At 03:09 PM 6/7/2002 -0500, Chris Bisanar wrote: >From: "Steven Brust" <skzb at dreamcafe.com> > > > > >Steve, what did I miss, or are you snickering already at how wrong I've >got > > >it all? :) > > Well, you left out wizardry. Vlad says that wizardry is just high-end sorcery. Of course, Vlad is an idiot. (As someone or other once said). After all, what does Vlad know about what wizards do, aside from failing to watch the space between their shoulder blades sufficiently carefully? > > But while I have no actual disagreement with you, you ought to know that, > > in my own head, I do not *want* these things precisely defined. That > > doesn't mean if I object if you do, it just means that I won't. >... >I agree entirely... if you turn magic into some kind of pseudoscience with >clear, described rules, it ceases to be magical. Haha, midiclorians, >anybody? Sigh... Though it can be done well: _Operation Chaos_, "Magic, Inc", the Lord Darcy stories, etc. My impression, actually, had been that sorcery was amenable to that sort of systemization, but that witchcraft was not (or at least hadn't yet been). The application of sorcery to things like genetics, the development of military sorcery, along with the general tone of discussion about sorcerous research, come across to me like nascent science, albeit science applied to forces that don't exist in our own world. (Of course, if the author disagrees... well I'll just have to read on and see how things develop. :-) ) Mike