"Any technology sufficiently advanced would be indistinguishable from Magic"

[Rasmus]

It's "magic" because it can't be measured/quantified/tested.

Yes, you've said so.

I disagree.

What do you actually have, what are you calling "it", what do you observe if it cannot be measured or quantified or tested?

Take homeopathy : We can measure it and find that it doesn't work. If we did measure it as before and suddenly found it working, then we'd have something that could possibly meet a definition of magic. (i.e. something that is actually there, but that is in violation of the laws of nature as we understand them.)

What good is magic that cannot be measured or quantified? How do you tell it apart from mere nothing?

Say I could magically turn lead into gold. Of course you could measure it: You could weight the amount of lead and gold I start with, and then count how much of each I end up with. Whatever lead is gone in the end and whatever gold I have more than I had when I started is a precise measure of my magic.

If that cannot be measured or counted, I would suggest that no magic is happening and I actually am not able to turn lead into gold.

 

[Mark6]

See my example just before your post. If you can measure input/output (lead/gold), you may be able to USE the technology, but not necessarily UNDERSTAND it.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Let me give an example here, what about Alchemy?

Alchemy posits transformations of materials that are impossible so far as we know. If they do become possible, with advanced technology, they move from alchemy to chemistry. Still not magic.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Yes, you've said so.

I disagree.

What do you actually have, what are you calling "it", what do you observe if it cannot be measured or quantified or tested?

Take homeopathy : We can measure it and find that it doesn't work. If we did measure it as before and suddenly found it working, then we'd have something that could possibly meet a definition of magic. (i.e. something that is actually there, but that is in violation of the laws of nature as we understand them.)

What good is magic that cannot be measured or quantified? How do you tell it apart from mere nothing?

Say I could magically turn lead into gold. Of course you could measure it: You could weight the amount of lead and gold I start with, and then count how much of each I end up with. Whatever lead is gone in the end and whatever gold I have more than I had when I started is a precise measure of my magic.

If that cannot be measured or counted, I would suggest that no magic is happening and I actually am not able to turn lead into gold.

And so there's no magic. What's your point?

 

[Maus]

In a more recent interview with Clark, he seemed to have changed his tune on this a bit.

He indicated that as we become more technologically reliant (advanced) we have become less sensitive to technology.

In other words, we are to a point where we wouldn't be as awestruck by advanced technology now and moving forwards as we would have in the past.

Example: If you took someone from 1800 and moved them to now, they probably wouldn't be able to understand or even handle the overload of advancement we have today, but he felt taking someone from now and moving them to 200 years into the future we would be ok and able to adjust.

I'm probably wording it badly, but that's the gist of it anyway.

 

[Rasmus]

And so there's no magic. What's your point?

My point is that if there was magic, it could indeed be measured and I don't see why anyone would assume differently.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

My point is that if there was magic, it could indeed be measured and I don't see why anyone would assume differently.

I disagree, because it's magic, and defies measurability.

 

[Mark6]

Personally, I always interpreted that quote somewhat differently. Namely, the more advanced technology is, the less visible it is. In an old car you open a window by turning a rather obvious crank handle. In a modern car you push a very inconspicuous button. I do not know if there are any motion-controlled car windows, but I encounter various motion-controlled devices every day. You make them work by waving a hand, which is but a step away from wizard making gestures at a magic mirror.

To me, part of the definition of "mature technology" is that it is hidden. You use it without noticing it. And I expect there will be more of that. The world 50 or 100 years from now will resemble not so much "I, Robot" with large conspicuous mechanical servants everywhere, but magical fairyland where things "just happen" according to inhabitants' wishes, controlled by gestures, brief phrases, or just thought -- user interface embedded in one's nervous system.

Heinlein used famous phrase "The door dilated" to indicate future-ness of a particular setting. A similar and much better IMO example is several occasions in Alastair Reynolds' "Inhibitors" series where one or another character sketches a window. He or she sits in some enclosed aircraft, and to look outside simply draws with one finger the outline of a window on the wall. Which is beyond our current technology, but entirely believable in Reynolds' timeframe -- and is the kind of things people would want to have. I know I would!

 

[catsmate]

BOB: Hey, look, a magic rock!

JIM: No, it's not.

BOB: Dude. It's floating, and glowing, and every time you touch it a candy bar appears under it. That's magic.

JIM: It must be alien technology or something.

BOB: It's magic.

JIM: Magic doesn't exist.

BOB: What? Of course it does! It's RIGHT HERE. Magic is right here, glowing and pooping out candy while it levitates. That's magic.


So... how do you distinguish between the two at this point? I'm not saying magic exists, but I am saying that in the scenario above I would be hard pressed to come up with a way to distinguish between the two without defining magic as "something that doesn't exist" which feels like cheating.

I'm with Jim. We may not know how this technology works, and we would not be able to replicate it but we have ideas and concepts how it might work.
The light could be caused by a layer geneered bio-luminescent algae or tiny luminescent nanomachines or just a lot of really small LEDs; the floating could be accomplished by microscopic ducted fans or gravity manipulation; the candy bars could be produced by reorganisation of mass/energy or teleportation; we can think of ways it would be done, even if they are beyond our capabilities, therefore it's not magic but advanced science.

YOU can't distinguish between technology and magic in the original statement. That doesn't mean they are interchangeable, just that you don't have the tools to understand the technology.

Exactly. For technology to be taken as magic it would have to be really advanced relative to what we're experienced with.
For example; a modern handgun could be magical to someone from c. 1200CE who's never experienced gunpowder weapons; to someone from 1400CE it's an advanced hand-cannon.

 

[SOdhner]

The light could be caused by a layer geneered bio-luminescent algae or tiny luminescent nanomachines or just a lot of really small LEDs; the floating could be accomplished by microscopic ducted fans or gravity manipulation; the candy bars could be produced by reorganisation of mass/energy or teleportation; we can think of ways it would be done, even if they are beyond our capabilities, therefore it's not magic but advanced science.

Eh. That doesn't seem helpful, to me. You're still primarily making the distinction based off of your knowledge that magic doesn't exist. It's not that I don't agree (here, for the record: Magic does not exist) it's that that's not a way to DISTINGUISH between them. If magic DID exist, you could use those same rationalizations on it. "Yeah, it looked like that guy dressed as a wizard turned her into a frog, but it was probably done through some sort of teleportation."

You say so casually that it could have been done with "gravity manipulation" and "teleportation" - as if that's an answer. It just begs the question: how in the world do you teleport, or manipulate gravity? Maybe by magic?

We can be sure, deep in our skeptic hearts, that there is a scientific answer - but that doesn't mean we can distinguish ultra-high tech from magic in actual practice.

 

[GrandMasterFox]

See my example just before your post. If you can measure input/output (lead/gold), you may be able to USE the technology, but not necessarily UNDERSTAND it.

But what does that actually mean? "Understand it"?
How much do we have to understand something before it's de-classified from "magic"?

For example, I don't think in the dark ages people had problems with starting fires. But did they understand fire? Did they even know what oxygen is?

I'm betting "no" on that one. Did they consider starting fires as magic?

Alchemy posits transformations of materials that are impossible so far as we know. If they do become possible, with advanced technology, they move from alchemy to chemistry. Still not magic.

I think the bolded is actually the correct definition of magic. Magic is simply seeing stuff that we know doesn't work. That is why we call both necromancy and pulling a rabbit out of a hat as magic. Because it's stuff that "shouldn't" work.

If Rain Dancing would have actually worked through proper blind repeatative testings, then we could get to the point where every town has its rain dancers and the entire thing become completely accustomed to us that we would recognize it as technological without even understanding *how* it works.

 

[Akhenaten]

In a more recent interview with Clark, he seemed to have changed his tune on this a bit.

He indicated that as we become more technologically reliant (advanced) we have become less sensitive to technology.

In other words, we are to a point where we wouldn't be as awestruck by advanced technology now and moving forwards as we would have in the past.

Example: If you took someone from 1800 and moved them to now, they probably wouldn't be able to understand or even handle the overload of advancement we have today, but he felt taking someone from now and moving them to 200 years into the future we would be ok and able to adjust.

I'm probably wording it badly, but that's the gist of it anyway.

Makes sense to me. At the same time that we've experienced an exponential increase in our understanding of new technology we've had the inverse effect applied to our ability to be bamboozled.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Makes sense to me. At the same time that we've experienced an exponential increase in our understanding of new technology we've had the inverse effect applied to our ability to be bamboozled.

Wasn't he just saying that the technology that isn't too advanced wouldn't be indistinguishable from magic?

 

[Egg]

I'm a little confused as to how we would define magic as anything other than some kind of technology we don't/can't understand, unless we define it as an impossibility.

Assuming that magic would not be totally random, if it works consistently and some kind of being is able to manipulate it (eg. create a magic ring that makes the wearer invisible or summon fire in their fingertips) there would presumably be some of reason or mechanism as to why that works, even if it's completely beyond our understanding.

In reference to a point made earlier, I see no reason to assume that humans would be capable of understanding all the workings of the universe. So if technologically advance aliens exist somewhere, they could be so "other" from us, that it's quite possible that they could understand concepts that our brains were incapable of touching.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I'm a little confused as to how we would define magic as anything other than some kind of technology we don't/can't understand, unless we define it as an impossibility.

Assuming that magic would not be totally random, if it works consistently and some kind of being is able to manipulate it (eg. create a magic ring that makes the wearer invisible or summon fire in their fingertips) there would presumably be some of reason or mechanism as to why that works, even if it's completely beyond our understanding.

In reference to a point made earlier, I see no reason to assume that humans would be capable of understanding all the workings of the universe. So if technologically advance aliens exist somewhere, they could be so "other" from us, that it's quite possible that they could understand concepts that our brains were incapable of touching.

First, magic is a total fiction. So requiring it to obey laws that make it easier to force it into your favored position is a bit a iffy matter, no?

 

[Rasmus]

So if technologically advance aliens exist somewhere, they could be so "other" from us, that it's quite possible that they could understand concepts that our brains were incapable of touching.

I don't think that that is likely at all, and I only can't rule out "possible" because the idea is defined in a way that I couldn't reasonably do so.

But judging at the available evidence, so far the human brain has not shut down on anything yet, has it? Is there anything where the current consensus is that our brain simply cannot grasp the underlying concepts?

And even the few things where it might be argued that our brains are not capable of understanding them find themselves clad in analogies and reduced down to formulas that our brains can work with.

 

[Egg]

But judging at the available evidence, so far the human brain has not shut down on anything yet, has it?

I wasn't suggesting it would shut down.

Is there anything where the current consensus is that our brain simply cannot grasp the underlying concepts?

No, but then we wouldn't necessarily know that we aren't grasping something if we were incapable of grasping it. It would be an unknown unknown.

And even the few things where it might be argued that our brains are not capable of understanding them find themselves clad in analogies and reduced down to formulas that our brains can work with.

So why couldn't there be some things so far beyond human perception that no amount of analogy would get us anywhere close? How could we ever know?

 

[Rasmus]

I wasn't suggesting it would shut down.
No, but then we wouldn't necessarily know that we aren't grasping something if we were incapable of grasping it. It would be an unknown unknown.

meh. Yes, that is of course possible in the strictest sense - but too vague and too far fetched to be worthy of discussion.

So why couldn't there be some things so far beyond human perception that no amount of analogy would get us anywhere close? How could we ever know?

Not being aware of something isn't the same thing as being incapable of understanding it.

Again, you are using a concept that we cannot talk about *by definition*.

The same thing gets trotted out a lot when it comes to humans vs. god when the usual analogy is that it would be similar to ants vs. humans. There it will be pointed out that we couldn't understand god the same way ants couldn't understand humans.

The problem there is that ants don't understand *anything*. They lack the ability for "understanding". We don't. It's a qualitative difference, not a quantitative one.

 

[Egg]

meh. Yes, that is of course possible in the strictest sense - but too vague and too far fetched to be worthy of discussion.

Vague in so far as saying we don't know what we don't know. I've no idea how to judge just how far fetched the idea is. Since we're creatures adapted to survive in the environment we evolved in, I'm not sure it seems so implausible myself.

Not being aware of something isn't the same thing as being incapable of understanding it.

No, but I suspect not understanding something might make you unaware of something, or at least many aspects of that thing.

Again, you are using a concept that we cannot talk about *by definition*.

Sure. We can't talk really talk about some imagined thing that we wouldn't understand with any authority whatsoever. That doesn't mean to say we can't discuss the concept that such things might exist. In fact that's exactly what we are doing.

The same thing gets trotted out a lot when it comes to humans vs. god when the usual analogy is that it would be similar to ants vs. humans. There it will be pointed out that we couldn't understand god the same way ants couldn't understand humans.

The problem there is that ants don't understand *anything*. They lack the ability for "understanding". We don't. It's a qualitative difference, not a quantitative one.

I agree that it's a flawed analogy for the reason you suggest. However, I don't think the idea behind the analogy is entirely without merit in this instance.

If perhaps we used a dog as an example. My dog is pretty bright as dogs go. He can distinguish between various toys, respond to dozens of commands and reacts to cues I don't even know I'm giving. He's never going to understand the concepts involved in computer programming though.

So perhaps there are concepts which we would only come to grips with if we studied for 200 years or if our intelligence was significantly improved.

There's still a qualitative difference involved in the analogy, but who's to say there might not be a further qualitative difference involved in an alien intelligence? Some inter-dimensional beings or even some other concept of life and intelligence which our imaginations haven't considered yet that allow for an understanding of the universe on a level we're incapable of.

Anyway, this is drifting away from the original point in the thread. My point was really in exploring definitions of "magic". My thinking is that something using some kind of technology beyond our understanding might not be merely indistinguishable from magic, but by some definitions, might actually be magic.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Anyway, this is drifting away from the original point in the thread. My point was really in exploring definitions of "magic". My thinking is that something using some kind of technology beyond our understanding might not be merely indistinguishable from magic, but by some definitions, might actually be magic.

Technology is measurable, quantifiable and testable. Magic isn't.