1--OSC, when he does his 1000 Ideas in an Hour presentations, spends some time talking about the theory that magic in fantasy stories needs to have a price. And he has the members of the audience shout out prices for magic.

I'd like to encourage that kind of discussion here. What prices for magic have you noticed in stories you've read. And what are some other prices of magic that could be used in fantasy stories.

Example: in Lloyd Alexander's PRYDAIN universe, Dallben, the wizard, pays the price of giving up his youth to have the knowledge necessary for wizardry.

If this theory were to be applied to the Harry Potter universe, I'd be inclined to submit that the price is time taken in study and practice. Talent is also required, though, so I don't know if I believe that the magic price theory really applies to the Harry Potter universe. Magic is more inherent in words and objects and people in that universe, and the characters learn how to use magic more than they pay a specific price to make it work.

2--Survivor pointed out in another topic that Clarke's law, which states that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic requires that if someone knows the technology, they don't consider what they do to be magic. It is called "magic" only by those who don't know the technology (or that it is a technology).

This seems applicable to the Harry Potter universe, except that the people who know the technology DO call it magic. I think this works, however, because there are those around them who don't know and who would call it magic if they believed it existed. So rather than refer to what Dumbledore and every non-Muggle does in the Harry Potter universe as "technology" (which is what the Muggles do), the non-Muggles call what they do "magic."

I'd like to discuss ways in which a writer can actually allow characters to refer to an advanced (or not-understood) technology as magic without violating Survivor's completely valid point.

3--There are surely other stories and/or universes where magic is important and where it neither requires a specific price or is considered an advanced technology.

I'd like to see if we can think of examples of such stories and discuss them here.

So, price? technology? or neither?

So what are they? Well, there was a novel called something like "When the magic goes away." There was a short story called "What good is a glass dagger." And I think there were a couple of other shorts, but I cannot recall them.

We come from a technological society. Over the past few hundred years, the belief in magic has faded in our society. For example, when we encounter unexplained phenomena we generally don't blame it on witches in our midst.

So, if somebody in our society found he could move small objects just by thinking about it, he would probably call it telekinesis -- trying to give a scientific name to something that is, in fact, still indistinguishable from magic.

Someone four hundred years ago would call it witchcraft.

Such magic would not be considered technology by those who used it until a rational scientific explanation for the phenomenon had been found.

We don't switch on a light when we enter a room and call that magic (even if a good percentage of us are not sure exactly how it works).

I think it depends on which direction you're coming from. If you come at it as technology (you know there's a scientific explanation for how to do it, and it can be reliably repeated by anyone else who knows how to do it, and it was created by mere human scientists), you're not going to name it magic.

There are hundreds of things we do every day that we take for granted that someone from a less advanced technology would call magic, but we wouldn't call it that.

If you come at it as magic, and then figure out how it was done, you might still call it magic, even if you understood what made it happen--or you might call it trickery or illusion.

As for the telekinesis example--suppose you could create a device that could make something move without your touching it. Would you call that "telekinesis" or "magic" or "remote control?"

If you could do it merely by thinking at it, and sometimes it wouldn't work because you had a headache, or there was too much going on around you to distract you, or whatever, would you call it "magic" then?

One of the little bits of humor in the Harry Potter universe is that the magic doesn't always work. Seamus keeps making things explode by accident, and Nigel can't seem to succeed at all. The relative unrepeatability might be a characteristic of magic in that universe (and in many others, for that matter--it adds to the tension if the magic doesn't always work the way it's supposed to--Murphy's law, and all that).

The threat of being expelled from Hogwarts - losing the ability to learn and do magic is a price. I suppose you could still do the magic you learned, but you are not supposed to - Hagrid had to give it up (not sure why he does not get in trouble when he does use it - maybe a special dispensation). A lot of the limits are school rules, and others are established by the Ministry of Magic. So limits are self-imposed for concealment/safety/survival of those who can use magic. If you do evil, or break the rules/limits, you go to Azkaban - that is shown to be a really bad price. Maybe the general rule is - break the rules and get in trouble. A very accessible idea for children. Even as an adult, I can sympathize. I found the system acceptable as the learning takes so long, and it obviously not easy, and is even dangerous - face terrors in the magical world - that is a price of accepting to learn magic.

And not everyone has the same talent - I think it is important that J.K Rowling does not show Harry to be the best in class - Hermione works very hard and does well. Harry is the one who fights and defeats Voldemort because he has the special connection, and does have skill and whatever, but he is not the best student.

Of course, once you know the rules well enough, and the stakes are high, you can break the rules and win the House Cup in the process.

Harry has a great magical protection from Voldemort - his mother paid a price for it.

In Mercedes Lackey's Valdemar books, the idea of ley lines comes up. A main issue is access to magic, and how it can be redirected. Magical wars resulted from problems that led to magical terrors and the loss of magic. The price of doing magic in her books seems to be a personal one, a painful one, very emotional and psychological and sometimes physical. I'm a bit vague, because I haven't read the ones I'm thinking of in a while.

In the Robert Jordan books (WoT), the price seems to be - for men, go mad, and oh yeah the Aes Sedai will come after you and "still" you, taking away your power which often results in death; for women, put up with abominable treatment from overbearing, arrogant know-it-alls, and someday you can do it to others. Later, the AS have to worry that they will be collared, leashed, and forced to do magic for the Seanchan...

The trouble is that in fantasy worlds magic is NOT simply advanced technology. Magic is the art of doing things you should not be able to do for whatever reason and for whatever price. The author invents the reason and the price. Often the reason is shrouded in mystery.

But the idea that magic would not be plausible in a technologically advanced society may be part of the reason that most fantasies are set in Tokienesque middle age worlds. The authors want to make sure that there is no confusion -- that theirs is truly magic and has nothing to do with science or technology.

But what if that sort of magic could be achieved through science? What if someone found a way to unlock something in the human brain that would allow a person to manipulate the world around him much as Harry Potter does? Perhaps the methods would be more grounded, requiring more of concentration and less magical dust and incantations, but the principle is still magical.

If someone can move something with their mind it is telekenesis. If they can start a fire it is pyrokenesis. If they can read minds it is telepathy. If they can disappear from one location and reappear somewhere else it is teleportation. But what do you call it if they can change iron into gold? (yes, alchemy, but that is a rather magical term in its current connotation) What is it when someone calls a thunderstorm? What do you call it when someone can heal an injury with a thought or stop your heart beating in your chest?

Will we take all the magic out of life simply by renaming it? We could, if we gave science fiction names to all the things I listed above. But really, it is an exercise for the author to decide what terms his universe will employ.

I propose that the cost of magic could be sufficiently advanced technology, but that this could still be considered magic. The reason is simple. I believe that magic can exist without mystery surrounding how it actually occurs. Many people do not, and I accept that, but I think there is a divergence and this is the point it stems from.

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I'd like to discuss ways in which a writer can actually allow characters to refer to an advanced (or not-understood) technology as magic without violating Survivor's completely valid point.

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If you follow instructions given on an ancient artifact and create a certain pattern of silicon, add energy to it, try to communicate through it, and a humanoid from another dimension appears in it, you've created a dimensional portal. That's advanced technology.

I do think there is an important element here - the most technologically advanced society would be at a loss to understand how things happened through a blink or nose wiggle that did not actually trigger hidden mechanical devices that caused the events or items to happen/appear.

I think of my printer as technology. Sure, to a caveman it might appear magical, but he could be shown how it works, and more importantly, that he has the power to stop it by breaking it, or removing the ink, or unplugging it. It might not be magic if HE has power over it. If my printer breaks, I might be able to fix it, or might need someone else to fix it. Now, if I could wave my hand and all of a sudden it started working again, then what I did is magic. Magic may be unexplainable - you can teach someone how to do it (whether they have the access to power or talent would judge if they could do it), but you can't really explain it. Technology can be explained - the caveman might not understand, but he could see there is a reason and a method.

Sure, Snapes can teach how to make a potion that will make you look like someone else, and why you use this material and not that, but can he really explain how magic works?

And don't tell me it's because Harry has lots of midiclorians (sp?) and turn the force into a simple accident of biology.

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So, I'm curious....does anyone else believe that magic can exist without a mystery enshrouding it?

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I've been in a universe where some people have a natural ability to cast spells, which can hurt an enemy or heal a friend. It is well known to most people in that universe that spellcasters have a certain amount of mana (magical power) which is drained by casting a spell, and which regenerates slowly. The parameters of what magic can and cann't do are very well defined (although new spells are discovered from time to time.)

There is no mystery about how magic works -- it is well-known that the universe was designed with magic in mind.

That universe is a (very addictive) online game called EverQuest. (I used to spend about as much time in EQ each week as at my full-time job.)

I am a firm believer in the phrase: "where much is given, much is required."

An example of technological "magic" is in J. Gregory Keyes, AGE OF UNREASON. Sir Isaac Newton and Ben Franklin come up with "magic" that is based in Science. This may be a good example of technology and magic merging to form a higher plane of both.

Terry Brooks showed us a good example of magic and tecnology existing at the same time in the JERLE SHANNARA series. The fight between Antrax and Walker shows us that Magic and Technology can both be thought of as magic. It just depends on your point of view.

I think it is very Plausible to have magic and technology emerging simultaneously in a world.

I might think of it in this manner:
Magic is the Norm, and things are created and controlled by it. Someone gets tired of always expending effort to do a task with magic, so he invents a machine to do it for him. Now he has used technology to make his life easier.

With his machine, now he doesn't have to stand there and recite a magic spell or use components, like bat dung, which smells, or concentrate on a spell to continue his work, he can turn on his machine and let it go.
This allows him some time to relax and enjoy a book, or study up on the chain lightning spell he has been wanting to learn. And, most importantly it doesn't make him age prematurely, lose his hair, grow boils etc... to get the job done, if indeed magic evokes a cost from you.
And after all of this his friends mught be thinking that his technological machine is magic, because magic wouldn't be called magic, just a trait or "KNACK" to coin a phrase.

I hope that made sense.

First of all, when Harry and his classmates do various magical spells and things, and when they learn them, while they understand these things as being 'magic', they specify individual spells as belonging to subdivided classes. While these classes are still named using archaic terminology, the terminology is still basically descriptive. And it is in those areas where their understanding of magic is most tenuous that they refer to things simply as magic.

But think about it for a moment, you who've read the books, how many new (or quite old) terms have been introduced and defined in the course of your reading?

Complex vocabulary is one of the hallmarks of a technology. The difference is that once you ask certain questions that would seem to be quite important, such as whether or not magic is genetic (from what I know of the series, it seems that magical abilities--and possibly also vulnerability to magic--are a recessive trait, or perhaps a series of recessives), the magic users themselves don't know...and simply call it inborn magicalness or whatever. So while the performance and effective control of magic requires technology (knowledge and technique), the origin of magical power is...magical, because none of the characters really knows whence it comes.

Well, enough about Harry Potter. I might read the books if Rowlings tells the true history of the Black Plague...and how the muggles very nearly obliterated the wizards over that affair. Till then, I will suffer my own ignorance of affairs at Hogwarts.

I think that a lot of this confusion we suffer is because we mistake the meaning of the word "technology", which simply means a systematic knowledge of methods. Insofar as you learn magical techniques, it is technology. Insofar as you cannot learn the origin or sources of magic, there is no technology.

Because of this, I base all my 'magic' use on people figuring out limited uses of artifacts which are beyond their comprehension. Whether the artifact in question is singular (like a ubiquitous psionic energy field that responds to individuals with a certain mental/genetic/linguistic pattern) or multiple (as various advanced implements for healing, killing, communications, etc.), this makes it easy for me to figure out what the limits and costs of magic will be.

I think that the most interesting question, though, isn't what magic costs but what magic causes.

For instance, the idea that sacrificing things that were very valuable to you would cause people to gain magical power. Obviously, the more willing you were to make the sacrifice without extreme duress...the less magical power the sacrifice would bring. But the more duress applied....

Think of the implication for a conquering army. If they threaten distruction or loss that anyone in the besieged nation found unbearable...then that person would instead make that sacrifice serve their own desire for vengeace. It changes the dynamic of warfare considerably, if those who will lose the most have the opportunity to gain great power as a result. And when you change the fundamental nature of war, you change everything. What are the new methods of enforcing law, forming alliances, selecting the nobility? What are the new conceptions of honor, fidelity, integrity? In a world where the greatest power accrues to those that have lost all personal honor, destroyed those they swore to love faithfully, and sold their own hearts for power...do such words still have meaning?

Then show me...OSC did a good job of this in Hart's Hope, not just with Queen Beauty, who was all powerful because she was utterly evil. He also showed us this in the hero, who sacrifices everything to kill the woman he loves...and suffers then total betrayal...and in the end must die by his father's hand.

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In Harry Potter, there are limits or rules that you must follow, which are the price paid to do magic - many are more from the view of kids than adults, though. It is backwards from the "do magic, pay a price" idea.

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The thing that bothered me when reading the book was that, as a reader, I could not feel oriented in what the rules that govern the world are.

Let me explain:

Initially I was under the impression that magic was relatively simple, a replacement of common technology today, but nothing especially supernormal, however, as the adventure continues the level of "powerful magic," increases significantly.

This is not unusual, especially since the story is told from the points of view of children whose skills increase, interestingly enough, though, the world seems to increase in skill as well.

All right that's excusable, but still while reading something subconsciously nagged me and it took me a long to realize what it was.

The most blatent example of what I am referring to is the sloppy use of time travel, an element I wish did not even exist in the book. I have read and can fathom excellent time-travel thrillers that do not contradict themselves and such is the focusing element of the entire story, it would seem, however, that time travel magic is more of a handicap for the author.

The author has the unfortunate habit of inventing a new "magic," to deal with a situation or problem. Something the redears have not been introduced to before and are never effect by again. This is a poor "plot-device," in that the author does little else but "explain," their way out, I believe.

Example: The main conflict of the book is the battle between good and evil magic, the predictably evil but daunting villain, fititngly stereotypical, and the ever conscious but unskilled good hero who leads the opposing side. Rather basic but still enjoyable plotline, however the entire substance would be eliminated by having the mileau maintain consistant rules, which any good mileau does.

My example is this: After Voldemort kills people time travel could prevent it, eliminate him, and the conflict is dismissed before the story begins.

The author's defense mechanism for this is to say, "They respect natural events and consider such an abuse of time-travel," of course for the sake of saving lives I doubt such sentiments would prevent the ue of the time travel, and so the reason is weak at best. More to the point any society so rigid in that pattern of thinking would enevr trust a school-girl with such an item, regardless of how responsible she may appear.

So you see my problem is not the unbelievably paradoxic applications of time-travel, I can dismiss such in that the story is juvenile fantasy, but the way the author administrates the rules is bothersome.

And that is why I tend to refer to the Harry Potter series as a poor example of using magic, fun, and certainly economically successful, but bare-boned the story has little real substance to offer because of such abuses.

I will now step down from my soap-box, but I'd like to hear your opinions on the subject as well. Perhaps there was something I missed.

First, I agree that Harry Potter is one of the poorest examples of using magic that I have ever read. I only excuse it because it is fun, escapist, and juvenille in intent and audience.

But I never had a problem with time travel. Actually, she never adequately explains her rules for time travel at all! She says you can go back in time and kill your past or future self, which is one of the weirdest ideas I've ever heard when it comes to time travel. Usually this either causes a paradox that destroys the universe, gets you stuck in an infinite time loop, or at the very least causes an alternate reality. The point is, though, that she could slip in a rule that would be consistent with what she said before but also shows us exactly why we could not simply go back in time and save someone from dying.

And that brings me to the biggest problem with the series...I don't honestly believe that J.K. Rowling has completely thought out her millieu. She's writing her sixth book (I hope) and I don't think she's done anything as simple as to write out a class schedule for her characters! I notice this because it amazes me that when Harry Potter is not in a teacher's class, that teacher has that time block free. Don't they teach other classes? I've tried to map it out and I get confused, it doesn't actually add up.

But the biggest abuse of magic that I found in the series is one that does not just occur in juvenille fiction...it occurs in adult fantasy literature ALL THE TIME! I excuse it in this book because it is juvenille and because for a lot of reasons, I still love the books. But warning...don't do this:

In the fourth book we are introduced to the concept of a port key. As you say, Alias, she introduces it when it becomes relevant to the plot, although since the kids are learning bit by bit, year by year, I don't have such a problem with that. What I do have a problem with is that anything can be a port key...an old boot, a tire, a trophy, perhaps a book or quill? So why did Harry have to go through this elaborate scheme to get to a port key when the bad guy could have handed him a pencil and sent him to Lord Valdemort about a thousand times?

I agree with everything you said above, except the time-issue, again. Though I would first point out how well you explained something I found annoying in the series and even more annoying when trying to convert my annoyance to words, thanks for doing that for me.

Now back to the time issue:
You said,

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The point is, though, that she could slip in a rule that would be consistent with what she said...

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what she said before but also shows us exactly why we could not simply go back in time and save someone from dying.

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If the reason is that going back in time could do more harm than good, I could buy that. But to really stand by that reason she could only apply magic in either the use of an antagonist, or the protagonists must have a damn good reason for taking a risk that effects everybody.

If that was the reason, Hermione wouldn't have the luxury of traveling back in time on a daily basis.

Also the over-friendly environment, similar to what you said, makes characters superficial enough to deny themselves opportunities to get ahead. Call me a cynic but I would expect the Ministry to not let Hermione use that powerful of magic, because it could potentially jeopardize their motives.

The entire introduction of time-travel seems to me to be a convenient way to explain away the pickle she, the author, created for herself.

I see her, in the third book, creating a lot of interest from the reader by having peculiar events like:
-Hermione being in more places than one
-How they save the Hippogriff who is dead
-how....etc, the list goes on,

So she capitalizes on the interest in the reader who expects something good and is handed a dividend of poorly applied magic as the excuse for how it all "worked out,"

This was my impression. But perhaps I am a picky reader...

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The type of design problem under consideration here is particularly intractable because there exists a series of approximate conceptual models of increasing fidelity and complexity. Faced with situations like these many systems designers will claim to be applying Occam's razor when they opt to base their solution on the simplest conceptual model. But, a solution based on an approximation is only as good as the approximation. The only way to improve such a solution, if it is insufficient, is to replace the low fidelity conceptual model with one of higher fidelity. The worst type of problem is one that has many plausible conceptual models each of slightly higher fidelity and complexity than the last. The slavish misapplication of the principle of parsimony will condemn our systems designer to step through each successively higher complexity model until they finally reach one with the required fidelity.

Occams Razor - When faced with several explanations of a phenomenon One should always choose the simplest, the one that requires the fewest leaps of logic
This leads to a tentative conclusion: Occam's Razor is no good for selecting between alternative models if the alternatives are approximations with differing fidelity. A simple low fidelity model cannot be compared with a complex high fidelity one.

An old joke comes to mind. An engineer, a physicist, a mathematician and a biologist were asked to define Pi: The engineer said About 3, the physicist said 3.14159 +- 0.00001, the mathematician said The circumference of a circle divided by its diameter and the biologist said What is Pi. Choosing the least complex, lowest fidelity model is not always the right answer! Too many systems designers think there is virtue in always assuming Pi should be about three.

From Virtual Travelog...because I like quoting stuff

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I think that writers do this a lot, they pick out a 'simple' plot device to get the dramatic effect desired, then realize that the 'simple' model lacks essential characteristics...like anything to prevent the good/bad guys from using said device to prevent the whole story from happening in the first place!

Of course, John slightly misleads the careless reader when he says, "The only way to improve such a solution, if it is insufficient, is to replace the low fidelity conceptual model with one of higher fidelity." This is true, but it requires a corollary. Any solution that does not replace a lower fidelity conceptual model with a higher fidelity will not be an improvement!

Fidelity is an interesting term to use when we are talking about a magical system, which has no analog in the real world, right? Well...wrong!

Our concept of magic grew out of the experience of primitive peoples being introduced to technologies they didn't understand. Historically, this is the only source for the idea that magic exists. Which means, in the end, that a 'high fidelity model' of a magical system must always be based on this real world model of magic.

So if I get your meaning, a fireball spell is technology?
Or is it technology because I somehow understand it. But before I understood it, it was magic?
I think it is either one way or the other, it can't be both things. And this isn't even adding in the idea of wild or chaos magic.

I think in a fantasy setting, magic (in that writers world) is determined by that writer. Rules governing magic will be set up and the players in book will play by those rules. If the writer deviates from those rules it is a mistake. This is why D&D was so successful, rules were set and the many worlds grew up around those rules.

I can agree that magic could be percieved as a strange form of science, but to me magic is a power manipulated by someone or something. Technology is commonly grouped with things, be they a car, or a space ship, or laser weapon, they all have something in common...the item. Magic on the other hand can be used without a created item. Yes, you could make a magic system that required items, and it has been done, but I will refer back to my original point; accepted magic is based on a person or creature.

As for the price, that depends on the magic system created. I think one of the points OSC was making is that a magic system with no price would give everyone with magic ability superiority over anyone who does not. In most role playing games the magic systems are designed to balance out the power of magic by imposing limitation on how much it can be used. DnD required a mage to learn the spells over and over, forgetting the spell the moment it was cast. The mage also could only remember a certain number based on their level, or ability. Other systems have used magic points to give it more flexibility while still keeping the mage from being a killing machine without limits.

Overall I think a world were magic is common and lacking any serious limitations for normal use is fine. The trick is to not let the story be drowned in too much magic. It is hard to have conflict and a sense of danger if you have people all around that can cure you with magic.

The Darksword series did a good job of making the magic a problem from the viewpoint of the main character. Since the main character was lacking magic he had no familiarity with it, it also formed a source of motivation for him.

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In the real world, "Magic" is always the perception of a technology that the audience doesn't fully understand. In any convincing fictional world, the same must hold true.

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There's really no such thing as centrifugal force; the scientific explanation for what appears to be a force exerting pressure away from the axis of rotation is that it is actually the object's inertia, and that force is actually being applied toward the axis in order to keep the object from continuing in a straight line.

I've been aware of this fact for decades. Yet I still use the phrase "centrifugal force" to describe the phenomenon.

Look, when I wave a wand and make somebody levitate, I tell the audience it's magic. But really, if I want to be able to actually pull this off, I have to know how it's really done, and what technique I use to accomplish it.

So, for the audience it's magic, but I have to learn the technology by which the thing is actually accomplished (unless we're going to do that stage thing where I'm volunteer #1 and I'm waving a wand to levitate volunteer #2--and the actual magician is pretending to ignore us or telling jokes or something).

That is the essence of magic, the man behind the curtain, the one to whom none of it is "magic" at all. Yes, magical in that it's a lot of fun, and isn't it interesting that people can be fooled into thinking they've seen something they know very well to be impossible and all that, but if I want to do magic, I don't rely on some kind of mystic energy I don't understand, which is called 'magic' power.

And lest you all jump in and claim that this has nothing to do with writing fantasy...think for a moment about what separates all the magicians, shamen, wizards and witches (Wicca, which by the way is simply old English for Illuminati--think on that a moment) and all such from modern stage magicians. I assure you it has very little to do with technique.

When we lift the curtain and show others how the trick is performed, we're revealing a technology. When we hide our methods and rely on the audience being amazed by a trick they don't know how to replicate, that's called magic.

Actually, my dear Eric, you've been misled as to the meaning of "centrifugal force" if you think that there is no actual force causing things to move away from the center of a spinning object. But the confusion is understandable. We say that there is "really" no such thing as centrifugal force when we know quite well that it is simply too complicated to explain easily. Let me try (and no doubt illustrate the point). Let us assume that I'm going to begin spinning an array of beads...which are not attached to each other in any way, they are all free-floating (I'm in space). Before I begin applying a centripetal force, I have to apply a force that is at a right angle to the shortest line from the axis of motion to each individual bead. For the sake of simplicity, I will apply this as an impulse rather than a force, then begin applying the correct centripetal force immediatly. Each bead moves in a circle around the axis, and I am only applying centripetal force, see? But what happened to get the beads moving?

Ah, that initial impulse at the tangent of each bead's motion...it had a force component, and a time component. At first I was pushing those beads at the tangent to their intended orbit...but the instant passed when they actually started moving along that line...and they were then all being pushed by a force which consisted of a large component in the direction of the intended path of motion and a component that was pushing them directly outward, away from the axis.

So we see that the initial push to get our system moving did involve a centrifugal force after all...one that we can't really eliminate if we want to get something spinning. Think about test tubes in a centrifuge (a better example because you have a longer acceleration). It is not just a figure of speech that we are exerting a force that powerfully accelerates the material in the test tubes away from the central axis of the centrifuge. Or consider a washing machine in the spin cycle...it is actually flinging water (which was resting quite contentedly in your clothes) outwards against the outer tub. There is a force being applied....

However, once we stop accelerating the spinning motion...we are no longer applying a centrifugal force. At that point, we are only applying the centripetal force needed to hold the centrifugal energy which we have already and necessarily put into the system in check. So when we look at a system that is already spinning, we say, 'there is no centrifugal force here, the actual force is centripetal'.

Survivor, I believe that your entire argument is based on a certain definition of terms that you hold true. To you technology = something you understand and magic = something you do not understand. They are therefore polar opposites and can exist together only in that they are defined from a certain person's point of view. So that from one person's point of view something can be "magic" and from another the same thing can be "technology".

This is where my disagreement lies. I do not believe in your definitions of these concepts. I've looked up the terms in the dictionary to try to find some measured way of approaching it, but to be honest, it was useless in this case. The fact is that even the definitions of the words will be based on culture and perception.

To me, magic is mind over matter. Anytime a sentient being uses force of will to cause something to happen, this is magic. It doesn't mattter if you tell me they have some genetic ability to do this, it doesn't matter if you tell me there are microscopic organisms called miticlorions (sp?) that are actually the force behind the power. The thing that distinguishes real magic from what a state magician does it trickery and slight of hand...a stage magician does not actually use mind over matter.

So you see, to me magic is magic. A rose by any other name would still smell as sweet, yes?

Finally, yes, sufficiently advanced technology will certainly be confused with magic by those that do not understand. But it is not magic, it is simply *confused* with magic.

As for whether one person's magic is just another's misunderstood technology, it again depends upon the story. I've read tales in which magic was a raw element that certain people were simply able to tap into and use. There were no techniques involves, no proper arrangement of motions or language required, just an innate ability to channel power. Blanket statements (as usual) don't work when talking about fantasy...authors come up with their own definitions and internal logic when it comes to magical elements. As a reader, all I ask for is consistency within the story; set up your rules and then stick to them, and I'll go along for the ride.

If someone is actually casting a spell that causes something to levitate, that's real magic. Even if he knows the scientific reason why casting a spell works, it's still magic.

When you're going to say "magic means mind over matter", then be aware that we all constantly use our minds to make matter do stuff, by a mechanism that is poorly understood at best. Most materialists simply write off the question and say that there is no such thing as 'mind' at all, it is all simply the matter doing stuff. I frankly find this unintelligible...it makes a hell of a lot more sense to say that there is no such thing as matter, only illusions of such within the mind.

Eric, I believe I made my point clearer than your response would indicate...modern stage magicians are doing basically the same thing that all 'magic' users in our history have done...that is, they impress people using technology that the audiance doesn't fully understand.

This is the thing we have always called by the name 'magic', a person hiding the technique for doing something behind a curtain. Yes, in the imaginations of the dupe, it may so be that they believed this 'magic' was some kind of telekinetic or psionic energy, but it never was.

And when we look at what is necessary for magic to remain magic, it depends absolutely on the audience not knowing how it is done. But the magician has to know! If there does not exist an actual technique that accomplishes the trick, then the trick is not accomplished and there is no magic.

I will say that this is one thing that Jordan gets right (we probably spend too much time bashing the guy), only the most ignorant people in his milieu really think that 'The Power' is magic.

Good...no, wait, I have a good new expression...Holy Shat!, I've gotten pulled into a quibble over the definition of words, when anyone could just whip out a dictionary (as Christine was about to do before she realized that by the dictionary, I'm right), and settle the meaning of the words.

That isn't the point. The point is that for the actual, skilled user of 'magic', the use of magic follows the rules of behaving like the use of an advanced technology. The conscious magic user has to learn techniques and terminology (well, maybe you don't need a specific terminology, you only need terminology to communicate with others). It is really no different from how we all learn to drive a car or use a computer...just imagine for a moment that you tried to teach someone to drive using only the word 'car' for every part of the car.

Okay, first you need to turn the car...that starts the car, no, that...you turn the car to control the car, to start the car you turn the car...here, let me do it.

Or a computer.

Okay, to computer the computer push the computer...no, no, (*&^!, you're computering my computer, get away from there!

I still have no idea what centrifugal force has to do with this argument...the only time I've heard centifugal force used by people who really understand it is to refer to the actual centrifugal force, not the 'apparent' centrifugal force. For instance, the simple reaction force an object exerts against a centripetal force will always be centifugal (in our world's geometry, in any case). Just like a table exerts an upwards force on a book sitting on top of the table.

So far as I know, the only common and incorrect application of the term is when we state that some force is pushing the...okay, let me start all over.

When you have a load being accelerated centripetally while traveling in a circle, the force on the load must be centripetal...dang it, that's a tautalogy.

Look, when you have an object with mass moving in a circle at a constant speed even though the velocity is changing at a constant rate, there must be a centripetal force acting on that object. In this case, laymen often state that there is centrifugal force on the object, when in fact there is not centrifugal force currently acting on the object (though of course a centrifugal force was required to get the object moving). However, any object with mass will exert a centrifugal force against whatever centripetal force is keeping it moving in a circle. For example, if I have a ball on a string, and I swing it around my head, the string exerts a centripetal force on the ball, while the ball exerts a centrifugal force on the string. This is why I can't swing a heavy ball with a weak string (okay, there are other reasons, but this is on of them).

Experienced engineers (that I know) never confuse the force the ball exerts on the string with the force the string exerts on the ball, even though they are necessarily equal...they are also necessarily opposite. To an engineer, it is about as sensible as confusing black with white (artists are allowed to do this...engineers are not).

It is not that there is no centrifugal force, it is that centrifugal forces are only acting on the load mass when the system is being accelerated initially. After that, the centrifugal force is exerted by the load mass against the centipetal force. If you are on a certain class of carnival ride, you experience centripetal, not centrifugal, force (unless it is designed so that another passenger is squishing you...I've been on a couple of rides like that). But the ride is affected by a centrifugal force exerted by your body, see?

You feel the centripetal, force, not the centrifugal force...but both exist. When an engineer speaks of the centrifugal forces acting on the load, this can only mean the forces applied to get it in motion. But when he speaks of the centrifugal force exerted by the load on the system, he isn't talking about something that doesn't exist.

This is one of those educational over-corrections that is so common as a great source of error. We pound people so hard with the idea that centrifugal force doesn't act on the load, and then everyone think it doesn't exist. Well I, for one, say, "Enough with the pounding!"

I'm not opposed to using the word "magic". I'm just opposed to using it to describe everything to do with your magical system...see my comment about teaching someone to drive a car or use a computer using nothing but the word "car" or "computer". In just the same way, it wouldn't work for learning magic...because when you learn something, you must treat it as a 'technology', that is, a group of methods and techniques.

I just think you are disecting this subject WAAAAY too much.

Are you an engineer of some sort?

There are too many facets of magic to just categorize it as one thing. Too many angles to play it from to label it in technological terms. Is it a genetic ability or talent? Is it an object or combination of elements? Is it ordained by a higher power? Is it the spoken word or symbols? I have read books that use all of these examples of magic.

A few of these could fit into your category "A GROUP OF METHODS AND TECHNIQUES" but your definition doesn't cover all of these.

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Eric, I believe I made my point clearer than your response would indicate...modern stage magicians are doing basically the same thing that all 'magic' users in our history have done...that is, they impress people using technology that the audiance doesn't fully understand.

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Modern stage magicians depend on tricking the audience. Someone who could do the things stage magicians pretend to do would not have to trick the audience.

If you cannot understand the difference between a magician who uses mirrors and misdirection to make it appear a wooden staff has turned into a live snake, and a magician who actually transforms a wooden staff into a live snake, then there's no point in discussing this subject with you.

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I'm not opposed to using the word "magic". I'm just opposed to using it to describe everything to do with your magical system...see my comment about teaching someone to drive a car or use a computer using nothing but the word "car" or "computer". In just the same way, it wouldn't work for learning magic...because when you learn something, you must treat it as a 'technology', that is, a group of methods and techniques.

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In the real world, "Magic" is always the perception of a technology that the audience doesn't fully understand.

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My position is that, if a woman in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692 discovered that she could make a neighbor's cow get sick and die by wiggling her fingers at it, she would call her power "witchcraft." (Not out loud, obviously.)

Obviously, people who are studying magic will use specialized terms for different aspects of the "technology" of magic. But they would still consider the field as a whole to be "magic." (Or witchcraft, sorcery, etc.)

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Alias, maybe you should give the third book another look. If I'm understanding you correctly, you believe that she wrote herself into a corner and used time travel to work her way out? No, she had the time travel thing planned throughout the book.

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All right, in retrospect I can agree with this. She clearly intended to use the device and planned for it throughout the book. However, I am still under the belief that she had resorted to it, though in earlier stages than I had previously thought, as a method of forcing the plot to a certain design.

There were things she wanted to happen in the story that she couldn't have happen in her already present mileau, to which she modified the world by introducing this new element, time travel. I still consider this sloppy, to brute-force the world setup off its natural course to force-fit something else. I think an author should hold true to the world he/she created in the first book instead of introducing overhwelming changes in the reader's perspective of the world later on.

Especially when this "new," element could have been so key and critical to the events that the plot is basing its foundation.

ie: Harry's parents' deaths, reign of terror of Voldemort, etc. Time-travel magic could have easily prevented this. The counter argument, that I am seeing, is that time travel is so dangerous and risky that they had "legislated," not to "abuse" the magic for such things. All right I can buy that, except it introduces a catch 22:

If magical time-travel is so dangerous and so protected, naturally it would have to be protected incredibly, and the ministry could recognize this, they would also be intelligent enough not to give the power to a teenage girl, or anyone for that matter.

You see, even if she was somehow trustworthy, forced to use the magic for "X" purpose only by magic, or some such nonesense explanation, the item could easily be stolen from her and abused by someone else, criminial or otherwise.
Simply implausible.

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She just didn't have a really good time travel setup in my opinion. For that matter, time travel is almost never done well in scifi or fantasy so really, didn't care that much.

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In the real world, "Magic" is always the perception of a technology that the audience doesn't fully understand. In any convincing fictional world, the same must hold true.

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Huh. And here I always thought of magic as just... well.. Magic. Thanks for ruining it for me. So if I get your meaning, a fireball spell is technology?

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Overall I think a world were magic is common and lacking any serious limitations for normal use is fine. The trick is to not let the story be drowned in too much magic. It is hard to have conflict and a sense of danger if you have people all around that can cure you with magic.

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Survivor, I believe that your entire argument is based on a certain definition of terms that you hold true. To you technology = something you understand and magic = something you do not understand.

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To me, magic is mind over matter. Anytime a sentient being uses force of will to cause something to happen, this is magic.

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Magic is something that defies the natural laws of the universe.

For instance, take Newton's Second Law of Motion. Force = Mass X Acceleration

If you can accelerate an object (Flying carpet, broomstick) without appling a force, it's magic.

If you can hit something with a force that has no mass(telekinetic blast), it's magic.

By the same token, humans can't usually breathe sea water or float on a breeze, because these actions defy several natural laws. If you can do these things by waving a stick or by sheer will, that's magic.

If you perform an action that has a consistent, but unrelated reaction, that could also be magic.

Example: I shake some chicken bones and a drop of my blood in a shoe box. This causes all the glass withing six yards to shatter explosively.

Some laws may govern these action/reaction relationships, but they are outside of the natural laws of the universe.

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Magic is something that defies the natural laws of the universe.

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Well, the reason why I would never come up with anything close to that definition of magic is that I believe the following to be true:

If the natural laws of the universe do not permit something to happen, it cannot happen.

If something does happen, then the natural laws of the universe permit it.

Therefore, any story in which the characters use magic must take place in a universe with natural laws that allow magic.

For instance, if someone tricks me into thinking that a staff turned into a snake, that's magic, if the staff actually turns into a snake, that's a miracle.

- An event that appears inexplicable by the laws of nature and so is held to be supernatural in origin or an act of God

Magic:

- The art that purports to control or forecast natural events, effects, or forces by invoking the supernatural.

Miracles are generally associated with religion and god. Magic is not. If I turn your staff into a snake, you will only perceive it as an act of god (a miracle) if you are part of a society that credits acts like those to a god. If you've learned instead that wizards do those things, and the act of doing it is called magic, then you will see it as magic.

I agree with Christine. "Real" magic is some sort of power that is used by the mind to control matter/nature. This is not the same as a lesser developed society perceiving advanced technology as magic. They are two completely different things.

Have to admit, I don't worry too much as long as an author's system doesn't slap me with mistakes or contradictions. Many books that use magic are not ABOUT the magic anyway - Harry's books are about Harry, who just happens to be able to do magic and isn't that cool... I'm not worried about him being able to do whatever with a port key - I'm worried about him creating a better life for himself in spite of the odds. I'd love for him to get his parents back, but I would have trouble believing that will happen. I don't think the author is thinking Harry has to pay a price to do magic - Harry has to grow up, control his own life, build self-esteem, vanquish the foe...

In fact, what bothered me most in the 5th book was the cutting (won't do details so won't spoil things). As a teacher of young adolescents, I've seen it, and however it happens, someone reports it. I don't care what reasons were given, I had issues with that. And I don't think it was a price for doing magic. I also don't like how he becomes whiney... my least favorite book so far.

But I guess I still read for fun, and haven't been writing long enough yet to tear books apart as I read them, analyzing every little thing until I can't just enjoy a good story - but now I'm going to have to go back and reread about the time travel thing and the port keys - guess I was reading wrong not to notice something wrong.

Quantum Leap was so wrong (yes, time travel thread, but oh well), but I still enjoyed the show - I think it was about making things better, and not about time travel. Bad device and premise? Yeah, but I still liked the stories. And I hate that the mc never got to go home. Guess he paid a price too.

The use of technology requires that an action is performed through some kind of artifact.

For instance, if I reach out and push something and it moves, you wouldn't say that any form of technology has been used. I just pushed it.

If I switch on a motor and it moves, then technology has been used. The difference is that the motor has been built with the purpose of making things move.

The same distinction can be applied to magic. Most fantasy stories, therefore, use magic that is inherently non-technological, because the power to perform it comes entirely from within the person who is performing it (same as pushing an object to move it).

Sometimes an artifact of some kind is used to perform magic, though. Usually the artifact amplifies a natural ability, although not always (e.g., the ring in The Hobbit / L.O.T.R. makes its wearer invisible whether or not that wearer has any natural magical capability and without any conscious effort on behalf of the wearer). It is hard to state whether this is technology or not, but I feel that it probably _doesn't_ count (at least in most cases), because usually the description of the way such artifacts are made (when any is given) relies on magic of the absolutely non-technological kind to give the artifact its magical properties.

It isn't that you've all decided on a completely unsupported and novel definition of magic (though there is that).

It's that you desperately want to stay in the audience. You simply don't want to be shown how magic works...because then it wouldn't be magic to you anymore.

Thanks to TruHero for showing me the light. Yes, I live in a world completely devoid of magic. Miracles can be performed by advanced technology, and you can acknowledge this and still experience miracle (which I like better than magic anyway). Magic is always an illusion, dependent on ignorance. Once you truly understand what magic is...it no longer exists for you. And for reasons beyond my imagining, most people would rather remain ignorant exactly because it means they can then live in a magical world.

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Magic is always an illusion, dependent on ignorance.

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They might call it sorcery, thaumaturgy, witchcraft, wizardry, charms, spells, voodoo, enchantment, alchemy, black arts, summoning, divination, prophecy, hex, jinx, incantation, runes, conjury, augury, occultism, Saidar/Saidin, The One Power -- even miracle -- but it's magical power, and within the setting of the story, it is a real power. Those who understand how to use magical power do not consider it an illusion.

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No, that's the definition of miracle, not magic.
For instance, if someone tricks me into thinking that a staff turned into a snake, that's magic, if the staff actually turns into a snake, that's a miracle.

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But Kathleen's original post said:

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Let's discuss some theories of how magic is used in fantasy stories.

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Note that we are not discussing how magic works in the "real world."

Survivor's point seems to be that magic does not exist. It's all just technological tricks to fool the rubes.

For most fantasy worlds, this doesn't hold water. In Harry Potter, Magic is only allowed to those born with the genetic ability and is accomplished by saying a few latinesqe words and wiggling a wand.

If Potter's magic was all a tech trick, a muggle could be taught to use it. Rowling doesn't allow this in her universe.

I suppose you could postulate that there is some relation between a recessive human gene, latinesque words, and sticks embedded with animal parts, that is tecnological in nature, but you're getting into the realm of baloneyium.

I offer the concept that method does not make technology. Technology is something that takes advantage of and stays within the realms of science (known and unknown.) Magic is something that bends or ignores the laws of science (known or unknown.)

A caveman might believe that a microwave oven is magic, but he can be taught to operate it. But the inventor of the microwave oven knows why it works.

Harry Potter knows HOW to create light from his wand, but he doesn't understand WHY it works. Maybe no one does. Maybe the method was passed down from a god. Maybe an ancient wizard stumbled upon the process.

Going back to Clarke's Law:

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Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

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This doesn't say "all magic is technology." It says "to an observer there is no difference between magic and advanced tech."

So, let's assume Survivor and Robin Hood were observing the microwave wielding caveman and wand waving Harry Potter.

Survivor is going to think, "Big Deal! The caveman's nuking an egg. I use that at home. But, I don't know how that Potter kid is doing that. It must be a trick. Let me see that wand. Hmmm. No light bulb. No power source. No heat. I don't get it."

Robin Hood is likely to think, "A box that beeps and cooks eggs without fire and a stick that glows like a candle, but gives no heat. What strange magic is this?"

The caveman might think, "Ugh! Magic Box make Og strong. If Og hit boy with Magic Box
and take Magic Stick, he will be stronger."

Harry may be thinking, "I could cook an egg faster with an Ovumus Thermogenicus. Why is Og looking at me that way?"

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Note that we are not discussing how magic works in the "real world."
Survivor's point seems to be that magic does not exist. It's all just technological tricks to fool the rubes.
For most fantasy worlds, this doesn't hold water. In Harry Potter, Magic is only allowed to those born with the genetic ability and is accomplished by saying a few latinesqe words and wiggling a wand.

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That magic is a talent that coincides with the natural universe but the majority of everyone and everything can't tap into it, use it, etc, but magic still works with physical laws. This is justifiable because "magic's" effects are generally involved around effecting the physical world.

What I mean is,
"Arathoz throws his life energy into the spell and felt the hot fingers of flame jet from his staff, and soar toward his adversary..."

The magic is that he did something any one of us, or any normal person, could not do. But for all we know his art is based on the manipulation of microscopic elements that create a fire, after all, fire can be created in the real physical world.

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If Potter's magic was all a tech trick, a muggle could be taught to use it. Rowling doesn't allow this in her universe.

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A caveman might believe that a microwave oven is magic, but he can be taught to operate it. But the inventor of the microwave oven knows why it works.

Harry Potter knows HOW to create light from his wand, but he doesn't understand WHY it works. Maybe no one does. Maybe the method was passed down from a god. Maybe an ancient wizard stumbled upon the process.

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You sort of imply that any magical user, were magic any form of technology, would need to invent it in order to ever actually use it. I do not think this is necessary.

I still believe that magic in fiction is composed of one of two categories.

1. total fantasy: flies in the face of reason, it operates by transcending the physical realm and therefore is not bound by any physical principles.

2. science: magic is a science or art that is directly linked to the workings of the physical world but is very hazy and/or difficult to manipulate, or comprehend, but is natural nonetheless.

I believe that writers use both whether or not they realize it. The Star Wars example of magic is much more like the second example but I would argue that Harry Potter magic is much more like the first, as it has no foundation or explanation of any kind.

I think one must appeal to the selected type of the author and respect magic however they have set it up, in order to enjoy the story.

The definition "rivets and steel" doesn't work too well...by that definition, nothing in Star Trek is technology, because...no rivets and no steel. Also, no strong attachment to known science.

I'll go back to what I've said before, and kind of highlight it.

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I think that a lot of this confusion we suffer is because we mistake the meaning of the word "technology", which simply means a systematic knowledge of methods. Insofar as you learn magical techniques, it is technology. Insofar as you cannot learn the origin or sources of magic, there is no technology.

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You might all say, correctly, that we're here quibbling over the meaning of a word. I've noticed that myself. But I'm not the one who started quibbling.

When I said that in a persuasive fantasy world, the magic has to function as technology...I was staying on the subject of how good fantasy uses magic. When everyone jumped on me for destroying the magic...well, somebody was quibbling over a word (and one they didn't bother to look up first).

I was making a point about fantasy writing...namely, the author has to work out how magic actually works in the story, what rules it follows. And convincing characters in a fantasy have to know what is and is not possible...otherwise there can't be any dramatic tension.

My main point was what I consider both interesting and difficult (to and for the writer of fantasy). If the author wants an interesting story, then the magic users must be limited in their abilities. There have to be rules. Otherwise, there can never be any dramatic tension, because any problem can be solved by waving a wand or exerting sheer mental power.

And that means the writer has to treat it as a technology...it can't be mysterious to the writer why magic works...because then it will simply be a Deus Ex device used over and over again...ruining any chance you have of making a good story.

I think what you were referring to earlier was more like this, at least this is the way it was coming across.

PRESTIDIGITATION:
Performance of or skill in performing magic or conjuring tricks with the hands; sleight of hand.
A show of skill or deceitful cleverness.

This has to do with MAGIC, but would be more commonly thought of as stage magic. Which in my opinion, and some of the others that have posted, is different from MAGIC in a fictional Fantasy setting. In the DRAGONLANCE series for instance, Raistlin started out his "career" as a stage magician, doing sleight-of-hand tricks. He later graduated to using actual MAGIC, based on a unique power. In those books there was a definate separation between sleight-of-hand and the use of actual magic.
I'm basing this on some of the things you said in earlier posts:

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the man behind the curtain, the one to whom none of it is "magic" at all. Yes, magical in that it's a lot of fun, and isn't it interesting that people can be fooled into thinking they've seen something they know very well to be impossible and all that, but if I want to do magic, I don't rely on some kind of mystic energy I don't understand, which is called 'magic' power.

AND

When we lift the curtain and show others how the trick is performed, we're revealing a technology. When we hide our methods and rely on the audience being amazed by a trick they don't know how to replicate, that's called magic.

AND

modern stage magicians are doing basically the same thing that all 'magic' users in our history have done...that is, they impress people using technology that the audiance doesn't fully understand.

AND

This is the thing we have always called by the name 'magic', a person hiding the technique for doing something behind a curtain. Yes, in the imaginations of the dupe, it may so be that they believed this 'magic' was some kind of telekinetic or psionic energy, but it never was.

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Those kind of comments were throwing me off earlier.

This quote, I agree with:

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My main point was what I consider both interesting and difficult (to and for the writer of fantasy). If the author wants an interesting story, then the magic users must be limited in their abilities. There have to be rules. Otherwise, there can never be any dramatic tension, because any problem can be solved by waving a wand or exerting sheer mental power.

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Which is very similar to what I said earlier:

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I think in a fantasy setting, magic (in that writers world) is determined by that writer. Rules governing magic will be set up and the players in book will play by those rules. If the writer deviates from those rules it is a mistake. This is why D&D was so successful, rules were set and the many worlds grew up around those rules.

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One problem for me is that I don't see what the fundamental difference is between doing something using an obscure or arcane technology and doing it with some kind of arcane power. A power that comes from superior knowledge of how the universe works, after all, is only different in kind from superior knowledge of how the human mind and eye work...they both have to be real knowledge about real things in order for them to be meaningfully 'superior' enough to allow magic to occur.

Most hand tricks you can see through quickly enough...but the fact of the matter is that it takes a bit extra in the dexterity department to be a master prestidigitator, dexterity that I will never really be able to achieve. Even when I can see through the trick, I can't replicate it. So in a sense, it remains magic in the sense that despite my theoretical knowledge of how the trick is performed, I don't have the practical skill to duplicate it.

Conversely, if my character uses 'real' magic in a fantasy setting, then a good bit of what makes it magic is that most other people don't know how it is done. This could be because my character has a naturally occuring ability (like being extra dexterous or perhaps having a better sense of some kind of 'magic' energy), but it doesn't need to be the case. But there is more to it than that. After all, a good many members of the animal kingdom have abilities that are quite extraordinary--at least by human standards. I lack the natural ability to shoot boiling acid out of my nether regions, or produce light (from the same area), or fly, or outrun a gazelle, or generate electrical shocks (except on accident). Nor could any other human do these things a thousand or even a hundred years ago. But we never thought of the animals that could do these things as being particularly 'magical'...it was simply a fact of nature (granted, where the natural world itself was considered entirely magical, so were these abilities, but in such societies, such things as getting pregnant, or having a menstrual cycle, or being able to spit, were also considered magical). A necessary part of what makes my ability 'magical' (to others) is that I know how to hide the fact that it is a natural ability...or even hide what type of ability I'm actually using.

There is an exception if my character happens to be...an exception That is to say, if my character has a unique ability, then the tendency will be for others to regard it as magical, whether or not my character is deliberately trying to play up the magic angle. It could be a totally natural mutation...think of a character that has a mutated gene so that his sweat smells really bad...to dogs. Dogs can't track him, because trying to follow his scent makes them dizzy, they can't attack him because he smells like the worst thing they've ever encountered, any time he walks up and there's a dog around, that dog acts like it's being tortured until it can get away from him.

But only dogs (and perhaps other carnivores) can smell this. All other humans see is that normally ferocious animals are scared spitless of this guy for no apparent reason. Maybe they know enough about how dogs smell things to realize that he just smells bad to dogs...or maybe they decide he's got some kind of mojo.

Let's extend a parallel to psi energy (presuming such a thing exists, and I think the fact we exists is strong, though not compelling, evidence this is the case). If psi energy exists, then it is almost certainly a 'natural' phenomenon, in that normal humans must have a certain level of psi energy (defined here as the force that allows a mind to affect the material world). If someone learned to use psi energy to affect objects directly without the intermediary process of generating signals in the brain that then are ampliphied and transmitted down...okay, I'll just say without the intermediary of the brain and body, then this would initially seem supernatural to us...until we developed an understanding of the natural principles behind it.

If our psi energy user were a 'witch' (or someone who simply learned to do this) then the technology already exists as a technology...the ability is not 'supernatural' in any sense except in the sense it is beyond the understanding of nature that everyone else possesses. Our witch would be a magician in the same sense as a prestidigitator, though instead of using finger dexterity this magic would use a psi "dexterity".

If the ability were the result of a fluke (rather than training), then the same case would apply as Mr. stealthy stink above. A sufficiently advanced technology (and I don't think ours is up to this particular job, though I could be wrong) could study the phenomenon and learn how it works...just the same way we've uncovered and controlled the previously completely mysterious force that drives lightning. A society insufficiently advanced to be able to study the phenomenon would have to regard it as magic (whatever the poor sod with the psi fluke might think).

In either case, it is the ability of the larger society to understand and control the power manifested that will determine whether it is generally called science or 'magic'. And among practitioners, it is the desire to either keep the technique arcane or disseminate knowledge of it that determines which words they will use. In the case of Hogwarts (or the Isle of Roke, if you prefer something a bit more literary), both factors play a role, and the whole body of knowledge is often (and realistically) referred to as magic, while more specific language is used in instructing initiates in the particular disciplines.

If someone 2000 years ago proved that he could move objects about with just by thinking about them, people would call it magic, and say thay he was using magic power to do it. And if he could teach other people to do it, so that pretty soon it was something nearly everybody could do, then everyone at the time would think it was great that they could do magic and that they had magic power.

The labels that people would use depend on their culture.

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If psi energy exists, then it is almost certainly a 'natural' phenomenon, in that normal humans must have a certain level of psi energy (defined here as the force that allows a mind to affect the material world).

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Affect implies that something is impacted on an emotional level.

Effect implies something is impacted by a physical or any other means, over all change