Could Magic be kept secret?

[edk926]

I'd say it wouldn't be kept a secret so much as kept a mystery. If there is any paperwork, there's a possibility of someone stumbling on it. Secret organizations generally don't stay secret forever ... as far as we can tell anyway. It would probably end up like a Bilderberg Group, where people will know the group exists and there will be conspiracy theories about it, but only people on the inside will actually know what's going on.

[DocRailgun]

The fans of "professional wrestling" were not unknown to riot if an especially beloved good guy wrestler was abused by an especially terrible bad guy. This was the case for many, many decades. We think it's silly now that anyone would be so gullible as to think professional wrestling was real, but they did. How? The business did an excellent job of keeping their secret despite there being hundreds of promotions all over the world since the 1920s. It wasn't until the 80s that the veil was lifted.
If hundreds (thousands?) of wrestlers, promoters, and promotion staff can keep a secret for 60 years a small group of people with potent magical abilities that need each other to survive can do it for a decade at least.

Originally Posted by Lameth

I am going to run a modern game, alla a minor supers game with traces of adventure, mystery, pulp, martial arts, and mystical arts. Innate super powers have only been around for about 10 years, and only about 3 years publically.


Could magic of a small population group world wide, maybe 150 people, be kept secret in the modern world?

[AlexanderHowl]

Magic is technically secret nowadays, even though billions of people believe in it, because there is little evidence of scientifically verifiable magic under controlled circumstances. If it does exist, it is secret in the developed world because its existence is not acknowledged as being part of reality. Of course, that could be because it does not exist, but I tend to keep an open mind about such things and only say that it has not been scientifically verified.

[David Johnston2]

Originally Posted by DocRailgun

The fans of "professional wrestling" were not unknown to riot if an especially beloved good guy wrestler was abused by an especially terrible bad guy.

I am skeptical. The truth is, that the interactions in wrestling were (mostly) scripted was a well known thing among wrestling fans well before the leagues fessed up. The thing they speculated about was whether any of the bits were real. They weren't blind. They knew that many of the things they saw in the ring were things that required the cooperation of both participants.

Of course in the case of magic, there are actually a lot of people who already believe that magic is real. They just dispute about which specific magic is real. The occasional eyewitness account is going to be discounted as long as no mage offers himself up for formal investigation in a laboratory setting. Assuming that they can police any of their own who actively want to expose the secret, they could keep it for a long time as long as they accept that it will only be secret from the majority.

[AlexanderHowl]

It would also be easy for them to give evidence that magic does not exist. If one of their own goes public and then is found to be a 'fraud', then skepticism about the existence of magic would only increase. After two or three dozen publicly confirmed 'frauds', a majority of the population would discount the existence of magic, even if they witnessed it, as only a clever fraud accomplished by mirrors, props, and sleight of hand.

[Kromm]

Don't discount hiding in plain sight.

In the world we live in, national and even international NGOs dedicated to psychic research have been around for about 135 years. Since the early 1950s, global superpowers have invested millions of dollars – maybe billions in the final balance, though it's impossible to say – in "psychotronic" research into remote viewing, mind control, and other facets of "psychic warfare." Even today, there are academic parapsychology programs at universities worldwide, supported by private funding from people who evidently feel such work is of importance. And of course entertainment media and sensational journalism deliver a steady stream of real-life psychics (we've all heard of Kreskin and Uri Geller).

Yet no scientifically tested, independently verified, reproducible examples of psychic abilities have been documented. Zero. We could choose to think that's because powerful organizations such as the CIA and FSB have covered it up, owing to the fact that their research did pay off and they have a vested interest in secrecy in the name of national security . . . but people who believe that are portrayed as conspiracy theorists and cranks, which means that right or wrong, they're ignored by the general public. Even the most gullible consumers of tabloid news just believe in what amounts to a modernized version of folk superstition, preoccupied with luck, premonitions, and the odd ghost. Powerful effects like bilocation, mind control, and psychokinesis are almost universally met with overwhelming skepticism.

The same could be true of magic. Some of the organizations and researchers mentioned above don't distinguish between "psychical" and "magical." There are people worldwide who believe in magic, be it as religion, spiritual discipline, or pure occult research. There are magicians in the media who claim to be more than mere prestidigitators and illusionists. Yet for the most part magic is an affair of good-luck charms, love potions, and the occasional evil eye . . . and most people think it's bunk.

Which means that if somebody engages in crime, espionage, or other shadowy actions using paranormal powers, investigators are going to assume conventional means – nobody is going to say, "Oh, it was a psychic!", or, "Oh, it was a wizard!" Even if the investigation hits a dead end because nobody can explain how the deed was done, the probable conclusion is going to be that the actors did a good job of cleaning or that the first responders did a lousy job of collecting evidence. And even if the whole thing was witnessed and looked decidedly supernatural, the likely reaction of those taking down the statements is going to be either, "This person is a liar, deranged, or on drugs," or, "Whoever did this had access to some pretty cool toys."

So I'd argue that the best thing magic-users could do is this: Generously fund research into magic by private organizations and universities. Attain positions of authority and push for occult research in the name of national defense. Be sure that self-professed but completely incapable magicians are found by the media. Have a few bona fide mages "exposed." And in each case, ensure that efforts to prove magic fail: research meets with dead ends and magic-wielders are exposed as frauds.

Thus, magic wouldn't be secret or mysterious. It would be eminently public and essentially a joke. That way, even the people who are openly involved in funding and researching it could probably get away with working actual magic in front of witnesses without anybody batting an eye. The vast majority of people would think, "Yeah, yeah, another cool trick involving metamaterials and a quiet quadcopter pulling a thin thread" or whatever, and the few true believers who protested would be labeled cranks and met with eye-rolling. And there wouldn't be a secret cell of the CIA looking into it and quietly "disappearing" the wizard, because that would either have been shut down as a waste of money back in the 1970s or be something the mages control.

[SteamBub]

Originally Posted by Kromm

Even if the investigation hits a dead end because nobody can explain how the deed was done...

I can just imagine half of the cold cases in the police warehouse are thanks to wizards.

[Lameth]

Originally Posted by Kromm

Don't discount hiding in plain sight.

In the world we live in, national and even international NGOs dedicated to psychic research have been around for about 135 years. Since the early 1950s, global superpowers have invested millions of dollars – maybe billions in the final balance, though it's impossible to say – in "psychotronic" research into remote viewing, mind control, and other facets of "psychic warfare." Even today, there are academic parapsychology programs at universities worldwide, supported by private funding from people who evidently feel such work is of importance. And of course entertainment media and sensational journalism deliver a steady stream of real-life psychics (we've all heard of Kreskin and Uri Geller).

Yet no scientifically tested, independently verified, reproducible examples of psychic abilities have been documented. Zero. We could choose to think that's because powerful organizations such as the CIA and FSB have covered it up, owing to the fact that their research did pay off and they have a vested interest in secrecy in the name of national security . . . but people who believe that are portrayed as conspiracy theorists and cranks, which means that right or wrong, they're ignored by the general public. Even the most gullible consumers of tabloid news just believe in what amounts to a modernized version of folk superstition, preoccupied with luck, premonitions, and the odd ghost. Powerful effects like bilocation, mind control, and psychokinesis are almost universally met with overwhelming skepticism.

The same could be true of magic. Some of the organizations and researchers mentioned above don't distinguish between "psychical" and "magical." There are people worldwide who believe in magic, be it as religion, spiritual discipline, or pure occult research. There are magicians in the media who claim to be more than mere prestidigitators and illusionists. Yet for the most part magic is an affair of good-luck charms, love potions, and the occasional evil eye . . . and most people think it's bunk.

Which means that if somebody engages in crime, espionage, or other shadowy actions using paranormal powers, investigators are going to assume conventional means – nobody is going to say, "Oh, it was a psychic!", or, "Oh, it was a wizard!" Even if the investigation hits a dead end because nobody can explain how the deed was done, the probable conclusion is going to be that the actors did a good job of cleaning or that the first responders did a lousy job of collecting evidence. And even if the whole thing was witnessed and looked decidedly supernatural, the likely reaction of those taking down the statements is going to be either, "This person is a liar, deranged, or on drugs," or, "Whoever did this had access to some pretty cool toys."

So I'd argue that the best thing magic-users could do is this: Generously fund research into magic by private organizations and universities. Attain positions of authority and push for occult research in the name of national defense. Be sure that self-professed but completely incapable magicians are found by the media. Have a few bona fide mages "exposed." And in each case, ensure that efforts to prove magic fail: research meets with dead ends and magic-wielders are exposed as frauds.

Thus, magic wouldn't be secret or mysterious. It would be eminently public and essentially a joke. That way, even the people who are openly involved in funding and researching it could probably get away with working actual magic in front of witnesses without anybody batting an eye. The vast majority of people would think, "Yeah, yeah, another cool trick involving metamaterials and a quiet quadcopter pulling a thin thread" or whatever, and the few true believers who protested would be labeled cranks and met with eye-rolling. And there wouldn't be a secret cell of the CIA looking into it and quietly "disappearing" the wizard, because that would either have been shut down as a waste of money back in the 1970s or be something the mages control.

good points..very cool

[Lameth]

So next issue with this...If the world then suddenly has "supers" starting to appear over the last few years, here and there, people with natural born super abilities. More super pulp action then Magneto. More Heroes / The Gifted TV show then DC gods.

Would the magical community still keep themselves secret in the background? Would they still wish to keep their secrets and secret world hidden from the normals? They have been around for 1000s of years, but magic energies died down ALOT round the Middle Ages, and then over the next 500 years or so basically dwindled to nothing at all to where even the simplest "trick" took great time and the right place. Basically magic was gone. Then for some reason reignited in 1880 during an odd solar eclipse.


In other words, "why tell them we have secret towers hidden by magic, arcane items dating back ages, and positions of power to protect ourselves in their own government and cities. Let these new "mutants" be ostracized , shunned, feared, worshiped, and hunted...no...not us. We had enough of that during the dark days of the Middle Ages and the "Enlightenment Age" and the countless ages of the Great Purge of our arcane lore, our ways and our people. We will remain hidden and fight the things only we can, and safeguard the shadow world and the Wall of Sleep from those that wish to invade our realm, as we have always done...let these mutants do as they wish and slug it out in times square..."

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by Lameth

Would the magical community still keep themselves secret in the background? Would they still wish to keep their secrets and secret world hidden from the normals?

Yes and yes – even more so than before super-powers showed up. Supers may well possess abilities that can expose magic . . . and that let them persecute or enslave mages. Even if they don't, or even if supers are for the most part pulp heroes and basically good guys, there's the risk of society shunning supers, imposing strict laws to control them, or even engaging in a little persecution and enslavement of its own. In that case, wizards would not want to risk being caught in the storm of bigots and authoritarians who don't much care about the difference between "mage" and "super." Either way, they would have a far stronger motivation to stay out of sight (and develop new magic that can block super-senses ASAP).