Conversation

Hmm. I guess I lack a certain kind of open-mindedness. Despite being generally curious about almost everything, I’ve never been even slightly tempted to try magic type things. I need a bit of a legible causal-material hook to get curious.
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Like the idea that chanting words might have psychological effects on the chanter, sure. Thay it might have suggestion effects on others, okay, I’ll entertain the thought. But the idea that it can have literal direct effects, no. I see zero reason to even entertain the thought.
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A lot of this depends where you place your locus of reality. Like, if reality is "particles in the physical world," then magic is silly. If reality is social, then suggestion effects ARE literal direct effects. If reality is your own experience, then it's all fair game.
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No suggestion effecrs are not direct. They rely on understanding. For eg if someone cursed you in a foreign language with symbolic performances that you find unfamiliar, it won’t work on you.
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Agreed. Trying to figure out where we diverge. Maybe the definition of "direct"? For me, "direct" roughly means short causal chain. Changing frames of reference can make the same chain (i.e. an utterance) look longer or shorter since the elements that make it up get chunked.
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Yeah Philip k Dick: reality is that which doesn’t go away when you stop believing in it. If I actually fall sick following a witch doctor curse I’ll suspect surreptitious poisoning and go see a toxicologist
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