The implementation of magic.

[Sullust]

As some of you are already aware, magic does not exist. If you were not aware, I apologize for crushing your hopes. This is not to say that all is lost; rather, I think we may be able to find a solution through technology to implement 'pseudo'-magic. Basically I envision using nanomachines, as well as a control device to manipulate the machines in the desired manner.

 

We'll need alot of nanomachines to accomplish this feat. Ideally they could generate themselves; however, barring that a suitable device could be constructed to disperse them into the atmosphere. This global collection of airbourne nanomachines will be referred to as mana.

The control device actually involves two separate mechanisms, your brain and a wand. The reason for this is to prevent you from doing harmful 'pseudo'-magic in your sleep. When held the wand interprets 'simple' commands from your brain and translates them into instructions the mana can interpret.

 

I'll start with something simple that everyone would find useful, moving distant objects.

 

Spell: Telekinesis

1. The wand is aimed at the desired object.

2. A sufficient amount of mana surrounds the object.

3. A 'follow' command is issued by your brain and interpreted by the wand.

4. The mana moves the object in accordance with the movement of your wand until the 'stop' command is issued.

 

'closer' and 'further' commands may be given to indicate that the object should be moved closer or further to the user.

 

Thoughts? Comments? Additional spell implementations?

[Dintiradan]

The difference between magic and your pseudomagic is that magic doesn't risk turning the entire world into grey goo.

 

Also, "real world" magic and spells would probably involve patents, licenses, and DRM. There would be competing nanomachine vendors having different implementations. So any given magic user would only have a license with one vendor, be it Illusions Incorporated or the Black Magic Company.

 

(I'd be surprised if this doesn't already exist as a short story somewhere.)

[Dikiyoba]

Originally Posted By: Dintiradan

The difference between magic and your pseudomagic is that magic doesn't risk turning the entire world into grey goo.

Well, that depends on the system of magic you develop, doesn't it?

For instance, if you developed a system that used the four elements and also allowed wizards to combine their powers together, you could conceivably get a bunch of wizards working together to make volcanoes (fire+earth) erupt all over the world at the same time that other wizards are making it rain all over (air+water). The world would then be buried under layers of liquified ash.

Dikiyoba doesn't know why a bunch of wizards would want to do this, but fantasy does lend itself to the existence of multiple worlds, so maybe they decided they had a world to spare and decided to do it for fun. Which is probably also the reason the nanobots will destroy everything on Earth.

[nikki.]

Originally Posted By: Lt. Sullust

As some of you are already aware, magic does not exist. If you were not aware, I apologize for crushing your hopes.

And I never got to take Hermione out for a drink!

[Sullust]

Originally Posted By: Impudent Strumpet!

And I never got to take Hermione out for a drink!

Emma Watson does exist though.

Originally Posted By: Dintiradan

The difference between magic and your pseudomagic is that magic doesn't risk turning the entire world into grey goo.

I think this is only a problem if you allow the nanomachines to self-replicate. We can probably keep them 'dumb' enough to prevent that.

Originally Posted By: Dintiradan

Also, "real world" magic and spells would probably involve patents, licenses, and DRM. There would be competing nanomachine vendors having different implementations. So any given magic user would only have a license with one vendor, be it Illusions Incorporated or the Black Magic Company.

You haven't installed the iLevitate App on your iMagic yet?

I also suspect an EMP device would act very effectively as an 'anti-magic' field.

[A less presumptuous name.]

Originally Posted By: Impudent Strumpet!

Originally Posted By: Lt. Sullust

As some of you are already aware, magic does not exist. If you were not aware, I apologize for crushing your hopes.

And I never got to take Hermione out for a drink!

Trust me, she's overrated. It is absolutely impossible to carry on a conversation with her. She thinks that she's some sort of superhero, when Harry did most of the work. And what with Ron sticking his freckled nose in everywhere, it's just a mess.



Oh god, what I have said? My HP friends aren't even this bad...

[Dantius]

In all fairness, "A nanobot-wielding rich dude did it" is a far less satisfying explanation of previously unobserved phenomena that "A wizard did it".

[nikki.]

Originally Posted By: Lt. Sullust

Emma Watson does exist though.

I might stand a chance with she of frizzied hair and great geekdom, though. The other, possibly not so much.

[The Ratt]

Mixing the two topics discussed in this thread, "magic" and lust/greed are what scare me. Attractive people would be sexually harassed all the time, and crime would be rampant, because who could catch a thief that was acting from halfway around the globe.

[Niemand]

Originally Posted By: Lt. Sullust

This is not to say that all is lost; rather, I think we may be able to find a solution through technology to implement 'pseudo'-magic. Basically I envision using nanomachines, as well as a control device to manipulate the machines in the desired manner.

I hadn't yet gotten around to mentioning these books in the 'What have you been reading?' thread, but if you thought of this idea you might like Mayer Alan Brenner's Dance of Gods series. Hopefully drawing the connection between your idea and the books isn't too much of a spoiler.

Originally Posted By: Dintiradan

The difference between magic and your pseudomagic is that magic doesn't risk turning the entire world into grey goo.

Also, "real world" magic and spells would probably involve patents, licenses, and DRM. There would be competing nanomachine vendors having different implementations. So any given magic user would only have a license with one vendor, be it Illusions Incorporated or the Black Magic Company.

(I'd be surprised if this doesn't already exist as a short story somewhere.)

This reminds me of Heinlein's Magic Incorporated, although in that story the magic was more of the traditionally supernatural form without any technological basis. Still it's a good story exploring how magic might fit into modern society (none of this nonsense with secretive groups hiding in plain sight everywhere, which while admittedly not a totally stupid idea, gets old as a treatment of magic). As you note, though, there are probably other stories less well known (at least to me) which treat a more similar idea.

With regard to the actual original idea here: This is basically an attempt to implement Clarke's third law literally. The main issue, as I see it, is that nanotechnology as, envisioned by many science fiction authors really just isn't plausible.

Consider the most simplistic of all nanomachine stories, the gray goo scenario. The nanomachines aren't expected to be all that sophisticated; all they do is take apart any matter they encounter and rebuild it into more, identical nanomachines. Issues arise quickly, though, such as: Assumedly each of these nanobots (being the variety nicknamed 'gobblers' in a few stories I've read since all they do is eat everything in order to reproduce) needs a certain distribution of elements to make. Perhaps it needs to be 20% carbon 10% oxygen, 8% iron, and so on. So what if I drop one into the ocean? It will be surrounded by hydrogen and oxygen, but (relatively speaking) very little else. If I walk outdoors and drop one on a rock it will have easy access to silicon and oxygen (from the rock, depending on what kind of rock it is, anyway) and nitrogen and more oxygen from the air. In either case there will be traces of other elements around, which could be collected to form a new nanobot, but most of the material available is useless in any given location unless your nanobot is also equipped to transmute elements. As a result, only a small fraction of the earth would ever get converted into nanobots, assuming no transmutation, including much of the surface as well as the core (which is not only lacking in variety but also quite inhospitable to most kinds of complex molecules). Gobblers might sterilize the earth's surface, but they would hardly eat everything.

Next, how does one get the gobblers to not attack each other? One might not care, since they might be able to devour the earth anyway, but then again they might not, and it would certainly be an issue for designing any more useful nanobot. Not only then is it a problem that in order to make a nanobot think more about what it's doing it will need to be made much large, in order to have some kind of expanded computational ability (even assuming some kind of computer using components far smaller than anything we can hope to make in the foreseeable future), but also that it needs to be able to see what it's doing. How does one make a nanobot 'see' it's surroundings, at the atomic or molecular level? How will it interpret this data so as to understand the 'forest' (object of interest) from the 'trees' (atoms or molecules nearby). Will one try to make the nanobots communicate amongst themselves? That will take even more processing capability as well as communication hardware, which will further bloat the size of each robot.

As a result of considerations like these I would argue that it is not possible, based on the extent of our present scientific knowledge, to ever create nanobots which can do generalized assembly or disassembly in a non-well controlled environment. Creating very small machines which do complicated, specialized tasks may very well be possible, but may also require highly specialized (and potentially forever macroscopic) equipment to do so.

(A number of years ago I read a science fiction book which I consider very stupid hinging on nanotechnology. In one scene the protagonist has been captured by the badguys. He manages to make a phone call, or make his voice heard in the background of someone else's call, and his deus ex machina nanomachine supercomputer detects his voice (since it sifts through all phone calls made anywhere in the world at all times) and dispatches a swarm of nanobots through the phone lines. The nanobots arrive in the room shortly and disassemble all of the badguys, but not the good guy, supposedly by recognizing his DNA. Problem: How do they recognize his DNA without eating the top layer of his skin? How do they not keep eating further into him as each new robot that blunders into him needs to eat enough to recognize who and what it's eating?

A much better book with regard to its treatment of nanotechnology is Ladybug, which involves machines which are small, but not molecular scale. (In fact one of the machines is large enough that it is the titular ladybug).)

[VCH]

Originally Posted By: Master1

Originally Posted By: Impudent Strumpet!

Originally Posted By: Lt. Sullust

As some of you are already aware, magic does not exist. If you were not aware, I apologize for crushing your hopes.

And I never got to take Hermione out for a drink!

Trust me, she's overrated. It is absolutely impossible to carry on a conversation with her. She thinks that she's some sort of superhero, when Harry did most of the work. And what with Ron sticking his freckled nose in everywhere, it's just a mess.



Oh god, what I have said? My HP friends aren't even this bad...

No you're right, she is the only reason those two buffoons get anything done. I mean Ron is completely useless, and Harry is mostly useless. How many times has she saved them from some horrible fate? Too many.

In short, Harry isn't the hero, she is.

[Rowen]

Originally Posted By: Dikiyoba

For instance, if you developed a system that used the four elements and also allowed wizards to combine their powers together, you could conceivably get a bunch of wizards working together [...]

By your powers combined, I am Capitan Planet!

Go Planet!

[Callie]

What if these nanomachines could somehow be used as a cloaking device?

 

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

[Randomizer]

"Any sufficienty analyzed magic is indistinguishable for science."

-- Agatha Heterodyne, Girl Genius (Cinderella story 12/5/2008)

[VCH]

Anything you are unable to explain is indistinguishable from magic

[Sudanna]

Overused and predictable quotes are indistinguishable from annoying.

[Student of Trinity]

Magic does exist. Technology has already achieved things more wonderful than medieval magicians dreamed.

 

And the medievals weren't even so wrong about how magic works. To put it in modern terms, the basic idea of magic was just that the game mechanics of the universe has exploits, and if you can find the right bizarre and improbable moves that will trigger them, you can do outrageous things. And this is simply true. The medieval magicians hadn't figured out quite the right trigger moves, but the right techniques turned out to be kind of like some of the kinds of things they thought of trying. You need special ingredients and special procedures, and it's all really hard and intricate — much more involved than any ordinary natural activity. The fact that many of the particular things the medievals tried were utterly hopeless — stuffing scrolls into the mouths of clay dummies, for instance — is not really a big deal. Many of the things modern engineers try are totally hopeless, too.

 

The medievals were not yet scientists or engineers, but I see no really sharp line between magicians and scientists. Science is just magic grown up.

 

I reached this conviction myself by teaching an electrodynamics course. When I came to review how an electric motor works, I freaked out, because I realized that the description sounded exactly like the kind of crackpot nonsense you can read on any crystals-and-magnets-in-Atlantis website. Part of it is almost mystical: a magic stone (magnet), winding the wire in circles, rotating through the field. And part of it is sheer hack: rig up any little trick, even if it's just scratching the insulation off the wire on one side only, so that the current direction through the wire changes as the loop turns.

 

Hacking the universe is exactly the magical mindset. But if you get it right, it works.

[Erebus the Black]

Originally Posted By: Lt. Sullust

As some of you are already aware, magic does not exist.

Sure it does, where do you think the word "magnet" comes from?

Click to reveal..

answer: magic net (force) === sum of all magic forces

[nikki.]

Forget Hermione - for his post I wanna take Rowen for a drink first.

[Lilith]

Originally Posted By: Erasmus

Originally Posted By: Lt. Sullust

As some of you are already aware, magic does not exist.

Sure it does, where do you think the word "magnet" comes from?

Click to reveal..

answer: magic net (force) === sum of all magic forces

for the record it actually comes from the Greek province of Magnesia, where naturally magnetic ore was found

[Alorael at Large]

You can save space on processing by putting communication in nanobots. Then they're limited to the range of the processor/director, but a lot of problems can be solved by having the control done externally.

 

Or you can make some kind of sci-fi neural net made out of millions of tiny components. As the bots make more bots, all the bots get smarter. When they get smart enough, bam, singularity!

 

—Alorael, who can't get worked up about nanobots in his fiction. He also regularly encounters telepathy (why is this a sci-fi staple?), shady faster-than-light travel, implausible alien races, and garbage biology.

[Enraged Slith]

Originally Posted By: Impudent Strumpet!

Forget Hermione - for his post I wanna take Rowen for a drink first.

Okay, but no funny business.

[Erebus the Black]

Now that above is a prime example of topic hijacking -

From NanoBots to Harry Potter in four simple steps.

[Rowen]

Originally Posted By: Impudent Strumpet!

Forget Hermione - for his post I wanna take Rowen for a drink first.

If I dress up as Hermione for the drinks would that be taking it to far?

[VCH]

This topic was about Harry Potter from the beginning.

 

On that note, how do you feel about splitting the last book into two movies?

[The Mystic]

Originally Posted By: Impudent Strumpet!

Originally Posted By: Lt. Sullust

As some of you are already aware, magic does not exist. If you were not aware, I apologize for crushing your hopes.

And I never got to take Hermione out for a drink!

That's because she's dating me.

Originally Posted By: VCH

Anything you are unable to explain is indistinguishable from magic

So that explains how my brain works! It's magical!

[Dikiyoba]

Quote:

On that note, how do you feel about splitting the last book into two movies?

I ended up renting Part 1 and was surprised to enjoy it. The first few movies felt rushed and incoherent while this was better paced, so I think splitting it into two was a reasonable thing. The most exciting scenes happen at the beginning while the climax was a bit dull, so the pacing isn't perfect, but that's the result of flaws in the book, not an introduced flaw.

Of course, they probably have to introduce all the Dumbledore angst and wand lectures in Part 2 and Dikiyoba will go back to disliking the movie series again.

[Dantius]

Originally Posted By: VCH

On that note, how do you feel about splitting the last book into two movies?

It makes less sense than splitting up Atlas Shrugged into 3 (!) parts. When the vast majority of a story is simply padding, you can use this thing called an "editor" to reduce it to manageable length. Besides, LotR proved that people are perfectly willing to watch 3.5 hours of fantasy in a stretch, so it's not like they lack a precedent.

So it was simply a monetary decision, pure and simple. Not that there's a problem with that, but it does look pretty cynical when they finally start to split it up with the last movie, adapted from a book that is far from the longest (3rd longest IIRC).

[nikki.]

Originally Posted By: Rowen

Originally Posted By: Impudent Strumpet!

Forget Hermione - for his post I wanna take Rowen for a drink first.

If I dress up as Hermione for the drinks would that be taking it to far?

Depends on whether you just put on a wig and some Hogwarts robes, or go to some real effort by shaving your legs and appling a pleasant scent.

[Dantius]

Originally Posted By: Impudent Strumpet!

Depends on whether you just put on a wig and some Hogwarts robes, or go to some real effort by shaving your legs and appling a pleasant scent.

Buuuuuuuhhh-what...

You've put quite a bit of thought into this fantasy, Nikki. It's actually starting to get kind of unsettling.

[nikki.]

Nah, I'm sufficently creative that I can make this up on the spot.

 

And come on, who doesn't put effort into dates they care about?

[Sullust]

Originally Posted By: VCH

This topic was about Harry Potter from the beginning.

Heh, it's true. I recently saw the first part of Deathly Hallows. It rekindled my deep desire for magic to exist. However, after 10 minutes of staring at a coin trying to make it fall over with my mind I've given up again.

Perhaps at 25 it's time to finally just throw in the towel on magic...

[Callie]

Originally Posted By: Dantius

I did see Atlas Shrugged...

...why!?

I actually like the book but have no interest in seeing the film.

[Dantius]

Originally Posted By: Excalibur

Originally Posted By: Dantius

I did see Atlas Shrugged...

...why!?

I actually like the book but have no interest in seeing the film.

Mainly so I could point and laugh at the libertarians in the theater whilst feeling smug in my Keynesian superiority.

Though it was by no means fantastic, it didn't really deserve the panning it got. It was a low-budget, privatley financed film with unknown actors and source material that does not transition well into a movie, but they actually did manage to come out with a half-decent movie that mildly entertained me for an hour and a half or so.

[Lilith]

Originally Posted By: There are three errors here.

He also regularly encounters telepathy (why is this a sci-fi staple?)

i blame gene roddenberry and his fetish for bald telepaths

no, really. look it up.

[Alorael at Large]

Ah, so in the 24th century not only will they have not cured baldness, they will care!

 

—Alorael, who is more curious about what gave telepathy its wide-ranging sci-fi legitimacy. Or, more particularly, why only telepathy. Breathing fire would be more plausible. More of a niche skill, perhaps, but everyone loves fire in space.

[Micawber]

Alfred Bester has been influential here. Whatever you think of telepathy as a plot starting point, the Demolished Man really explores the consequences in a really powerful way. I think that book alone has lent telepathy quite a bit of legitimacy.

[A less presumptuous name.]

Originally Posted By: Dantius

Originally Posted By: VCH

On that note, how do you feel about splitting the last book into two movies?

Besides, LotR proved that people are perfectly willing to watch 3.5 hours of fantasy in a stretch, so it's not like they lack a precedent.

This is how I feel. It seems like they cut too much our of the movies in an attempt to keep them around 2 hours. I would have been much happier with a more properly paced and fleshed out 3 hour film per book.

[nikki.]

Originally Posted By: Dantius

Originally Posted By: VCH

On that note, how do you feel about splitting the last book into two movies?

Besides, LotR proved that people are perfectly willing to watch 3.5 hours of fantasy in a stretch, so it's not like they lack a precedent.

I'd argue that LotR and HP are aimed at completely different audiences. It's not a stretch to imagine older teenagers and adults watching three and a half hours of fanstasy in a stretch, but what about pre-teens and children?

[Rowen]

Last time I saw a HP in the theater a group of little kids started crying at some scary point in the movie. I would say that latter HP movies are not targeted at pre-teens as much as the first 2 movies were.

[Dintiradan]

I thought the whole point of the Harry Potter series was that the readers would grow up with the series. And, by and large, it worked ... while the books were being released. I wonder what the impact of the series is like now, when you have eleven year olds read/watch the first book/movie and immediately dive into the rest of the series.

[A less presumptuous name.]

Eleven? My sister is 8 and finished reading the first book recently. Admittedly, it took her quite a while to finish. After she had watched the first 5 movies and my mom wouldn't let her watch the 6th, we looked at the film ratings, and she has now seen her first 2 PG-13 films.

 

The books and films alike both take on darker and darker tones as they progress. The first book is fine for children 10 and under, but by the 5th, I think 13 is the minimum appropriate age. After all, they were banned in Texas!.....

[RCCCL]

Originally Posted By: Master1

The books and films alike both take on darker and darker tones as they progress. The first book is fine for children 10 and under, but by the 5th, I think 13 is the minimum appropriate age. After all, they were banned in Texas!.....

Right, because Texas is the perfect roll model for raising kids, heck, look at their board of education and what they decide to put into their school books.

Take a look at the Curriculum Controversies section

No religous bias here!

Never heard of these people before, but ...aught in Texas.

Let's color history!

I'm sure I can find plenty more if I put any effort into it.

[Aoslare]

More to the point -- because book banning is the perfect model for raising kids.

[Callie]

The Daily Show had a segment about Texas legislators trying to oust a Jewish state representative. Then again, it's not surprising considering how Texas' congressional map looks like this:

 

Map

[Dantius]

What? Gerrymandering? No, none of that here, no sir!

[Student of Trinity]

And they say Texas is a red state. Why, a good part of it looks to be purple.

 

But those district boundaries are clearly rivers, railroads, and major highways.

 

Plus a few armadillo migration routes, and some carefully preserved rattlesnake burial grounds. Well, and a fair number of cactus havens, of course. Everyone supports cactus havens.

[Callie]

Woops! You're right: I put up the wrong map, and it's even more purple today!

 

Edit: Okay wow, I still had it wrong. Curse you DeLay!

[A less presumptuous name.]

Smaller map

Originally Posted By: Wikipedia

Texas' 14th congressional district, which is larger than Massachusetts.

[Tracer Bullet]

Originally Posted By: Dikiyoba

Originally Posted By: Dintiradan

The difference between magic and your pseudomagic is that magic doesn't risk turning the entire world into grey goo.

Well, that depends on the system of magic you develop, doesn't it?

For instance, if you developed a system that used the four elements and also allowed wizards to combine their powers together, you could conceivably get a bunch of wizards working together to make volcanoes (fire+earth) erupt all over the world at the same time that other wizards are making it rain all over (air+water). The world would then be buried under layers of liquified ash.

Dikiyoba doesn't know why a bunch of wizards would want to do this, but fantasy does lend itself to the existence of multiple worlds, so maybe they decided they had a world to spare and decided to do it for fun. Which is probably also the reason the nanobots will destroy everything on Earth.

Clarification before argument, please. Are we talking about elementalism, psionism, BG psycho-manipulation, magic as in Eragon, magic as in the subtle pervasive force found in Middle-Earth, magic as in Shaping, magic as in Harry Potter, the magic of Oriental mythology, the magic of European folklore, sympathy, emotion control by the Mule, alchemy in any of its diverse forms, or what?