Coalescent

Occasionally--it's a group blog, not his alone.

From:

faithhopetricks.livejournal.com

Well, fuckedy. I thought at first 1) he had an LJ and had commented on

truepenny's LJ, which was rather mind-blowing; and 2) that was his blog.

I liked his post v much.

From:

sharp-blue.livejournal.com

He argued about causality on my weblog too!

From:

I thought it was fairly obvious that magic implied that the universe was conscious. You can command it to do things that are very anthrocentric, and generally it works as if the way that people think about things is the way they really are.

From:

I hadn't thought about the difference in terms of consciousness before, or at least not as clearly as he lays it out in that post.

From:

It also ties in nicely to The Well Tempered Plot Device, and the discussion therein relating The Force to The Plot. Magic treats the world like a story, where things happen that affect the story we all pass through. The effects of magic are frequently described in the ways they change the plot of the characters, unless you're talking about hermetic magic, in which case the magic is verging on the scientific/alchemical anyway.

From:

But hang on, almost all fiction treats the world like a story; it just about has to. Real life doesn't generally have neat narrative arcs. Perhaps the difference between fantasy and sf is whether we can affect our own story or the world's story. Magic allows you control of your own life, allows you to escape social and economic forces that might otherwise constrain your choices.

I haven't thought this through, so it may well be nonsense.

From:

You get scientific devices that raise the temperature, move continents, alter emotions, etc. All of these have a defined effect on an object.

Magical effects tend to effect things on a more meta level - "You will be a frog until kissed by a princess" - try feeding a Princess Recognition System into a computer and see how much fun you have - but magic knows, because it's sentient.

There is magic that isomorphous to technical effects - fireballs match up with flamethrowers, etc - but any high fantasy type magic assumes sentience "Arthur will sleep until England's Greatest Threat is upon it." just isn't feasible in SF without a cryogenic system hooked up to a sentient computer.

From:

itchyfidget.livejournal.com

Magic has a subjective component--the intention, desire, or willpower of the practitioner--that is explicitly excluded from scientific experimentation.

I disagree - I think that although science ought to be practiced like that, it often isn't - people frequently go into experiments with a very clear idea of what they'd like out of them (indeed, to develop an experimental hypothesis is to make a fairly fundamental statement about the desired outcome).

It's funny that you should post about this today - I'll write a poll in a sec that will explain why.

From:

mattia.livejournal.com

I disagree - I think that although science ought to be practiced like that, it often isn't - people frequently go into experiments with a very clear idea of what they'd like out of them (indeed, to develop an experimental hypothesis is to make a fairly fundamental statement about the desired outcome).

Well, yes, but surely that's a different argument? This argument speaks to the nature of Science vs. Magic. Ultimately, good science either fits the observable, indepentently verifiable, or it does not. No matter if the scientists wants it to. The way Magic is presented is far more ephemeral, having more to do with the practitioner's intention, the will for something to be done than with fairly strict physical laws that might get in the way. In what I've read, Magic can often be created, while science remains little more than description.

From:

itchyfidget.livejournal.com

Magic can often be created, while science remains little more than description.

Ah, but is it? You know about the experimenter effect, right? That merely by observing, we change things. One might argue that the mere act of constructing and observing a scientific experiment produces a synergy impossible to mimic without the scientist's/observer's presence ... isn't that magic?

I'm just playing the Devil's Avocado here, obviously.

From:

mattia.livejournal.com

No, that's quantum physics.

The simple fact that we can use science to create technology/machines/experiments that continue to do what they're supposed to do, based on the principles that may or may not have been altered by the observer effect, without any observers, or even having anyone there who understands why it works, is proof enough for me.

From:

Poll? I see no poll.

From:

oursin.livejournal.com

Also, some people are just better hands-on experimenters, for whatever reason. (I am trying to recall the precise details of a seminar on Pasteur I once went to, which suggested that he was brilliant at getting results from his experiments. But it was too long ago - though I think partly due to his exactly technical standards.)

From:

del-c.livejournal.com

I disagree - I think that although science ought to be practiced like that, it often isn't - people frequently go into experiments with a very clear idea of what they'd like out of them (indeed, to develop an experimental hypothesis is to make a fairly fundamental statement about the desired outcome).

I think you, or possibly Chiang, are putting the consciousness in the wrong place. Magic works if the universe has a consciousness that can respond to the magic user's request. Superstition works if the universe recognises and processes symbols, although it needn't necessarily do so consciously. Science works even though the universe has no symbol processing capability at all, at least at present (Ubiquitous Computing Power may change that, see Stross et al.)

Add me to the list of people surprised that Chiang's distinctioin is new to Niall: the above is how I define fantasy. For instance, some have said Groundhog Day could be science fiction; I say no, it's fantasy, because the Bill Murray character finds himself in a universe that responds to actions according to moral criteria. That only works if the universe in question can understand morals.

From:

This ties in with an idea I've been formulating for some time: that science fiction is a child of rational philosophy. It's not just a matter of the science, that is just one aspect of the philosophical view that grew up during the Renaissance that the world is explicable. If we look hard enough there is a rational explanation for everything, from the movements of the stars to the behaviour of our fellow humans. Even if science fiction is not about science, it is imbued with this notion that everything operates within a comprehensible universe.

In fantasy, not everything is explicable. It may not be magic that represents the unknowable, but the underlying ethos is that some aspect of the universe within which fantasy operates is unknown and perhaps unknowable.

What we have seen in the world outside literature over the last few years is the rise of a non-rationalist philosophy. There is the spread of fundamentalist religions, the rise to political authority of people who make religious belief the basis of their political actions, even in the relatively esoteric field of moral philosophy new schools of thought are suggesting that our moral judgements are based on emotion not on reason. And alongside this we have seen a growth in fantasy and a decline in science fiction. I cannot say for sure, but I have a gut feeling that the two are connected in some way.

From:

There is the spread of fundamentalist religions,

Go back 200 years, or even 100, and _everyone_ was a fundamentalist, outside of a few scattered intellectuals.

the rise to political authority of people who make religious belief the basis of their political actions,

Again, this was all politicians until extremely recently, largely because nearly everyone believed

even in the relatively esoteric field of moral philosophy new schools of thought are suggesting that our moral judgements are based on emotion not on reason.

That's because they are. There is no absolute basis for morality, therefore morality has naught to be based on _but_ emotion. You can, of course, guide your actions with reason, but emotion gives you your basis to begin with.

From:

morality has naught to be based on _but_ emotion

Since at least John Locke until at least R.M. Hare, all moral philosophy has been based on reason, the sense that there was a rational basis for understanding and explaining our actions and our motives.

I'm not saying that morality is not based on emotion rather than reason, but that development in moral philosophy is a dramatic reversal of over 300 years of a theory of ethics based on reason.

From:

I think there has been more variation in moral philosophy than that. What about utilitarianism - that was an attempt to fuse the two. Or existentialism? And the idea that the separation of reason and emotion is a false dichotomy. I'm of that latter view.

From:

Utilitarianism is a strictly reason-based philosophy, it all builds on a rational calculation of what might constitute the greater good for the greater number. Emotion has absolutely no place in that philosophy.

And existentialism uses an understanding of what it is to 'be' as the foundation upon which a system of morality can be rationally developed.

Again, I am not saying that the separation of reason and emotion is a good or right thing, I am simply saying that such separation was the most basic layer upon which rational philosophy was built. By now simply considering that it might be a false dichotomy we are already separating ourselves from the systems of thought that held general sway in Europe and America throughout the Renaissance, the Enlightenment and into the early years of the 20th century.

From:

For instance, John Stuart Mill

'Actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness; wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness.'

In other words, the calculation is made on the basis of the degree of an emotion - specifically happiness.

From:

ninebelow.livejournal.com

In other words, the calculation is made on the basis of the degree of an emotion - specifically happiness.

No, the calculation is made on the basis of producing the greatest good. That is a rational basis. It is the unit of measurement that Mill uses that is the emotion.

From:

That's a circular argument, because the whole point of moral philosphy is to define what 'the good' is. Utilitarianism defines it as human happiness, or pleasure. This was to get away from the idea that the good was what god told us was good.

Mill tried to distinguish higher pleasures from lower ones, while primitive utilitarianism said all pleasures were equal.

I've got to leave the computer now, so I can't follow this conversation for a while.

From:

But it is still a rational philosophy, emotion is not something that creates the moral theory, it is something that can be rationally measured as the target for that theory.

From:

(Damn - this comment won't come out in the right place - hope it's OK now)

Or, now I think about it, the most rationalistic of philosophers, David Hume:

"every quality of the mind, which is useful or agreeable to the person himself or to others, communicates a pleasure to the spectator, engages his esteem ... is admitted under the honourable denomination of virtue or merit"

Hume thought that reason was the servant of emotion.

From:

we have,indeed, gone from "God will tell us what is morally right!" to "We will discover what is morally right ourselves!" to "There's no such thing as morally right!" but the move from the middle stage to the latter hasn't been a regression backwards, but a step forwards in understanding of what "morally right" means.

Basically - those people who turn to religion for moral answers aren't postmodern - they're premodern.

From:

I neither know nor, really, care whether it is a step backwards, forwards or sideways, the only thing i am saying is that it is a step away from.

The rise of rationalism was marked by the movement you describe from 'God will tell us what is morally right' to 'we will decide what is morally right' to 'there is no such thing as morally right'.

World War II put paid to that last position, ever since then the movement has been towards 'maybe there is a morally right after all' and now we are getting political positions built upon the belief that 'God will tell us what is morally right'.

From: