You seem hung up on this notion of "True" magic (which immediately makes me think of Mage The Ascension) vs. what people in the setting actually call forces they can't explain.

To put it another way, if the movie "Doctor Strange" a fantasy or soft science fiction because it posits that magic is a part of the rational world but not understandable by current human science? Its got spells, its got magic items, its got demon gods from other realms.

The argument that that's not fantasy because it posits a rational explanation basically renders the entire word "magic" meaningless.

I mean, right now in the real world there are events labeled miracles that, even after investigation, defy scientific explanation, but according to the Catholic Church there is a completely rational explanation for them; God is real and interceded. There is nothing any more irrational in that theory than "sometimes stuff happens we can't explain" is... but the former is labeled magic.

So if a story where all the events of Revelations were to play out, complete with God Himself coming down out of Heaven and proving He is real and responsible for all the miracles over the course millennia... that He is the rational explanation for them all... that this story should be labeled science fiction and not fantasy?

I think your definition is near worthless in a practical sense because it's too focused on there being some objective truth of reality that crosses all stories throughout time instead of focusing on the concepts as presented in the fictional story itself.

Quote from: Chris24601;1104600You seem hung up on this notion of "True" magic (which immediately makes me think of Mage The Ascension) vs. what people in the setting actually call forces they can't explain.

To put it another way, if the movie "Doctor Strange" a fantasy or soft science fiction because it posits that magic is a part of the rational world but not understandable by current human science? Its got spells, its got magic items, its got demon gods from other realms.

The argument that that's not fantasy because it posits a rational explanation basically renders the entire word "magic" meaningless.

I mean, right now in the real world there are events labeled miracles that, even after investigation, defy scientific explanation, but according to the Catholic Church there is a completely rational explanation for them; God is real and interceded. There is nothing any more irrational in that theory than "sometimes stuff happens we can't explain" is... but the former is labeled magic.

So if a story where all the events of Revelations were to play out, complete with God Himself coming down out of Heaven and proving He is real and responsible for all the miracles over the course millennia... that He is the rational explanation for them all... that this story should be labeled science fiction and not fantasy?

I think your definition is near worthless in a practical sense because it's too focused on there being some objective truth of reality that crosses all stories throughout time instead of focusing on the concepts as presented in the fictional story itself.

Great explanation, thank you.

I use that sort of religious approach for my own world building. What we the audience consider magic exists in the fantasy world because the gods created it that way when they invented the rules governing the world. It is entirely natural to the world and cannot be disengaged from everything else any more than we can disengage the fundamental forces in reality.

I still maintain a distinction between miracles and non-miracles. Miracles cannot be explained even by those who perform them because they are literal divine intervention, whereas non-miracles require those creating them to understand how. Healing "magic" would be an example: a miracle worker wouldn't know the first thing about medicine while healing the sick by laying hands, whereas a healer mage would have the equivalent of a real medical education but be able to perform operations impossible in reality because the fantasy world has different underlying physics.

It is difficult for me to explain simply because it is so foreign to the sensibilities of modern Western fantasy. Victorian pseudo-science or the cultivation of qi and alchemy in Eastern fantasy is probably a better example of what I mean.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1104604Great explanation, thank you.

I use that sort of religious approach for my own world building. What we the audience consider magic exists in the fantasy world because the gods created it that way when they invented the rules governing the world. It is entirely natural to the world and cannot be disengaged from everything else any more than we can disengage the fundamental forces in reality.

I still maintain a distinction between miracles and non-miracles. Miracles cannot be explained even by those who perform them because they are literal divine intervention, whereas non-miracles require those creating them to understand how.

"A miracle properly so called is when something is done outside the order of nature. But it is not enough for a miracle if something is done outside the order of any particular nature; for otherwise anyone would perform a miracle by throwing a stone upwards, as such a thing is outside the order of the stone's nature. So for a miracle is required that it be against the order of the whole created nature. But God alone can do this, because, whatever an angel or any other creature does by its own power, is according to the order of created nature; and thus it is not a miracle. Hence God alone can work miracles.

"... Properly speaking, as said above, miracles are those things which are done outside the order of the whole created nature. But as we do not know all the power of created nature, it follows that when anything is done outside the order of created nature by a power unknown to us, it is called a miracle as regards ourselves. So when the demons do anything of their own natural power, these things are called "miracles" not in an absolute sense, but in reference to ourselves. In this way the magicians work miracles through the demons; and these are said to be done by "private contracts," forasmuch as every power of the creature, in the universe, may be compared to the power of a private person in a city. Hence when a magician does anything by compact with the devil, this is done as it were by private contract. On the other hand, the Divine justice is in the whole universe as the public law is in the city. Therefore good Christians, so far as they work miracles by Divine justice, are said to work miracles by "public justice": but bad Christians by the "signs of public justice," as by invoking the name of Christ, or by making use of other sacred signs."

 --St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, Prima Pars, Question 110, Article 4, "Whether angels can work miracles."

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;1104608--St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, Prima Pars, Question 110, Article 4, "Whether angels can work miracles."

Nice quotes and does pretty well sum it up. We call "miracle" (or "magic" in this case) what we ourselves cannot explain. For an angel, healing the sick* is no more a miracle than us taking a step... its just a natural thing we can do.

So too in most settings, magic, particularly what D&D terms Arcane Magic is, by definition, working inside the natural order of the created universe they inhabit. They may not know precisely how it works, but they, by definition in D&D, are NOT calling on divine powers to bring about supernatural effects, they are employing esoteric knowledge (hence the term arcane being applied to it) of the cosmos that the right words, gestures and material components can bring these effects about as readily and repeatedly as striking an iron rod while aligned with a magnetic field will render it magnetic.

What most settings call magic, particularly when it is a force distinct from divine intervention, is just "insufficiently understood science" by Rhedyn's standards. Hell, the entirety of Lord of the Rings operates by the existence of known superhuman powers acting in accord with their natures in the world, but lumping it and all of those other works into the heading of science fiction renders the entire term meaningless and the fantasy heading all but devoid of entries.

* provided healing the sick is something an angel is actually capable of of course.

Quote from: Chris24601;1104600You seem hung up on this notion of "True" magic (which immediately makes me think of Mage The Ascension) vs. what people in the setting actually call forces they can't explain.

To put it another way, if the movie "Doctor Strange" a fantasy or soft science fiction because it posits that magic is a part of the rational world but not understandable by current human science? Its got spells, its got magic items, its got demon gods from other realms.

The argument that that's not fantasy because it posits a rational explanation basically renders the entire word "magic" meaningless.

I mean, right now in the real world there are events labeled miracles that, even after investigation, defy scientific explanation, but according to the Catholic Church there is a completely rational explanation for them; God is real and interceded. There is nothing any more irrational in that theory than "sometimes stuff happens we can't explain" is... but the former is labeled magic.

So if a story where all the events of Revelations were to play out, complete with God Himself coming down out of Heaven and proving He is real and responsible for all the miracles over the course millennia... that He is the rational explanation for them all... that this story should be labeled science fiction and not fantasy?

I think your definition is near worthless in a practical sense because it's too focused on there being some objective truth of reality that crosses all stories throughout time instead of focusing on the concepts as presented in the fictional story itself.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]3846[/ATTACH]

Tsoukalos has been saying this very thing for YEARS!

Quote from: Chris24601;1104600You seem hung up on this notion of "True" magic (which immediately makes me think of Mage The Ascension) vs. what people in the setting actually call forces they can't explain.

To put it another way, if the movie "Doctor Strange" a fantasy or soft science fiction because it posits that magic is a part of the rational world but not understandable by current human science? Its got spells, its got magic items, its got demon gods from other realms.

The argument that that's not fantasy because it posits a rational explanation basically renders the entire word "magic" meaningless.

I mean, right now in the real world there are events labeled miracles that, even after investigation, defy scientific explanation, but according to the Catholic Church there is a completely rational explanation for them; God is real and interceded. There is nothing any more irrational in that theory than "sometimes stuff happens we can't explain" is... but the former is labeled magic.

So if a story where all the events of Revelations were to play out, complete with God Himself coming down out of Heaven and proving He is real and responsible for all the miracles over the course millennia... that He is the rational explanation for them all... that this story should be labeled science fiction and not fantasy?

I think your definition is near worthless in a practical sense because it's too focused on there being some objective truth of reality that crosses all stories throughout time instead of focusing on the concepts as presented in the fictional story itself.

Doctor Strange is either Fantasy or Science Fantasy (like when he is in a space ship) because he uses true magic. Either his magical powers are irrational or they depend on physical laws in that universe that are irrational.

I am religious, but when God does magic that violates the assumption that "our world is rational". Him actually doing things though is not Fantasy when it actually happens because that would not be fiction. "Our world is rational" is the basic premise of Science. That's why evolutionary science is fun, "well assuming that a space wizard didn't just spontaneously create life, we have determined that the placenta was the result of an infectious disease." (no really look that up)
I personally do not limit how much God decided to do things rationally in the world because of religious assumptions. Just because I assume a passage meant "God did magic" that does not mean my faith is suddenly shaken if a scientific explanation is later found.

Your argument hinge on an assumption of how I would answer your first question about Doctor Strange and then spiraled out of control from there.

Quote from: Rhedyn;1104580I did.

Other than your tautology, no your haven't. And your tautology is worthless. You also seem fuzzy on what irrational means.

Quote from: Rhedyn;1104664Doctor Strange is either Fantasy or Science Fantasy (like when he is in a space ship) because he uses true magic. Either his magical powers are irrational or they depend on physical laws in that universe that are irrational.

  How can a physical law be irrational?

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;1104763How can a physical law be irrational?

It would have to not make sense or be illogical.

Seems pretty straightforward to me.

Quote from: Rhedyn;1104769It would have to not make sense or be illogical.

Seems pretty straightforward to me.

  I think I'm starting to wrap my head around this; the best example I can think of for an 'irrational physical law' that also meets most definition of magic would be 'effect exceeds causes,' or something along those lines, without any handwaving.

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;1104763How can a physical law be irrational?

Quote from: Rhedyn;1104769It would have to not make sense or be illogical.

Seems pretty straightforward to me.

The square root of negative one.

Quote from: jeff37923;1104893The square root of negative one.

Math isn't logic. We use math to model some things in the real world. Neither numbers or irrational numbers exist, but an argument* can be made that the ability to count a thing means it does exist. Of course that rabbit whole goes deeper because you then have to explain how people can count things that don't exist and then your metaphysics professor Reeeees at you and says if it does not exist then it isn't a thing.

*I do not wholly endorse this argument.

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;1104891I think I'm starting to wrap my head around this; the best example I can think of for an 'irrational physical law' that also meets most definition of magic would be 'effect exceeds causes,' or something along those lines, without any handwaving.

I would generally agree with that. I have fun pointing out the "effect exceeding causes" in a hard magic system. Like Allomancers ability to burn metal and convert the investiguer into effects. They "burn metal" with thought and magical talent a lone.

Quote from: Rhedyn;1104905I would generally agree with that. I have fun pointing out the "effect exceeding causes" in a hard magic system. Like Allomancers ability to burn metal and convert the investiguer into effects. They "burn metal" with thought and magical talent a lone.

OK, this is from Mistborn, right? I'm not familiar with the series, but how is this irrational? It sounds like it follows consistent, reproducible rules. Effects like telekinesis or other psionic powers don't fit with real-world science. But they could exist in a rational universe.

I would picture it like this. Suppose there was a perfect virtual reality computer simulation. Inside that computer simulation, simulated people can do things like use telekinesis - where effect exceeds cause. The computer simulation can be programmed to allow telekinesis to work. If that's true, then I would say it's rational. If it could be run as a virtual reality, then it doesn't have to *be* a virtual reality. There could be an alternate universe where those are the actual laws.

An irrational issue might be something like Looney Tunes or surrealism, where the world itself isn't internally consistent.

Quote from: jhkim;1104919OK, this is from Mistborn, right? I'm not familiar with the series, but how is this irrational? It sounds like it follows consistent, reproducible rules. Effects like telekinesis or other psionic powers don't fit with real-world science. But they could exist in a rational universe.

I would picture it like this. Suppose there was a perfect virtual reality computer simulation. Inside that computer simulation, simulated people can do things like use telekinesis - where effect exceeds cause. The computer simulation can be programmed to allow telekinesis to work. If that's true, then I would say it's rational. If it could be run as a virtual reality, then it doesn't have to *be* a virtual reality. There could be an alternate universe where those are the actual laws.

An irrational issue might be something like Looney Tunes or surrealism, where the world itself isn't internally consistent.

What you describe is valid logic, but not sound logical.

Your system has an irrational premise. You can act logically in that universe, you can work with the rules logically, but the universe is irrational.

In our universe, we assume it to be Scientific. That is why the definitions of science tie so close to reality. It's possible that reality has to be the way it is to be fully rationale. We don't know that yet because we do not fully understand how things work. But in Science and in sound logic, something does not come from nothing. That's why Creationism will never be a part of Science. It can be true, but violates the basic premise of Science that the world is rational. The other way it could fit into Science is to figure out where the something came from to suddenly be here.

That's part of the problem with "effects exceeding causes". You've created something from nothing because even kinetic energy is a thing.

*tangent: There is an argument that simulated realities aren't real, thus don't exist, and cannot rationally be more than a mental construct. That of course assumes that our reality is real and not a mental construct.