Low-Tech: Magic?

[NorphTehDwarf]

I hate to say it, but I'm not sure there's enough crunch in real-world magic to tie together a GURPS book, and maybe not even enough for a PDF.

I find the subject fascinating myself, though.

Most religious/magical tasks could be described by a number of GURPS skills. Aside from the obvious like Theology and Religious Ritual, I'd say that a practitioner of witchcraft or religion may have any one of the following skills:
Esoteric Medicine, Pharmacy (especially herbal), Psychology, Fortune-Telling, Body Language, Brainwashing, Acting, Artist, Astronomy, Autohypnosis, Meditation, Dreaming (the non-supernatural parts of the skill), Fast-Talk, Hypnotism, Performance, Group Performance, Musical Instrument, Singing, Leadership, Law, Literature (Possibly with an oral tradition specialization in preliterate cultures), Makeup and/or Disguise (for traditions in which practitioners dress up in elaborate costumes), Merchant (for cultures in which the practitioner is just another professional doing a job, albeit an esoteric one), Mimicry, Naturalist, Navigation (for seafaring cultures, probably), Occultism, Panhandling, Physician, Poetry, Poisons, Public Speaking, Teaching, Propaganda, Savoir-Faire, Stage Combat, Ventriloquism, and Writing.



And more, of course. It's important to note that the practitioner probably won't think of a lot of these skills by their GURPS names. An abbot likely won't think of the endless repetitions of chanting and fasting and suchlike as Brainwashing, but the monastic life certainly inspires a certain mindset, and men such as Francis of Assisi and whoever founded the Jesuits were using it when they organized their orders were certainly using that skill, although perhaps at default. Similarly the azande oracle board was influenced by the user's understanding of a situation, and its use was influenced by the answers of the person commissioning the divination; this falls under either Psychology, Body Language, or Fortune-Telling or possibly a mix of the three, but the oracle board practitioner and client are both convinced that they are consulting with a spirit.

Another thing to remember is the mindset of a magic practitioner. If a given working didn't work, then the practitioner did it wrong, or the spirits weren't willing, or someone else opposed the work strongly enough that nothing happened. The basic idea is that barring any interfering conditions, magic will always work.

This is all based on an anthropology course I took like two years ago, though.

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by NorphTehDwarf

It's important to note that the practitioner probably won't think of a lot of these skills by their GURPS names.

That's a good point. I agree with it very much. An Indian Shaman wouldn't understand what do you mean by describing him as an "occultist", or as having the Occultism skill. Likewise, a Taoist sage would look at you with a really weird expression if you're telling him that he has the skill Theology (Taoism).

Originally Posted by NorphTehDwarf

An abbot likely won't think of the endless repetitions of chanting and fasting and suchlike as Brainwashing

That is a life of concentration.

If you want to talk about brainwashing, what's about watching TV? You see, is very easy to be controversial.

Originally Posted by Gudiomen

Kardecists employ psychic healing techniques that are pretty much what we call "magic".

All that derives from Allan Kardec isn't but Spiritualism, an exclusively modern creation weirdly linked to discarded scientific theories for achieving what is often called "a transposed materialism". I mean, that isn't representative of any "Low-Tech Magic".

Originally Posted by Gudiomen

*one example of this was the aborigine punishment of having a knee pierced by a "spiritual" spear, with the punished limping across the desert from the belief that his knee was pierced by the invisible spear. So hostile "magic" is possible too.

It's extremely easy to misunderstand these things. I can't be sure about this specific example, but there is the possibility of that being a kind of atonement ritual: and rituals needs to be "role played", sometimes even to uncomfortable extremes. If not, they are regarded as invalid. The symbolic items often used in rituals are material ones, but occasionally there are "invisible items" in play with the purpose serving as a vehicle of psychic or spiritual elements, too.

[LogicalDash]

The brainwashing skill is a cinematic skill based on how brainwashing works in movies like The Manchurian Candidate. Nobody has been able to make it work like that in real life; the best you can do is get your target in a position where they are inclined to listen to you and nobody else, which is more like Fast-Talk or the also-cinematic Persuade.

Historical religions and magical practices certainly used a lot of propaganda, but it's not very different from modern advertising. Pyramid #3/15: Transhuman Space contains a nice little system for simulating the effects of propaganda on a population. It's not really specific to the Transhuman Space setting, it just includes some modifiers to take that setting's concept of meme engineering into account.

[LogicalDash]

Come to think of it, if what you want is a book on how to induce the placebo/nocebo effect, you might be looking for GURPS Social Engineering. You need to make them really believe they are being magicked, right, and for that you need to run a con.

[fschiff]

Kind of weird that no one can just come up with some book suggestions for this topic.

"The Magic Book" by Harry Lorayne
Excellent layman's book written by one of the top professionals.

"The Amateur Magician's Handbook" by Henry Hay
don't let the term "amateur" fool ya. Solid entry to the hobby.
Magic happens in the minds of the spectators.

"Magic and Showmanship: A Handbook for Conjurers" by Henning Nelms
Theature knowledge applied to magic.


Oh. you mean the other kind of magic.

"Modern Magick" by Donald Michael Kraig
Very through introductory textbook on Western ceremonial magick.

Now you know GURPS Thaumatology? This is the book that should have been in its bibliography, cause this is the book on its subject matter.

In terms of game books, Thaumatology has all of the GURPS nitty gritty on different magic systems. The various world books tell how to apply it. They will say for example, this college of magic is missing, this spell is only known by kami or dragons or whatever, but not by player characters (implying a story hook or an unusual background cost to obtain), such and such is not known by anyone, what the magical elements are, if elementals exist, etc.

Taking the "this is how culture X thought about magick" away from other aspects of that culture does not strike me as a product that SJG is going to produce. Treating magical knowledge as technology levels like the Pyramid 3e article, "The Five Movements of Magic" might be what you are talking about concerning a Low Tech: Magic article/book.

[Gudiomen]

All that derives from Allan Kardec isn't but Spiritualism, an exclusively modern creation weirdly linked to discarded scientific theories for achieving what is often called "a transposed materialism". I mean, that isn't representative of any "Low-Tech Magic".

You're right, and I did trail off into non low-tech examples... what I meant to say was, that "magic" is present in a lot of traditions that are still around today. I also wasn't making a precise statement about kardecism or spiritualism, just a general imprecise comment that some modern day religions and traditions still use what was used as "magic" in the past.

It's extremely easy to misunderstand these things. I can't be sure about this specific example, but there is the possibility of that being a kind of atonement ritual: and rituals needs to be "role played", sometimes even to uncomfortable extremes. If not, they are regarded as invalid. The symbolic items often used in rituals are material ones, but occasionally there are "invisible items" in play with the purpose serving as a vehicle of psychic or spiritual elements, too.

Again, you're reading too much into casual examples. This one I drew from memory of an australian tour I took when I was 16 years-old, so the details might be hazy. I just needed an example for nocebo that showed how hostile magic was possible too, and that belief, boosed by ritual and tradition... I'm not even saying that's all there is to it. I mean, we could go further in and talk about cognitive dissonance too, and how practitioners would remember the times it worked far more than the times it didn't, or twist their perception or the facts to find results... or at least lessons and explanations, where there is just... stuff.

Anyway, my suggestion was looking into real world anthropological studies of relgious rites, shamanism and what have you. I can probably dig up some references, but its late, I'm not sure if that's exactly what you want, or if you're already familiar with the topic and thus the tip is empty... you seem to already know a bit about it.

[Flyndaran]

An awesome example of nocebo is in the episode "Nocebo" of the British series Wire in the Blood.
Without giving too much away, it involves how much havoc and power someone can initiate without involving any "real magic".

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by Gudiomen

You're right, and I did trail off into non low-tech examples... what I meant to say was, that "magic" is present in a lot of traditions that are still around today. I also wasn't making a precise statement about kardecism or spiritualism, just a general imprecise comment that some modern day religions and traditions still use what was used as "magic" in the past.

Of course, you're right. I understood your point, but I added a few comments to it. I wasn't really making a criticism of your lines.

Originally Posted by Gudiomen

Again, you're reading too much into casual examples.

What do you mean with "again"? It's also possible to read too little, or read wrongly (by saying this, I'm not looking exclusively at you). Sometimes, to read too little is to read wrongly, too (*). And who would be the one(s) reading too much into casual examples? Anthropologists are well known for interpreting them in their own way, discarding the so-called "emic" accounts of the "studied primitive people" for then consciously or unconsciously substituting them for their own so-called "emic" accounts, and this is why trying to render "culturally neutral" so-called "etic" accounts is mostly fallacious and delusional. By interpreting the mentalities and practices of "primitives", natives (etc.) through the anthropologist's own mentality and particular world-view, many anthropological accounts often attribute intentions and beliefs to these natives that they actually don't or didn't have, containing misinterpretations in varying degrees.

You're right in what I don't want exactly to dig into this particular example: there are lots of them, I'm sure you already know. One of my points is that a single "fact" or "casual example" can be seen from different perspectives, specially if the information about it isn't specially reliable or, as you say, hazy: in this case, your interpretation of it was related with "magic" and "hostile magic" through the "nocebo" theory, while my own was seeing it just as rite of atonement, having nothing to do with magic (at least not in a phenomenological sense, as it's usually regarded -specially in role playing games and of course, in this thread). It was only a viable interpretation as an example of these things; I'm not truly meaning that I am right about this case and you're wrong; I used it for showing how easily there can be misinterpretations and, at the same time, that there's room for different interpretations.

Digging more in this would be too much for me right now, specially because yesterday I posted a lot in other thread around here, and I'm lacking of time, in part because that. Another of my points is: I'm OK with the "nocebo" interpretation you provided about the "Spiritual" lance and the punished man limping around; but I'd expect that you were OK with mine, too.

(*) A part of my work is exegetical, I mean, it's expected from me to "read" more attentively than the usual reader (I'm not talking only about reading texts, BTW), to draw more from sources than the usual reader, and to use tools than a "lay" reader (and an anthropologist is included in such category) can't handle, but that doesn't means that I'm allowed to lie or to invent things at whim.

[Gudiomen]

Ok, now I get where you're coming from.

Anyways, in a nutshell...

IMO, low-tech magic are the fantastic or unexpected elements in low-tech religion, rituals and traditions... therefore the OP can look at sources of these (historical, anthropological, the religions themselves...) to find real-world low-tech "magic".

If one also understands much of this from being derived as placebo or nocebo effects, avoidance of cognitive dissonance, and many other processes... one can also extrapolate a low-tech magic system thinking up ways to activate these principles. For example:

1) the magician must be formally or informally recognized as such, as capable of such powers
2) the subject must believe in these powers and the authority of the magician
3) effects can be beneficial or malefic to the subject, but the subject must be able to produce them in some level, reinforcing his motivation, self-sabotage, psychosomatic effects and so on...
4) it might be possible to "counter" such effects by convincing the subject that the magician was not competent as he thought, or that the ritual was not adequately realized, or by invoking a superior power/authority to that of the magician
etc...