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Reading the book, Learned Pigs and Fireproof Women4, by the world's
greatest living magician, Ricky Jay, and then turning to Steven Shapin's
more serious treatise, The Scientific Revolution5, one quickly realizes the
similarities between magic and science. Both can prove very entertaining;
alter our perceptions of the world around us; tell us that what we see and
believe possible might diverge; and put us in awe of their practitioners who
demonstrate a mastery of the world and "secret" forces that we envy and
wish we had, too.
One can best appreciate the link-up between magic and science and the
wisdom captured in the Arthur C. Clarke quote above, by rereading Mark
Twain's classic, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court.6 In Twain's
book, of course, late 19th century technology, e.g., electricity, firearms, was
magic when transported to the England of King Arthur. Once there, it
caused initially great good, but, eventually, despite the Yankee's good
intentions, became a force for destruction as it clashed with and ultimately
lost to the established order, including the resentful wizard, Merlin.
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The fall of Christian Constantinople proved the final and dramatic last act
of the 1100 year Byzantine Empire, direct heir to the old Eastern Roman
Empire. The end of the Byzantine era sent political and religious
shockwaves through Europe.10 Besides serving as Christendom's last
outpost in southeastern Europe, bi-continental Constantinople had long
served as a repository for the teachings of the ancient Greeks, teachings
only sparingly and imperfectly known in most of the rest of Europe. As
many have noted11, when Greek-speaking scholars fled Constantinople,
they brought with them large numbers of these prized texts to Europe,
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No less than one of the greatest scientists of all time, Sir Isaac Newton,
proved an avid alchemist, but, fearing public shame, practiced it in "high
silence."18 Alchemy, although legal by Newton's time, had acquired a bad
reputation as the province of crooks and mountebanks, many of whom
used their knowledge of metals to go into the counterfeiting business.
Newton biographer Michael White notes,
"What stuck in the craw of [his] early biographers was a body of material
found in Newton's vast library . . . that made it very clear that the most
respected scientist in history, the model for the scientific method,, has
spent more of his life intensely involved with alchemy than he had delving
into the clear blue waters of pure science. . . . . he had expended a vast
amount of time studying the chronology of the Bible, examining prophecy,
investigating natural magic . . .." 19
Newton, as did other alchemists, became involved in what we, today, might
call chemical technology. These alchemists covered the field from making
paint pigment, all manner of medicines, artificial precious stones, and,
most famously, the Holy Grail of alchemy, seeking to make the
"philosopher's stone." As historian Bill Newman describes it, that stone,
which Newton sought to make for some 30 years, "was thought to be an
agent of universal transmutation . . . and viewed as a curative agent that
could 'cure' metals of their impurities and cure human beings of their
illnesses . . . a sort of universal panacea."20
Magic, of course, had and has its many flaws as an instrument for
expanding the frontiers of human knowledge. The main one--some might
argue a flaw it shares with religion--is that unlike what we now regard
science, magic or a philosophy of the occult depends on special
revelations and secrets. Unlike science, it does not provide a means of
testing by replication the results; we cannot establish a causal link between
the action of the magician and the result of his action. Did a rain dance
cause it to rain? Did a particular ceremony cure an illness or stave off a
volcanic eruption? Can an astrologer or a palm reader accurately and with
precision predict a specific event? Can the magician repeat that
performance on call, and show us why it works? Not likely.
Throughout his book, Mebane stresses not just the allure of magic for both
the educated and uneducated, but that the major aim of serious magicians
-- we might throw Newton into that lot -- consisted of seeking the
redemption of mankind and of the world, both natural and social.21 In
accord with this view, we must not see the magician as an aberration, a
throwback, or some other anomaly in the so-called "Age of Reason." In the
pre-science age, magicians, at least serious ones such Newton and Boyle,
used magic as another instrument of navigation as they sought The
Answer, or at least some answers, to the reasonable questions of the Age
of Reason. That many (most?) set off on the wrong path, or got otherwise
lost on their journey, should not make them objects of our ridicule, anymore
tan should a brave explorer or mountain climber who takes a wrong turn
and falls into a crevasse or becomes lunch for a hungry bear.