Post by pai on Apr 28, 2010 9:27:19 GMT -7
“Magic, sometimes known as sorcery, is the practice of consciousness manipulation and/or autosuggestion to achieve a desired result, usually by techniques described in various conceptual systems. The practice is often influenced by ideas of religion, mysticism, occultism, and psychology.”
-Wikipedia
THIS IS NOT THE DEFINITION WE WILL BE USING. Let us get that perfectly clear—this definition, in my attempt to define what I consider different levels of metaphysics, will not be used; at best, it’ll be broken down, meaning at the moment, it has no IC truth to it simply because it lumps in some of the very things that need to be seperated.
Main Entry: 1mag•ic
Pronunciation: \ˈma-jik\
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English ‘magique’, from Middle French, from Latin ‘magice’, from Greek ‘magikç’, feminine of ‘magikos’ Magian, magical, from ‘magos’ magus, sorcerer, of Iranian origin; akin to Old Persian ‘maguð’ sorcerer
Date: 14th century
1 a : the use of means (as charms or spells) believed to have supernatural power over natural forces b : magic rites or incantations
2 a : an extraordinary power or influence seemingly from a supernatural source b : something that seems to cast a spell
-Merriam-Webster
Interestingly enough, this definition(s) are much more accurate to what “magic” is in this breakdown, though definition number 2a could be skewed to, once again, lump in everything metaphysical into “magic”.
Before this continues, it is, once again, very important we leave real life ways of thinking behind. Some people have great, great, GREAT difficulty doing this. Clearly, what happens in RP cannot happen In Real Life, with that said, you should really try to put it into mind that what happens In Real Life can and will likely find itself changed in RP, especially in a freeform setting. With that said, its time for one of my favorite examples: IN REAL LIFE, you light a match by striking the head of the match against a suitable surface, the ignitable chemicals in the match head light due to the friction, and presto, you’ve got fire. IN RP [FREE FORM because closed-rps have their own rules and setups] a mage might snap his fingers, summoning the energy to bring into being a fire, and granted this fire has no burnable material like the match, it is kept alive by a consistant flow of energy and oxidization of air molecules. In a FREE-FORM ROLE PLAY SETTING, the man striking the match is basically equivocal to the mage snapping his fingers; the burning of ignitable material and the consumption of energy to keep the fires alive is basically quivocal; the fact that it is going to burn your ass if you touch it does not change. Noe, one is obviously a magical fire, however, this is the point: different means bring about the same result, as with most things IN REAL LIFE as well as IN RP. In terms of who can do it and who can’t, well, obviously not “everyone” can do it, however, if you decide to btich because you’ve taken upon yourself to make it particularly complicated for your character to even bring a flame into existence, well, that’s your problem, and with the different ways to learn magic in the first place, as well as various other metaphysical means, and taking into account, again, the free-form setting, there is a inconceivable amount of opportunities for everyone to learn magic—obviously, not everyone learns magic, whether from lack of it being public knowledge where they can go to learn it, or whatever; its irrelavent. Because it sfreeform, everyone has the potential.
With that straightened out, this Rper right here considers there to be three conduits that allow metaphysics to take place: the mind, the body, and the soul. The mind, in my opinion, is aligned to things such as telekinetics and psionics for obvious reasons; both forms of ‘metaphysics’ use the mind as the medium for supernatural anomolies. The body is designed to channel internal and natural energies, namely chi, qi, ki, or however you prefer to spell it. The simple, wikipedia definition is: “the life-process or “flow” of energy that sustains living beings are found in many belief systems”. Some might assert this as the soul, however, it is commonly believed that the soul is an integral part of life, and yet separate the body; qi is directly linked to the body, and any qi practitioneers you see will either be shooting it out of their hands, or using it to fortify their bodies, something that “the soul” would not be able to do given its seperation from the physical. This leads into the final piece, the soul, of which I personally choose to believe links to “magic”. Some would likely say the soul is not necessary for magic, as seen with magic users who give up their souls. For that reason, the soul could be disregarded, and yet at the same time, it functions intamately with such magics like necromancy which needs a soul to divine.
This is merely my interpretation and my guidelines for characters I make, and it is likely to differ among other Rpers, and yet, this is the part where the issue of “free-form” comes in and subjective reasoning. Its hard to be objective about things that don’t happen IN REAL LIFE, and yet, REAL LIFE information can be applied to make it easier. Thank goodness it still disregards whether or not you really can throws fireballs in your own house. This is also why it becomes important classify everything under the blanket term of "metaphysics" and not simply "magic", because people have a tendency to lump everything is as magic and make wards to stop ALL magic (and then bitch to those of us who don't agree that everything supernatural is magic; to be perfectly honest, those people who bitch about not being able to completely negate other characters are about as douchey as they make those upset about out to be. Get a fucking clue. Damn.)
To be continued...
-Wikipedia
THIS IS NOT THE DEFINITION WE WILL BE USING. Let us get that perfectly clear—this definition, in my attempt to define what I consider different levels of metaphysics, will not be used; at best, it’ll be broken down, meaning at the moment, it has no IC truth to it simply because it lumps in some of the very things that need to be seperated.
Main Entry: 1mag•ic
Pronunciation: \ˈma-jik\
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English ‘magique’, from Middle French, from Latin ‘magice’, from Greek ‘magikç’, feminine of ‘magikos’ Magian, magical, from ‘magos’ magus, sorcerer, of Iranian origin; akin to Old Persian ‘maguð’ sorcerer
Date: 14th century
1 a : the use of means (as charms or spells) believed to have supernatural power over natural forces b : magic rites or incantations
2 a : an extraordinary power or influence seemingly from a supernatural source b : something that seems to cast a spell
-Merriam-Webster
Interestingly enough, this definition(s) are much more accurate to what “magic” is in this breakdown, though definition number 2a could be skewed to, once again, lump in everything metaphysical into “magic”.
Before this continues, it is, once again, very important we leave real life ways of thinking behind. Some people have great, great, GREAT difficulty doing this. Clearly, what happens in RP cannot happen In Real Life, with that said, you should really try to put it into mind that what happens In Real Life can and will likely find itself changed in RP, especially in a freeform setting. With that said, its time for one of my favorite examples: IN REAL LIFE, you light a match by striking the head of the match against a suitable surface, the ignitable chemicals in the match head light due to the friction, and presto, you’ve got fire. IN RP [FREE FORM because closed-rps have their own rules and setups] a mage might snap his fingers, summoning the energy to bring into being a fire, and granted this fire has no burnable material like the match, it is kept alive by a consistant flow of energy and oxidization of air molecules. In a FREE-FORM ROLE PLAY SETTING, the man striking the match is basically equivocal to the mage snapping his fingers; the burning of ignitable material and the consumption of energy to keep the fires alive is basically quivocal; the fact that it is going to burn your ass if you touch it does not change. Noe, one is obviously a magical fire, however, this is the point: different means bring about the same result, as with most things IN REAL LIFE as well as IN RP. In terms of who can do it and who can’t, well, obviously not “everyone” can do it, however, if you decide to btich because you’ve taken upon yourself to make it particularly complicated for your character to even bring a flame into existence, well, that’s your problem, and with the different ways to learn magic in the first place, as well as various other metaphysical means, and taking into account, again, the free-form setting, there is a inconceivable amount of opportunities for everyone to learn magic—obviously, not everyone learns magic, whether from lack of it being public knowledge where they can go to learn it, or whatever; its irrelavent. Because it sfreeform, everyone has the potential.
With that straightened out, this Rper right here considers there to be three conduits that allow metaphysics to take place: the mind, the body, and the soul. The mind, in my opinion, is aligned to things such as telekinetics and psionics for obvious reasons; both forms of ‘metaphysics’ use the mind as the medium for supernatural anomolies. The body is designed to channel internal and natural energies, namely chi, qi, ki, or however you prefer to spell it. The simple, wikipedia definition is: “the life-process or “flow” of energy that sustains living beings are found in many belief systems”. Some might assert this as the soul, however, it is commonly believed that the soul is an integral part of life, and yet separate the body; qi is directly linked to the body, and any qi practitioneers you see will either be shooting it out of their hands, or using it to fortify their bodies, something that “the soul” would not be able to do given its seperation from the physical. This leads into the final piece, the soul, of which I personally choose to believe links to “magic”. Some would likely say the soul is not necessary for magic, as seen with magic users who give up their souls. For that reason, the soul could be disregarded, and yet at the same time, it functions intamately with such magics like necromancy which needs a soul to divine.
This is merely my interpretation and my guidelines for characters I make, and it is likely to differ among other Rpers, and yet, this is the part where the issue of “free-form” comes in and subjective reasoning. Its hard to be objective about things that don’t happen IN REAL LIFE, and yet, REAL LIFE information can be applied to make it easier. Thank goodness it still disregards whether or not you really can throws fireballs in your own house. This is also why it becomes important classify everything under the blanket term of "metaphysics" and not simply "magic", because people have a tendency to lump everything is as magic and make wards to stop ALL magic (and then bitch to those of us who don't agree that everything supernatural is magic; to be perfectly honest, those people who bitch about not being able to completely negate other characters are about as douchey as they make those upset about out to be. Get a fucking clue. Damn.)
To be continued...