Many thanks; An enjoyable read on an interesting subject.

I think magic has a difficult time in this world. A fundamental law of our reality seems to be the forced retention of causal consistency. (a la Thomas Campbell) and magic is tasked with putting pressure on and sneaking around this law.

I like this idea of hidden connections and correspondences woven through our ‘world’. I imagine it like some sort of ‘service duct’ network. I suspect certain correspondences have been worn into the ‘fabric’ through use and others are more intrinsic.

I would guess that nudging the worlds causality impulse takes quite some focus of intent. It is probably a blessing that each of us is legion; filled with conflicting voices, chatter and ideas, so this pressure is limited.

We are quite ingenious though and have devised many external routes to harness intent, in the endeavour to draw each sense from the diffuse to the single point. I envisage this is where the connections, correspondences and shortcuts come in to it.

I warm to Campbell’s take on this which seems to shed light on the admonition of silence and secret working.

He gives the example of a disease manifesting in our physical reality and states that if uncertainty exists then much can be done to remove said disease via intent, as it would be much easier for the physical material reality to retain it’s consistency and compatibility with causality. Conversely the disease would become much more firmly fixed into existence if information about the likely outcome (a high degree of causal certainty) is held and shared in the minds and expectations of credible sentient beings.
Reversing the causal laws of space-time (a miracle) requires much more energy than directly modifying the outcome of an uncertain event.