letter

Dear Byron:

So I'm dying to know ...

If Cats had explained that the 20-ton weight materialized through a hyperspatial conduit that was connected to a warehouse on the other end of the world, stocked with 20-ton weights, and that it had failed to destroy the ship because the HMS Naked Glittery Squirrel is actually made of neutronium (the neutron-star-like gravitational effects of which are effectively neutralized through a fusion-driven gravity field), would you have reacted as negatively as you did to her use of the phrase "magic?"

I ask this because she said "magic," not necromancy, not a Satanic pact, not divination, not kartomancy, not witchcraft, not spiritism, not conjuration, not blood sacrifice, and not any other recognized branch of the occult. Just "magic," a generic fantasy term that shows up in the works of Christian authors like J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Stephen Lawhead, Charles Williams and G.O.K. who else.

The argument I expect you're inclined to use is essentially the slippery slope fallacy used against fantasy works like Harry Potter, that although the books are hopelessly fantastic and not at all realistic, their present the danger of enticing innocents into attempting actual witchcraft and trafficking with the Devil.

I call it a fallacy because that's what it essentially is, based as it is in a faulty assumption that most or many people are incapable of telling the difference between a literary or imaginative vehicle and the real world. (There are a few who can't, it's true, but they're either very young or in some way mentally impaired.)

In reality, you could argue that science fiction is much more dangerous to people than fantasy. While each can fire imagination and offer valuable insights into the human condition, fantasy includes at least a nod in the direction of the supernatural and stirs the heart to consider the existence of a world that ours operates within but often is unaware of. Science fiction on the other hand quite typically envisions an utterly naturlistic viewpoint, suggests that all things can and will be neatly explained once we have attained a sufficient amount of naturalist knowledge, and either ignores God or treats him as a contemtuous idea. Its treatment of God's natural laws of physics also is pretty contemptible, and since it has the same effect (plotwise) as magic, one could argue that it could lead impressionable readers down a parallel path of scientific-seeming witchcraft

So, while I perhaps am being a teensy bit facetious about the whole thing, I do wonder why you feel it's necessary to have yourself rescued by an angel -- I would have just jumped out of the way -- and warn Cats so sternly about the dangers of practicing nondescript magic upon a Christian.

Just curious. :-)