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Will the reality of technology outpace the fantasy of magic?

Penpilot

Staff
Article Team
Even if there is what we would see as wondrous technology in the future, to someone who was born and lived in that time, it would seem mundane. A major draw of speculative fiction is escapism, and I don't think there will be a change in that because of advances in technology. In all honesty, this seems like it would be a bigger issue for science fiction writers, who would have to worry about their ideas being eclipsed as technology marches on.

This got me thinking. Just look at present day. We can fly. We can send probes to other planets. We can pinpoint a person's location on the planet to within several feet. Most of us carry a phone that lets you communicate with another person on the other side of the planet. That same phone has more processing power than the computers that ran the Voyager probes and the ones that sent men to the moon.

That phone grants us instantaneous access a data network with information on almost anything. Some phones have software that lets you take video, record music, and edit both. It's like a portable TV station and recording studio in one.

Give this phone to someone fifty years ago and what could they have done with it?

What do we do with it? Play Angry Birds, take selfies, read/update twitter and facebook, surf for p@rn.

With one bomb we can level a city.

We have planes that destroy a target a hundred miles away.

We can see DNA the building blocks of life.

Does any of this make Harry Potter less magical? Does it take away the mystery of Middle-Earth? Heck, does this even take away the wonder of watching a Magician perform on stage? We all know the Magician is doing sleight of hand and/or their equipment is rigged in some way, but do we care? I don't. I just want to be swept away and allow myself to be fool.

I know it isn't real, but it's fun to pretend it is.


Edit: The more we learn, the more we realize how little we know. There will always be something we don't understand, so IMHO there will always be room for magic. Magic breeds in the areas where technology can't explain.
 
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Sheilawisz

Queen of Titania
Moderator
Hello, Penpilot.

I like very much what you said, it's a nice conclusion to the subject of this thread. We can be sure that people who love Imagination and Fantasy will always enjoy to read about Magic, despite the Scientific advancements that would perhaps ruin the fun for other types of readers.

My very personal message here is this:

I know that the advances that have been achieved in our world during the past one hundred years seem unbelievable, but it's wrong to think that we are somehow unstoppable because of that.

You see, I find it strange that humanity is already dreaming with mastering the universe and becoming gods while our world remains plagued by troubles that represent more than a challenge to our tiny technology. We need less arrogance and more humbleness as a species, because so far we are nothing but microbes living on a grain of dust.

We do not fly, we ride on flying machines. The weapons that we have created simply put us in a much greater danger of destroying ourselves, and despite the interplanetary probes, satellites and smartphones we remain critically vulnerable to dangers as innocent as drug-resistant bacteria, weather change, supervolcanic eruptions and solar storms.

I mean, even passing from the Stone Age to Cities on the Moon would still be nothing if compared to Interstellar Travel... That is, in case Interstellar Travel is possible at all.

This does not mean that I despise Science and its applications.

In my Joan of England trilogy, there is a part when magical dragons and fighter jets join forces to attack the Werewolf armies before they could advance too far into Europe. The same jets played a critical role defending London, Paris and other cities, giving the Mages enough time to re-organize and attack, and this means that they saved tens of millions of lives.

I like combining Magic and cool Technology in my worlds, I think they make a great team sometimes =)
 

SeverinR

Vala
As tech expands our life, it will boost our imagination.
What we have was almost unimaginable 30-40 yrs. ago. We can still imagine greater things for reality and fiction.

Tolkien could never imagine that what he wrote would ever be portrayed before a camera in such vivid colorful reality.
 

skip.knox

toujours gai, archie
Moderator
To reply to the OP in a word: no.

I hate the phrase truth is stranger than fiction. If truth is stranger than your fiction, then you ain't doing it right.

And while the Lawrence bit was amusing, it misses the point of this thread. Fantasy is more than just the magic system.

But it was still funny.
 

X Equestris

Maester
Even if you are right and magic (the product of human imagination) will always trum human tech, what about what I write today?
How do we know that in the centuries to come, when man has doubtless gain technology far beyon what we can currently imagine, my stories about magic will still be looked at with wonder?

You don't. But this sort of ties in with a quote from Benjamin Franklin: "If you would not be forgotten, as soon as you are dead and rotten, either write things worth the reading, or do things worth the writing."

Others will judge whether what you write is worth reading. All you can do is take a leap of faith, and hope for the best.
 
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