew
2008-06-01, 09:45 AM
If magic can be used to create an self-inconsistent world, then we cannot discuss the self-inconsistent world that is created (because self-inconsistency makes all statements provably true). If we do not discuss the self-inconsistent worlds, then in effect we are discussing magic that is limited to the creation of self-consistent worlds.

Yes, inconsistancy is something of a staple of fantasy, isn't it?



You agree that technology can do things that you can't imagine. You also say that you can imagine things technology cannot do. What makes one set larger than the other?

Do you think that technology has unlimited potential to affect the universe in every conceivable way? If you think/believe that, then we are at an impasse.

Roog
2008-06-01, 09:45 AM
yes, that's right. Magic is impossible. If it were to occur it would still be impossible.

You can go further than that, in all self-consistent worlds magic is impossible, and we can only meaningfully discuss self-consistent worlds.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 09:46 AM
You can go further than that, in all self-consistent worlds magic is impossible, and we can only meaningfully discuss self-consistent worlds.

Who says that? Is Middle Earth self consistant? I think you'll find it's not.

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 09:49 AM
It's imaginery. Not actual. That's the point.

Right, but even if somehow magic did exist because of, well, magic... you wouldn't know it.

I'm being entirely theoretical here, of course.


yes, that's right. Magic is impossible. If it were to occur it would still be impossible.

The second sentence seems illogical. If it were to occur it would be possible. It would simply not be magic.


I don't particularly want to derail the thread here, but theories are untested speculations. They may have good grounding in fact, but they are not true until proven to be true. If you believe that they will be proven to be true, that is a belief.

And when exactly did I state to believe that the theory will be proven to be true?

Matthew
2008-06-01, 09:51 AM
Right, but even if somehow magic did exist because of, well, magic... you wouldn't know it.

I'm being entirely theoretical here, of course.

The second sentence seems illogical. If it were to occur it would be possible. It would simply not be magic.

Perhaps you are now coming close to understanding what I am saying. It is illogical. Magic is illogical. It is paradoxial.



And when exactly did I state to believe that the theory will be proven to be true?

That's why I said 'if', and not "you do", speculation on my part. You can confirm one way or the other, if you like.

Roog
2008-06-01, 09:52 AM
Yes, inconsistancy is something of a staple of fantasy, isn't it?
So we had better get a tighter definition of magic, then we can discuss it meaningfully.


Do you think that technology has unlimited potential to affect the universe in every conceivable way? If you think/believe that, then we are at an impasse.

No. I think that you (as a finite being) can imagine a vast (and finite) number of things. I think that technolgy can do many things that you cannot imagine. If this universe is finite, then technology can do a finite number of things. If we are to talk about possible universes, then maybe technology can do an infinite number of things.

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 09:55 AM
Perhaps you are now coming close to understanding what I am saying. It is illogical. Magic is illogical. It is paradoxial.

Well, yes. Of course.

... Have we just been agreeing this whole time?


That's why I said 'if', and not "you do", speculation on my part. You can confirm one way or the other, if you like.

This is what you stated earlier:


Yes, you're one of the folk that believes that theory. I reject that theory, but the point wasn't about one individual example of agreement/disagreement as to what is possible.

You said that I believed in that theory. I'm not putting words into your mouth here.

Roog
2008-06-01, 09:56 AM
Who says that? Is Middle Earth self consistant? I think you'll find it's not.

If you can tell me of any facts about Middle Earth that are inconsistent with each other, I would be interested to know.

Also why do you think that magic in Middle Earth fits the following desciption?

Any, I think apply, but lets assume that there's no theoritical limit on what magic can do.

Since it might be best to continue the discussion here, as to get that other thread back on track.


Let's assume for the sake of this argument, that for the magic in question, that they can literally do anything. Not just breaking the laws of physics, but outright insanity.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 09:57 AM
So we had better get a tighter definition of magic, then we can discuss it meaningfully.

It sounds as though you want to define magic your way, which is perfectly fine, but why not admit other definitions? I am defining magic as impossible .



No. I think that you (as a finite being) can imagine a vast (and finite) number of things. I think that technolgy can do many things that you cannot imagine. If this universe is finite, then technology can do a finite number of things. If we are to talk about possible universes, then maybe technology can do an infinite number of things.

Well now. So now I can only imagine things that are possible? Very interesting double standard from you there.



You said that I believed in that theory. I'm not putting words into your mouth here.

Well, to be fair, you didn't contradict that statement in your response to it. In fact it was I who left room to indicate that I could be wrong about your beliefs.


If you can tell me of any facts about Middle Earth that are inconsistent with each other, I would be interested to know.

The facts of Middle Earth were in flux, it's creator being undecided about many things, sometimes leaning one way and then the other. Orcs were a particularly vexing question for him, so the [I]Silmarillion says one thing about their genesis and his letters quite another.

Xuincherguixe
2008-06-01, 09:59 AM
There is a problem with trying to have a discusion about something that explicitly denies logic.

That is - we need logic to hold a meaningful discussion.


e.g.
Assume magic exits.
Assume (as you say) "magic ... can literally do anything. Not just breaking the laws of physics, but outright insanity."

Therefore that magic can be used to do things that we no it cannot:
e.g. make magic exist in our world.

It can also be used to do things that we cannot discus meaningfully:
e.g. make magic only exist in worlds where magic does not exist

It can also be used to make our discusion meaningless:
e.g. it can be used to make every statement that you make about any and every world that you discuss false. (Even the one I just made one.)


If you want to discuss magic in a meaningful way, then it needs to be limited (at least to the point that it can only be used to create self-constent worlds).

My love of Discordianism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discordianism) is kind of coming into things here. You're pretty much right, but I suspect this may be only case where magic can break physics.

Physics isn't what we imagine things to be, it's what they actually are. If something happens that seems impossible, it wasn't.

I think, that the point I was kind of heading towards that if magic can do the impossible, and thus it isn't actually impossible.

In fact, anything that happens must by it's very nature not be impossible.


For a discussion on magic being something separate than physics, we need to make it something powerful enough to do the impossible. I wanted to set the bar high enough that it really did do something not possible. I used logical impossibility, and things kind of spiraled.

I suspect that outside of making something both true and false at the same time, magic is going to have to be part of Physics. But, that's with the assumption that the Physics don't have to be like ours.

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 10:01 AM
Well, to be fair, you didn't contradict that statement in your response to it. In fact it was I who left room to indicate that I could be wrong about your beliefs.

Ha, true, I simply stated that belief has no bearing on theory, I didn't actually state that I didn't believe in it.

Okay, well, I obviously don't "believe" that theory, because belief has nothing to do with theory.

Roog
2008-06-01, 10:01 AM
It sounds as though you want to define magic your way, which is perfectly fine, but why not admit other definitions? I am defining magic as impossible [i.e. supernatural, paranormal, etc...].
I don't have a way of describing magic, I simply disagree with the given description, as I think it is of no use for a discussion.



Well now. So now I can only imagine things that are possible? Very interesting double standard from you there.

I did not say that you can only imagine possible things, I said that you can imagine a finite number of things.
I then compared that number to the number of things that technology can do, and concluded that I have no reason to think that the number of things you that you can imagine is larger than the number of things technology can do.

Fishy
2008-06-01, 10:04 AM
Perhaps you are now coming close to understanding what I am saying. It is illogical. Magic is illogical. It is paradoxial.

What's going on here is that people are attempting to have a discussion coming from different assumptions.

If you define Magic as 'the power to do the impossible' (Which, well, you'll need a different definition of 'impossible' but let's not go there), then technology will never replicate Magic. With sufficiently advanced tools, you can do things that seem impossible, but there's a line (somewhere) that can't be crossed.

However, the existence of that sort of Magic negates the laws of cause and effect, which negates the experimental method, which kills science, which means no technology anyway. This is the 'A Wizard Did It' scenario.

Regardless, that's the assumption that (I think) Matthew is making. However, it's not the only way to define the word Magic- and, any other definition gives something that has limitations, obeys laws, and therefore can be studied. Since magic is fictional anyway, we can define the concept however we like- but if we have different axioms, it's very hard to have a conversation.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 10:08 AM
I don't have a way of describing magic, I simply disagree with the given description, as I think it is of no use for a discussion.

Fair enough, but if you are unwilling to define magic, but disagree with the current definition, I am not really sure what use saying so can be.



I did not say that you can only imagine possible things, I said that you can imagine a finite number of things.
I then compared that number to the number of things that technology can do, and concluded that I have no reason to think that the number of things you that you can imagine is larger than the number of things technology can do.

Not sure what the difference is there. You deem it improbable that I can imagine impossible things. That's hardly a useful statement. I can imagine myself spontaneously growing four pairs of legs right now for no reason and without the assisstance of technology. Can technology make it so?



Ha, true, I simply stated that belief has no bearing on theory, I didn't actually state that I didn't believe in it.

Okay, well, I obviously don't "believe" that theory, because belief has nothing to do with theory.

Looks like we're using two different definitions of theory, according to Wiki anyway.



What's going on here is that people are attempting to have a discussion coming from different assumptions.

If you define Magic as 'the power to do the impossible' (Which, well, you'll need a different definition of 'impossible' but let's not go there), then technology will never replicate Magic. With sufficiently advanced tools, you can do things that seem impossible, but there's a line (somewhere) that can't be crossed.

However, the existence of that sort of Magic negates the laws of cause and effect, which negates the experimental method, which kills science, which means no technology anyway. This is the 'A Wizard Did It' scenario.

Regardless, that's the assumption that (I think) Matthew is making. However, it's not the only way to define the word Magic- and, any other definition gives something that has limitations, obeys laws, and therefore can be studied. Since magic is fictional anyway, we can define the concept however we like- but if we have different axioms, it's very hard to have a conversation.

Exactly correct (though I may not agree with the conclusions). And, as I have said, I agree with the other definition of magic as a possibility as well.

Xuincherguixe
2008-06-01, 10:18 AM
If you define Magic as 'the power to do the impossible' (Which, well, you'll need a different definition of 'impossible' but let's not go there)

I kind of did. That could get to be all kinds of confusing fun ^_^

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 10:19 AM
What's going on here is that people are attempting to have a discussion coming from different assumptions.

If you define Magic as 'the power to do the impossible' (Which, well, you'll need a different definition of 'impossible' but let's not go there), then technology will never replicate Magic. With sufficiently advanced tools, you can do things that seem impossible, but there's a line (somewhere) that can't be crossed.

However, the existence of that sort of Magic negates the laws of cause and effect, which negates the experimental method, which kills science, which means no technology anyway. This is the 'A Wizard Did It' scenario.

Regardless, that's the assumption that (I think) Matthew is making. However, it's not the only way to define the word Magic- and, any other definition gives something that has limitations, obeys laws, and therefore can be studied. Since magic is fictional anyway, we can define the concept however we like- but if we have different axioms, it's very hard to have a conversation.

That's exactly what my sleep-deprived mind has been trying to say.

Fishy
2008-06-01, 10:20 AM
In which case, you derailed a perfectly good thread about Elvish Lightsabers just because you were using a different set of axioms than everyone else. Fie, fie upon thee! :P

As long as we're here, what does 'Impossible' mean in a world with big-m Magic?

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 10:22 AM
Looks like we're using two different definitions of theory, according to Wiki anyway.

I meant theoretical, or the colloquial use of the word theory. Not scientific theory - since what we were talking about isn't a scientific theory, that couldn't have been the definition of the word theory I was using, could it have?

Roog
2008-06-01, 10:23 AM
Not sure what the difference is there. You deem it improbable that I can imagine impossible things. That's hardly a useful statement. I can imagine myself spontaneously growing four pairs of legs right now for no reason and without the assisstance of technology. Can technology make it so?

I said nothing about about any qualities that the things you can imagine except to agree that you may be able to imagine things that rechnology cannot do.

My comparisons were comparision of numbers of things that you could imagine with numbers of things technology can do. The reason that I made the comparison was because of you original statement:

There's no way that technology can do more than my imagination.
Unless you mean more in some non-numerical sense, in which case I'll ask you the original question again (this time made more explicit):
Why do you say that technology cannot do more than your imagination?

Roog
2008-06-01, 10:28 AM
Fair enough, but if you are unwilling to define magic, but disagree with the current definition, I am not really sure what use saying so can be.

Magic would seem to me to be (roughly): personal power to change the world beyond the ability of a given observer to understand.

This would include divine or spirit magic as power ascribed to the god or spirit, rather than the petitioner.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 10:29 AM
That's exactly what my sleep-deprived mind has been trying to say.



Well, yes. Of course.

... Have we just been agreeing this whole time?

It would seem so.



In which case, you derailed a perfectly good thread about Elvish Lightsabers just because you were using a different set of axioms than everyone else. Fie, fie upon thee! :P

Yah, I think me and Skyserpent had already thrashed it out from the other angle.


As long as we're here, what does 'Impossible' mean in a world with big-m Magic?

Opposite of possible. :smallbiggrin:



I meant theoretical, or the colloquial use of the word theory. Not scientific theory - since what were are talking about isn't a scientfic theory, that couldn't have been the definition of the word theory I was using, could it?

No idea. All I know is that I don't accept the theoretical explanation for time travel. Whether that is a belief or not, depends on how you define belief, I suppose. I view belief as being mutable .


I said nothing about about any qualities that the things you can imagine except to agree that you may be able to imagine things that rechnology cannot do.

My comparisons were comparision of [I]numbers of things that you could imagine with numbers of things technology can do. The reason that I made the comparison was because of you original statement:

Unless you mean more in some non-numerical sense, in which case I'll ask you the original question again (this time made more explicit):
Why do you say that technology cannot do more than your imagination?
You are giving me quite a headache. If you agree with the first premise, that it is possible that I may be able to imagine things that technology cannot do, then why argue that it is also possible that I may not be able to? Seems like you're just arguing for the sake of arguing. Perhaps you are asking me to prove it? I don't know. I can imagine paradoxes, paradoxes are not possible, as far as I am aware (nor paradox machines).

Roog
2008-06-01, 10:36 AM
You are giving me quite a headache. If you agree with the first premise, that it is possible that I may be able to imagine things that technology cannot do, then why argue that it is also possible that I may nt be able to? Seems like you're just arguing for the sake of arguing. Perhaps you are asking me to prove it, I don't know.
I am not arguing that you cannot imagine things that technology cannot do. I am arguing that you should not think that you can imagine more things than technology can do (unless you have a good reason, that has not been articulated).

Your orignial statement seemed to be a strong (but not clear) statement of:
Stuff Technology can do << stuff I can imagine << stuff magic can do

I think that that is the kind of statement that puts a spin on the rest of what you say about magic, where you have a assumption that other people have not realised you are arguing from.

Really, I wanted to see how you were imagining the possibility spaces involved, and that seemed a good question to see where you were coming from.

Fishy
2008-06-01, 10:37 AM
Unless you mean more in some non-numerical sense, in which case I'll ask you the original question again (this time made more explicit):
Why do you say that technology cannot do more than your imagination?

Oooh, can I do this one?

A Platonic Solid is a 'convex regular polyhedron', the three-dimensional equivalent of a square, or an equilateral triangle, or the like. Each one has several faces, and all of the faces are the same. There are six of them: the tetrahedron (Triangular pyramid-thingie), the cube, the dodecahedron (the much unloved d12), and three others which aren't important.

Take a moment and think about a device that carves all six objects out of wood, and then rings a bell. Simple enough, right?

Can't be done, because I just lied to you. The way the mathematics works out, there are only 5 Platonic Solids (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platonic_solid), you can't make a sixth one in the normal space in which we live.

Regardless, you just imagined it. Not in any detail, sure, but I can't always imagine every single detail of how a car works.

Roog
2008-06-01, 10:42 AM
Regardless, you just imagined it. Not in any detail, sure, but I can't always imagine every single detail of how a car works.

Well, the thing that I imagined was a wood-carving and bell-ringing device. There are many technological solutions to wood-carving and bell-ringing, and I imagined one idealisation of a device. Which is more?

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 10:45 AM
No idea. All I know is that I don't accept the theoretical explanation for time travel. Whether that is a belief or not, depends on how you define belief, I suppose. I view belief as being mutable [i.e. a thing you believe to be true, based on observable facts and abstract thought, but could at some point change your mind about].

That's an opinion, not a belief.

Beliefs aren't something you intentionally leave open to changing your mind about.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 10:46 AM
Because your orignial statement seemed to be a strong (but not clear) statement of:
Stuff Technology can do << stuff I can imagine << stuff magic can do

I think that that is the kind of statement that puts a spin on the rest of what you say about magic, where you have a assumption that other people have not realised you are arguing from.

Really, I wanted to see how you were imagining the possibility spaces involved, and that seemed a good question to see where you were coming from.

Sounds to me like you were misreading the context. I have said several times over the course of this thread that magic could be conceived of as operating (perhaps even defining) the laws of physics in an imaginary world. I also said I wanted to discuss another view of magic.

So, let's try and bring this thread back on course. One of the things I wanted to discuss is the difference between magic and psionics. Until this discussion began I was happy to conflate the two as more or less the same thing, now I am no longer happy to do so. I think Psionics fits the first view of magic, but not the second. I think that is where a lot of the Psionics/Magic problem comes from [i.e. psionics haters].



That's an opinion, not a belief.

Beliefs aren't something you intentionally leave open to changing your mind about.

Perhaps technically (though some philosophers may disagree), but we were speaking colloquially, were we not?

Roog
2008-06-01, 10:53 AM
So, let's try and bring this thread back on course. One of things I wanted to discuss is the difference between magic and psionics. Until this discussion began I was happy to conflate the two as more or less the same thing, now I am no longer happy to do so. I think Psionics fits the first view of magic, but not the second. I think that is where a lot of the Psionics/Magic problem comes from [i.e. psionics haters].

Excluding some scifi settings where Psionics is the science and practice of powers of the mind, as yet unknown to modern science; I see Psionics simply as flavoured magic - it is different only because its set of associations is more defined. Compare it with necromancy, they are both focused by their conotations.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 11:05 AM
Excluding some scifi settings where Psionics is the science and practice of powers of the mind, as yet unknown to modern science; I see Psionics simply as flavoured magic - it is different only because its set of associations is more defined. Compare it with necromancy, they are both focused by their conotations.

Yes, that's a possibility, but what I was getting at is whether Psionics can be only viewed as describing a form of magic that operates (or defines) the physics of the world in which it operates. Failing that, is it more likely than other forms of magic to have limitations.

One of the depictions of Psionics that occurs to me is the one in Babylon Five, where it sems to truly have unlimited potential (I'm thinking of the episode with the character who was a PsiCore experiment, former tutor of Talia Winters). Or is that an example of limited power?

To put it another way, does psionics lend itself better to some settings than others?

Another example, the force pre Episode I and the force post Episode I, where it went (I would argue) from being magic to being science.

Roog
2008-06-01, 11:29 AM
Yes, that's a possibility, but what I was getting at is whether Psionics can be only viewed as describing a form of magic that operates (or defines) the physics of the world in which it operates. Failing that, is it more likely than other forms of magic to have limitations.
Psionics has a flavor "designed" to fit with late 19th century science. That makes it easier to fit in scifi settings where a simple veneer of scientific realism is all that is desired.


One of the depictions of Psionics that occurs to me is the one in Babylon Five, where it sems to truly have unlimited potential (I'm thinking of the episode with the character who was a PsiCore experiment, former tutor of Talia Winters). Or is that an example of limited power?
As above. Any level of power (finite or infinite) sits easier on the story when the nature of the power matches the trapings of the story.


To put it another way, does psionics lend itself better to some settings than others?
Of course, all types of magic (or sets of trappings) lend themselves better to some settings than others.


Another example, the force pre Episode I and the force post Episode I, where it went (I would argue) from being magic to being science.
Episode I threw in some scientific-pseudobable, the force went from magic to immersion breaking and never reached science.

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 11:31 AM
Perhaps technically (though some philosophers may disagree), but we were speaking colloquially, were we not?

Perhaps :smallsmile:

I think we've pretty much agreed to agree at this point.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 11:50 AM
Psionics has a flavor "designed" to fit with late 19th century science. That makes it easier to fit in scifi settings where a simple veneer of scientific realism is all that is desired.

Maybe, though surely it has come to be more widely used than that? Psionics in Dark Sun, for instance, in no way are related to the level of technological veneer desired.



As above. Any level of power (finite or infinite) sits easier on the story when the nature of the power matches the trapings of the story.

Right, but in accordance with the above, Psionics is usually not depicted as being a paradox, but rather a natural part of the world. I am wondering whether there are any examples of psionics being used as a paradox creating force, rather than 'the evolution of man' sort.



Of course, all types of magic (or sets of trappings) lend themselves better to some settings than others.

Okay, well let's do something useful with that information and try to identify types of settings.



Episode I threw in some scientific-pseudobable, the force went from magic to immersion breaking and never reached science.

Right, but the idea was implanted in the viewer that the force was scientifically explicable, rather than an inexplicable 'life force'. That was one of the great things about Star Wars, the fusing of 'magic' and 'futuristic technology', rather than the Star Trek approach where everything is scientifically measurable and explicable (despite the series containing incredible contradictions).

Roog
2008-06-01, 12:15 PM
Maybe, though surely it has come to be more widely used than that? Psionics in Dark Sun, for instance, in no way are related to the level of technological veneer desired.
I get the impression that Psionics was used in Dark Sun to distance the it from other settings, because it was differernt from the regular magic, but D&D already had rules for it.



Right, but in accordance with the above, Psionics is usually not depicted as being a paradox, but rather a natural part of the world. I am wondering whether there are any examples of psionics being used as a paradox creating force, rather than 'the evolution of man' sort.
I don't see 'paradox creating force' and 'the evolution of man' as contradictory for a story - a story set close to now could easily show Psionics changing from 'a natural part of the world' to a 'paradox creating force'.
I cant think of any specific examples of Psionics as a 'paradox creating force', although I am sure that they could be found (I have a feeling that I have read some new wave science fiction that might fit).


Okay, well let's do something useful with that information and try to identify types of settings.
It might be easier to identify standard sets of trappings.


Right, but the idea was implanted in the viewer that the force was scientifically explicable, rather than an inexplicable 'life force'. That was one of the great things about Star Wars, the fusing of 'magic' and 'futuristic technology', rather than the Star Trek approach where everything is scientifically measurable and explicable (despite the series containing incredible contradictions).
I don't see that idea as sucessfully implanted in the viewer. The earlier Star Wars went a long way by not trying to explain too much, allowing the viewer to fuse things as they saw fit.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 12:24 PM
I get the impression that Psionics was used in Dark Sun to distance the it from other settings, because it was differernt from the regular magic, but D&D already had rules for it.

Nah, there were a lot of reasons. The way magic works in Dark Sun and the absence of Gods kind of necessiated a third form of magic.



I don't see 'paradox creating force' and 'the evolution of man' as contradictory for a story - a story set close to now could easily show Psionics changing from 'a natural part of the world' to a 'paradox creating force'.
I cant think of any specific examples of Psionics as a 'paradox creating force', although I am sure that they could be found (I have a feeling that I have read some new wave science fiction that might fit).

Well, indeed, it doesn't have to be. The question is really of finding pre existing examples.



It might be easier to identify standard sets of trappings.

Then let's do that.



I don't see that idea as sucessfully implanted in the viewer. The earlier Star Wars went a long way by not trying to explain too much, allowing the viewer to fuse things as they saw fit.

Maybe, maybe not. It certainly sucked, and contributed to the ruination of Star Wars from where I am sitting.

Tingel
2008-06-01, 01:10 PM
The following attempt has been made in this thread: to define "magic" as "doing the impossible".

This attempt automatically fails, since it goes against the law of noncontradiction. Impossible means impossible and not also at the same time possible. As soon as something is real, it has been absolutely and without a doubt proven to be possible in the first place. Thus if magic is real, it was never impossible.

In conclusion, the definition of magic as "doing the impossible" cannot be applied to any fictional setting where magic is obviously practiced.



You cannot argue with what I just said. Because the only way to argue against it would be to contradict the law of noncontradiction. If you do that however, you already prove what you are trying to disagree with, since saying "the law of contradiction is not correct" implies that it is not at the same time also correct. Thus you are already using the law itself in your attempt to object.







In a fantasy setting where magic is real, magic is a part of the world. It might not be completely (or even remotely) understood, but it is nonetheless real. It might be mysterious, but it is not impossible. And it cannot be completely independent from "non-magical" laws of the physical universe, since it affects the same values (for example energy and matter). There has to be an interaction between physics and the mechanisms of magic - if you "reverse gravity" with a magical spell you obviously affect gravity.
Since magic and physical laws are necessarily intertwined in a world where magic is real, there must exist a truth (a set of theories, a science) that describes both, that encompasses both. It's the natural evolution of science to progress from the more specific to the more general.

Due to these facts, magic is never impossible or even unnatural in any given fantasy setting (and any claims of the opposite are normally based on the use of bad wording and a lack of thought).



There are laws of magic. Magic is logical, and cannot be paradoxical. It might appear to be, but that's only due to a lack of understanding. A magic-user might practice his profession intuitively, based on false assumptions and superstitious idées fixes - but magic in itself remains logical, since otherwise it simply wouldn't exist.

Quellian-dyrae
2008-06-01, 01:14 PM
In the end, magic and psionics are just as different or as limited as the creator of the book/movie/game/whatever decides they are. I don't think that there are, inherently, any significant differences in their core functions. With both of them, you have a person able to will things to happen. The classic uses of each tend to vary somewhat, but I don't think most people would balk about the idea of either a psion or a wizard being able to create any effect it could imagine. As has been pointed out, it would make for boring fiction, but I don't think anything inherent in magic or psionics would cause a break in suspension of disbelief.

If there is any difference, I would say that it lies in the fact that magic seems more likely to be based on ritual of some kind. Whether full-on rituals or chants and gestures or items such as wands, if one guy is doing something that causes an effect to occur, and one guy just makes an effect occur, chances are that the first one is a wizard and the second one a psion. Even then, though, it isn't guaranteed; you can easily have a wizard who can create effects through will alone, or a psion using some degree of ritual to fuel its powers (the latter less likely, unless, perhaps, you count things like "directing" its powers with say a wave of its hand or by narrowing its eyes).

And largely, although either magic or psionics can accomplish things that are certainly not possible to modern technology, and can accomplish things that might not be possible to the upper limits that techology as it can exist in the real universe (we don't know them), in the realm of fiction, there is absolutely no need for technology to be more limited than magic, because the laws of physics of any fictional world/dimension/universe/whatever may or may not be equivalent to our own, and even if they are, there is no guarantee that our ability to perceive and analyze the universe around us is sufficient to discern its true nature. And even given that, all that would really be required is technology capable of easily and to a large degree altering matter on a molecular level, energy on whatever level it works in (waves? Particles? I'm not up to date), and sufficient application to thereby affect the brain to alter its perceptions, and there really isn't anything you can't do with technology that you can do with magic, since at that stage you pretty much have control over matter, energy, and other peoples' perceptions of reality, which is, I feel, about as good a definition of what both magic and psionics allow for to whatever degree.

If I were to differentiate the three at all, it would have to be:
Magic is most likely going to rely on ritual, external power, and the personal proficiency of the practitioner, rapidly advancing.
Psionics is most likely going to rely on will alone, internal power, and the personal proficiency of the practitioner, rapidly advancing.
Technology is most likely going to rely on devices, external power, and the collective proficiency of all practitioners who came before, slowly advancing.

And at that, I do believe I have rambled on enough.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 01:33 PM
The following attempt has been made in this thread: to define "magic" as "doing the impossible".

This attempt automatically fails, since it goes against the law of noncontradiction.

Sorry, but I don't agree with you and I am not really all that interested in continuing this argument. What I am interested in is constructive criticism and the moving forward of thinking on this subject. I get that you don't agree, and I am willing to repect that, so I would also ask you to respect the purposes of this thread and save absolute statements and inapplicable laws about fantasy constructs for another.




If I were to differentiate the three at all, it would have to be:

Magic is most likely going to rely on ritual, external power, and the personal proficiency of the practitioner, rapidly advancing.
Psionics is most likely going to rely on will alone, internal power, and the personal proficiency of the practitioner, rapidly advancing.
Technology is most likely going to rely on devices, external power, and the collective proficiency of all practitioners who came before, slowly advancing.

Interesting thoughts there, Quellian-dyrae. So, you would prefer to see Psionics as internal sourced power and magic as externalised? I can definitely get with that, especially because Psionics is so closely related to the Greek word for spirit, which implies just that.

The question I would put to you is whether there is a difference between how that internalised power is acquired. Is it different if it manifest and waiting in every individual to when it is divinely granted? Would both continue to be thought of as Psionics?

Do the sources of externalised power matter? There's the whole 'crystal' thing with Psionics to be thought about, isn't there?

Tingel
2008-06-01, 01:41 PM
Sorry, but I don't agree with you and I am not really all that interested in continuing this argument. What I am interested in is constructive criticism and the moving forward of thinkiing on this subject. I get that you don't agree, and I am willing to repect that, so I would also ask you to respect the purposes of this thread and save absolute statmements about fantasy constructs for another.
The problem is Matthew, that if you do not agree with "in a world where magic is real magic must be possible", then this whole discussion is pointless. As I showed in my post, you violate the law of noncontradiction. With this you basically destroy logic altogether and the "thinking" and "constructive criticism" you mentioned are made impossible. Suddenly every statement can be made about everything without any relation to any other statement, since the law of contradiction and thus basic logic do not apply anymore. We suddenly cannot say anything relevant anymore, and thus the best thing we could do is to fall silent.


I have to admit that I am intrigued how you can say that magic is impossible in a magical fantasy setting. The self-contradiction befuddles me greatly.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 02:09 PM
The problem is Matthew, that if you do not agree with "in a world where magic is real magic must be possible", then this whole discussion is pointless. As I showed in my post, you violate the law of noncontradiction. With this you basically destroy logic altogether and the "thinking" and "constructive criticism" you mentioned are made impossible. Suddenly every statement can be made about everything without any relation to any other statement, since the law of contradiction and thus basic logic do not apply anymore. We suddenly cannot say anything relevant anymore, and thus the best thing we could do is to fall silent.

Well, if you choose to fall silent that's up to you. I have never really had a problem discussing this sort of thing before and I cannot really see any problem with magic defying logic.



I have to admit that I am intrigued how you can say that magic is impossible in a magical fantasy setting. The self-contradiction befuddles me greatly.
It's supposed to be contradictory. It's like asking how you feed 5,000 people with two loaves of bread and a fish (or whatever the figures happen to be). Just because one person is able to do it, doesn't mean that somebody else will be able to it (or indeed learn how to do it). It is impossible to feed 5,000 people in that manner (and let's assume for the moment this is not a trick question and that these people were indeed actually fed) and it remains impossible afterwards, yet it is done. That's a paradox, and it's the kind of magic being envisioned here.

If it could be logically explained, it wouldn't be magic (or rather, it would be a particular type of magic that could be logically explained :smallwink:).

Quellian-dyrae
2008-06-01, 02:10 PM
Sorry, but I don't agree with you and I am not really all that interested in continuing this argument. What I am interested in is constructive criticism and the moving forward of thinking on this subject. I get that you don't agree, and I am willing to repect that, so I would also ask you to respect the purposes of this thread and save absolute statements and inapplicable laws about fantasy constructs for another.


Interesting thoughts there, Quellian-dyrae. So, you would prefer to see Psionics as internal sourced power and magic as externalised? I can definitely get with that, especially because Psionics is so closely related to the Greek word for spirit, which implies just that.

The question I would put to you is whether there is a difference between how that internalised power is acquired. Is it different if it manifest and waiting in every individual to when it is divinely granted? Would both continue to be thought of as Psionics?

Do the sources of externalised power matter? There's the whole 'crystal' thing with Psionics to be thought about, isn't there?

That's kind of the thing. The distinctions I suggested were simply very broad suggestions. Magic could just as easily be internalized and without ritual; the spell-like abilities of many D&D monsters are just that. Likewise, psionic power can be granted or channeled externally or by ritual, as per your examples. Would it still be thought of as psionics? I would say, that if it were being described in the setting as psionics, it would be thought of as psionics. If it were being described as magic, it would be thought of as magic. If it weren't being described as either, it would be thought of as magic by most people, and psionics by those who are fantasy-enthusiasts enough that they know of the existence of psionics and are willing to define it as different from magic, assuming it was doing things in a way similar to normal psionics. Like how the Force was referred to as an example of psionics earlier in the thread. It looks and feels like we expect psionics to look and feel like. However, I don't think Star Wars would have changed appreciably if the Force were referred to as magic (although psionics do seem to fit into the sci-fi genre more smoothly, for whatever reason). And likewise, I imagine that if a non-D&Der were trying to explain the Force to someone, the word magic would be much more likely to come up than psionics (and hey, that might be the case for a D&Der too, just to simplify the explanation).

Matthew
2008-06-01, 02:18 PM
Would it still be thought of as psionics? I would say, that if it were being described in the setting as psionics, it would be thought of as psionics. If it were being described as magic, it would be thought of as magic. If it weren't being described as either, it would be thought of as magic by most people, and psionics by those who are fantasy-enthusiasts enough that they know of the existence of psionics and are willing to define it as different from magic, assuming it was doing things in a way similar to normal psionics.

Good thoughts, and I think this cuts to the core of the issue. Do the terms 'psionics' and 'magic' denote anything fundamentally different or are they interchangable terms that have become associated with setting types [i.e. fantasy/sci fi].

When I think of psionics I think of something that can measured and quantified in some way [i.e. "the blah, blah part of his brain is showing hyperactivity captain, it's as though he were thinking a thousand times faster than a normal man," etc...]. Whilst magic is not measureable at all, but its effects may be. I think the distinction those terms suggest is going to be sleight, bu the question is whether it is there at all.

Tingel
2008-06-01, 02:28 PM
A short pair of questions for Matthew.

1) is it possible for mages in D&D to cast spells?

2) is spellcasting magic?


If you answer both questions with "yes", then you have disproven your own definition.




Do the terms 'psionics' and 'magic' denote anything fundamentally different or are they interchangable terms that have become associated with setting types [i.e. fantasy/sci fi].
I'd say yes. The differing nomenclature is simply a reflection of the differing "flavor". Every attempt to fundamentally distinguish magic and psionics I have encountered so far felt forced to me.

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 02:29 PM
AFAICT, just thinking back to all of the media archetypes of Psionics and Magic that I feel willing to devote a bit of thought to, D&D actually incorporates the fundamental difference between Psionics and Magic into its ruleset:

Psionics is usually pure mental exertion, whereas Magic usually requires Verbal and/or Somatic components and/or a Focus.

That's about it. :smallsmile:

Tingel
2008-06-01, 02:31 PM
Psionics is pure mental exertion, whereas Magic usually requires Verbal and/or Somatic components.
This only distinguishes the two by approach, not by nature. A different method/approach/technique/procedure does not necessarily imply a different underlying phenomenon.

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 02:33 PM
This only distinguishes the two by approach, not by nature. A different method/approach/technique/procedure does not necessarily imply a different underlying phenomenon.

Correct.....

Flickerdart
2008-06-01, 02:33 PM
Wizards/Sorcerers cast spells. These spells can only be changed by metamagic feats, and can never do anything except what they say in the description.

Psions manifest mental energy, and have more freedom when choosing their effects, augmenting many powers at will.

I suppose that means the "underlying phenomenon" is different.

Quellian-dyrae
2008-06-01, 02:36 PM
I'd argue it's purely descriptive and interchangeable, although there may certainly be connotations that lend themselves to each. Taking your 1,000 times thought speed example, my first instinct, seeing that and knowing that that character has powers, would be that that is a psionic character. However, if it were later revealed that the character is actually a mage, and that superhuman thought speed is just a superhuman mental capacity that is the prerequisite for or an enhancement of high-level magic (i.e. an Int score of 30), I would have no problem accepting it.

Likewise, say a wizard and a psion were explaining how they just created a 20' radius blast of fire. Either one could have a description ranging from quasi-scientific "my {power source} rapidly moved the molecules in the air, creating such friction that it ignited the oxygen and created a blast of flame" to theoretical "I invoked the element of fire/I tapped into the searing rage of the id" or quite simple "I cast a Fireball spell/I manifested an Energy Ball power, choosing the fire energy" or a variety of others. Now, I imagine that in that second description no one will have any trouble guessing which one was the psion, but I think also that with a bit of additional explanation on the how and why, the two could be reversed without any major outcry.

The archetypes are different, but I don't think there is anything that prevents a wizard and psion from working in the exact same way for any given fiction writer, any more than there is something that would prevent a D&D player from creating the chieftain of a barbarian tribe using the stats of a fighter, or making the best fighter in the world using a 20th level barbarian build.

Tingel
2008-06-01, 02:41 PM
Wizards/Sorcerers cast spells. These spells can only be changed by metamagic feats, and can never do anything except what they say in the description.

Psions manifest mental energy, and have more freedom when choosing their effects, augmenting many powers at will.

I suppose that means the "underlying phenomenon" is different.

Water dropping in a pool makes a sound. These sounds can only be changed by outside parameters and have no inner diversity beyond basic variations

The human voice manifests sounds, and a human has a lot of freedom of choosing the produced sounds, changing volume, pitch and quality at will.

And yet, even though those two mechanisms of producing sounds are so vastly different, the "underlying phenomenon" is still the same: acoustics.


That's what I meant.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 02:51 PM
A short pair of questions for Matthew.

1) is it possible for mages in D&D to cast spells?

2) is spellcasting magic?


If you answer both questions with "yes", then you have disproven your own definition.

Hah, well that's a loaded question! This isn't specifically D&D we're discussing here (hence the generic label). The answer to the former is both "no" and "yes" in the context of what is being discussed (i.e. assuming we are not talking directly about D&D), which is what makes it a paradox. The answer to the latter is yes.

Tingel
2008-06-01, 02:59 PM
Hah, well that's a loaded question! This isn't specifically D&D we're discussing here (hence the generic label). The answer to the former is both "no" and "yes" in the context of what is being discussed (i.e. assuming we are not talking directly about D&D), which is what makes it a paradox. The answer to the latter is yes.
"In D&D" was just an example. You can exchange it with "in any fantasy setting where mages cast magical spells" and my point still remains. I know that this thread is supposed to be "generic", but that doesn't prevent us from making specific examples. D&D is just one of the examples used in this thread, others are Star Wars and Lord of the Rings.

Your definition of "magic is impossible" is inherently flawed when applied to a magical setting, as I have already (irrefutably by the way) proven in my first post. Those two questions were just a less systematic attempt to make you see that. Obviously I did not succeed.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 03:04 PM
I'd argue it's purely descriptive and interchangeable, although there may certainly be connotations that lend themselves to each. Taking your 1,000 times thought speed example, my first instinct, seeing that and knowing that that character has powers, would be that that is a psionic character. However, if it were later revealed that the character is actually a mage, and that superhuman thought speed is just a superhuman mental capacity that is the prerequisite for or an enhancement of high-level magic (i.e. an Int score of 30), I would have no problem accepting it.

I think I would tend to agree with that.

However, taking your example of the Psion describing the physics of what he did. I could imagine a Wizard doing the same, but I think I would have more trouble with a Psion describing what he did in 'magical' terms. I think it is possible and acceptable, but I wonder if it is also subverting the archetype.

A problem with the natural progress of modern fiction is that one of its conventions has become archetype subversion, so that it becomes increasingly hard to see any distinctions at all. I wonder if these distinctions were ever really there or whether they were the same thing all along.

I tend to think that the former is true, but it could be the latter.



"In D&D" was just an example. You can exchange it with "in any fantasy setting where mages cast magical spells" and my point still remains. I know that this thread is supposed to be "generic", but that doesn't prevent us from making specific examples. D&D is just one of the examples used in this thread, others are Star Wars and Lord of the Rings.

Your definition of "magic is impossible" is inherently flawed when applied to a magical setting, as I have already (irrefutably by the way) proven in my first post. Those two questions were just a less systematic attempt to make you see that. Obviously I did not succeed.

Mate, I understand your arguments. I don't agree with them. Not everyone will agree with what you might consider an absolute logical truth, that's just the nature of things. You find it flawed, I find your reasoning boring, close minded and unimaginative. That's not to say I think you possess those negative qualities, only that I don't agree with what you consider irrefutable.

Tingel
2008-06-01, 03:10 PM
Maybe my reasoning is boring, close-minded and unimaginative, as you say. In that case, please help me to overcome this shortcoming and explain to me how anyone can refute this:


You cannot argue with what I just said. Because the only way to argue against it would be to contradict the law of noncontradiction. If you do that however, you already prove what you are trying to disagree with, since saying "the law of contradiction is not correct" implies that it is not at the same time also correct. Thus you are already using the law itself in your attempt to object.

Currently I don't see how I can move beyond this basic "dilemma".

Matthew
2008-06-01, 03:19 PM
Maybe my reasoning is boring, close-minded and unimaginative, as you say. In that case, please help me to overcome this shortcoming and explain to me how anyone can refute this:

Currently I don't see how I can move beyond this basic "dilemma".

Primarily because the law of noninconsistancy is a real world law that deals with logical thought. Magic (in the context being described) is nonlogical, so laws that deal with logic do not apply (except insofar as they seek to prove that magic does not conform to logic and therefore cannot exist). That's why it is paradoxial.

There are detractors of the law of noninconsistancy, but I am not familiar with their methods, nor their conclusions.

To put it another way, I might use the law of noninconsistancy to prove in the real world that magic does not (or cannot) exist, but I would not then use that law to describe something that is a fantasy, because it is a fantasy. It is an imagined thing that contravenes reality and need not conform to it.

Dragons are illogical, but I don't worry about the physics of dragonflight.

Tingel
2008-06-01, 03:33 PM
Primarily because the law of noninconsistancy is a real world law that deals with logical thought. Magic (in the context being described) is nonlogical, so laws that deal with logic do not apply (except insofar as they seek to prove that magic does not conform to logic and therefore cannot exist). That's why it is paradoxial.

Logic is the basis of thought and discourse. In this thread you seek discourse and the exchange of thought, as you have stated yourself. This means we have to follow the laws of logic, since otherwise our "ideas" are not communicable - if we say self-contradicting things everything we say becomes empty. That's what I was referring to when I said that in this case "the best thing we could do is to fall silent" earlier.

The law of noncontradiction is not a "real-world law". It is the first law of human reasoning and thus necessary for every "world" a human (like you and me) wants to understand and talk about.

By intentionally making fictional magic illogical and self-contradictory by default, you prevent every form of productive discussion about it. Since this is the internet, many people won't realize this and will nonetheless discuss ad nauseam, but I find that unfortunate.



because it is a fantasy. It is an imagined thing that contravenes reality and need not conform to it.

Dragons are illogical, but I don't worry about the physics of dragonflight.
Logic and reality are two different things, as are logic and physics. I do not talk about reality or physics here, only about logic.

Neither dragons nor magic need to be illogical.

Jack_Simth
2008-06-01, 03:43 PM
Primarily because the law of noninconsistancy is a real world law that deals with logical thought. Magic (in the context being described) is nonlogical, so laws that deal with logic do not apply (except insofar as they seek to prove that magic does not conform to logic and therefore cannot exist). That's why it is paradoxial.

There are detractors of the law of noninconsistancy, but I am not familiar with their methods, nor their conclusions.
Catch:
Do to the nature of science (or at least, the proper application of scientific method), if magic exists, then it is not nonscientific. See, the proper application of the scientific method is a basic loop:

1) Observe
2) Hypothesize
3) Experiment
4) Observe Experimental results
5) Refine Hypothesis
6) Goto 3

In any case where magic is usable (a caster who casts Fireball has a reasonable chance to get a fireball, rather than a completely random effect) there's going to be a pattern of some form to it. This pattern can be observed, hypothesized about, and experimented on. For instance, in Core D&D, for any mage capable of casting both Shield and Fireball, the only mages found who were unable to hold the Shield for at least five minutes were suffering from some form of negative energy effect. Removing the negative energy effect restored the mage's ability to hold Shield for at least five minutes. With a lot of cooperative mage's and a lot of work, this statement can be generalized for almost any pair of spells in the book, provided one of them has a duration based on caster level - just due to the nature of how D&D mechanically defines magic.

Cases where magic is not usable as defined above are generally not interesting, discussion-wise or play-wise.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 03:56 PM
Logic is the basis of thought and discourse. In this thread you seek discourse and the exchange of thought, as you have stated yourself. This means we have to follow the laws of logic, since otherwise our "ideas" are not communicable - if we say self-contradicting things everything we say becomes empty. That's what I was referring to when I said that in this case "the best thing we could do is to fall silent" earlier.

The law of noncontradiction is not a "real-world law". It is the first law of human reasoning and thus necessary for every "world" a human (like you and me) wants to understand and talk about.

By intentionally making fictional magic illogical and self-contradictory by default, you prevent every form of productive discussion about it. Since this is the internet, many people won't realize this and will nonetheless discuss ad nauseam, but I find that unfortunate.

I am starting to think that it is not that you don't understand, but that you actually don't want to. It may be the case that you're missing a step somewhere along the line, I don't know. All I can get from what you're saying is that "Logically, magic that is possible is not impossible, therefore it must be possible. If you say it is both, then we cannot discuss it, since it is not logical and logical thought is the basis for discourse." I keep trying to explain to you that illogical thought on this subject is perfectly fine and that magic is intentionally illogical in this context, but you keep going back to the same premise. I reject what you are saying because somehow I am able to think logically (or perhaps illogically) about things that are both possible and impossible. I can conceive of them. I cannot really help you understand if you cannot.


Catch:
Do to the nature of science (or at least, the proper application of scientific method), if magic exists, then it is not nonscientific. See, the proper application of the scientific method is a basic loop:

Sure, I understand that. However, I am willing to look beyond it and consider magic as an impossible thing co-existing with what is possible.



Cases where magic is not usable as defined above are generally not interesting, discussion-wise or play-wise.

Well, that may be your opinion; however, I find this area of thought considerably more interesting and even valuable playwise. It helps me to conceive of deities that are undefined and impossible (perhaps even truly unimaginable) and it helps me to think about the potential of magic in a game world without having to quantify it or use scientific methodology to dissect how it works (since it doesn't, which I consider no big deal).

I am not sure if I can put it more simply than this:

Magic is impossible.
Creating a physics of magic to render it possible makes it just another branch of science.
Magic that occurs, but is impossible, is paradoxial.

I find the idea of paradoxial magic much more interesting than magic that is possible. I even find it possible to discuss it (whether logically or illogically). Surely paradoxes can be discussed?

Tingel
2008-06-01, 04:02 PM
I keep trying to explain to you that illogical thought on this subject is perfectly fine
Okay then. Magic is a weasel, but it is also not a weasel, since it is also a pig and therefore a weasel. Of course bears are impossible, but luckily they're possible so we can wonder what their nature is (I suspect it's weasels).

Matthew
2008-06-01, 04:10 PM
Okay then. Magic is a weasel, but it is also not a weasel, since it is also a pig and therefore a weasel. Of course bears are impossible, but luckily they're possible so we can wonder what their nature is (I suspect it's weasels).

I suspect that there is a logic in there attempting to show something. Thinking illogically does not preclude making sense, it simply means that not everything follows from a logical basis.

Flickerdart
2008-06-01, 04:13 PM
Okay then. Magic is a weasel, but it is also not a weasel, since it is also a pig and therefore a weasel. Of course bears are impossible, but luckily they're possible so we can wonder what their nature is (I suspect it's weasels).
So magic is a pig, and Psionics is a bear, but in the end they're both weasels?

Quellian-dyrae
2008-06-01, 04:16 PM
A problem with the natural progress of modern fiction is that one of its conventions has become archetype subversion, so that it becomes increasingly hard to see any distinctions at all. I wonder if these distinctions were ever really there or whether they were the same thing all along.

I guess it depends on what you see the archetype as. If the archetype of a wizard is "someone who has magical powers that alter reality" and the archetype of a psion is "someone who can alter reality by force of will", then they're pretty similar. The more specifically you define the archetypes, the more that a crossover becomes subversion of the archetype, rather than natural extension of it.

Regarding the ability to define magic as both possible and impossible...I can see how you could describe it that way. Any effect created by magic is impossible. Fire cannot, and will not, ever spontaneously flash into being in open air with neither a fuel source or a combustion trigger owed to any course of action that any person, object, or entity could take, least of all chanting and gesturing. What magic does is reshapes reality such that things in a limited area now act as if fire did, indeed, suddenly flash into being, but only in a manner condusive to the nature of the spell. That is to say, any physical laws that would be broken or logical repurcussions of such an event happening would not be broken and would not occur, as the event never, in fact happened. However, the directly desired results to reality that such an event, if it could occur, would precipitate (such as damage being inflicted, nearby people witnessing a ball of fire and feeling heat from it, terrain being scorched, and so on), would occur as a result of the magic.

It's a somewhat convoluted way of describing it, and not how I typically would, but it's a valid and interesting interpretation to consider.

Or I'm missing the point like a BAB +2 warrior taking a swing at an ancient red dragon with a ten sided die. Either way.

Jack_Simth
2008-06-01, 04:23 PM
Sure, I understand that. However, I am willing to look beyond it and consider magic as an impossible thing co-existing with what is possible.

If it happens in a way that is meaningful, it's observable.
If it's observable, people can make guesses about it.
After having made guesses about it, people can devise ways to test their guesses.
After having tested their guesses, people can revise their guesses and devise new tests.

By definition, if it happens (or happened), it's not impossible (or at least, wasn't impossible).


Well, that may be your opinion; however, I find this area of thought considerably more interesting and even valuable playwise. It helps me to conceive of deities that are undefined and impossible (perhaps even truly unimaginable) and it helps me to think about the potential of magic in a game world without having to quantify it or use scientific methodology to dissect how it works (since it doesn't, which I consider no big deal).
Any such critter is not particularly distinguishable from "it does what I say it does." Likewise, you don't have to dissect something for it to be possible. Also, if you're thinking about the potential of magic in a game world, but don't put some form of limits on it, you've got a problem: All quests boil down to "I cast one spell to make what I want happen" when "what I want" is the solution of the quest. Princess is lost? I cast "Call Lost Princess". Some limit and/or cost to anything player-accessible is required to make a game interesting (and if it's not player-accessible, you've got your first limit right there). You don't necessarily have to dissect it to see how it works - but if some such limit exists, it's possible to so dissect or quantify from an in-game perspective. If some such limit does not exist, it's boring, because you can't construct a reasonable plot.



I am not sure if I can put it more simply than this:

Magic is impossible.
Creating a physics of magic to render it possible makes it just another branch of science.
Magic that occurs, but is impossible, is paradoxial.

If it occurs, it is not impossible by definition of the word impossible. And yes - any set of rules that permit to within the local game does indeed render it subject to the scientific method within that game. No paradox involved.


I find the idea of paradoxial magic much more interesting than magic that is possible. I even find it possible to discuss it (whether logically or illogically). Surely paradoxes can be discussed? They can, but this isn't one.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 04:25 PM
Or I'm missing the point like a BAB +2 warrior taking a swing at an ancient red dragon with a ten sided die. Either way.

No, that sounds like a reasonable articulation to me. I imagine the problem to be that the fact that the effects of the event are quantifiable, that it is evidence of a 'true physics' that supercedes 'natural physics', which suggests that it was not impossible, but possible (according to true physics). The idea of impossible magic is that 'true physics' does not in fact exist and that the event was impossible. The idea being similar to that of there being no physics of hell.



If it happens in a way that is meaningful, it's observable.
If it's observable, people can make guesses about it.
After having made guesses about it, people can devise ways to test their guesses.
After having tested their guesses, people can revise their guesses and devise new tests.

By definition, if it happens (or happened), it's not impossible (or at least, wasn't impossible).

See above.



Any such critter is not particularly distinguishable from "it does what I say it does." Likewise, you don't have to dissect something for it to be possible. Also, if you're thinking about the potential of magic in a game world, but don't put some form of limits on it, you've got a problem: All quests boil down to "I cast one spell to make what I want happen" when "what I want" is the solution of the quest. Princess is lost? I cast "Call Lost Princess". Some limit and/or cost to anything player-accessible is required to make a game interesting (and if it's not player-accessible, you've got your first limit right there). You don't necessarily have to dissect it to see how it works - but if some such limit exists, it's possible to so dissect or quantify from an in-game perspective. If some such limit does not exist, it's boring, because you can't construct a reasonable plot.

There is a difference between what magic can do and what the practioners of magic can do (for what, the fourth time in this thread?). A common theme for the Dark Lord is the acquisition of limitless power.



If it occurs, it is not impossible by definition of the word impossible. And yes - any set of rules that permit to within the local game does indeed render it subject to the scientific method within that game. No paradox involved.
They can, but this isn't one.

I am not following you here. If I define magic as being paradoxial, I don't really see how you can then say it is not. Game World rules are all well and fine, but they are models of reality (and sometimes not even that) not reality itself.

Can we please move this thread back onto the tracks. I honestly couldn't care less whether some people don't buy the premise (and I am getting pretty tired of going round in circles with different people as my dance partners). The signal to noise ratio in this thread has become very weak.

Raum
2008-06-01, 04:40 PM
I am starting to think that it is not that you don't understand, but that you actually don't want to. It may be the case that you're missing a step somewhere along the line, I don't know. All I can get from what you're saying is that "Logically, magic that is possible is not impossible, therefore it must be possible. If you say it is both, then we cannot discuss it, since it is not logical and logical thought is the basis for discourse." I keep trying to explain to you that illogical thought on this subject is perfectly fine and that magic is intentionally illogical in this context, but you keep going back to the same premise. I reject what you are saying because somehow I am able to think logically (or perhaps illogically) about things that are both possible and impossible. I can conceive of them. I cannot really help you understand if you cannot.I suspect part of what Tingel is saying is simply that people cannot meaningfully converse without a common and consistent symbol set. In other words, you have to mean the same things by the words used - i.e. use the same language.

As I understand it, you're defining magic as 'a method of accomplishing the impossible'. Tingel's point seems to be simply that once you have a repeatable method (or possibly even having done it once, not certain) the impossible has become possible. If so, it's not longer magic by the definition above.

Of course I may have misinterpreted both points. :-/

Regarding magic becoming science or vice versa, have you considered the historical example of Alchemy and Natural Science? For centuries it was considered science. It took the Renaissance and Enlightenment to remove Alchemy as a science. Or consider the modern study of psychology. Is it a science? If not, does that make it magic?

Is an action or effect which violates what is known about physics magic? Or is it simply pointing out shortcomings in our knowledge?

Matthew
2008-06-01, 04:47 PM
I suspect part of what Tingel is saying is simply that people cannot meaningfully converse without a common and consistent symbol set. In other words, you have to mean the same things by the words used - i.e. use the same language.

Perhaps. Magic as a paradox seems a perfectly good symbol to me, but maybe not.



As I understand it, you're defining magic as 'a method of accomplishing the impossible'. Tingel's point seems to be simply that once you have a repeatable method (or possibly even having done it once, not certain) the impossible has become possible. If so, it's not longer magic by the definition above.

Sure, I am following what is being said. I am also denying it as being the only interpretation available. I consider impossible things that occur to potentially still be impossible. It's not logical, of course.



Regarding magic becoming science or vice versa, have you considered the historical example of Alchemy and Natural Science? For centuries it was considered science. It took the Renaissance and Enlightenment to remove Alchemy as a science.

Sure.



Or consider the modern study of psychology. Is it a science? If not, does that make it magic?

I should hope not.



Is an action or effect which violates what is known about physics magic? Or is it simply pointing out shortcomings in our knowledge?

In the real world it is as you describe. In a fantasy world it does not have to be.

Jack_Simth
2008-06-01, 04:48 PM
No, that sounds like a reasonable articulation to me. I imagine the problem to be that the fact that the effects of the event are quantifiable, that it is evidence of a 'true physics' that supercedes 'natural physics', which suggests that it was not impossible, but possible (according to true physics). The idea of impossible magic is that 'true physics' does not in fact exist and that the event was impossible. The idea being similar to that of there being no physics of hell.


See above.

If the event occurred, it was not impossible - by simple definition of the term impossible. If the event can be made to occur, it can be studied.


There is a difference between what magic can do and what the practioners of magic can do.

Ah, but that starts to put limits and rules on magic - there's some thing in the practitioners of magic that controls how much they can use magic to bend the rules as they would exist were magic to be removed from the equation. This limit or rule can be studied and experimented upon.


I am not following you here. If I define magic as being paradoxial, I don't really see how you can then say it is not. Game World rules are all well and fine, but they are models of reality (and sometimes not even that) not reality itself.

Because your definition is self-contradictory in any case where magic exists. Have you ever heard of proof by contradiction?

If we start by assuming that A = B and B = C, but can show that A <> C given the assumptions, then we have proof that either A <> B or that B <> C (using an inclusive "or", rather than an exclusive "or") (e.g., that one or more of the assumptions are false).

You have yet to come up with a definition for magic that is actually a paradox without changing or violating definitions of other words (e.g., the definition of "impossible").

Tingel
2008-06-01, 04:51 PM
Because your definition is self-contradictory in any case where magic exists. Have you ever heard of proof by contradiction?

If we start by assuming that A = B and B = C, but can show that A <> C given the assumptions, then we have proof that either A <> B or that B <> C (using an inclusive "or", rather than an exclusive "or") (e.g., that one or more of the assumptions are false).

Don't bother, Jack. Matthew doesn't believe in the law of noncontradiction. Most of page 3 of this thread I tried to argue that his definition is self-contradictory, but he doesn't see why that would be a problem.

Raum
2008-06-01, 05:05 PM
Perhaps. Magic as a paradox seems a perfectly good symbol to me, but maybe not. Sure, we have that today. Yet, as a paradox it's unrepeatable and unprovable.


Sure, I am following what is being said. I am also denying it as being the only interpretation available. I consider impossible things that occur to potentially still be impossible. It's not logical, of course.I wasn't trying to say either was the "only interpretation possible." I'm simply pointing out that discussion doesn't make much progress until there's agreement on definitions. Though, when you state "it's not logical" I think you're stating there cannot be meaningful disagreement. To discuss we must agree to take your paradox on faith. Once we've discarded the common framework of logic, all disagreement is justified by falling back on the basic paradoxical premise.


In the real world it is as you describe. In a fantasy world it does not have to be.I'm not sure I follow. In a fantasy world, even one where magic is doing the impossible which remains impossible even after having been accomplished, magic is repeatable. There's cause and effect. So, superficially at least, it's knowable. Even if it's just knowing that holding a piece of bat guano just so and saying certain words causes a fireball.

It's magic while the underlying physics are unknown.

Jack_Simth
2008-06-01, 05:29 PM
Don't bother, Jack. Matthew doesn't believe in the law of noncontradiction. Most of page 3 of this thread I tried to argue that his definition is self-contradictory, but he doesn't see why that would be a problem.
It's fairly rare for debate to change a target's mind on a subject. There's a fairly strong tendency towards entrenchment, in fact. That doesn't prevent it from being amusing, and it's often possible to convince third parties by way of the debate, however.

Changing Matthew's mind isn't the point of contradicting him.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 05:41 PM
Sure, we have that today. Yet, as a paradox it's unrepeatable and unprovable.

Yes.



I wasn't trying to say either was the "only interpretation possible." I'm simply pointing out that discussion doesn't make much progress until there's agreement on definitions. Though, when you state "it's not logical" I think you're stating there cannot be meaningful disagreement. To discuss we must agree to take your paradox on faith. Once we've discarded the common framework of logic, all disagreement is justified by falling back on the basic paradoxical premise.

I don't know whether there is a need to disregard the entirety of a logical framework to discuss it. Certainly, if it is simply accepted as being a paradox on faith there's not much to say. However, it does seem like a few other people in the course of this thread have 'got it' and provided meaningful and interesting discourse. For the rest, we simply have people basically saying "this is illogical", which is kind of annoying, because I know that it is. I would encourage others to try and imagine magic as a paradox, if they cannot that's no big deal.



I'm not sure I follow. In a fantasy world, even one where magic is doing the impossible which remains impossible even after having been accomplished, magic is repeatable. There's cause and effect. So, superficially at least, it's knowable. Even if it's just knowing that holding a piece of bat guano just so and saying certain words causes a fireball.

It's magic while the underlying physics are unknown.

Right, if there is a cause and effect. But let's take the example of a D&D Sorcerer who casts a spell. He then does the same things as he did to cause the effect five minutes ago, but no spell effect results (having run out of slots). A few weeks later he does the same thing and the second spell casting succeeds (he's gone up a level). Is there a logical basis for this? Do we need one?

In the impossible constructed fantasy it would be possible for someone to do the same things as cause to create an effect and yet fail without explanation.



It's fairly rare for debate to change a target's mind on a subject. There's a fairly strong tendency towards entrenchment, in fact. That doesn't prevent it from being amusing, and it's often possible to convince third parties by way of the debate, however.

Changing Matthew's mind isn't the point of contradicting him.

My experience of threads that degenerate into this sort of discourse is that nobody reads them apart from the people who post. And I should say that entrechment is a two way street. :smallwink:

Jack_Simth
2008-06-01, 05:58 PM
Yes.


I don't know whether there is a need to disregard the entirety of a logical framework to discuss it. Certainly, if it is simply accepted as being a paradox on faith there's not much to say. However, it does seem like a few other people in the course of this thread have 'got it' and provided meaningful and interesting discourse. For the rest, we simply have people basically saying "this is illogical", which is kind of annoying, because I know that it is. I would encourage others to try and imagine magic as a paradox, if they cannot that's no big deal.

Calling magic a paradox is silly, for the simple reason that it isn't one. Once you get a set of game mechanics for magic, it actually tends to become quite logical.


Right, if there is a cause and effect. But let's take the example of a D&D Sorcerer who casts a spell. He then does the same things as he did to cause the effect five minutes ago, but no spell effect results (having run out of slots). A few weeks later he does the same thing and the second spell casting succeeds (he's gone up a level). Is there a logical basis for this? Do we need one?

Is there an explanation? Yes. He ran out of that "something" needed to power the spell, initially. Later on (when he leveled) he had gotten better at it, and had a bigger reserve of that "something" to draw on. Do we need the explanation? Not particularly, no; and yet, the explanation still exists. One does not need an explanation for how a microwave works in order to be able to use one. But at the same time, there will still be a workable explanation for why said microwave works hiding somewhere if the microwave does, indeed, work. Likewise, in order to adjudicate when the Sorcerer can and cannot cast spells in a way that's conducive to a game, there needs to be some reasonably predictable way to determine when said sorcerer can and cannot cast spells (even if it's a matter of rolling a die or three and looking up the result on a table).


In the impossible constructed fantasy it would be possible for someone to do the same things as cause to create an effect and yet fail without explanation.

Oh, that's just "freeform" with a DM that nixes things that break his plot.


My experience of threads that degenerate into this sort of discourse is that nobody reads them apart from the people who post.
Who said I was doing this for the purpose of changing a third parties mind? You focused on an unintended bit - I'm doing this for personal amusement.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 06:01 PM
Who said I was doing this for the purpose of changing a third parties mind? You focused on an unintended bit - I'm doing this for personal amusement.
So, what? You're trolling, then?

Raum
2008-06-01, 06:02 PM
Right, if there is a cause and effect. But let's take the example of a D&D Sorcerer who casts a spell. He then does the same things as he did to cause the effect five minutes ago, but no spell effect results (having run out of slots). A few weeks later he does the same thing and the second spell casting succeeds (he's gone up a level). Is there a logical basis for this? Do we need one?In the context of playing a game, you do need the logical basis. You've also provided it in your example - the sorcerer gained experience / practice / power / whatever.


In the impossible constructed fantasy it would be possible for someone to do the same things as cause to create an effect and yet fail without explanation.

Even in a game system allowing for randomized (or semi-randomized) spell failure there's logical mechanics (usually dice) behind it. In the world's internal terms failure may be explained by anything from skill to planetary conjunction, or left up to the GM to explain or not as he chooses.

Some games even use perceived paradox as a mechanic. Ars Magica makes magic more difficult if in the presence of those who don't believe it's possible. It gives you a public perception of reality which can be difficult for a magician to overcome even though the same feat may be easy for him out in the wilderness.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 06:07 PM
In the context of playing a game, you do need the logical basis. You've also provided it in your example - the sorcerer gained experience / practice / power / whatever.

Sure, I know. But then what's an experience level? Maybe he gained all of those things, maybe not. Maybe he just stood by whilst the rest of the party killed whatever and the DM said *ding* next level. Maybe he drowned back up to 0 Hit Points. RPGs are often illogical. It is generally desirable to try and make them more logical, but it isn't strictly necessary.



Even in a game system allowing for randomized (or semi-randomized) spell failure there's logical mechanics (usually dice) behind it. In the world's internal terms failure may be explained by anything from skill to planetary conjunction, or left up to the GM to explain or not as he chooses.

Sure.



Some games even use perceived paradox as a mechanic. Ars Magica makes magic more difficult if in the presence of those who don't believe it's possible. It gives you a public perception of reality which can be difficult for a magician to overcome even though the same feat may be easy for him out in the wilderness.

Yes, I know.

Jack_Simth
2008-06-01, 06:09 PM
So, what? You're trolling, then?
By This Board's definition (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/announcement.php?a=1), no;


Trolling
Any post that, in the judgment of the Moderators, was made solely or primarily to incite angry responses and/or flames, or attempts to disrupt a thread so that it becomes a flame war, will be edited to remove the offending content and the poster issued an Infraction. If a thread is judged to have been started for this reason, it will be locked, and the poster issued an Infraction.

In particular, editing a quote of another user's post to make the other user's words appear misleading, inflammatory, or insulting is considered trolling, and any such modified quotes will be removed and an Infraction issued.
I'm not attempting to make you angry, nor am I attempting to make you flame me (although per the board's definition, it's a moderator's judgment for that). It's just that at this particular moment in time, such a debate as this is amusing to me.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 06:14 PM
I'm not attempting to make you angry, nor am I attempting to make you flame me (although per the board's definition, it's a moderator's judgment for that). It's just that at this particular moment in time, such a debate as this is amusing to me.

Well, in that case, since your purpose is only to amuse yourself, and since I am not particularly amused, but tired of dancing the same dance with different partners (as I have indicated at least once above), please take no offence if I do not reply to further posts you might make to amuse yourself.

JaxGaret
2008-06-01, 06:17 PM
Pigbearweasel.

That is all.

Jack_Simth
2008-06-01, 06:19 PM
Well, in that case, since your purpose is only to amuse yourself, and since I am not particularly amused, but tired of dancing the same dance (as I have indicated at least once above), please take no offence if I do not reply to further posts you might make to amuse yourself.
You've already been skipping replying to quite a few posts I've made, or responding to only a very small slice of them; do I appear offended yet? Why would your further lack of response offend me when previous lack of response has not?

Matthew
2008-06-01, 06:20 PM
Pigbearweasel.

That is all.

An illogical statement made for logical reasons? The mind boggles.

Devils_Advocate
2008-06-01, 07:19 PM
Matthew, would you agree that by definition no impossible things ever happens? If not, could you explain what you mean by "impossible"?

If you're actually arguing for a contradiction... You do realize that anything follows from a contradiction, right? Given a true contradiction, everybody is right, and everybody is wrong, too.

Matthew
2008-06-01, 07:31 PM
Matthew, would you agree that by definition no impossible things ever happens? If not, could you explain what you mean by "impossible"?

I agree that such is true in the real world.



If you're actually arguing for a contradiction... You do realize that anything follows from a contradiction, right? Given a true contradiction, everybody is right, and everybody is wrong, too.

Sure. Though I should point out that other modes of thought about the nature of true contradictions exist, such as Dialetheism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialetheism).

Devils_Advocate
2008-06-01, 09:01 PM
Ah, OK. So a fictional wizard who could call forth a burst of fire with an incantation would say that this ability is not magic, if he were going by your definition, since, to him, his world is the "real" one (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ThisIsReality). You're defining "magic" as things that can only happen in fiction.

Bit of a tangent here, but do you feel that reality is subjective or objective? Personally, I reckon that e.g. Middle Earth is as real to Frodo and Aragorn as our world is to us, so the whole business is just a matter of perspective. That would mean that "magic", by your definition, is subjective as well.

Eldritch_Ent
2008-06-01, 09:47 PM
Magic is a science in the DnD world. It generally is in any world where wizards have spellbooks. In a world where magic exists, it is a science. We simply consider it magic because it's not possible in OUR world. You have to consider it from their frame of reference. Just because people don't have a good grasp on it yet doesn't mean it isn't a science- I mean, these games are generally set in the dark ages.

Some people go to school studying it for years and years, they even have specialists in certain fields. That's the basis of Wizard- they literally study how magic works, then use that to apply certain formulae that make it do set things. A specific formula ALWAYS does a specific thing. Messing it up (by, say, failing your concentration check) simply causes it to not work or otherwise break down, same as a single mistake in any long equation. (1 + 1 = 3? It's an equation, but an invalid one.)

Some people instead study how to apply these "Magical Science" principles to practical use. They're artificers. Or alchemists if you want a Chemistry equivalent. Or Geometers. Or Fatespinners, if they're into statistics.

Of course, there are certain people who are just good at the stuff. Sorcerers are basically magical savants. They didn't go to school for it, but they understand how it works because they just *do*.

Of course this isn't opening up the big can of worms that is Divine magic (Religion), Nature Magic (Paganism, aka More religion), and Psionics (Which is optional and more akin to, well, Psychics.). Let's not get into those

Jayabalard
2008-06-01, 09:59 PM
No, you see you're deferring to one view of magic there. Just like you're deferring to one view of this fictional "sufficiently advanced technology", one that is limited by the laws of physics as we know them in the real world. It seems kind of hypocritical; unless you're going to accept anyone's view of technology, and that includes the "technology can do anything" school of thought, you don't really have any room to complain when they limit magic in the same way.


As I said above, I am quite happy with that explanation as far as it goes and would agree that in that situation magic and technology could be equally limited. However, as I have also explained, the extreme view of magic is that it creates paradoxes by its very use, it is completely impossible.Sufficiently advanced technology can do the same thing in fiction; it has no limitation beyond the imagination of the author; in some cases it may have no limitations. This is exactly the same as magic; magic has no limitations beyond what is imposed by the author; in some cases it may have no limitations

Roog
2008-06-01, 11:23 PM
I don't know whether there is a need to disregard the entirety of a logical framework to discuss it. Certainly, if it is simply accepted as being a paradox on faith there's not much to say. However, it does seem like a few other people in the course of this thread have 'got it' and provided meaningful and interesting discourse. For the rest, we simply have people basically saying "this is illogical", which is kind of annoying, because I know that it is. I would encourage others to try and imagine magic as a paradox, if they cannot that's no big deal.
There is one way to avoid the Law of Self-Contradiction - the Law of GM/Authour Fiat. By the Law of GM/Author Fiat, only that which is writen by the author or approved by the GM happens, and logic cannot be used on anything else in the world/game. As long as what is described is self-consistent (in the most basic sense) this can work. However if we do things this way, and treat the world as incomplete, we give up the ability to discuss how things as yet undescribed are and can only discuss what the author could make make them.


Right, if there is a cause and effect. But let's take the example of a D&D Sorcerer who casts a spell. He then does the same things as he did to cause the effect five minutes ago, but no spell effect results (having run out of slots). A few weeks later he does the same thing and the second spell casting succeeds (he's gone up a level). Is there a logical basis for this? Do we need one?
Of course there is a logical basis - any D&D player can see what happened and why. He does not do the "same things as he did to cause the effect five minutes ago" because he does not expend another spell slot. You just explained what happened yourself; how can you then say it is illogical - if it was illogical then your explantion would not have made sense.

nagora
2008-06-02, 04:20 AM
Magic is a science in the DnD world. It generally is in any world where wizards have spellbooks. In a world where magic exists, it is a science. We simply consider it magic because it's not possible in OUR world.
I think this is the key here, although it does depend partly on our gaming needs: we want spell casters to be useful so magic in games is codified and repeatable, mostly. At that point there's not much difference between magic and science.

I thought of an interesting example, however.

In our universe it is not possible to know the location and momentum of anything (an electron is the normal example but it works for buses and elephants too) to arbitrary levels of precision at the same time - the more precise you know location, the less precise you can be about momentum.

Now, this is not a trivial point, and in fact derives ultimately from a problem in classical physics which would result in the universe collapsing. In other words, Heisenberg's uncertainty principle explains why we exist at all. (Which tells you something about the human condidition...)

Now, if we introduce a spell-caster who has "Know Electron", a spell which reveals the exact location and motion of an electron (variants exist for buses or elephants etc). If she can cast that spell without the universe collapsing then that is magic in our universe (unless Heisenberg was wrong, of course).

I think that gets closer to what Matt's trying to say: magic allows things to happen which are so fundimental that their ability to exist contradicts other aspects of reality that, if the magical effect was the norm, the universe would not be as it actually can be seen to be.

But one can still argue that all it is doing is revealing that science has not been finalised, which is true. Magic could always then just be a way of revealing that we've missed something - and many physicists have indeed suspected that Heisenberg was wrong, they've just never been able to prove it! (Schrodinger, for example, invented his famous cat in order to demonstrate that something had to be wrong, but Heisenberg sidestepped it by simply accepting the "impossible" and refusing to look any deeper).

So, for people in a universe where magic does not exist, and who play games where magic is predictable, the distinction between magic and science will always be arbitrary and debatable.

Jack_Simth
2008-06-02, 05:58 AM
Of course this isn't opening up the big can of worms that is Divine magic (Religion), Nature Magic (Paganism, aka More religion), and Psionics (Which is optional and more akin to, well, Psychics.). Let's not get into thoseWhy not? It's not all that hard to do, once you've settled on a particular framework; here's one I wrote up a while back:

For the most part, Wizard's can't touch magic directly. Sure, they can do a few things every here and there, and they can apply mystic energy.... but mostly, they're stuck powering the awkward "magical circuitry" which is their spellbook. Apply energy here, here, and here for fifteen minutes, putting a variance in the energy then to control certain options, and the painted "circuits" manipulate the energies into an energy packet which can then be picked up and maintained with almost no effort. In a scroll, the energy packet is tied to the parchment; the spellcraft roll to copy represents figuring out how that particular packet of energy was shaped; the spellcraft roll to familiarize yourself with it for later casting represents tracking down which tabs for triggering are appropriate; the caster level check for activating a scroll with a caster level higher than yours represents seeing if you can manage the force needed to activate the stored spell. When using a borrowed spellbook, the Spellcraft check represents tracking down where to apply energy properly (they don't come with instructions) and how to pick up the resultant packet. The Wizard doesn't so much cast a spell as build and invoke one. It's something he picks up and uses, not something that's a part of him. This explanation also covers why it takes a 20th level specialist Wizard with in excess of fifty spell slots and 227.5 spell levels (counting 0th level spells as half a level) a full fifteen minutes to prepare a cantrip in an empty slot; fifteen minutes is the minimum needed to run and retrieve a "spell program"; it's just that the Wizard is capable of running more than one such at a time, so he can run (prepare) his fifty spells in an hour. As a bonus, this explains why scribing a spell into a spellbook is expensive - the wizard is painting magical circuitry onto the pages... possibly using things like gold and platinum directly.

A Sorcerer's magic is virtually a part of him. He touches it directly and shapes it through raw mystic force. Like most cases of the biological vs. the mechanical, it's a lot more efficient; the spell a Wizard takes fifteen minutes to put together via his spellbook, a Sorcerer sets up in one standard action. The downside, though, is that it's a lot less flexible. He can only put his impromptu packets together in so many ways, as he has to remember them all personally (they are partially instinctive, but do require practice and experimentation). He can do it more often, though, as he only has to gather a pool of energy; there's less maintenance involved in holding an energy pool together than there is in trickle-charging a bunch of spell packets.

The bard constructs his spells on the fly, similar to how a Sorcerer does. But in the Bard's case, he's using verbal memory tricks to remind himself of exactly how the spell goes, in a musically "learned" fashion, rather than drawing on instinct. He's got a lot of other things to focus on, though, and doesn't have quite the energy to apply to packet-making as the Wizard or Sorcerer.

A Divine spellcaster gets these packets handed down pre-made; the Cleric need only invoke them (Causes, if permitted, are [quasi-]deities under this Theory of Magic; perhaps Causes are what the deities were originally born of, or there's an awful lot of deities out there and you don't actually need a deity's name to pray to one [and thus a Cause cleric is actually getting spells granted by a deity who's name he doesn't know] - it is technically possible for a Cleric to have no ranks in Knowledge(Religion), after all - or whatever).

The verbal and somatic components of spells are not all the same - that's why you need a Spellcraft check to identify a spell as it's being cast. Each Wizard sets up a slightly different trigger mechanism - and, indeed, sets up slightly different trigger mechanisms even for copies of the same spell, so he doesn't fumble two spells trying to supply the right bit of extra push to the same triggers and coming up short (the Quicken Spell metamagic feat partially revolves around arranging for less "push" and redundant triggers). Much of the Spellcraft check to identify a spell on the fly is involved in tracking the energies as they come into play in order to predict the final result; the energy packet has something of an effect on the outside world while it's still being given that final push.

Spellcasters need the material and focus components because some energy packets require a pattern to draw off of; there's a little more information needed to finish the effect than can be easily contained in the energy packet (in the case of "complex" material or focus components, such as a live spider or a cocoon; Eschew Materials alleviates the need for some of it by putting a bit more info into the spell); others require something physical for a slight boost in energy or focus (for "simple" components like the copper coin for Detect Thoughts or the copper wire for Sending; Eschew Materials alleviates the need for some of it by putting a bit more force or focus into the spell). Sorcerers still need them because sometimes, there's just too much to remember, or some of it really does need to be channeled outside the body, for whatever reason. Other components are either a source of energy to power certain portions of the spell that are only quasi-magical in and of themselves, a bribe of sorts to certain forces,
or even a form of insulation against backlash. A divine caster avoids the need for most such trappings with help from above... but there are limits to what they can be bothered to do for their followers.


: Although I didn't include Psionics in that write up, it's not all that hard to adapt the Sorcerer - fits even better, actually, what with Psions having an even more proper energy pool, although they generally have less endurance than does a Wizard with a good generic list.

Matthew
2008-06-02, 06:23 AM
Ah, OK. So a fictional wizard who could call forth a burst of fire with an incantation would say that this ability is not magic, if he were going by your definition, since, to him, his world is the "real" one (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ThisIsReality). You're defining "magic" as things that can only happen in fiction.

Well, not exactly. The reality of the 'real' world would be the reality of his world as well (unless the 'true' physics of that world are defined by the author as being different). Where magic interferes with that reality it would defy reasonable explanation, being an illogical force. Any attempt to discover a 'true' physics for that world that encompassed magic would fail (because there would be no 'true' physics in that sense).



Bit of a tangent here, but do you feel that reality is subjective or objective? Personally, I reckon that e.g. Middle Earth is as real to Frodo and Aragorn as our world is to us, so the whole business is just a matter of perspective. That would mean that "magic", by your definition, is subjective as well.
I couldn't tell you for certain whether our reality is subjective or objective. If it were subjective, I probably wouldn't be aware of it [i.e. it would continue to appear objective to me], and the same would apply to Middle Earth for the characters that reside there. However, from our point of view, Middle Earth is subjective, being mutable.

On the other hand, whilst I deal with our world as being objective [i.e. I assume it is so in order to function] I would not preclude the possibility that it is in fact subjective.



Just like you're deferring to one view of this fictional "sufficiently advanced technology", one that is limited by the laws of physics as we know them in the real world. It seems kind of hypocritical; unless you're going to accept anyone's view of technology, and that includes the "technology can do anything" school of thought, you don't really have any room to complain when they limit magic in the same way.

Sure, and as I said, I am happy with that explanation as well, though I do not really consider it to be describing 'magic' at that point. If magic is being defined in that way, then surely my point of view would not be sustainable.



Sufficiently advanced technology can do the same thing in fiction; it has no limitation beyond the imagination of the author; in some cases it may have no limitations. This is exactly the same as magic; magic has no limitations beyond what is imposed by the author; in some cases it may have no limitations

Right, but we're not talking about the fictional limits of technology. If we were, then that would also render this point of view invalid (as both technology and magic would then be only limited by the imagination, and perhaps not even that). The point is that technology is fact and magic is fiction. The contention following that was that factual technology is limited (may not be true, but I think it is) and that fictional magic is potentially unlimited (currently being contested right here).



I think that gets closer to what Matt's trying to say: magic allows things to happen which are so fundimental that their ability to exist contradicts other aspects of reality that, if the magical effect was the norm, the universe would not be as it actually can be seen to be.

But one can still argue that all it is doing is revealing that science has not been finalised, which is true. Magic could always then just be a way of revealing that we've missed something - and many physicists have indeed suspected that Heisenberg was wrong, they've just never been able to prove it! (Schrodinger, for example, invented his famous cat in order to demonstrate that something [i]had to be wrong, but Heisenberg sidestepped it by simply accepting the "impossible" and refusing to look any deeper).

Sure, that sounds close. What I am doing is taking the other side of the argument and saying that magic isn't a way of saying something about reality has been missed, but an unknowable and illogical force.

It's startling how many people here would rather argue about the legitimacy of this point of view (or who cannot even imagine it to be true in an imaginary world) than explore it as a concept.

Roog
2008-06-02, 06:48 AM
Well, not exactly. The reality of the 'real' world [i.e. our own] would be the reality of his world as well (unless the 'true' physics of that world are defined by the author as being different). Where magic interferes with that reality it would defy reasonable explanation, being an illogical force. Any attempt to discover a 'true' physics for that world that encompassed magic would fail (because there would be no 'true' physics in that sense).
Why on earth would the character base his judgements on the 'truth' of our world? He has no means of knowing what our world is like.

How about you give an example of magic as an 'illogical force' in fiction. I can think of no fictional examples where magic makes events both happen and not happen (or where the effects of magic are entirely unpredictable) - and that is what is required to disallow the existence of a physics of the fictional world.

#Edit
The physics of most literary worlds are incomplete, as the worlds that are described are incomplete. That does not mean that an attempt to discover rules of physics within the world would necessary arrive at a point of failure. If the author describes logical inconsistencies, then that point will arrive; but that inconsistency is usually considered to be a bug rather than a feature.


Right, but we're not talking about the fictional limits of technology. If we were, then that would also render this point of view invalid. The point is that technology is fact and magic is fiction. The contention following that was that factual technology is limited (may not be true, but I think it is) and that fictional magic is unlimited (currently being contested right here).
Technology is not just fact. If you have a fictional world, then technology is also fiction. In our world both technology and magic are limited. Why do you want to assume that the fictional world is so much like our world that technology has the same limits, and yet so much unlike our world that magic is not even limited by logic?

sikyon
2008-06-02, 07:05 AM
Science:

Fundamental postulate: The universe obeys a set of absolute rules.

Magic:

Fundamental Postulate : Magic obeys a set of absolute rules. If true, then Magic is the same as science.

Rejection of Fundamental Postulate: Magic does not obey a set of absolute rules. As magic is part of the universe, then science's Fundamental postulate is untrue.

-------

Therefore, if magic has the same fundamental postulate as science they are the same thing. If magic does not have the same fundamental postulate as science, then science doesn't exist and magic/rejected postulate science are the same thing.

Either way, THEY ARE THE SAME THING.

Matthew
2008-06-02, 07:14 AM
Why on earth would the character base his judgements on the 'truth' of our world? He has no means of knowing what our world is like.

You are misunderstanding. The physics of his world are the true physics of our world. It's not a matter for the character to decide. He may observe magic and attempt to construct a model of physics to describe what he has observed, but he will fail because there are no 'true physics' governing magic.



Technology is not just fact. If you have a fictional world, then technology is also fiction. In our world both technology and magic are limited. Why do you want to assume that the fictional world is so much like our world that technology has the same limits, and yet so much unlike our world that magic is not even limited by logic?

The basis of this discussion is that fictional technnology is not applicable. As for assumptions, why not assume the above? I imagine your answer to be 'becasue it's not logical', which drops us right back in the cycle of "it's not logical", "I know".



#Edit
The physics of most literary worlds are incomplete, as the worlds that are described are incomplete. That does not mean that an attempt to discover rules of physics within the world would necessary arrive at a point of failure. If the author describes logical inconsistencies, then that point will arrive; but that inconsistency is usually considered to be a bug rather than a feature.

In my experience, the physics of most literary worlds are never even discussed, they are just assumed to be our own with a few exceptions here and there that don't actually modify the physics of that world .



How about you give an example of magic as an 'illogical force' in fiction. I can think of no fictional examples where magic makes events both happen and not happen (or where the effects of magic are [I]entirely unpredictable) - and that is what is required to disallow the existence of a physics of the fictional world.

Okay, that's a good question and something actually worth exploring, instead of confining ourselves to this perpetual roundabout of legitimacy.

An example of this sort would be the account of the Gesta Francorum at the battle of Antioch where numerous eye witnesses attested to having seen white riders (a heavenly host in fact) fighting at the side of the crusaders, but other eye witnesses attest that they saw nothing at all and that there was no supernatural force at work during the battle. The author of the Gesta Francorum says that he saw nothing, but passes no judgement as to what the truth might be. That sounds to me like something both happened and did not happen. As I understand it, the law of non contradiction says that one or the other must have happened, but the author seems content that both did.

Roog
2008-06-02, 07:15 AM
I think that gets closer to what Matt's trying to say: magic allows things to happen which are so fundimental that their ability to exist contradicts other aspects of reality that, if the magical effect was the norm, the universe would not be as it actually can be seen to be.

In most gaming worlds the experimentation needed to come up with Heisenberg's uncertainty principle has not been performed, so we cannot draw the conclusion that the fictional world has the same fundamental principles as our's, even though large scale events appear to be the same.

The question still arises, of what would happen in a fictional world which is assumed to be like ours when a spell like "Know Electron" is used.

Two possibilities occur to me
1) When we tell stories about a world we usually assume that it is self-consistent without testing whether that is actually true. We may find self-inconsistentcies in any non-real world that we describe, and when we see them we have several methods of handling them (divide the description od the world into separate sections and avoid cross-section logic, retcon the world to avoid the self-inconsistency, treat the description we have of the world as an incomplete model and make ad-hoc changes to outcomes when we find that they are not what we desire, etc). The obvious solution to the "Know Electron" problem would be to never use the infomation that it provides for physical calculations both IG and OOG. (In fact in our universe I don't think that it would be possible to distinguish between the output of a "Know Electron" spell and an appropriate measurement+random function, as our universe seems to work in such a way that the infomation the spell would provide is infomation that is not actually contained within our universe.)

2) Some stories we tell involve a universe which obviously will not bear the strain of careful examination and logic. If we apply logic to examining these worlds we will find that, yes they do not make internal sense, and from that point on we can only consider them as stories and not as self-contained worlds.

Matthew
2008-06-02, 07:16 AM
Science:

Fundamental postulate: The universe obeys a set of absolute rules.

Yes.


Magic:

Fundamental Postulate : Magic obeys a set of absolute rules. If true, then Magic is the same as science.

Yes.



Rejection of Fundamental Postulate: Magic does not obey a set of absolute rules.

Yes



As magic is part of the universe, then science's Fundamental postulate is untrue.

No, magic need not be part of the universe. It can exist outside the universe.



2) Some stories we tell involve a universe which obviously will not bear the strain of careful examination and logic. If we apply logic to examining these worlds we will find that, yes they do not make internal sense, and from that point on we can only consider them as stories and not as self-contained worlds.

This I don't get. I cannot think of any fictional world that differs from our own that will bear the strain of logical examination. That's why we have to suspend our disbelief when interacting with such worlds.

I wonder if this isn't a fundamental difference in method of approach? I assume from the outset that fictional worlds are going to contain things that just logically cannot be true (like Disc World, for instance).

Oslecamo
2008-06-02, 07:19 AM
Ok, here go my 2 cents:

Science follows strict rules. You study/discover the rules and find a way fto make them to work for you. The guy next door also has to follow the same rules as you do, as everything else in the world. If there's a logic explanation to why something hapened, then it's science.

Magic doesn't follow rules at all. Magical stuff simply happens. What works for one magician may not work for the other. The same spell may have wildly diferent results in the same conditions. Everything affects certain spells. Nothing affects other spells. There is always a way to go around any "rules" there may seem to be. Magic can be created from nothingness, and magic can be destroyed to nothingness. If there's no logic explanation to why something hapened, then it's magic.

Remember, if magic in D&D has rules, it's because otherwise it would be somewhat hard for anybody to play with it. But otherwise magic doesn't really give a damn about rules.

sikyon
2008-06-02, 07:26 AM
No, magic need not be part of the universe. It can exist outside the universe.


Does magic effect the universe?

Yes.

Therefore it is part of the universe.

Edit: Furthermore, the definition of "universe" for science does not just encompass 3 physical dimensions and one temporal one, theoetical limits of space-time, ect. It encompasses everything.

Matthew
2008-06-02, 07:29 AM
Does magic effect the universe?

Yes.

Therefore it is part of the universe.

Well, since you have answered your own question, it would seem you need no answer, but let me contradict you anyway. "Does magic affect the fictional universe?" "Yes". Is it therefore part of the universe? "Not necessarily".

sikyon
2008-06-02, 07:32 AM
Well, since you have answered your own question, it would seem you need no answer, but let me contradict you anyway. "Does magic affect the fictional universe?" "Yes". Is it therefore part of the universe? "Not necessarily".

Elaborate.

Roog
2008-06-02, 07:35 AM
You are misunderstanding. The physics of his world are the true physics of our world. It's not a matter for the character to decide. He may observe magic and attempt to construct a model of physics to describe what he has observed, but he will fail because there are no 'true physics' governing magic.
On what basis do you say that "The physics of his world are the true physics of our world"? When did we start discussing only those fictional worlds that have the same laws of physics as our world?

As for the character contructing a model of the physics of his world, physics models start with the simplest of things. Like cause and effect. The character starts with those simple things are tries to determine the rules of his world. Does 'cause and effect' fail? Does 'things that have repeated themselves in the past tend to repeat themselves in the future' fail?



The basis of this discussion is that fictional technnology is not applicable. As for assumptions, why not assume the above? I imagine your answer to be 'becasue it's not logical', which drops us right back in the cycle of "it's not logical", "I know".
So we are not talking about D&D then, because that has fictional technology. What worlds/stories/settings are we talking about? Because "no fictional technology" is a pretty tight restriction.



In my experience, the physics of most literary worlds are never even discussed, they are just assumed to be our own with a few exceptions here and there that don't actually modify the physics of that world .
Most stories don't discuss physics. Why do you assume that those worlds assume the same physics as our world? I think that most worlds assume common sense (with a few extra rules for what is possible).



An example of this sort would be the account of the [I]Gesta Francorum at the battle of Antioch where numerous eye witnesses attested to having seen white riders (a heavenly host in fact) fighting at the side of the crusaders, but other eye witnesses attest that they saw nothing at all and that there was no supernatural force at work during the battle. The author of the Gesta Francorum says that he saw nothing, but passes no judgement as to what the truth might be. That sounds to me like something both happened and did not happen. As I understand it, the law of non contradiction says that one or the other must have happened.
Did anyone believe that both were true? Or did they all believe that their own view was the correct one? I understand that uncertanty of truth can be an important thing in fiction, and it is something I work hard to preserve in my own games. But preserving room for uncertanty is not the same thing as stating contradiction.

If the heavenly host did infact both fight and not-fight, did that have an effect on the outcome of the battle? Were any soldiers save and non-saved by their assistance? Were any of their opponents killed and not-killed by the host? Did the parents of those opponents weep and not-weep at the news of their death and not-death?

Xuincherguixe
2008-06-02, 07:37 AM
See, there might be a physical reality in which the players are, and that could be called "The Universe". Magic could be outside that.

However, if it's outside that Universe, and still affects it, then it's still part of the Universe. It's just a larger one.


This thread is getting kind of dull. I want to see some minds snap.

Matthew
2008-06-02, 07:37 AM
Elaborate.

Just read back through the thread and you will fin plenty of elaboration.




Edit: Furthermore, the definition of "universe" for science does not just encompass 3 physical dimensions and one temporal one, theoetical limits of space-time, ect. It encompasses everything.

It encompasses everything in the rational universe. I don't think it encompasses heaven and hell (except perhaps to disprove their existance). The point here is to imagine something that goes beyond the limits of the universe. I think D&D usually describes it as the MultiVerse, but ended up defining what that was. From what I hear, the Far Realms may now take that place, I don't know.

Roog
2008-06-02, 07:38 AM
I wonder if this isn't a fundamental difference in method of approach? I assume from the outset that fictional worlds are going to contain things that just logically cannot be true (like Disc World, for instance).

Specifically, what in Disk World just logically cannot be true?

sikyon
2008-06-02, 07:45 AM
It encompasses everything in the rational universe. I don't think it encompasses heaven and hell (except perhaps to disprove their existance). The point here is to imagine something that goes beyond the limits of the universe. I think D&D usually describes it as the MultiVerse, but ended up defining what that was. From what I hear, the Far Realms may now take that place, I don't know.

Yes, exactly, science encompasses heaven and hell to disprove them. Everything we can imagine is part of the universe, either through physical existence or through an analysis of our imaginations. That's the point of science. To say that there is something outside of science's bounds violates science's fundamental postulate, that everything follows a set of rules. Therefore if heaven and hell were real, and science did not encapsulate them, then science would in effect be disproven.

Roog
2008-06-02, 07:46 AM
It encompasses everything in the rational universe. I don't think it encompasses heaven and hell (except perhaps to disprove their existance). The point here is to imagine something that goes beyond the limits of the universe. I think D&D usually describes it as the MultiVerse, but ended up defining what that was. From what I hear, the Far Realms may now take that place, I don't know.


If there is a possible connection of cause and effect between any two things, then they are in the same universe. If the Far Realms or Heaven or Hell can have an effect or be effected by anything already known to be in the universe, then they are also part of that same universe.

Matthew
2008-06-02, 07:47 AM
On what basis do you say that "The physics of his world are the true physics of our world"? When did we start discussing only those fictional worlds that have the same laws of physics as our world?

I am not postulating this as the only possibility, as you can see above (i.e. if an author decides the world doesn't conform to normal physics, such as in the Death Gate Cycle or the Awakeners). The assumption that a fictional world conforms to the physics of our own is fairly standard.



As for the character contructing a model of the physics of his world, physics models start with the simplest of things. Like cause and effect. The character starts with those simple things are tries to determine the rules of his world. Does 'cause and effect' fail? Does 'things that have repeated themselves in the past tend to repeat themselves in the future' fail?

Yes, cause and effect often fails. What works for one Wizard may not work for another, and each time it works it need not work in exactly the same way or for exactly the same cause.



So we are not talking about D&D then, because that has fictional technology. What worlds/stories/settings are we talking about? Because "no fictional technology" is a pretty tight restriction.

To begin with we were not actually talking about any worlds at all, but a comparison of factual technology to the potential of fictional magic. We still haven't really talked about any worlds. I did ask you a while back (I think it was you) to move this debate on by coming up with 'trappings' best suited to different views of magic, but apparently you decided you would rather argue the legitimacy issue again.



Most stories don't discuss physics. Why do you assume that those worlds assume the same physics as our world? I think that most worlds assume common sense (with a few extra rules for what is possible).

Well, that's actually what the D&D DMG says [i.e. players will assume physics work normally unless they don't], and I would consider it fairly normal operating procedure



Did anyone believe that both were true? Or did they all believe that their own view was the correct one? I understand that uncertanty of truth can be an important thing in fiction, and it is something I work hard to preserve in my own games. But preserving room for uncertanty is not the same thing as stating contradiction.

If the heavenly host did infact both fight and not-fight, did that have an effect on the outcome of the battle? Were any soldiers save and non-saved by their assistance? Were any of their opponents killed and not-killed by the host? Did the parents of those opponents weep and not-weep at the news of their death and not-death?

Yes, they did. Boethian reconciliation of philosophy and theology seems to have made that sort of thinking normal. [i.e. we both have free will and are predestined to do such and such].

Charity
2008-06-02, 07:48 AM
:smallwink: Still at it Matt.

I think there is a blurring of criteria going on in this thread.

Real world science being compared to fantasy setting magic and science fiction psionics is going to throw up some inconsistencies of language and logic... Though it gladdens my physicists heart to hear the staunch defense of scientific method and philosophical rigor, it is seems slightly misplaced to my ears.
On a board such as this though Matt you should have expected us physicists to come a callin' with our cold hard logic and slide rules (does any body even know what they are anymore?)

Even comparing Science fiction science to magic is dubious as it is based on the authors (often incomplete) knowledge of science; Whereas magic is not bound by any chains of real world comparison existing only in the imagination.


In an attempt to address the thread, I tend to like to keep my magic as far away from my technology as possible it is just my preference to avoid such interactions as they tend to force the issue of application of physics to magical effects... and I quite like cats.

I can only draw on novels I've read...
Iain M Banks writes some very good novels which include high end future tech and it's interaction with society. I believe the Space Maverick by..*looks it up* Michael Kring includes a magical artifact in a science fiction world... though it could just have been super high tech, he never wrote the third book. Grunts by Mary Gentle explores technology in a magical realm (in a pretty light hearted fashion).

Matthew
2008-06-02, 08:00 AM
Specifically, what in Disk World just logically cannot be true?

Are you saying there are no internal contradictions in the Disc World series? That it is a perfectly internally consistant world? Well, I suppose that is true if one accepts Pratchett's explanation: "There are no inconsistencies in the Discworld books; ocassionally, however, there are alternate pasts."



Yes, exactly, science encompasses heaven and hell to disprove them. Everything we can imagine is part of the universe, either through physical existence or through an analysis of our imaginations. That's the point of science. To say that there is something outside of science's bounds violates science's fundamental postulate, that everything follows a set of rules. Therefore if heaven and hell were real, and science did not encapsulate them, then science would in effect be disproven.

Yet there are scientists who accept the existence of heaven and hell without encapsulating them with science, and yet do not contend that science is wrong.



If there is a possible connection of cause and effect between any two things, then they are in the same universe. If the Far Realms or Heaven or Hell can have an effect or be effected by anything already known to be in the universe, then they are also part of that same universe.

Okay, you may well be misunderstanding me here. I am not talking about reality, but a fictional universe where things can exist beyond the universe. You say "that's impossible and illogical", I say "I know".



:smallwink: Still at it Matt.

It would seem so. People love to argue legitimacy, apparently.

Roog
2008-06-02, 08:04 AM
I am not postulating this as the only possibility, as you can see above (i.e. if an author decides the world doesn't conform to normal physics, such as in the Death Gate Cycle or the Awakeners). The assumption that a fictional world conforms to the physics of our own is fairly standard.
If you are not postulating this as the only possibility, then don't say that it is. (to quote you)

The physics of his world are the true physics of our world.



Yes, cause and effect often fails. What works for one Wizard may not work for another, and each time it works it need not work in exactly the same way or for exactly the same cause.
If cuase and effect does not work why does the wizard think that he can even get a result remotly like he aims for?



To begin with we were not actually talking about any worlds at all, but a comparison of factual technology to the potential of fictional magic. We still haven't really talked about any worlds. I did ask you a while back (I think it was you) to move this debate on by coming up with 'trappings' best suited to different views of magic, but apparently you decided you would rather argue the legitimacy issue again.
I'm happy to discuss trappings (although I went to bed just after sugesting it yesterday). Its just that you seem to keep wanting to restrict discussion to a very small set of worlds/stories/settings (to situations where technology can only do what factual technology can do and magic can do everything including violating logic), I have severe difficulty restricting any discussions of trappings to only those worlds.



Well, that's actually what the D&D DMG says [i.e. players will assume physics work normally unless they don't], and I would consider it fairly normal operating procedure
Until some player wants to summon anti-osmium (etc), given the way the rules of D&D work I would consider it a very bad idea to assume that physics works the same way it does in our world, beyond what would be apparent to a pre-scientific person.



Yes, they did. Boethian reconciliation of philosophy and theology seems to have made that sort of thinking normal. [i.e. we both have free will and are predestined to do such and such].
I do not consider Free Will and Predestination to be mutually exclusive concepts. Definetly mutually exclusive to the degree of the examples I gave you. Wikied Boethian, I think I have read Consolation of Philosophy, I don't remember any embrasing of physical contradictions (as opposed to philosophical ones).

Matthew
2008-06-02, 08:09 AM
If you are not postulating this as the only possibility, then don't say that it is. (to quote you)

Please read things in context. Devil's Advocate was asking about the universe I am postulating (you responded to what I said to Devil's Advocate, which elicited further clarification from me, if you follow the train of conversation backwards).



If cuase and effect does not work why does the wizard think that he can even get a result remotly like he aims for?

No idea, it defies rational explanation.



I'm happy to discuss trappings (although I went to bed just after sugesting it yesterday). Its just that you seem to keep wanting to restrict discussion to a very small set of worlds/stories/settings (to situations where technology can only do what factual technology can do and magic can do everything including violating logic), I have severe difficulty restricting any discussions of trappings to only those worlds.

Not at all, the problem is that everytime we seem to move along, somebody new pipes up to say "what you postulate is impossible and here's why", then the cycle begins anew.



Until some player wants to summon anti-osmium (etc), given the way the rules of D&D work I would consider it a very bad idea to assume that physics works the same way it does in our world, beyond what would be apparent to a pre-scientific person.

Maybe so, but that's what it says and I haven't found any problems coming at it from that angle (except for the Spiked Chain, but that's another thread :smallwink:).



I do not consider Free Will and Predestination to be mutually exclusive concepts. Definetly mutually exclusive to the degree of the examples I gave you. Wikied Boethian, I think I have read Consolation of Philosophy, I don't remember any embrasing of physical contradictions (as opposed to philosophical ones).

Well, I suppose I can't really go into it because of the restrictions on this board, but it has to do with the nature of reality [i.e. reality is only a shadowy reflection of the truth]. PM me about it if you want to discuss it further.

Roog
2008-06-02, 08:14 AM
Are you saying there are no internal contradictions in the Disc World series? That it is a perfectly internally consistant world? Well, I suppose that is true if one accepts Pratchett's explanation: "There are no inconsistencies in the Discworld books; ocassionally, however, there are alternate pasts."
I am saying that in this discussion you are championing magic with internal conrtadictions, after all the discussion I am not sure if we mean the same thing by:
internal contradiction
physics
universe
rules
consistency
etc.

If you say Disk World is inconsistent, then I want to know what inconsistencies you are talking about.



Okay, you may well be misunderstanding me here. I am not talking about reality, but a fictional universe where things can exist beyond the universe. You say "that's impossible and illogical", I say "I know".

Do you mean a fictional universe where things exist beyond that fictional universe? Thats fine, its just that those things that you mentioned do not seem to be beyond the fictional universe. Unless of course you are using the word universe in the colloquial way, which is what forces us to look for another word for all connected things (i.e. the universe) without using that word. Some people like Multi-verse, although that is better used for a set of parallel or alternate colloquial-universes.

Roog
2008-06-02, 08:19 AM
No idea, it defies rational explanation.
And rational discussion, which is the problem we are having here.:smallbiggrin:



Not at all, the problem is that everytime we seem to move along, somebody new pipes up to say "what you postulate is impossible and here's why", then the cycle begins anew.

Maybe a new thread would be best for that.

nagora
2008-06-02, 08:25 AM
Here's an example from Saberhagen: A ring which is is the same radius at all angles, but who's circumference is exactly three times that radius. Imagine finding that; is it magic?

Matthew
2008-06-02, 08:26 AM
I am saying that in this discussion you are championing magic with internal contradictions, after all the discussion I am not sure if we mean the same thing by:

internal contradiction
physics
universe
rules
consistency
etc.

If you say Disk World is inconsistent, then I want to know what inconsistencies you are talking about.

To tell the truth it has been a long time since I read any Pratchett, I think the last one I read was Small Gods. It was just getting too inane for me and self referential. I remember being particularly annoyed at inconsistancies in Feet of Clay, but I couldn't tell you what they were now. The infinite ocean that rushes over the edge of the world always struck me as being impossible, but perhaps there is an explanation for that.

As for our definition of terms, there is bound to be some level of disagreement and misuse going on. That's typical of this sort of discussion involving multiple people.



Do you mean a fictional universe where things exist beyond that fictional universe? Thats fine, its just that those things that you mentioned do not seem to be beyond the fictional universe. Unless of course you are using the word universe in the colloquial way, which is what forces us to look for another word for all connected things (i.e. the universe) without using that word. Some people like Multi-verse, although that is better used for a set of parallel or alternate colloquial-universes.

Right, this probably goes to the root of the matter. If we use Universe to mean 'everything' and then somebody says "no, there are things that can exist outside the universe", then we can then say "no, since the universe is everything nothing can exist outside it, we just need to redfine universe to encompass those things".

That's a valid view, but I actually contest that any one word can be used to describe "everything" in a useful way, because such a word assumes that everything is in some way connected and interacts with everything else as part of a whole, following a broad set of potentially discernable rules.

To put it another way, I reject the idea that there need be a universe in the sense of everything in a fantasy setting.



Here's an example from Saberhagen: A ring which is is the same radius at all angles, but who's circumference is exactly three times that radius. Imagine finding that; is it magic?

Sounds like it might be.

Roog
2008-06-02, 08:29 AM
That's a valid view, but I actually contest that any one word can be used to describe "everything" in a useful way, because such a word assumes that everything is in some way connected and interacts with everything else as part of a whole, following a broad set of potentially discernable rules.

To put it another way, I reject the idea that there need be a universe in the sense of everything in a fantasy setting.

If you reject the use of the word universe, you also need to reject the term "outside the universe", and try to describe things in a less universal way.

Roog
2008-06-02, 08:33 AM
Here's an example from Saberhagen: A ring which is is the same radius at all angles, but who's circumference is exactly three times that radius. Imagine finding that; is it magic?

Or a mobile spatial distortion?

Matthew
2008-06-02, 08:35 AM
And rational discussion, which is the problem we are having here.:smallbiggrin:

Heh, heh. Well, I think it's possible to discuss irrational things within a rational framework, but maybe not.



Maybe a new thread would be best for that.

Maybe, somehow I suspect it will just end up like this one, though.



If you reject the use of the word universe, you also need to reject the term "outside the universe", and try to describe things in a less universal way.

Well, we may need to redefine universe for the purposes of this concept. Probably something like "Anything that exists that can be rationally explained."



Or a mobile spatial distortion?

Could be.

Roog
2008-06-02, 08:38 AM
Maybe, somehow I suspect it will just end up like this one, though.

A new thread discussing the trappings of magic would leave this one for the argument about the possibility or imposibility of possible impossibilities

Matthew
2008-06-02, 08:45 AM
A new thread discussing the trappings of magic would leave this one for the argument about the possibility or imposibility of possible impossibilities

One would hope, but then there's only one way to find out, I suppose.

nagora
2008-06-02, 08:46 AM
Or a mobile spatial distortion?

No, that's just the way it is. The ring is totally passive.

What I'm trying to get at here is the idea of things that "just don't fit". That have no explanation other than the bare fact of them being there.

The ring is created and inserted into the universe where it simply can't exist, but does. That's magic. For double magic bonus points: imagine that the creator of the ring did not know what would be created and can not replicate the effect.

A fair die which always rolls 6.

Roog
2008-06-02, 08:58 AM
No, that's just the way it is. The ring is totally passive.

What I'm trying to get at here is the idea of things that "just don't fit". That have no explanation other than the bare fact of them being there.

The ring is created and inserted into the universe where it simply can't exist, but does. That's magic. For double magic bonus points: imagine that the creator of the ring did not know what would be created and can not replicate the effect.

A fair die which always rolls 6.

The trouble with things like that, is that if characters are of a mind to investergite them, they can break the world.

Take "A fair die which always rolls 6" for example. What does "a fair die" mean? The author can simply write that down, but what meaning does it have within the story? How does anyone in the fictional world know that the object in question is "a fair die"?
The usual way to test if an object is "a fair die" would be to roll it a large number of times and then performing a statistical test on the results to see if the results vary significantly from what is expected. What would happen if the characters tried to perform that process. Would the die roll a 'fair' distribution and always roll a 6? Would the die always roll a 6 and the statistical test always report that the die was fair? What would happen? The author of a novel is free to describe a world where the inconsistency is never tested in a way that would spoil the story, but if we want to talk about RPGs then I dont see a solution except the GM saying "sorry, your character does not do that", "sorry, your character does not know that" etc.

sikyon
2008-06-02, 09:02 AM
Yet there are scientists who accept the existence of heaven and hell without encapsulating them with science, and yet do not contend that science is wrong.


These scientists postulate that heaven and hell which are not encompassed by science cannot affect the material universe. Basically, if heaven and hell didn't exist, and was all in our imagination, then the world would be exactly the same.

If they actually believe that heaven and hell do exist and that they affect our world but are not accountable to any set of rules (known or unknown) then the (unscientific) scientists are violating the fundamental postulate of science, and the scientific method, and soforth.

nagora
2008-06-02, 09:07 AM
The trouble with things like that, is that if characters are of a mind to investergite them, they can break the world.

Take "A fair die which always rolls 6" for example. What does "a fair die" mean?

It means that its center of mass is in the center and all faces, corners etc are evenly and correctly distributed. You can show that there is something worth investigating about a die by rolling it, but all you actually establish by repeating the process is your level of suspicion, you can't ever prove that the die is not fair by statistics alone.

AKA_Bait
2008-06-02, 09:09 AM
To begin with we were not actually talking about any worlds at all, but a comparison of factual technology to the potential of fictional magic.

This makes the issue much different. Even if magic is defined as "sufficently advanced techonology" then given that parameter one can make a division bettween the technology of the realm and the magic of the realm. The latter being the result of pure trial and error without out the knowledge of any overarching and governing causal laws (Bob the Wizard tried lizard and chicken guano to no effect first and he has no clue as to how the physical laws governing a fireball relate to a flaming sphere) and the former being extrapolations from known causal laws (Zorkan the blacksmith knows that when you heat metal, any metal, sufficently, you can beat it into a desired shape).


Yes, they did. Boethian reconciliation of philosophy and theology seems to have made that sort of thinking normal. .

Well, compatibilism isn't exactly universally accepted. Personally, I prefer the Hawking approach to determinism (scientific determinism but the reply works pretty well for religous determinism as well) which basically amounts to 'Sure, we are predetermined but since we can't know what we are predetermined to do then as far as matters we have free will".


Yet there are scientists who accept the existence of heaven and hell without encapsulating them with science, and yet do not contend that science is wrong.

Well, that's in part because of the concept of testability. The existence of Heaven and Hell are intelectually constructed in such a way as to make them untestable (or unfalsifiable). A scientist can, and Karl Popper who is one of the more important philosophers of science did, draw a line bettween statements that are "not true" and those that are "not scientific."


Okay, you may well be misunderstanding me here. I am not talking about reality, but a fictional universe where things can exist [I]beyond the universe. You say "that's impossible and illogical", I say "I know".


If you reject the use of the word universe, you also need to reject the term "outside the universe", and try to describe things in a less universal way.

The problem is that it's not just 'impossible and illogical' it's definitionally inconcievable since universe encompasses everything. I think it would be much tidier to draw the line at "knowable universe". It's certianly possible to accept a universe who's causal laws are unknowable in scientific terms. We are limited and finite beings after all.


It would seem so. People love to argue legitimacy, apparently.

Who doesn't?


No idea, it defies rational explanation.

This seems like the best spot to draw the line. We can say that Magic is theoretically knowlable in a scientific manner but at the same time say that it is practially impossible to figure out the causal laws at play. Heck, we might be getting near that point already with real science. I'm reminded of the quote by Oppenhiemer (at least I think it was him, might have been Feinman though), who said "Anyone who thinks they understand Quantam Mechanics doesn't."

Roog
2008-06-02, 09:22 AM
It means that its center of mass is in the center and all faces, corners etc are evenly and correctly distributed.

But is "its center of mass is in the center and all faces, corners etc are evenly and correctly distributed" the definition of a 'fair die'? It is quite possible to have dice that roll fairly which do not fit that description. Are they not 'fair' dice?



You can show that there is something worth investigating about a die by rolling it, but all you actually establish by repeating the process is your level of suspicion, you can't ever prove that the die is not fair by statistics alone.

You can prove as much by statistics as you can by any form of observation.

Obviously testing that die will show that it is astronimically unlikely to be 'fair', and continued testing will show that it is arbitarily unlikely to be 'fair'.

Roog
2008-06-02, 09:24 AM
This seems like the best spot to draw the line. We can say that Magic is theoretically knowlable in a scientific manner but at the same time say that it is practially impossible to figure out the causal laws at play. Heck, we might be getting near that point already with real science. I'm reminded of the quote by Oppenhiemer (at least I think it was him, might have been Feinman though), who said "Anyone who thinks they understand Quantam Mechanics doesn't."

I think that where you draw the line depends not on the magic, but on the observer.

AKA_Bait
2008-06-02, 09:25 AM
You can prove as much by statistics as you can by any form of observation.


Indeed, statistics (at least useful ones) are just organized compilations of observation. Honestly, that's all science really is anyway. It's impossible to 'prove' a physical law. All you can do is 'confirm' or 'disconfirm' it. The best laws, the ones we take as 'true' for all practical purposes are just very, very highly confirmed.


I think that where you draw the line depends not on the magic, but on the observer.

Of course it does. But in setting up a game world you can decide what the limitations of understanding are of the 'observer', meaning all the fictional characters in that setting. Despite the fact that theoretically it's a non-existant line, practically for every creature in the setting (or the PC's, or whatever subdivisions you don't want to be vastly more powerful and smart than the rest of the setting) it's a hard and very real line. More importantly for the topic, it's a line that allows a meaningful distinction bettween scientific truth and magical truth.

nagora
2008-06-02, 09:30 AM
But is "its center of mass is in the center and all faces, corners etc are evenly and correctly distributed" the definition of a 'fair die'? It is quite possible to have dice that roll fairly which do not fit that description. Are they not 'fair' dice?

That's a different question; if I take an umbrella when it is raining, does it mean that it will rain if I take my umbrella?

If a die always rolls 6, is it lucky or biased? If you say "biased" how do you prove it?

AKA_Bait
2008-06-02, 09:33 AM
If a die always rolls 6, is it lucky or biased? If you say "biased" how do you prove it?

How do you prove the lucky? More importantly, is there a meaningful difference bettween the two when the results are the same? I honestly don't see one.

Roog
2008-06-02, 09:38 AM
That's a different question; if I take an umbrella when it is raining, does it mean that it will rain if I take my umbrella?

No, but "I take an umbrella when it is raining" does mean that "if I do not have an umbrella then it is not raining".


If a die always rolls 6, is it lucky or biased? If you say "biased" how do you prove it?

How do I prove anything - by observing.

How do I prove that a preponderance of sixes is bias - I define bias with a definition based on observations.

Then I observe for long enough to show that it is significantly unlikely that the deviation from what would be expected from a fair die is caused by chance.

Then, when you ask "But, how do you know?", I guess that a discussion of the nature of probability will not persuade you. So, I set the threshhold as high as YOU want (couldn't happen by chance in my lifetime, OK; couldn't happen by chance in a million years, OK; couldn't happen by chance in the lifetime of the universe, OK). Then I keep rolling that die until I hit that threshhold, I doesn't take that long, and you know what - it just keeps rolling sixes.

Tokiko Mima
2008-06-02, 09:39 AM
Ah, this brings back memories for me. Back when I started posting on the forums I was involved in an discussion very similiar to this one. It's pretty circular: natural phenomenon encompass everything in our universe that we can observe and measure. Ergo, if magic actually worked and produced measurable results it would become a natural event, instead of a supernatural one. Thus magic as defined as a 'supernatural force or event' cannot happen because the moment it did it would cease to be magic and instead become an occurance as yet unexplained by science. So anything magic can do science can do because the moment magic does anything, it becomes science.

Many catgirls died to bring you this explanation, so show some respect! :smallwink:

pendell
2008-06-02, 09:41 AM
Reading through this thread, I want to throw in something purely for the sake of argument...

There seems to be an assumed dichotomy between science and magic -- science follows hard and fast rules. Magic can do what is impossible for science, and that's why magic doesn't exist -- because it is impossible.

I want to look at that word 'impossible'.

Sez who, exactly?

Because it's against the Laws of Science? But who made those laws, and just how 'unbreakable' are they?

Add in a little philosophy here .. what if reality was consensual, rather than Objective? What if the 'laws' of science were not objective, but were simply what people believed them to be? What if, in the monk's question, a tree didn't make a sound if no one was there to observe it ... because there was no reality apart from the observer?

In such a world, science and magic could co-exist and not be logical contradictions. Science would be the study of the natural laws of the universe. But magic would be the knowledge that those 'laws' could be bent, broken , or simply re-written. Access to the kernel software, if you will.

Of course, in such a world "magicians" -- people who altered the rules of the universe -- would probably be mostly crazy. Because they would literally not be living in the same reality as everyone else.

In such a world, magic would not be limited by laws. Magic would be limited only by one's imagination ,and the raw power (whatever that mechanism would be) to convert what one imagines into the reality everyone else experiences.

And that's where the evil overlord comes in. The evil overlord's objective would be to manipulate this raw power (generated by people's belief, perhaps, if it was a consensual universe) and to shape the world into his/her own image, to rewrite the entire universe in his own image.

If he's successful -- he is a god of a sort.

If he fails -- he's another crazy in a straitjacket, claiming all sort of things but no one else experiences that reality.

Perhaps there would be an order of magicians in such a universe -- a universe where some Being or council of beings had decreed that the universe should run a certain way. It would then be the task of these police officers to run down rogue magicians who were attempting to altar that reality to suit their own whims and purposes. It would be the duty of the order to stop the rogue and smooth out whatever damage he had done to reality. A time-travel story.

The bottom line I'm trying to get at is that the magic/science dichotomy that some here are drawing only makes sense in a universe where the 'laws' of science are immutable, always rational, always logical. Where the act of observation or the presence of the observer, or his/her feelings, intentions, desires, in no way have an impact on reality. A world where a tree makes a sound regardless of whether someone observes it or not.

And that doesn't seem to me to be the way a magical universe would work at all. Given things like Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, we're not even entirely sure that's true of *our* universe.

In a universe where reality is subjective, magic and science correspond and dovetail quite neatly, the possible and the impossible sort of blending together. Magic in such a world is neither a contradiction .. it is simply meta, over and above the normal rules.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

Roog
2008-06-02, 09:53 AM
Reading through this thread, I want to throw in something purely for the sake of argument...

There seems to be an assumed dichotomy between science and magic -- science follows hard and fast rules. Magic can do what is impossible for science, and that's why magic doesn't exist -- because it is impossible.

No Matthew has been describing magic that does what is impossible for magic.


The bottom line I'm trying to get at is that the magic/science dichotomy that some here are drawing only makes sense in a universe where the 'laws' of science are immutable, always rational, always logical. Where the act of observation or the presence of the observer, or his/her feelings, intentions, desires, in no way have an impact on reality. A world where a tree makes a sound regardless of whether someone observes it or not.

The laws/rules/limits of magic/science only need to be describable for us to discuss them. I don't think that magic by Matthew's definition is describable in any way that would limit it.

pendell
2008-06-02, 09:59 AM
Reading through this thread, I want to throw in something purely for the sake of argument...

There seems to be an assumed dichotomy between science and magic -- science follows hard and fast rules. Magic can do what is impossible for science, and that's why magic doesn't exist -- because it is impossible.

I want to look at that word 'impossible'.

Sez who, exactly?

Because it's against the Laws of Science? But who made those laws, and just how 'unbreakable' are they?

Add in a little philosophy here .. what if reality was consensual, rather than Objective? What if the 'laws' of science were not objective, but were simply what people believed them to be? What if, in the monk's question, a tree didn't make a sound if no one was there to observe it ... because there was no reality apart from the observer?

In such a world, science and magic could co-exist and not be logical contradictions. Science would be the study of the natural laws of the universe. But magic would be the knowledge that those 'laws' could be bent, broken , or simply re-written. Access to the kernel software, if you will.

Of course, in such a world "magicians" -- people who altered the rules of the universe -- would probably be mostly crazy. Because they would literally not be living in the same reality as everyone else.

In such a world, magic would not be limited by laws. Magic would be limited only by one's imagination ,and the raw power (whatever that mechanism would be) to convert what one imagines into the reality everyone else experiences.

And that's where the evil overlord comes in. The evil overlord's objective would be to manipulate this raw power (generated by people's belief, perhaps, if it was a consensual universe) and to shape the world into his/her own image, to rewrite the entire universe in his own image.

If he's successful -- he is a god of a sort.

If he fails -- he's another crazy in a straitjacket, claiming all sort of things but no one else experiences that reality.

Perhaps there would be an order of magicians in such a universe -- a universe where some Being or council of beings had decreed that the universe should run a certain way. It would then be the task of these police officers to run down rogue magicians who were attempting to altar that reality to suit their own whims and purposes. It would be the duty of the order to stop the rogue and smooth out whatever damage he had done to reality. A time-travel story.

The bottom line I'm trying to get at is that the magic/science dichotomy that some here are drawing only makes sense in a universe where the 'laws' of science are immutable, always rational, always logical. Where the act of observation or the presence of the observer, or his/her feelings, intentions, desires, in no way have an impact on reality. A world where a tree makes a sound regardless of whether someone observes it or not.

And that doesn't seem to me to be the way a magical universe would work at all. Given things like Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, we're not even entirely sure that's true of *our* universe.

In a universe where reality is subjective, magic and science correspond and dovetail quite neatly, the possible and the impossible sort of blending together. Magic in such a world is neither a contradiction .. it is simply meta, over and above the normal rules.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

AKA_Bait
2008-06-02, 10:00 AM
Add in a little philosophy here .. what if reality was consensual, rather than Objective? What if the 'laws' of science were not objective, but were simply what people believed them to be? What if, in the monk's question, a tree didn't make a sound if no one was there to observe it ... because there was no reality apart from the observer?

Well, you then have several problems actually.

1. Are you just postulating solipsim? i.e. does nothing actually exist aside from the observer and is the 'observed' simply created by the observer?

2. Who is the observer? NPCs? PCs?

3. If you aren't going for solipsism, how do you negotiate different observers' points of view? Do they merge into an overall system?

4. Do effects only work on those who 'believe' in them?

5. Does belief have a categorzable value or potency?


In such a world, science and magic could co-exist and not be logical contradictions. Science would be the study of the natural laws of the universe. But magic would be the knowledge that those 'laws' could be bent, broken , or simply re-written. Access to the kernel software, if you will.

Welcome back to the loop. If there are consistant ways to bend or break the laws then there are in fact just extra scientific laws and once again science = magic. It's just a difference science than the one we have at this stage.


The bottom line I'm trying to get at is that the magic/science dichotomy that some here are drawing only makes sense in a universe where the 'laws' of science are immutable, always rational, always logical.

Well, that's what laws of science are... the thing you seem to be missing here is that although the theoretical laws are immutable we don't, and never can, know exactly what they are. We can have theories that are more and less confirmed by testing. Since we can never test something an infinite number of times (to know it will always work, and hence be a scientific law, our theories are and must be mutable. If something disconfirms a theory that just means that the old theory needs revision to encompass the new results. Your bending and breaking would just be new, as yet outside of a theoretical framework, results.


Where the act of observation or the presence of the observer, or his/her feelings, intentions, desires, in no way have an impact on reality. A world where a tree makes a sound regardless of whether someone observes it or not.

Not Necc. There could theoretically be testable laws that govern how someones feelings, intentions, desires have an impact on reality in a scientific world. The laws would just be different than those in our own. Well, that depends upon who you ask actually. Crowley and his followers like Peter Carroll would say the world works more like your theoretical magical one.

Matthew
2008-06-02, 10:03 AM
No Matthew has been describing magic that does what is impossible for magic.

Hmmn. I think the idea was more that magic is a word for describing impossible. Of course, if magic then achieves impossible things it is fair to say that magic does the impossible without making it possible, and thus "magic does things that are also impossible for magic to do." I think if you state the latter outside of its context, though, you lose the full meaning.

nagora
2008-06-02, 10:07 AM
How do I prove anything - by observing.

Foolishly I thought it would be through a process of elimination of alternative theories by experiment.

All you're doing is observing. If I say "This die is not biased, it's just luck that has casued it to roll 6 3,501,146 times in a row" observing it achieves exactly nothing as regards my statement.

I have claimed that the die is not biased; that can be proven wrong by finding a mechanism whereby the die can be shown to be restrained from falling on certain numbers. It can not be proven wrong by just continuing to roll the die.

You are thrashing about trying to avoid the issue, which is that the die in question is undoubtedly impossible yet I have asked you what you would do with such a die. I think that's the core problem here - in a world without magic we can't really imagine what magic is like. Like you, we try almost anything including contradictory definitions of bias and luck in order to avoid just going "That's impossible!".

But a die which has no reason to land on any side more often than any other yet persists in doing so is impossible. That's magic.

AKA_Bait
2008-06-02, 10:18 AM
Hmmn. I think the idea was more that magic is a word for describing impossible. Of course, if magic then achieves impossible things it is fair to say that magic does the impossible without making it possible, and thus "magic does things that are also impossible for magic to do." I think if you state the latter outside of its context, though, you lose the full meaning.

Honestly, this confuses me. Does that mean that magic is unbound by the principle of the excluded middle under your conception? If so, magic is fundimentally paradoxical. Most folks don't want to allow things that are fundimentally paradoxical into their ontology. If they do, then there really can't be a logical basis for anything. Be it science or magic.

Roog
2008-06-02, 10:23 AM
Foolishly I thought it would be through a process of elimination of alternative theories by experiment.

All you're doing is observing. If I say "This die is not biased, it's just luck that has casued it to roll 6 3,501,146 times in a row" observing it achieves exactly nothing as regards my statement.

What is bias, except for a tendancy towards some outcomes over others?


I have claimed that the die is not biased; that can be proven wrong by finding a mechanism whereby the die can be shown to be restrained from falling on certain numbers. It can not be proven wrong by just continuing to roll the die.

I made no statements and drew no conclusions about the shape of the die - I simply observed bias.



You are thrashing about trying to avoid the issue, which is that the die in question is undoubtedly impossible yet I have asked you what you would do with such a die. I think that's the core problem here - in a world without magic we can't really imagine what magic is like. Like you, we try almost anything including contradictory definitions of bias and luck in order to avoid just going "That's impossible!".

No, the reason I ask for deatils of the die, is because I want to find the point where reality fails to hold up to the expected model, and starts to follow a different model.

As a PC I can use that breaking point to break the universe or the game. If this is a science fiction game then trying to break the universe is entirely within genre.



But a die which has no reason to land on any side more often than any other yet persists in doing so is impossible. That's magic.
How can I conclude that there is no reason? I simply have not found a reason (and maybe I'll never find a reason). But I observe the phenomenon, and construct a set of rules to model its behavior - that's Science.

And if it turns out that the dice really is impossible not just following some aparently non-general rules, for example if:

- it really does roll and random number from 1-6 and that random number is always six
- it always rolls a six and my statistical tests still tell me that it is non-biased
- it is truely 'fair' and any thinking being will recognise it as such even when it continues to roll sixes

then that would be a self-inconsistent artifact, and that would be magic by Matthew's definition.

AKA_Bait
2008-06-02, 10:25 AM
But a die which has no reason to land on any side more often than any other yet persists in doing so is impossible. That's magic.

Here is the problem though. It's literally impossible to determine that something has 'no reason' to do what it is doing. In the end, it boils down to a scientific determinism issue. Either there are causal laws which bind the universe or there are no such laws. The fact that we do not, and perhaps cannot, know what all of those laws are is beside the point. In the end, Johnson was right by saying either everything is random or everything is determined.

This is why for magical systems I advocate using the proposal above if you want a consistant system. There are knowable scientific laws and unknowable scientific laws. Those effects in the world which are governed by the latter we call magic.

nagora
2008-06-02, 10:25 AM
Honestly, this confuses me. Does that mean that magic is unbound by the principle of the excluded middle under your conception? If so, magic is fundimentally paradoxical.
That is a fairly common description of magic, IME.

Matthew
2008-06-02, 10:27 AM
Honestly, this confuses me. Does that mean that magic is unbound by the principle of the excluded middle under your conception? If so, magic is fundimentally paradoxical. Most folks don't want to allow things that are fundimentally paradoxical into their ontology. If they do, then there really can't be a logical basis for anything. Be it science or magic.

Yep, that's been the general course of this thread.

New Poster - "That's impossible and here's why"
Me - "Yes, I know."

The last part there that says there cannot be a logical basis for anything is where I disagree and where a lot of other discussion has headed off to. It's the reason we have ended up having to redefine universe so that things can exist outside it that literally are not rational or capable of rational explanation.

AKA_Bait
2008-06-02, 10:30 AM
That is a fairly common description of magic, IME.

Honestly, I haven't found that to be the case. Most fiction I have read either postulates some basical laws involved in the use of magic (in say the Dreseden Files books), doesn't get into the topic of how magic works at all, or postulates something like what I have suggested above, namely that magic functions according to some set of rules but that those rules are beyond the mortal kenn.

Can you give me an example or three of a fictional system where magic is openly a true paradox rather than an unknown or unknowable?

nagora
2008-06-02, 10:33 AM
Here is the problem though. It's literally impossible to determine that something has 'no reason' to do what it is doing. In the end, it boils down to a scientific determinism issue. Either there are causal laws which bind the universe or there are no such laws. The fact that we do not, and perhaps cannot, know what all of those laws are is beside the point. In the end, Johnson was right by saying either everything is random or everything is determined.

Why can we not imagine a localised suspention of cause and effect? Sure, the localised area itself is created through a knowable system, perhaps, but what then transpires within it for its duration does is non-deterministic. There are causal laws, including the laws which deal with the suspention of causal laws.



This is why for magical systems I advocate using the proposal above if you want a consistant system. There are knowable scientific laws and unknowable scientific laws. Those effects in the world which are governed by the latter we call magic.
I agree that this is the practical solution for gaming.

Matthew
2008-06-02, 10:38 AM
Can you give me an example or three of a fictional system where magic is openly a true paradox rather than an unknown or unknowable?

Good question. That is one of the things that I really wanted to explore. I suspect certain real world religions conceive of 'magic' or 'miracles' as a paradox, but we cannot discuss those here. Most fictional explanations for magic leave me thinking "what a load of BS", which is why I don't use them when I game. So, my next best bet is to go with Conan and the Cthulu Mythos, which is where we are at in the other thread.

AKA_Bait
2008-06-02, 10:49 AM
Yep, that's been the general course of this thread.

New Poster - "That's impossible and here's why"
Me - "Yes, I know."

The last part there that says there cannot be a logical basis for anything is where I disagree and where a lot of other discussion has headed off to. It's the reason we have ended up having to redefine universe so that things can exist outside it that literally are not rational or capable of rational explanation.

The reason for the second part is, as I said above, there either are governing laws for the universe/metauniverse or there are not. If there are no governing laws, then everything must essentially be random since there are no extrapolations of behavior.

I guess in the end then I'm wondering why you are insisting on including a paradox in your system when you can, in my view, more easily use a system with unknowable laws.

Thinking about it more, the confusion may stem from a conflation in the notion of paradox. There can be multiple kinds of paradox. I'd suggest that the paradox created by magic is an antimony (i.e. a paradox that is exists within our currently accepted forms of reasoning but which may in fact not be a paradox under other forms of reasoning). This kind of paradox is not resolvable under current, or perhaps possible for humans, lines of thought. It is not, however, strictly false.

What those who are arguing the impossibility position seem to be saying is that your paradox is a falsidical paradox, i.e. one that is actually false.

This isn't really the place to get into it too much, but if you are interested W.V. Quine has a very interesting article on the subject which if you like philosophy I would strongly encourage you to read. I've made reference to the distinction in there myself in my own published work.



Why can we not imagine a localised suspention of cause and effect? Sure, the localised area itself is created through a knowable system, perhaps, but what then transpires within it for its duration does is non-deterministic. There are causal laws, including the laws which deal with the suspention of causal laws.


Honestly, I cannot imagine a world where there are no causal laws. I'm not sure anyone else can either. Kant would certianly say that it's hardwired into the human mind that there is cause and effect. This doesn't mean that it's not possible, just that it's not really concievable for humans without paradox simply because we experience things in cause and effect. This space, outside human conception but inside possiblity, is exactly where I would put 'magic'.


Good question. That is one of the things that I really wanted to explore. I suspect certain real world religions conceive of 'magic' or 'miracles' as a paradox, but we cannot discuss those here.

Some of those do tend to embrace paradox, but because the world is essentially viewed as not real and part of the point is to get beyond the modes of thinking which bind us to it. Magic and Miracles are not usually explained via paradox but within the context they don't really need explanation at all, since the world isn't 'real' to begin with. But you are right that we can't delve too deep into the real ones here.


Most fictional explanations for magic leave me thinking "what a load of BS", which is why I don't use them when I game. So, my next best bet is to go with Conan and the Cthulu Mythos, which is where we are at in the other thread.

Most do the same for me. It's why I prefer to go with either fictional expectations that are kind of a loose science with the unerlying notion that humans can't really understand fully why things operate the way they do but can get certian effects. Almost like a child who pushes a button on a toy which lights up. He canmake it light up, but beyond the act of pushing the button, he has no idea why.

I looked at the thread you mentioned, but since I haven't read either of those, I have no frame of reference to contribute, sadly. :-(

pendell
2008-06-02, 10:53 AM
1. Are you just postulating solipsim? i.e. does nothing actually exist aside from the observer and is the 'observed' simply created by the observer?

2. Who is the observer? NPCs? PCs?

3. If you aren't going for solipsism, how do you negotiate different observers' points of view? Do they merge into an overall system?


I should clarify, first, that I am primarily talking about universes to tell stories in, *not* the one we both live in.


#1: I would say solipsism is a subset -- an extreme endpoint -- of possible universes.

Getting back to the idea of fictional universes, I think you can draw a direct correlation between how high/low magic a universe is and how much people can change the rules simply by wishing them otherwise.

On one end of the scale you have pure solipsism -- the world is nothing but a shared dream, and logic is entirely useless because the rules can change from minute to minute, with no more logic than a dream.

On the other end of the scale you have a pure scientific universe, in which the physical laws are exactly that. Humans are simply actors within the system, they cannot get outside it to change the rules.

A "magical universe" in which I'd like to tell stories should be about 60% up the scale from pure scientific. Thus, the phrase 'consensual reality'. Reality exists outside the observer, but only because there are a multitude of other observers in the system. The consensus of all the observers resolves into reality. It merges as you say.

That's why it's reality ... because although individuals may not accept the consensus, there are simply too few of them to alter the consensus. So one man may believe that gravity allows him to fall up instead of down, but he can't do it.

Therefore , the universe exists outside of the mind of the actual observer, but it is also affected by it as well.


Question 2: What constitutes an observer?
Depends on the story you're trying to tell.

The first prima facie answer would be 'all humans'. But why limit it to that? What if there are demons, djinn, angels, fairies, etc.? Shouldn't they be observers too? Then you've got a fairy tale world like Discworld.

And why assume sentience is necessary? What about animals and plants? In such a universe, everything is alive is an observer and contributes to consensual reality -- that's George Lucas' Star Wars.

And are all observers equal? What if one observer has more power than another, whatever 'power' means?

Well, then you could even build a monotheist magical world. Simply take your set of observers, designate one as 'God', and give him a power level of eleventy billion trillion kazillion where everyone else has a level at maximum in the thousands. In such a world, 'God' could make anything happen he wanted to, but no one else could unless God chose to permit it.



4. Do effects only work on those who 'believe' in them?


Hmm .. in a story I would want to tell, I would say that the ability of one individual to defy the Consensus would be very limited. He might not be able to , say, fly. But he might be able to adjust the probability of a die coming up 6 from 1/6 to , say, 1/5.

I would say that , therefore, that it depends on how strong the 'belief' is. As a rule, the universe is what it is. One step up the scale, you could have one person able to achieve local effects when no one else is looking. Say, a kid who could levitate only when no one else was around.

The next step up the scale you have a group of people who can influence reality locally, but it's maintained for a limited area and disappears when exposed to the larger consensus. An example might be a worship service where people could walk out of wheelchairs ... but put the same group of people in a lab, and nothing happens, because the Consensus is now strong enough to overwhelm the local reality this group of people create.

The next step up ... get enough people to believe in something, and the Consensus changes. Now it no longer effects just those who believe in it, but even those who don't. Once upon a time salt was valuable. Now, hardly anyone thinks salt is valuable and therefore it isn't, and those few who remember a time when it was are so few and far between that they are powerless to alter the new consensual reality. They may be able to get together and form a group where salt once again has value, but it will have no effect whatsoever outside their group.

Of course, the real tricky question is what happens when a consensus is so unclear -- when two different views of the world are nearly tied, as the US presidential election was in 2004 or the current primary in 2008. What do you have then? I imagine a world like Piers Antony's Phaze in the book 'Juxtaposition' -- a time of chaos, of constantly shifting reality until finally the Consensus settles into a new form. Or like the Time of Troubles in Forgotten Realms. Might make an interesting series of novels.



Welcome back to the loop. If there are consistant ways to bend or break the laws then there are in fact just extra scientific laws and once again science = magic. It's just a difference science than the one we have at this stage.


Agree. Or you might call magic 'metascience' -- the art of causing change in conformity with the will, of rewriting the natural laws. The mere fact that it would be poorly understood would not stop it from being science. There's a lot of purely natural science no one understands either!

Respectfully,

Brian P.

Matthew
2008-06-02, 11:06 AM
The reason for the second part is, as I said above, there either are governing laws for the universe/metauniverse or there are not. If there are nogoverning laws, then everything must essentially be random since there are no extrapolations of behavior.

Right, but what I am seeking to do here is imagine a fictional reality where that is not the case.



I guess in the end then I'm wondering why you are insisting on including a paradox in your system when you can, in my view, more easily use a system with unknowable laws.

Ah, the reason why... Just to stretch the imagination really.



Thinking about it more, the confusion may stem from a conflation in the notion of paradox. There can be multiple kinds of paradox. I'd suggest that the paradox created by magic is an antimony (i.e. a paradox that is exists within our currently accepted forms of reasoning but which may in fact not be a paradox under other forms of reasoning). This kind of paradox is not resolvable under current, or perhaps possible for humans, lines of thought. It is not, however, strictly false.

What those who are arguing the impossibility position seem to be saying is that your paradox is a falsidical paradox, i.e. one that is actually false.

This isn't really the place to get into it too much, but if you are interested W.V. Quine has a very interesting article on the subject which if you like philosophy I would strongly encourage you to read. I've made reference to the distinction in there myself in my own published work.

Sounds interesting, I will make a note of it. I was hoping somebody might eventually say something about paradoxes.



Some of those do tend to embrace paradox, but because the world is essentially viewed as not real and part of the point is to get beyond the modes of thinking which bind us to it. Magic and Miracles are not usually explained via paradox but within the context they don't really need explanation at all, since the world isn't 'real' to begin with. But you are right that we can't delve too deep into the real ones here.

Yep, the non real world is definitely part of this process of thought. The world as a shadow of true reality is definitely part of my fantasy thought processes.



Most do the same for me. It's why I prefer to go with either fictional expectations that are kind of a loose science with the unerlying notion that humans can't really understand fully why things operate the way they do but can get certian effects. Almost like a child who pushes a button on a toy which lights up. He canmake it light up, but beyond the act of pushing the button, he has no idea why.

Yeah, that's a perfectly usable version... but, I don't like how that then interacts with conceptions of godhead and deities, so I ended up looking for another explanation.



I looked at the thread you mentioned, but since I haven't read either of those, I have no frame of reference to contribute, sadly. :-(

They're all available to read online or you can buy the sexy new hard back editions for $40 each. Excellent reads, such a good break from a lot of modern fantasy literature.

AKA_Bait
2008-06-02, 11:19 AM
Yep, the non real world is definitely part of this process of thought. The world as a shadow of true reality is definitely part of my fantasy thought processes.

Well, to skirt the line a little, in some eastern traditions there is no 'true reality' at all, only nonexistence is 'true'. In others, the 'true reality' is an undefineable in human terms whole (not that some western authors don't try to define it from time to time...).


Yeah, that's a perfectly usable version... but, I don't like how that then interacts with conceptions of godhead and deities, so I ended up looking for another explanation.

I'm curious as to what those problems are. You can give conceptions of godhead and deities simply more access to the 'metalaws'. In 3.5 D&D there are already some of the preconazince paradoxes that exist in real religions with greater deities.

@Pendell: You would probably like Peter Carroll's work. It's very very similar to what you are proposing there. Of course, he doesn't view it as fiction...

Matthew
2008-06-02, 11:29 AM
Well, to skirt the line a little, in some eastern traditions there is no 'true reality' at all, only nonexistence is 'true'. In others, the 'true reality' is an undefineable in human terms whole (not that some western authors don't try to define it from time to time...).

Yep, all interesting lines of thought.



I'm curious as to what those problems are. You can give conceptions of godhead and deities simply more access to the 'metalaws'. In 3.5 D&D there are already some of the preconazince paradoxes that exist in real religions with greater deities.

Well, without babbling on too much... religion in my campaign world is a form of monotheistic animism, where there is a godhead from which all power flows in totallity and is literally capable of anything. To place limits of any sort on the abilities of that true deity would be to begin to describe him, and describing him is impossible.

AKA_Bait
2008-06-02, 11:34 AM
Well, without babbling on too much... religion in my campaign world is a form of monotheistic animism, where there is a godhead from which all power flows in totallity and is literally capable of anything. To place limits of any sort on the abilities of that true deity would be to begin to describe him, and describing him is impossible.

I'd suggest looking at Advaita Vedanta and the treatment of Iswara/Brahman in Hinduism if you haven't already. That's very close to the theory you seem to be using for your setting. It's a totally valid theory within it's own paradigm and makes for an interesting setting.

The problem with a setting like that, for our purposes here not necc in play by any means, is that the magic/science line doesn't really exist/matter.

Matthew
2008-06-02, 11:38 AM
I'd suggest looking at Advaita Vedanta and the treatment of Iswara/Brahman in Hinduism if you haven't already. That's very close to the theory you seem to be using for your setting. It's a totally valid theory within it's own paradigm and makes for an interesting setting.

Indeed, I have nicked a bit from that source.



The problem with a setting like that, for our purposes here not necc in play by any means, is that the magic/science line doesn't really exist/matter.
Ah well, that rather depends on the role of the deity. For the moment, reality is set and unchanging, with laws that govern reality and forms of magic that could perhaps be described and have been like that since the beginning of recorded time. However, at any given moment any one of these laws could be over turned in some way, they just generally are not (they may have been already, but nobody really knows). Reality could be objective or it could be subjective, it's unknown. Most things, indeed, are unknown, but a pursuit of science would reveal the same things about this world as about our world.

Tyrrell
2008-06-03, 08:27 PM
Some games even use perceived paradox as a mechanic. Ars Magica makes magic more difficult if in the presence of those who don't believe it's possible. It gives you a public perception of reality which can be difficult for a magician to overcome even though the same feat may be easy for him out in the wilderness.

That's not actually true you're confusing Ars Magica with Mage.