Magic in Altearth rests on two foundations, phlogiston and aether. Phlogiston is the stuff that causes magic; it can be regarded as the essence of magical force. Aether is the medium through which magic (and everything else) moves. I think of phlogiston as an extension of the table of elements, while aether is a medium underlying all the elements. Both are universal, but while aether is a constant, phlogiston can like any element be concentrated, diluted, extracted.
Until modern times, no one knew any of this, so people came up with their own explanations for why magic works. So we got theories of humors, for example. Other peoples believed magic powers came from the gods by way of prayer. Still others thought it was inherited through blood, was drawn upon in places of power, or was regulated by the stars.
In truth, the forces at work were so many and varied, it was impossible for anyone to puzzle out the root causes for about fifteen hundred years. It required the discipline of science to unlock the secrets of magic. Once that was accomplished, we get the Age of Steam, in which Altearth learned to extract and refine phlogiston directly to drive the machines of the new age. It was only a little over two centuries before we learned how to harness the power of phlogiston to our understanding of the aether and we achieved space flight.
I like this system because it allows the characters I write to have all kinds of understandings about magic. I can invent any number of rules. They don't have to be exactly right in order to be effective. The analogy is that for centuries doctors in Earth practiced medicine having all sorts of silly notions about the human body, yet they could still be effective often enough that people continued to consult them. My magicians aren't always effective; they're just effective often enough.
At the same time, I didn't want to have magic be ad hoc, invented just for the occasion of the story. Altearth has two thousand years of history, and I wanted there to be some continuity. In keeping with my core principle that the mythology of Earth is the reality of Altearth, I hit on the idea of phlogiston a few years ago. Once I coupled that with aether, I figured I had what I needed. My other analogy is with gravity. People have always lived with gravity, but for a very long time they had ideas about weight and flight and falling that were quite wrong. Yet they could still function and build. So it is in Altearth.
Comments on all this are most welcome.
Until modern times, no one knew any of this, so people came up with their own explanations for why magic works. So we got theories of humors, for example. Other peoples believed magic powers came from the gods by way of prayer. Still others thought it was inherited through blood, was drawn upon in places of power, or was regulated by the stars.
In truth, the forces at work were so many and varied, it was impossible for anyone to puzzle out the root causes for about fifteen hundred years. It required the discipline of science to unlock the secrets of magic. Once that was accomplished, we get the Age of Steam, in which Altearth learned to extract and refine phlogiston directly to drive the machines of the new age. It was only a little over two centuries before we learned how to harness the power of phlogiston to our understanding of the aether and we achieved space flight.
I like this system because it allows the characters I write to have all kinds of understandings about magic. I can invent any number of rules. They don't have to be exactly right in order to be effective. The analogy is that for centuries doctors in Earth practiced medicine having all sorts of silly notions about the human body, yet they could still be effective often enough that people continued to consult them. My magicians aren't always effective; they're just effective often enough.
At the same time, I didn't want to have magic be ad hoc, invented just for the occasion of the story. Altearth has two thousand years of history, and I wanted there to be some continuity. In keeping with my core principle that the mythology of Earth is the reality of Altearth, I hit on the idea of phlogiston a few years ago. Once I coupled that with aether, I figured I had what I needed. My other analogy is with gravity. People have always lived with gravity, but for a very long time they had ideas about weight and flight and falling that were quite wrong. Yet they could still function and build. So it is in Altearth.
Comments on all this are most welcome.
Scribe
Sage
