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Speaking of myths, pixies, and spirits: > I. DEFINITION: > MAGICK is the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will. > (Illustration:
by rdevilla 6mo ago
Speaking of myths, pixies, and spirits:
> I. DEFINITION:
> MAGICK is the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will.
> (Illustration: It is my Will to inform the World of certain facts within my knowledge. I therefore take “magical weapons,” pen, ink, and paper; I write “incantations”—these sentences—in the “magical language” i.e. that which is understood by people I wish to instruct.
> I call forth “spirits” such as printers, publishers, booksellers, and so forth, and constrain them to convey my message to those people. The composition and distribution is thus an act of MAGICK by which I cause Changes to take place in conformity with my Will.)
- Aleister Crowley, "Magick Without Tears," Chapter I, 1954. https://hermetic.com/crowley/magick-without-tears/mwt_01 https://hermetic.com/crowley/magick-without-tears/mwt_01
- grehbies 6mo agoOil is the medium of time manipulation magic. Created through ancient sacrificial rituals, it is is a substance that can be used to create aging/rot-retarding barriers, or refined into derivatives that increase the rate of plant growth and mechanical work. To be handled with care, as extended contact can lead to corruption of the body, as well as increased susceptibility to fire elemental spells. Simple rituals can render an inferior product from most living things; the time-manipulation abilities of such substances will be weaker, but the substance will be safer to handle, and can even be imbibed (this is a double-aged sword, reducing one's vital life force while increasing one's bodily proportions to that of a toddler). -Me, "Early Morning Bed Thoughts", a few months ago.
- AlotOfReading 6mo agoA common definition anthropologists use for magic is occult technology: a system of laws that can be manipulated to create desired changes. There's a lot of value in thinking of programming as a form of magic.
- WJW 6mo agoCan you expand on this? It has always seemed to me that while programming does indeed like to couch itself in magical terms ("he's a database wizard", "this compiler stuff is black magic", etc), it is fundamentally understandable and replicable. All layers of programming build on their lower layers and this stuff is understood well enough that you can go to university to learn about it in detail. Programming is technology but not "occult" technology, and I don't really see the added value of treating it as occult. Quite the opposite actually, most good programmers I know acquired their skill because they have a decent grasp about the entire system rather than treating most of it as a black box.
- deleted 6mo ago[deleted]
- pocksuppet 6mo agoOf course it's replicable to us high wizards who have studied it for most of our lives and now understand it in depth. So is the actual magic in many fictitious universes. All technology is like this to some extent, but a lot of technology is grounded enough for the average person to see the rough operation of it. You look inside a washing machine, there's a part that spins around. Attached to it by a rubber belt is a smaller part that spins around, and has electric wires on the other end. Your explainer points to that and says "that's an electric motor - it converts electric power into spinning motion" and you say "ok". How do you do that with code?
- WJW 6mo agoAFAIK learning to program these days is a fairly normalized process where people start with basic commands (ie hello world stuff), then move on to control flow (if/while/for) and eventually on to object oriented programming, higher order functions and all the rest. Some people even go on to do things like "craft your own interpreter" and "NAND to Tetris" to really round out their knowledge, but most do not and that's fine. I think that some of the simplest programs are just as "explainable" as your washing machine example. Conversely, there are plenty of machines complex enough that an average person has no idea how they work. A MRI machine for instance is just a collection of metals and hoses and most people would seriously struggle to point out which parts do what and why. It's still not magic though. I guess the difference between magic and science to me is that "not everyone can learn magic", but the core bit that makes science work is that in principle everyone can learn it. In practice of course we cannot know everything and so have to rely on the expertise of others, but that is a limitation in the humans and not in the knowledge. Meanwhile for "magic" you have to be chosen by the gods/genetically gifted/cursed/whatever. In a universe where magic is just another skill that anyone can learn, that reasoning goes right out the window of course.
- throwanem 6mo agoCrowley is full of shit. By this definition a hammer is a magical or "magickal" implement - the K was Crowley's invention, so that he could trademark it - which of course can be true if someone decides as much, but the only reason to couch such trivia in the pettifogging obscurity Crowley favored is because doing so will help you nail bored young socialites, an activity which Crowley also famously favored. (Gotta watch out for that neurosyphilis! What a shame he never did.) Try thinking for yourself, instead.
- WJW 6mo agoFor sure. Despite all the talking about "self-deification" and all that shit, they sure seem to care a lot about what society (and their imaginary demons) think about them.
- notpachet 6mo ago> pettifogging Off-topic but just wanted to thank you for teaching me a new word. I try to always reply to HN comments that expand my vocabulary.
- Slow_Hand 6mo agoNice word. I rue the day the IG reels crowd pick up on it and it becomes the "word du jour" that gets overused to the point of being intolerable. Right up there with "narcissist" and "gaslighting".
- Terr_ 6mo agoThe problem isn't so much overuse as misuse, as "gaslighting" gets thrown around for almost any kind of falsehood. Another example would be "Ponzi scheme", which I've seen abused for any situation the speakers seems unsustainable, even when there isn't any records fraud.
- sunrunner 6mo agoIs pettifogging some kind of etymological parent of bikeshedding then?
- WJW 6mo agoA definition by which every human alive ever qualifies as a magician, and which is therefore not very useful as a distinction.
- throwanem 6mo agoIf you called him on it he would say that was on purpose, then talk your ears off about how. He was a ferociously effective charlatan, which is why people still remember the name he made up for himself. (And even invented a rhyming couplet to prate as a pronunciation guide!)
- rdevilla 6mo ago[flagged]
- throwanem 6mo agoFrom most this would be no compliment. Out of you I genuinely appreciate it. I don't think you could show me greater kindness if you were trying, and I want you to know it means a lot.
- dugidugout 6mo agoThese don't sound like convincing indicators of being an "effective charlatan". Am I to see the Notorious B.I.G. in the same frame?
- throwanem 6mo agoYes.
- dugidugout 6mo agoMhm.
- throwanem 6mo ago