Re: Giant magic

From: Alex Ferguson <abf_at_cs.ucc.ie>
Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 23:23:36 +0100 (BST)

TTrotsky, on whether Dragon Magic is different from 'being a dragon':
> > No, not really, IMO. No more than throwing lightning bolts is part of
> > 'being a Storm Voice'.
>
> Different categories of being. Storm Voices are not an a priori class of
> entity, they're a social condition which presupposes a magical one. >>
>
> I can't see why that makes a difference, I'm afraid.

They sound pretty different to me. Becoming a Storm Voice requires a show of hands (OK, loud drunken shouting, and the like, more accurately) at a clan moot. Becoming a Dragon is a rather more cosmologically fundamental 'process'. (If process is the the word...)

> << OTOH, the idea of a dragon learning or heroquesting for the ability to
> breathe fire (etc) seems rather silly.>>
>
> Sure. They don't get it in the same way. Still doesn't mean its an
> aspect of 'being a dragon', IMO.

So, how do they get it then, if it _isn't_ simply an aspect of their being, in some a priori sense? They don't, so far as I know _do_ anything to get it, or to keep being able to have it for that matter. In what sense is it different from their 'innate' abilities, like Be Very Big, or Eat Large Chunk of Boldhome?

> << > For good reason, perhaps... My understanding is that the term Dragon
> Magic
> > describes at least primarily the practice of becoming/being a dragon.
> > YDMV... >>
>
> > I'd define it simply as the type of magic that dragons use and which
> > results from their worldview.
>
> Only makes sense if you accept that all 'newts and Darudans a priori are
> dragons (as opposed to potential dragons), since they are the main
> practitioners of anything one would usefully call 'Dragon Magic'.>>
>
> I disagree. I said its 'the type of magic that dragons use' not 'the
> type of magic that dragons, and dragons alone, are able to use'.

Well, you didn't say 'dragons and assorted unspecified others' either, which seems the less apparent inference to draw. What little we know (in our pre-AR state, at least) of 'dragon magic' among newts and Kralorelans implies it's a process of becoming or manifesting a dragon in some partial way, or least that that's involved. The simplest assumption, at first wink, would seem to be that that's exactly the point...

> So I guess you're just arguing against me, and then on the philosophy,
> not the end result.

Perhaps more on the terminology, to be precise. (An ever-popular thing to argue about on the digest.)

Cheers,
Alex.

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