Magic and the Unexplained

     One of my guilty pleasures that I am a bit embarrassed by is that I watch the History Channel show Ancient Aliens. If you aren't familiar with the show, each episode takes on a different topic like "Cowboys and Aliens," "Aliens and Mythology," or "Aliens and Ancient Technology." Essentially, the show pushes forward the claim that advanced aliens have visited Earth before and have gotten involved in shaping human history. As a history student, I find it enjoyable to watch because its almost like a form of alternative history and historical fiction. Sometimes the end of a really good episode will leave me saying, "I don't know, maybe there was something interesting going on there," whether I truly believe in the theory that aliens were an integral part of making the event, person, civilization, etc. interesting. 

    Why am I talking about Ancient Aliens? One of the things I have picked up from the show is that humans always come up with something to explain what they don't understand. Fire chariot? Maybe a comet or futuristic spacecraft. Hindu gods raining fire down from the stars? Perhaps we would see it as a meteor shower. Giant silver eagle? We know that to be an airplane, although I am not sure why an airplane would make an appearance to the Aztec civilization... The point is, humans come up with all kinds of things to make sense of the things they are seeing and hearing. Belief in magic could certainly fall in line with this phenomenon, and in some ways we know it to be true. The simple illusion or sleight of hand trick performed for entertainment is called "magic" even though we know there is an explanation behind it that we probably don't understand. Mixing plants and other ingredients together to make potions is always a magical action in video games and television. However, we know that mixing various ingredients together to cause a reaction is a form of chemistry and is the method used to make our modern day healing potions, aka medicine. I couldn't tell you how the COVID vaccines are being made, but I know there is a logical explanation for it... at least I think there is.... maybe it is magic. 

    Until recently, I thought this thought that magic is just another way of explaining the unexplained was only rooted in popular belief and lacked any academic term or philosophy. However, I stumbled across some principles of this thought process rooted in academia called Clarke's Three Laws. Arthur C. Clarke was a British science fiction writer and futurist. Clarke displayed great literary skill and an ability to make accurate technological predictions. He co-wrote the 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey, popularized the idea of space travel, and predicted the use of satellites. He also wrote a book called Profiles of the Future, originally published in 1962. It is from essays within this book that Clarke's Three Laws were born. The first law states that "When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong." This is a way of saying that the possibilities of technology are nearly limitless. The second law reads, "The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible." There is no way to know if something is possible until you try something that was once thought to be impossible. The third law is the one I want to put the most emphasis on, and it appears in a footnote of the 1973 revision of Profiles of the Future. It says "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." To me, this seems like Clarke believes that magic doesn't exist, and it is just an advanced technology that we haven't developed yet. I often think of how science fiction writers set the agenda for what technologies we develop next. I remember reading Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 and thinking about how funny it was to read the description of some of the "futuristic technologies" that I knew to be earbuds. I often wonder if scientists read science fiction and think of a way to make the things they read possible. Perhaps the same has been done for magic. Could we have a wand or staff that casts "spells" one day? We have already backed alchemy with chemistry. Who knows what unexplained magic will become basic technology in the near future.