This is not a proof, it’s a definition. The word “magic” has a specific meaning which you’re ignoring.

It has a meaning, yes. I just skipped it and went directly to the root. So, what is the root of that "meaning"? After all, isn't it an attempt of keeping something in an isolated realm of the "unexplainable"? Isolation is an essential factor in esoterism. Isolation inhibits not only falsification but also "naming". This way something remains mysterical and therefore magic too.

I’ll do my best to stoke this fire.

There’s your definition of magic – that which is unexplainable – and then there's the more formal definition of magic, namely:

Aleister Crowley (1875–1947), a British occultist, defined "magick" as "the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will",[9] adding a 'k' to distinguish ceremonial or ritual magic from stage magic.[1] — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_(supernatural)

As to magic being the unexplainable, the very occurrence of being per se is devoid of explanation. Ergo, the whole of existence is then, in and of itself, pure magic. Ergo, magic occurs.

As to the referenced more formal definition of magic, it would only not occur were it to be metaphysically impossible that such a thing as “causing change to occur in conformity to the will” can occur. This being a bit of a catch-22: If you provide proof to evidence magic's impossibility, you will in effect be “causing change such that the results end up being in conformity to your will”, thereby validating the occurrence of magic thus defined.

Ta-da … :razz:

Exactly. In the end everything can be called "magic" and "non-magic" as well. As there is no difference, there's no meaning either. Instead, there's this: Speculation.

In the end everything can be called "magic" and "non-magic" as well. — Quk

What part of what I said would be "non-magic"? On a related topic, one can call a rose a "buffalo" but it's still going to be a rose.

This part:

As to magic being the unexplainable, the very occurrence of being per se is devoid of explanation. Ergo, the whole of existence is then, in and of itself, pure magic. Ergo, magic occurs. — javra

I mean, when my will is moving my hand, I can call it "magic" according to Crowley's definition. I can also call it non-magic as I have a scientific explanation for it. (I think, like Popper suggested, science always remains speculation, therefore scientific theories need to be open for tests and improvements.)

This gets at a common concern among fantasy writers and fans. Does a writer go with a "hard magic system" or a "soft magic system." A "hard magic system" is one where there are definite rules to magic, e.g. a strict cause/effect relationship.

The complaint against "hard magic" is that it reduces magic to something that isn't magic. For magic to be "magic" it has to be sort of inexplicable. It becomes a sort of "interesting physics." Whereas people often enjoy "hard magic" particularly because it lets them think about magic in more concrete terms.

Personally, I think a "hard magic" can work quite well, so long as the author just keeps it vague.

In the quote you gave, quite logically, everything that is is magic bar none. So then there is no such thing as a non-magical event or thing.

As to this:

I mean, when my will is moving my hand, I can call it "magic" according to Crowley's definition. I can also call it non-magic as I have a scientific explanation for it. — Quk

Is why one of Corwley's aphorisms is that "blowing your nose is magical".

The empirical sciences too, bar none, in this more formal definition of magic are nothing but .... magic: the causing of change in conformity to will - here, namely, or at least ideally, the will to gain better understanding of being at large and its specifics.

One of the best things about children is that you get to reexperience the magic of the world through their eyes.

One of the best things about children is that you get to reexperience the magic of the world through their eyes. — DifferentiatingEgg

As the song goes, it's good to be young at heart.

This gets at a common concern among fantasy writers and fans. Does a writer go with a "hard magic system" or a "soft magic system." A "hard magic system" is one where there are definite rules to magic, e.g. a strict cause/effect relationship.

The complaint against "hard magic" is that it reduces magic to something that isn't magic. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Interesting. Interesting especially for me as I'm not a fan of the fantasy genre. I'm rather a fan of science fiction, particularly of Kubrick and Star Trek. Now what makes the basic difference between the fantasy genre and the science fiction genre? I guess it's what I just learned from you: The spectrum between hard and soft magic ... or between hard and soft speculation? Hehe.

One of the best things about children is that you get to reexperience the magic of the world through their eyes. — DifferentiatingEgg

Right. But I consider this line poetry. In this line, magic is a metaphor, I think.

For sure, I purposefully equivocated magic to a different version of the word than what you were using. But it also highlights what I feel about the concept of magic: the shock and awe of perceiving what is incomprehensible to us.

Yes, we can explain it. The explanation is this: The banana turns blue when someone reads that sentence. That explains it. So it's not magic. — Quk

Very facile, but completely overlooks the point of explanation. An explanation demonstrates a causal relationship between events, and a correlation is not causation. If a banana turned blue on account of someone doing anything, then presumably a scientific explanation would be sought by first of all examining the banana and trying to understand what about it has changed. As for the 'second force' example, that has never been used as an example of 'magic'. Comparing a 'banana turning blue' and 'classical physics' is entirely specious.

What else could "magic" be anyway? — Quk

Something your post demonstrates no conception of.

Yes, we can explain it. The explanation is this: The banana turns blue when someone reads that sentence. That explains it. So it's not magic. — Quk

That's not an explanation, that's just a sentence describing the phenomenon you want to explain.

Personally, I think a "hard magic" can work quite well, so long as the author just keeps it vague. — Count Timothy von Icarus

There's a damned good argument for the fact that quantum physics is, in fact, magic - specifically the effect known as non-locality or entanglement. This is what Einstein derisively described as 'spooky action at a distance', but despite his scorn, it was proven to occur, and was subject of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics.

I ran this idea past Gemini, which responded “No, quantum nonlocality, often described as "spooky action at a distance," is a real, experimentally verified phenomenon in physics, not magic, that describes the instantaneous correlation between entangled particles, despite the distance separating them."

But this bypasses the philosophical import of the question. Just because something is empirically observed and mathematically modeled doesn’t mean it’s conceptually understood, especially in causal terms. The mystery of quantum nonlocality isn't dissolved by calling it a “real phenomenon.” In fact, the phrase “spooky action at a distance” (Einstein's own) was intended as a criticism—it was meant to say, this doesn’t make sense under classical ideas of causality or locality.

Traditionally, magic is about non-local influence through sympathetic connection—what Sir James Frazer called "the law of sympathy," including "contagion", "sympathy" and "similarity." Two things that were once connected or resemble each other are thought to retain a link, even across space and time. "Like produces like" is known as "imitative magic" and things once in contact remain connected, as "contagious magic".

Now, if you set aside the cultural baggage around the word magic, it does seem that quantum entanglement shares an odd structural similarity to this older idea: two particles, once interacting, retain an instantaneous link, such that the measurement of one constrains the possible outcomes of the other, even when space-like separated. There's no energy transfer or classical information sent faster than light—but still, there’s a coherence.

So in a way, quantum nonlocality is “not magical” only in the sense that it obeys quantum theory’s predictions and doesn’t allow for faster-than-light signaling (i.e. it doesn’t violate causality in a relativistic sense). But in terms of intelligibility, it still appears as a kind of patterned connectedness that echoes what earlier traditions would have considered magical or symbolic influence.

The real issue is that the nature of the causal relationship involved remains deeply unclear (and hence controversial). Quantum theory points at the correlation, but can't explain the connection. So non-locality is not “magic” in the pre-scientific sense, but it does reintroduce a kind of pattern-based, holistic connectedness that resonates with what ancient ideas of magic expressed. That doesn't mean we should start casting spells—but it does mean that the sharp boundary between the “scientific” and the “magical” isn't as self-evident as it might seem.

And besides, saith Feynman, 'I can safely say that nobody understands quantum physics'. It works - as if by magic!

(Have a look at my self-published article, Spooky Action in Action!)

That's not an explanation, that's just a sentence describing the phenomenon you want to explain. — flannel jesus

An explanation is an answer to a "why"-question.

Why does the apple fall to the ground? Because of gravity. That explains it.
Why does this planet have gravity? Because it's a mass. That explains it.
Why does mass have gravity? Because ...

Which of these answers is a true explanation and which is just a description?

Every statement starting with the word "because" is a description of a causal scenario. It describes cause and effect.

the thing I said wasn't an explanation didn't have any because.

OK, disregard the word "because". The word isn't essential here. I just meant the "answer" to the "why"-question. The answer describes cause and effect.

How detailed must an answer be in order to be an explanation rather than a description?

How detailed must an answer be in order to be an explanation rather than a description? — Quk

It's not a matter of detail alone. In Greek philosophy, the issue is phrased in terms of explanans and explanandum. In the Phaedo, for example, Socrates argues that knowledge requires a method of inquiry that moves from the known to the unknown. He suggests that in order to explain a particular phenomenon, one must have knowledge of a more general principle or cause that underlies it. Socrates refers to this more general principle as the "cause" or "explanans," and the particular phenomenon as the "effect" or "explanandum."

Socrates asserts that the explanans must be of a higher order than the explanandum, because it is the more general principle that explains why the particular phenomenon occurs. He uses the example of how we explain why a lyre produces sound. Socrates argues that the explanans for why a lyre produces sound is not simply that the lyre is made of wood and strings, but rather that it is in the nature of harmony and discord to produce sound. (Of course, we now understand that it is the effect of the vibrating string on the sorrounding air which generate what we understand as sound waves.)

Thus, the explanans (the nature of harmony and discord) is of a higher order than the explanandum (the sound produced by the lyre).

This idea that the explanans must be of a higher order than the explanandum is sometimes referred to as the "Principle of Proportionate Causality" or the "Principle of Adequacy." It is a basic principle of many philosophical and scientific theories of explanation.

In later philosophy, David Hume famously cast doubt on the trustworthiness of inductive reasoning - reasoning from effect to cause. He argued that whilst we can give plausible reasons for why an effect follows from a cause, we can't discern a real basis to those causal relationships with the same degree of certainty we can discern in logical relationships. That was the point that was taken up by Immaneuel Kant in his famous 'answer to Hume'.

The question is whether the banana event repeats itself we always have a causal explanation. Hume would say yes. Another thing is to try to know the details in order to have a more detailed explanation that explains the banana event.

The question is in the details.

We must also keep in mind that we already have prior knowledge that explains to us in turn why an event like the banana is not possible or not explainable.

Magic is defined by the inexplicable. So yes there can be magic if an event is not explainable in any possible way. Or maybe there is just unknowing, but we can never rule out magic a priori.

Is our belief that every event is explainable absolutely true? Or is just an induction never proven false?

Socrates asserts that the explanans must be of a higher order than the explanandum — Wayfarer

What Sokrates means by "higher order" is what I mean by "level of detail". They are just different words for the same question. The more detailed, the higher the level. Well, I will rephrase my question:

How high must the described order be in order to be an explanation rather than just a description?

If I mention the gravity being the cause for the falling apple, do I mention a higher order or not?

The question is whether the banana event repeats itself we always have a causal explanation. — JuanZu

Good point.

In my example there is that sentence in the witchbook; whenever someone says that sentence, the banana turns blue. The effect is repeatable.

But even if it doesn't seem repeatable, there might be another hidden factor that is just not discovered yet. In other words, we can only assume it's not repeatable. Just like we can only assume that there are no red swans.

What Sokrates means by "higher order" is what I mean by "level of detail". — Quk

He doesn't. Detail is not the same as an explanatory principle. The higher order is more like a framework of explanation.

There's a philosophical point that I think you're sensing, but not describing very well. I agree that 'explanations don't go all the way down'. But there needs to be some clarity as to what constitutes a real explanation, as distinct from just hand-waving about 'magic'. Science and technology and much else besides relies on being able to discern cause and effect relations. But then there are also 'why is it so?' questions that can't be easily answered.

One way to say it might be that when the cause and effect are specific in nature, then the question is narrow enough to answer. But the more general the question, the more difficult it becomes. A falling apple accelerates at a given rate described by Newton's laws. But what is a 'scientific law' is a much bigger question than 'why does the apple accelerate at that rate'. That may be a good starting point - then you're getting into philosophy of science, which has long grappled with these questions.

Your idea of an explanation as nothing more than giving a name for what you want to explain is not even deflationary - it is patently silly. To wit:

Why does the apple fall to the ground? Because of gravity. That explains it. — Quk

This is just the sort of pretension that Moliere lampooned in one of his plays (The Imaginary Invalid): When a supposedly learned doctor is asked to explain the action of opium, he attributed it (speaking, suitably, in dog-Latin) to opium's "dormitive property whose nature is to lull the senses to sleep." Virtus dormitiva has since become a byword for just that sort of pseudo-explanation that merely names or rephrases the issue without providing any insight.

Of course, it's silly. With that silly explanation I just want to set a striking starting point for my question:

How high must the described order be in order to be an explanation rather than just a description?

I guess there is a gradual transition.

What else could "magic" be anyway? — Quk

Magic is the created illusion. As long as the illusion exists, magic exists.

How high must the described order be in order to be an explanation rather than just a description? — Quk

Well, that's a far broader question than the original topic. You won't make much headway on the question of magic if, in order to answer it, you first have to settle the question of what constitutes an explanation.

I think we can all agree that as a general requirement, an explanation should improve our understanding. A description does not satisfy that requirement, since a description is needed before we can even ask for an explanation (else, what are we even trying to explain?)

Yeah, I think it's a similar sort of distinction. Star Wars has a sort of magic for instance, and is generally cited as "soft sci-fi." But soft sci-fi doesn't need to involve magic, it can just involve ignoring science and including magic-like technology without any attempt at explanation.

Whereas some fantasy is largely trying to present the world as it is, just with heroic/mythic elements, e.g., the Iliad, Aeneid, Beowulf, etc. Magical realism, a sort of fantasy, uses magic to investigate the "higher/deeper realities" of our world in a somewhat similar, if more self-conscious way. Whereas Dante's Divine Comedy is a fantasy that is dramatizing the most cutting-edge philosophy and science of its time.



It's only silly if "gravity" is taken to simply mean "falling downwards." However, this is not how gravity is understood. There is a quite detailed explanation of what gravity is and how it works, even if it remains quite incomplete and the subject of much debate and research.

How high must the described order be in order to be an explanation rather than just a description?

We can think of them as two different types of demonstration:

From St. Thomas' Summa theologiae I.2.2c:

I answer that it must be said that demonstration is twofold: One which is through the cause, and is called demonstration "propter quid" [lit., 'on account of which'] and this is [to argue] from what is prior simply speaking (simpliciter). The other is through the effect, and is called a demonstration "quia" [lit., 'that']; this is [to argue] from what is prior relatively only to us (quoad nos). When an effect is better known to us than its cause, from the effect we proceed to the knowledge of the cause. And from every effect the existence of its proper cause can be demonstrated, so long as its effects are better known to us (quoad nos); because since every effect depends upon its cause, if the effect exists, the cause must pre-exist.

From Aristotle's Posterior Analytics I.13:

"Knowledge of the fact (quia demonstration) differs from knowledge of the reasoned fact (propter quid demonstrations). [...] You might prove as follows that the planets are near because they do not twinkle: let C be the planets, B not twinkling, A proximity. Then B is predicable of C; for the planets do not twinkle. But A is also predicable of B, since that which does not twinkle is near--we must take this truth as having been reached by induction or sense-perception. Therefore A is a necessary predicate of C; so that we have demonstrated that the planets are near. This syllogism, then, proves not the reasoned fact (propter quid) but only the fact (quia); since they are not near because they do not twinkle, but, because they are near, do not twinkle...."

A (major term) = close heavenly body
B (middle term) = non-twinkling heavenly body
C (minor term) = planet

Major Premise: B is A
Minor Premise: C is B
Conclusion: C is A

=

Major Premise: Non-Twinkling heavenly bodies are close heavenly bodies.
Minor Premise: Planets are non-twinkling heavenly bodies (effect).
Conclusion: Planets are close heavenly bodies (cause).

From Aristotle's Posterior Analytics I.13 (cont'd):

"The major and middle of the proof, however, may be reversed, and then the demonstration will be of the reasoned fact (propter quid). Thus: let C be the planets, B proximity, A not twinkling. Then B is an attribute of C, and A-not twinkling-of B. Consequently A is predicable of C, and the syllogism proves the reasoned fact (propter quid), since its middle term is the proximate cause...."

A (major term) = non-twinkling heavenly body
B (middle term) = close heavenly body
C (minor term) = planet

Major Premise: B is A
Minor Premise: C is B
Conclusion: C is A

=

Major Premise: Close heavenly bodies are non-twinkling heavenly bodies.
Minor Premise: Planets are close heavenly bodies (cause).
Conclusion: Planets are non-twinkling heavenly bodies (effect).

https://iteadthomam.blogspot.com/2010/05/quia-demonstrations-vs-propter-quid.html

I have a paper that explains the reasoning in more depth:

...Aristotle begins both the Physics and the Metaphysics with a review of how past thinkers have tried to explain the world and the causes at work in it (i.e,. its principles). The problem upon which past explanations had foundered was that of “the One and the Many.”

Here is the problem: initially, it seems that being must be in some way “one,” a unity. For, if there were many different “types of being,” then we would be left with the question of how these sui generis “types of being” interact. This is the same problem that plagued Cartesian “substance dualism.” Further, if these discrete “types of being” interact, then this interacting whole must itself be a “unity,” a “one.”

At the same time, the world we experience is one of tremendous multiplicity, where everything seems to be undergoing constant change. Yet for us to be able to “say anything true about anything,” there must be at least something that “stays the same” across this ceaseless change. Otherwise, our words would mean something different on each occasion, and whatever we referred to would constantly be passing out of being. If, as Heraclitus says, we “cannot step twice into the same river,” then it also seems we cannot speak of the same river twice either.1,i

It is important to stress that modern thought has not escaped this problem. The world described by contemporary science is one of tremendous diversity. It includes many types of star and galaxy, a vast number of animal species, each with their own complex biology, a “zoo” of fundamental particles, etc. At the same time, science paints a picture of a word that is unified. There are no truly isolated systems. Causation, energy, and information flow across the boundaries of all seemingly discrete “things,” such that the universe appears to be not so much a “collection of things,” but rather a single continuous process. How do we reconcile this seeming multiplicity (the Many) with the equally apparent unity of being (the One)?2,ii

Aristotle, like Plato before him, attempts to chart a via media between the Scylla of Parmenides, whose elevation of the unity of being led him deny the reality of change (and thus of all the evidence of the senses), and the Charybdis of Heraclitus, whose elevation of multiplicity seems to make it impossible to come to know anything.iii For Aristotle, this meant affirming the reality of the vast multiplicity experienced by the senses, while also affirming principles of unity that exist within this multiplicity. It is these principles which produce a “One” from the “Many.”iv

...

A. Generating Principles - Moving from Many to One

The epistemic issues raised by multiplicity and ceaseless change are addressed by Aristotle’s distinction between principles and causes. Aristotle presents this distinction early in the Physics through a criticism of Anaxagoras.1 Anaxagoras posits an infinite number of principles at work in the world. Were Anaxagoras correct, discursive knowledge would be impossible. For instance, if we wanted to know “how bows work,” we would have to come to know each individual instance of a bow shooting an arrow, since there would be no unifying principle through which all bows work. Yet we cannot come to know an infinite multitude in a finite time.2

However, an infinite (or practically infinite) number of causes does not preclude meaningful knowledge if we allow that many causes might be known through a single principle (a One), which manifests at many times and in many places (the Many). Further, such principles do seem to be knowable. For instance, the principle of lift allows us to explain many instances of flight, both as respects animals and flying machines. Moreover, a single unifying principle might be relevant to many distinct sciences, just as the principle of lift informs both our understanding of flying organisms (biology) and flying machines (engineering).

For Aristotle, what are “better known to us” are the concrete particulars experienced directly by the senses. By contrast, what are “better known in themselves” are the more general principles at work in the world.3,i Since every effect is a sign of its causes, we can move from the unmanageable multiplicity of concrete particulars to a deeper understanding of the world.ii

For instance, individual insects are what are best known to us. In most parts of the world, we can directly experience vast multitudes of them simply by stepping outside our homes. However, there are 200 million insects for each human on the planet, and perhaps 30 million insect species.4 If knowledge could only be acquired through the experience of particulars, it seems that we could only ever come to know an infinitesimally small amount of what there is to know about insects. However, the entomologist is able to understand much about insects because they understand the principles that are unequally realized in individual species and particular members of those species.iii

Some principles are more general than others. For example, one of the most consequential paradigm shifts across the sciences in the past fifty years has been the broad application of the methods of information theory, complexity studies, and cybernetics to a wide array of sciences. This has allowed scientists to explain disparate phenomena across the natural and social sciences using the same principles. For instance, the same principles can be used to explain both how heart cells synchronize and why Asian fireflies blink in unison.5 The same is true for how the body’s production of lymphocytes (a white blood cell) takes advantage of the same goal-direct “parallel terraced scan” technique developed independently by computer programmers and used by ants in foraging.6

Notably, such unifications are not reductions. Clearly, firefly behavior is not reducible to heart cell behavior or vice versa. Indeed, such unifications tend to be “top-down” explanations, focusing on similarities between systems taken as wholes, as opposed to “bottom-up” explanations that attempts to explain wholes in terms of their parts.iv

For Aristotle, this meant affirming the reality of the vast multiplicity experienced by the senses, while also affirming principles of unity that exist within this multiplicity. It is these principles which produce a “One” from the “Many.”iv

This is, though, a bare description not an explanation. We are left with no idea how the "one becomes the many".