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While answering another question (Does my magical addition to Linnaean taxonomy make sense?)

I began to imagine a full-fledged taxonomy of magic. I love fantasy fiction, RPG, and the entire shebang, but I have tired of the same old elemental themes - IMO there are so many approaches to categorising magic which don't apply to elements (or for which elements are force-fitted). Take, for instance 'blood' magic, or necromancy, or djinn-harnessing, or sigils and protection amulets - taboo, totems - even in alchemy the elements took a part, but they did not delineate the 'kingdoms' of magic.

In that answer above, I considered alternatives that could be possible - noetic/vital/symbolic/elemental/theurgic/entropic or mimetic/contagious/evocative/transmutative/divinatory or using several axes for a multidimensional system (after all, do we really need a tree? Maybe we need several orthogonal trees - a forest):

  • temporality (undo/transform/prophecy)
  • agency (self/another-channel/nature)
  • entropy (creation, sustaining, destruction)
  • reciprocity (bargains, invocation, binding)
  • consciousness (none, unconscious, subconscious, uncontrolled, controlled, controlling)...

Then there are all sorts of artefacts - blessings, oracles, luck .. so much.

The question is, does anyone already have this - or would you care to have a go? I don't need someone to tell me sure go read the golden bough. I know quite a bit about magic - this question is about taxonomising it - such that anything pertaining to 'magic' can be found within it.

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    $\begingroup$ @sphennings Worldbuilding resources requests are on topic. It seems like that's what this is; no review or third-party world is asked for. $\endgroup$ Commented Oct 31 at 14:22
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    $\begingroup$ I disagree with sphennings reading of my question. I am looking for novel approaches to taxonomies of magic. I expressed a dismay at the tendency not to consider the rich and varied nuances of the existing and mythological magical cultures, both within, and outside of fiction. @sphennings - if you feel that I am asking for a review, please suggest an edit, rather than downvote. $\endgroup$ Commented Oct 31 at 14:43
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    $\begingroup$ It seems to be an open-ended question asking for ideas without a clear focused problem to solve (i.e "fishing for ideas", which is off-topic here). Can you tell us what part you might be having issues with that we can offer solutions? $\endgroup$ Commented Oct 31 at 17:30
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    $\begingroup$ I'm not fishing for ideas. I'm not asking for a review. I am asking for answers - the question is - have you any experience with, or have you authored, a taxonomy of magic? What would one look like? What is it with these D/V - on halloween of all nights. $\endgroup$ Commented Oct 31 at 20:09
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    $\begingroup$ I think it's a fair question. The problem is that there is no one answer. Different people have come up with separations and classifications of magic. However, there are so many ways you can split them up. Some are more granular, others more sweeping. There is no one single definition for what a category of magic is. We could draw from the real world beliefs but there is, again, so many. In one culture you might have certain effects classified one way (like "good" or "while" magic), in another culture the same effects may be considered differently ("negative" or "black" magic).. $\endgroup$ Commented Oct 31 at 20:45

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Before we can even start with a taxonomy of magic, we have to consider what that taxonomy is going to be used for.

There are a few examples of such on the internet:

https://balioc.tumblr.com/post/628726469386960897/a-taxonomy-of-magic

https://blog.boroughbound.com/a-taxonomy-of-magical-taxonomies/

Once we settle upon a world and/or a use for that magic, we can then get into the nitty-gritty of classifying the magic as used in that scenario. A search using Google: https://www.google.com/search?q=taxonomy+of+magic comes up with a great list of them, enough to fill a book with just the links.

However, the one feature that most magic seems to have is that it is narratively useful. Since it does not truly exist in our real world, its inclusion in our imagined worlds typically fills a narrative need, even if that need is only to introduce an alien flavour to that world.

Once the goal of narrative usefulness is fulfilled, we may then find that the magic in that setting has taken on one of a number of flavours such as those described in the taxonomies of magical taxonomies. I could go on to list them, but that would fail this site's book test once again.

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I'm going to limit my answer to a bit of world-building craft, rather than giving a full taxonomy (which, oddly enough, I have thought about before). Arthur C Clarke once quipped that “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic", and as a writer you should be aware of the corollary: the any sufficiently advanced magic system will become indistinguishable from technology. If you make a strict taxonomy and your magic system becomes thorough and robust, you'll end up writing something that feels like hard sci-fi in a fantasy setting, and you'll lose the sense of wonder that readers typically want from a depiction of magic. That's a choice to make if you want that, but often a soft magic system can carry a story better.

I will say that magic should be like technology in some particulars:

  • It needs a source of power and a way to invoke it (i.e., the way a car uses gasoline)
  • It needs tools or techniques for manipulating, redirecting, enhancing or reducing, transforming, or otherwise controlling that power once it's invoked (i.e., the way a car pistons and gears and shafts to transform burning gas into motion)
  • It needs some expenditure of resources to get it started and keep it going in the desired way (i.e., the way a car uses lubricants to deal with friction and muscle strength to turn the steering wheel)
  • It needs structural limitations, so that the process of invocation and control might break or slip (i.e., the way a car might blow a gasket, spin out on icy roads, or break an axle if it hits a bad bump)

You don't want to fall into the 'superman' problem where his (seemingly magical) abilities make him almost invincible, and so we need to introduce (seemingly magical) kryptonite to make him vulnerable.

Figure out the source of power, and the rest should fall into place. The source of power can be anything you imagine; I always liked the way Ursula K Le Guin used 'true names' as a source of power in the Earthsea cycle, and developed an entirely language-based system of invocation and control. But you know what I'm saying…

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  • $\begingroup$ This is touching on an entirely different aspect. You describe magic systems and how they are constructed. That's completely different from classification of magical effects. Classification might be an aspect you want to work on when designing the magic system - that would usually be the case if you want something in the harder part of the spectrum. But it needs not be - even a soft magic system can be classified, albeit in wider categories. Or you can also have a hard magic system but never reveal the details to readers. $\endgroup$ Commented Nov 1 at 18:14
  • $\begingroup$ @VLAZ: No doubt. My main point is that we shouldn't allow the effort to create taxonomies interfere with the art of world-building. I watched that happen on a horror podcast; it was great theater at the beginning, but began to get pedantic as the episodes wore on. $\endgroup$ Commented Nov 1 at 18:29
  • $\begingroup$ Downvoted because this is not answer to the question asked. The question asks for a systematic classification of magic, not for a personal opinion of what magic should be. "Magic should be like technology": citation needed. Author-name book-name says that in all the books and stories magic is similar to a technological process. "[Magic] needs a source of power": citation needed. Who says that? Does magic always need an explicit source of power? E.g., in the book of Exodus, when the Egyptian magic workers throw down their walking sticks and those become snakes, what's the source of power? $\endgroup$ Commented Nov 2 at 10:21
  • $\begingroup$ @AlexP: IWell, it's always nice to have a visit from the thought police. Thanks for your input. Thank you for your input, and your downvote. $\endgroup$ Commented Nov 2 at 15:24
  • $\begingroup$ True names is a very old concept, which means people fundamentally understand it. Isis got the true name of Ra, giving her complete power over him. Knowing the true name of the Jewish God gives you power over his creations etc etc. For other purposes, you're drifting into technomancy, which is fine where useful but unnecessarily contraining otherwise. Sufficiently studied magic is indistinguishable from technology but loses its, well, magic. $\endgroup$ Commented Nov 3 at 9:50

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