Thoughts on magic

[SeriouslyMikey]

It's a load of nonsense. 

[Albatross]

If it can't be replicated, observed, explained through science and repeated it doesn't exist.

 

...but what if it just can't be observed with our knowledge at the moment?

[Serin]

 

 

But what if current science can explain it. We have discovered very small amounts of our universe and can't explain very much. Maybe magick is 'scientific' but we just haven't discovered how to replicate it.

 

 

Lemme know when that happens. In the mean time I'll continue not believing in things without any verifiable evidence.

Something something about having an open mind but not to the point that your brain falls out...

EDIT: Besides - if it can be explained with science its not magic

[TechStyle]

The burden of proof is on the person claiming something exists.

ie: I don't have to prove bigfoot exists.

 

I have never seen any evidence that magic is real.  I am a scientist.  I accept facts and logic.  

If someone can show me solid evidence then I will reevaluate my position.

 

Except what is considered fact and logic but not the culmination of the human condition?

 

-

 

On the topic of magic. Magic is just a fancy word humans have labeled something they do not understand. In other words, it's an unexplored science. Magic exists in the same way darkness exist. It's absence of something. While darkness itself doesn't truly exist, it's the absence of light that makes it so. Magic is just the absence of understanding. Also magic has other synonyms in this context. 

 

On the topic of magick. I once got 99 magic(k) on RuneScape.

[Albatross]

EDIT: Besides - if it can be explained with science its not magic

 

That's not all that true though. There are multiple definitions and practices of magic in history that do not view it as a supernatural force, like you see in many games like FF, TES etc. Many Wiccans practice "magic" as a science. And who is to say that the things happening in the natural world wasn't just perceived as "magic" because the people couldn't understand it?

[Moondrelor]

@dalekphalm

Everything you said is on point. Especially the part about how things we didn't understand then was magic, but now science has broken it down and studied it, and turned it into something we all understand and use everyday.

 

Just like how anyone who had a skill in something that people couldn't understand back in the old days they'd call that person a witch if it scared the public or the royals didn't want anyone to learn of that skill. Thus "Burn the witch!".

 

@Clanscorpia

Nothing a human can do is supernatural. Please read the definition of magic given below.

The only thing that makes something "supernatural", is something that people can't quite understand how or why it happens. Though as @dalekphalm explains, that of which we do not understand, will eventually be understood as our brains or more and more capable of understanding the concepts given to us. Usually via science. 

 

mag·ic

ˈmajik/

noun

 

1. 1.

   the power of apparently influencing the course of events by using mysterious or supernatural forces.

[Sauron]

But why

 

Because physics prove it doesn't. If you're telling me there's some unknown physical phenomenon that causes events that might seem to be magic, then maybe, but magic in the sense of making stuff happen at will with no energy source and no physical interaction between you and the target violates all that we know for a fact to be true.

 

Furthermore, it wouldn't make sense that we could have any control over that by using words of all things, something completely made up by us and that is different depending on location.

[Sauron]

That's not all that true though. There are multiple definitions and practices of magic in history that do not view it as a supernatural force, like you see in many games like FF, TES etc. Many Wiccans practice "magic" as a science. And who is to say that the things happening in the natural world wasn't just perceived as "magic" because the people couldn't understand it?

 

Well then how do you define magic? If I don't know how something works that doesn't make it magical...

[TechStyle]

Rel...women...women!  They use a magical force that makes us submit.  They use a mix of charms to activate their trap cards known as whipped cards.

 

you mean boobs

[Thorium19]

tap 10, summon Ulamog, the ceaseless hunger.

Sorry, I thought magic as in mtg, not magic as in runes and shit.

Nah, don't believe in it, superstitious things like that are a load of bollocks to me. The only magic around is science we don't understand yet.

[TechStyle]

No, I mean women as a whole. 

 

whole boobs? :^)

 

kk im done. 

[KemoKa]

Interesting. So you believe superphysical constructs exist?

Sure, I mean, I don't believe in them in the sense that they're a... mysterious mystical substance veiled in mystery and shrouded in the unknown that only those with "oooooh, the Sight" can see. My belief in the spirit is a bit more material than that. We know that different forms of matter exist outside what we would consider "physical matter". Protons, neutrons, electrons, photons, leptons, quarks, muons, etc, those things are part of and affect our physical, "material" world. But neutrinos, WIMPs, Bosons and other exotic particles like that are things that either affect our physical world indirectly or not at all. Those particles pass straight through the subatomic particles in your body in droves without affecting them in any way. particles like the Higgs Boson, for example, blip in and out of existence so quickly and under such specific circumstances that for all intents and purposes, they don't "exist" in our material world most of the time. And even then, with our knowledge that they do exist, we know almost nothing about them, what they do, or why they're there. Most of what we have about these exotic forms of matter is just scientific and mathematical guesswork.

 

So my belief is that the spirit and things pertaining to the spirit are just another, higher form of matter, one that we can't detect even with our most sensitive instruments and our most powerful machines. But one that we can detect with our minds if we take the time to tune them enough. That's my feeling, anyway.

[Albatross]

Well then how do you define magic? If I don't know how something works that doesn't make it magical...

 

Well in the now you don't but back then it was entirely different. If you saw someone in an air balloon five hundred years back you would probably call it black magic.

 

edit

 

Well, that's a hard question...I define it as an unknown science. Something we just haven't observed yet.

[Sauron]

Well in the now you don't but back then it was entirely different. If you saw someone in an air balloon five hundred years back you would probably call it black magic.

 

Still, doesn't mean magic existed then and not now...

[Albatross]

Still, doesn't mean magic existed then and not now...

 

Like I said earlier...and you act like you have definite evidence it doesn't exist. I'm leaning more toward the "we don't know" because we don't know much of anything if you think about it.

[Sauron]

Like I said earlier...and you act like you have definite evidence it doesn't exist. I'm leaning more toward the "we don't know" because we don't know much of anything if you think about it.

 

I do actually, physics prove magic in the sense I defined previously doesn't exist. 

[Albatross]

I do actually, physics prove magic in the sense I defined previously doesn't exist. 

 

Where did you define it, first of all? I don't see it.

 

True, but we always find changes in what we thought about science and how we thought something worked through more observations or theories etc. It could very well be we haven't observed or tested enough things to discover "magic" is real.

[Sauron]

Where did you define it, first of all? I don't see it.

 

True, but we always find changes in what we thought about science and how we thought something worked through more observations or theories etc. It could very well be we haven't observed or tested enough things to discover "magic" is real.

 

In the first post I made here, I said

 

 

 

 If you're telling me there's some unknown physical phenomenon that causes events that might seem to be magic, then maybe, but magic in the sense of making stuff happen at will with no energy source and no physical interaction between you and the target violates all that we know for a fact to be true.

 

It's true that we don't know everything, but there are a few things we do know for sure.

[JacobVR]

If to be honest I do not believe in magic. However some of the stuff can certainly be pretty awesome. 

[Albatross]

In the first post I made here, I said

 

 

It's true that we don't know everything, but there are a few things we do know for sure.

 

Ah, okay. I didn't see that one, thought you might of defined it toward me.

 

 

There were some things we thought we knew for sure but turned out to be wrong about.

[Sauron]

Ah, okay. I didn't see that one, thought you might of defined it toward me.

 

 

There were some things we thought we knew for sure but turned out to be wrong about.

 

Those things hadn't been scientifically proven. There's pretty damn solid math behind thermodynamics.

[Gregrs]

If it's real, then prove it, via the empirical scientific method, in a measurable and reproducible environment.

 

If god's real, prove it.

You can't, same way with magic.

 

The way I see it, magic probably is't real, but it's nice to think that there is such thing as real magic. Like harry potter stuff. I don't believe in magic personally, but I still leave a very small opening for hope that some day it will become real. Because that would be really awesome.

[Starelementpoke]

Magic Missile!

You roll 1. 

[TechStyle]

The thing is with physics, maths, or any sort of humans like to call evidence and logical thinking is only logical within the human mind and our scope of understanding. 

 

Unless you believe that humans are omniscient, we don't know everything. So the only thing we can do is make our best guess. That is essentially what our 'facts' are. A bunch of frizzy haired scientists got together and said hey we all drew similar conclusions so let's call this fact. However, fact is not absolute, it can be wrong. To say something is more right than another is simply saying something is more popular than another.

 

So while we bicker here about how magic is real or not real nobody really KNOWS. It's really just anyone's guess. This leads me to conclude that everything is magical. If you take a good hard look at life both the macro (universe) and micro (atomic) level, it truly is a, subjectively, magical place. Luckily, humans, unbeknownst to why (although I have my beliefs), have a far greater ability to reason than any other species. With this unique ability, we able to use tools like science to better understand our world. 

 

Just my 2 cents. 

[Overkilled]

I think real magic exists but 97% of people who practice it are lying frauds.