I saw the title of that article a few days ago and didn't read it, but today I noticed the name of the author. Clemens Setz has written some good stuff.
I had this realization a few years ago after experiencing various forms of manifestation to bring things into my life, improve my health, etc. Tech and especially AI seem to be catalysts that amplify the effect that our inner reality has on the outer co-created reality (if we believe in duality), just like with Arthur C. Clarke's third law:
So D&D stats like wisdom and charisma that were easily overlooked in our modern world are starting to surpass, say, intelligence when it comes to self-actualization/ascension.
If we follow this to its logical conclusion, then there are magical laws to consider, if such things could possibly be summarized in words:
I believe that every use of magic comes with a cost, which is unknown if the wielder isn't mindful of it. In the simplest terms: using magic to satisfy one's ego by acquiring something deprives someone of something - often the wielder.
There are a few ways to minimize the consequence of using magic:
1) Sacrifice something of value for the magic to consume
2) Appeal to a higher power through prayer, the law of attraction, etc like a paladin so that the spirit bears the cost
3) Act in alignment with the heart so that creation has a chance to help behind the scenes (loosely related to #2)
4) Avoid the use of magic altogether and stick to objectivity, that free will is a fantasy, that reason supersedes meaning, etc
I'm sure I'm missing some, as I'm relearning childish notions around magical thinking.
I think what we're seeing when our most wealthy and powerful leaders denounce empathy is the outward expression of #4. Because empathy allows one to simulate the subjective experience of others in the mind, which opens the door to meaning, the golden rule, reincarnation, even the multiverse and parallel timelines. On the one hand they say that magic is dead, but on the other they use tools like psychology/economics/politics that blur the line between science and magic in order to gain control.
The ultimate expression of tech as magic might be something like the Emperor in Star Wars. Total impeccability and plausible deniability from accountability, yet no soul.
What I've come to realize in my own life is that feeling the magic passing through us is akin to shifting realities. It can't be studied scientifically, because the observer may see outcomes that differ from those of other observers in the previous reality. Science may be deterministic on one timeline, but stochastic across timelines. Which ties into consciousness, quantum mechanics, synchronicity, pantheism, the many faces of God as every living thing, etc.
Whether we influence the world through our actions of manipulate it through control of our attention, karmic consequences still come. The inward flow of psychic energy for personal gain creates a sense of waiting for the other shoe to drop. Whereas the outward flow in service to others creates a sense of abundance. Life becomes a dance of working with these energies, either low-vibration or high-vibration, fear or love.
Where I'm going with this is that this rediscovered power of love has the potential to shift humanity into a reality where our demons can't follow. We are temporarily on this one which seems to be fraught with danger because maybe some part of our soul felt that our help was needed here most. We can shift to a gentler timeline if we wish, or continue playing the life we paid a quarter for in the astral plane and do some world building here.
There are no demons or any other supernatural beings, there is no magic. The world would be a massively different place if this were true, and if you truly take the time to consider the implications of this, you'll come to agree with me.
It's certainly entertaining and fulfilling to believe there is some great, deep truth and that you're finding it through the concept of magic, but your mental energy would better be spent understanding things like politics and technology for what they are, not draped in the context of the supernatural.
Overall your post comes off as detached from reality and this is my attempt to help you see that, I'm not interested in debating any of this stuff because there is plenty of literature and experimental results which already do a great job of this.
There are no demons or any other supernatural beings, there is no magic.
^^^ Any sufficiently advanced tech..
Under the definition I'm using, demons live in our mind, often operating through the subconscious mind. The Ancient Greek notion of a daemon described an entity which existed between the realm of gods and humans, connecting our deterministic material plane to the spiritual plane:
Taken literally it means that gods don't just live on Mount Olympus, but are present in our psyche at all times, vying for our attention.
So for example, someone compelled to drink alcohol might have let their mind become ruled by Dionysus (or the Roman name Bacchus), or a daemon in service of that god or pretending to be that god. Same for gambling (Hermes/Mercury). Or politics (Zeus and Athena/Jupiter and Minerva).
Today's billionaires would be ruled by gluttany (Adephagia/Nemesis) although the Romans equivocated on this because concepts like master and slave had different meanings then, because the empire's existence depended on subjugation so it became "just how things are". Much like in the modern era "it is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understand it" (Upton Sinclair).
So Nemesis may have allowed a human to reach a high station, even emperor, unless that human committed hubris. For example by defying the gods by trying to become a god, like Croesus did by seeing what he wanted to see:
For billionaires, obsessive thoughts revolve around health, mortality and waiting for the other shoe to drop, since they experience Nemesis without knowing its name. Whereas for farmers, concerns are more about putting food on the table, since their thinking is ruled by Demeter/Ceres.
This relates to modern concepts in psychology like "symphony of mind", that the faculties in our brain lead to the emergence of agents which influence our spiritual vibration to dominate our thinking.
So when someone perceives the presence of a demon through sight/sound or feeling, it's more like their intuition is communicating with them through a sense which is not well-defined. For nonbelievers or people who haven't experienced trauma yet which stresses the mind into seeking non-objective explanations for the breakdown of their reality, angels and demons are just as mythical as say, hearing voices or having multiple personality disorder. But for people who have witnessed paranormal activity, the idea that there may be more to our reality than we typically experience is as true as say, the love of a child for its parent.
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I've seen one or two things that I can't explain, that would amount to ghost stories and close encounters. But I've also seen things that were later explained. For example, I was hiking in the desert at night one time with friends and a star lit up so that for a second or two, it was as bright as day, but it wasn't a shooting star. I later learned about Iridium satellite flares.
So I'm open to the idea that magic doesn't exist. But as long as science can't explain how consciousness works, then none of this can be ruled out. IMHO science will never be able to do that, because I believe that consciousness is the quantum uncertainty portion of nondeterminism. In other words, everything down to the subatomic level has a measure of consciousness, that we observe as an outcome or choice. Withou...
Or even the similar story on CNN - "The media is learning what happens when you give a mouse a cookie" (as the article says: "Spoiler alert: The mouse has some more demands")
> I wonder if the original German is equally ambiguous...
The translation is good and authentic. Those who can read Low German[1] can compare the slightly different versions here[2]. In their comments[3 (German)], the brothers Grimm state that the storyline of a woman who pushes her husband for too much is ages old and known in many cultures. They have picked the richest German version.
If a Straussian reading is needed, then it should be considered that a Low German story from a coastal - hence Protestant - region rates the pope higher than the king.
[1] Low German was a way of getting crap[4] past the radar for the Grimms. Compared to the Juniper Tree[5] (Van den Machandelboom - Low German, again), this fairy tale is harmless.
[4] What he translates as "filthy shack" is literally a "pissing pot", i.e. a chamber pot. He seems to have a hard time telling it as it is. Maybe, the Straussian reading makes sense.
I think the point is that when one believes that having their desires fulfilled will bring them happiness, or an end to desire itsself, that the material circumstances in which that person lives are completely irrelevant. In the case of the wife, the suffering she experiences from not having her desires fulfilled is the same whether she is living in a filthy shack or whether she is god. Her internal state is identical in both situations, so her becoming god and her becoming a poor fisherman's wife are exactly the same from a phenomonological perspective. The same could be said for the man. His satisfaction was the same whether he was living in the shack or the palace. What changed for him was the burden of having these material things and asking for more, knowing it wouldn't ultimately make him or his wife happy.
Or it could mean that due to the transient nature of all material things, anything gained will invariably break down eventually. All desire leads to loss.
I read it as the fish returning her to her God-ordained state, as she was, from her magical-fish-given states of human appointed positions; that is, wealth and status coming from community rather than any kind of divine appointment—which is maybe also a Protestant dig at Papism?
One of my favourites. The Grimms' original is in a Low German dialect but the style is so beautifully simple that if you know the story and have a good knowledge of standard German then you can probably understand almost everything:
This tale of the Grimmsʼ collection was contributed (in a Low German dialect) by Philipp Otto Runge. His main profession was painting, and he designed a color model using a sphere.[1]
His interest in colors certainly left a trace in the elaboration how the sea and the sky are colored and change their colors.
Runge contributed another tale, “Von dem Machandelboom” ‘Of / about the juniper tree’. Both tales were held in high regard by the Grimms. They saw some traits as typical or classical for the genre, e.g. the repetitions, parallelisms with rising tension.
There is a similar episode of Frasier where he and his brother Niles keep trying to get into ever more exclusive tiers of the “Empire Club” in Seattle. One of my faves. https://frasier.fandom.com/wiki/The_Club
Reading this story and the discussion in the thread have been a rare treat; surprises like these are why I love this site. Now I must find more of the Grimms' work!
There's a similar Russian tale in blank verse by Pushkin: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tale_of_the_Fisherman_and_... - probably either inspired directly by the Low German story or mediated through a version told to him in his childhood by his nurse (who in turn heard it from someone else).
In the Russian version, the fisherman's wife's final and mistaken wish is to be the Queen of the Sea, with the fish as her servant.
I like to think of myself as having modest desires, but this story does a good job of making me wonder: am I the fisherman or the wife? I don't want a palace, but I wouldn't want a filthy shack either. Which of my desires, for myself or for others, are truly reasonable? I'd be fine with health and happiness, but none of us is entitled to those by birthright.
It's easy to read this story and think "Hah! Look at that greedy wife, I would not keep asking for more." But... would you ask for anything at all, then? And if you did and got it, would you be satisfied forever? All of history suggests that it is human to keep ratcheting it up.
And on the other hand, is it really "better" to be the fisherman? He may be satisfied with living in a filthy shack, but hey, he's out fishing every day. She's living in it. Is he really in a position to judge his wife for wanting something better?
I suppose the moral of the story is that one shouldn't fuck around with talking flounders? Or for that matter kneel before every capricious whimsy of a sociopathic control freak of a wife?
39 comments
[ 2.9 ms ] story [ 55.3 ms ] threadTo understand how AI will reconfigure humanity, try this German fairytale
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2025/sep/16/ai-artificial-...
https://www.thoughtco.com/what-are-clarkes-laws-2699067
So D&D stats like wisdom and charisma that were easily overlooked in our modern world are starting to surpass, say, intelligence when it comes to self-actualization/ascension.
If we follow this to its logical conclusion, then there are magical laws to consider, if such things could possibly be summarized in words:
https://www.themystica.com/the-laws-of-magic/
http://www.neopagan.net/AT_Laws.html
I believe that every use of magic comes with a cost, which is unknown if the wielder isn't mindful of it. In the simplest terms: using magic to satisfy one's ego by acquiring something deprives someone of something - often the wielder.
There are a few ways to minimize the consequence of using magic:
1) Sacrifice something of value for the magic to consume
2) Appeal to a higher power through prayer, the law of attraction, etc like a paladin so that the spirit bears the cost
3) Act in alignment with the heart so that creation has a chance to help behind the scenes (loosely related to #2)
4) Avoid the use of magic altogether and stick to objectivity, that free will is a fantasy, that reason supersedes meaning, etc
I'm sure I'm missing some, as I'm relearning childish notions around magical thinking.
I think what we're seeing when our most wealthy and powerful leaders denounce empathy is the outward expression of #4. Because empathy allows one to simulate the subjective experience of others in the mind, which opens the door to meaning, the golden rule, reincarnation, even the multiverse and parallel timelines. On the one hand they say that magic is dead, but on the other they use tools like psychology/economics/politics that blur the line between science and magic in order to gain control.
The ultimate expression of tech as magic might be something like the Emperor in Star Wars. Total impeccability and plausible deniability from accountability, yet no soul.
What I've come to realize in my own life is that feeling the magic passing through us is akin to shifting realities. It can't be studied scientifically, because the observer may see outcomes that differ from those of other observers in the previous reality. Science may be deterministic on one timeline, but stochastic across timelines. Which ties into consciousness, quantum mechanics, synchronicity, pantheism, the many faces of God as every living thing, etc.
Whether we influence the world through our actions of manipulate it through control of our attention, karmic consequences still come. The inward flow of psychic energy for personal gain creates a sense of waiting for the other shoe to drop. Whereas the outward flow in service to others creates a sense of abundance. Life becomes a dance of working with these energies, either low-vibration or high-vibration, fear or love.
Where I'm going with this is that this rediscovered power of love has the potential to shift humanity into a reality where our demons can't follow. We are temporarily on this one which seems to be fraught with danger because maybe some part of our soul felt that our help was needed here most. We can shift to a gentler timeline if we wish, or continue playing the life we paid a quarter for in the astral plane and do some world building here.
From a Zen perspective, I've said too much, ...
It's certainly entertaining and fulfilling to believe there is some great, deep truth and that you're finding it through the concept of magic, but your mental energy would better be spent understanding things like politics and technology for what they are, not draped in the context of the supernatural.
Overall your post comes off as detached from reality and this is my attempt to help you see that, I'm not interested in debating any of this stuff because there is plenty of literature and experimental results which already do a great job of this.
^^^ Any sufficiently advanced tech..
Under the definition I'm using, demons live in our mind, often operating through the subconscious mind. The Ancient Greek notion of a daemon described an entity which existed between the realm of gods and humans, connecting our deterministic material plane to the spiritual plane:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daemon_(classical_Greek_mythol...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daimonion_(Socrates)
Taken literally it means that gods don't just live on Mount Olympus, but are present in our psyche at all times, vying for our attention.
So for example, someone compelled to drink alcohol might have let their mind become ruled by Dionysus (or the Roman name Bacchus), or a daemon in service of that god or pretending to be that god. Same for gambling (Hermes/Mercury). Or politics (Zeus and Athena/Jupiter and Minerva).
Today's billionaires would be ruled by gluttany (Adephagia/Nemesis) although the Romans equivocated on this because concepts like master and slave had different meanings then, because the empire's existence depended on subjugation so it became "just how things are". Much like in the modern era "it is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understand it" (Upton Sinclair).
So Nemesis may have allowed a human to reach a high station, even emperor, unless that human committed hubris. For example by defying the gods by trying to become a god, like Croesus did by seeing what he wanted to see:
https://www.parikiaki.com/2021/12/croesus-of-lydia/
For billionaires, obsessive thoughts revolve around health, mortality and waiting for the other shoe to drop, since they experience Nemesis without knowing its name. Whereas for farmers, concerns are more about putting food on the table, since their thinking is ruled by Demeter/Ceres.
This relates to modern concepts in psychology like "symphony of mind", that the faculties in our brain lead to the emergence of agents which influence our spiritual vibration to dominate our thinking.
So when someone perceives the presence of a demon through sight/sound or feeling, it's more like their intuition is communicating with them through a sense which is not well-defined. For nonbelievers or people who haven't experienced trauma yet which stresses the mind into seeking non-objective explanations for the breakdown of their reality, angels and demons are just as mythical as say, hearing voices or having multiple personality disorder. But for people who have witnessed paranormal activity, the idea that there may be more to our reality than we typically experience is as true as say, the love of a child for its parent.
-
I've seen one or two things that I can't explain, that would amount to ghost stories and close encounters. But I've also seen things that were later explained. For example, I was hiking in the desert at night one time with friends and a star lit up so that for a second or two, it was as bright as day, but it wasn't a shooting star. I later learned about Iridium satellite flares.
So I'm open to the idea that magic doesn't exist. But as long as science can't explain how consciousness works, then none of this can be ruled out. IMHO science will never be able to do that, because I believe that consciousness is the quantum uncertainty portion of nondeterminism. In other words, everything down to the subatomic level has a measure of consciousness, that we observe as an outcome or choice. Withou...
* https://edition.cnn.com/2025/09/19/business/media-business-t...
But I'm really not sure what to make of the ending.
> "Oh," he said, "she wants to become like God."
> "Go home. She is sitting in her filthy shack again."
This is ambiguous. The flounder simply acknowledges a change in state without saying whether he actually fulfilled the request or not.
If he rejected the request, then it's a tale about checking ambition, trying to be like God, etc.
But if he accepted the request? Then it's advancing a very different idea of what God is like.
I wonder if the original German is equally ambiguous...
EDIT: I suppose she's not making the sun and moon rise, so maybe I'm overcomplicating it.
The translation is good and authentic. Those who can read Low German[1] can compare the slightly different versions here[2]. In their comments[3 (German)], the brothers Grimm state that the storyline of a woman who pushes her husband for too much is ages old and known in many cultures. They have picked the richest German version.
If a Straussian reading is needed, then it should be considered that a Low German story from a coastal - hence Protestant - region rates the pope higher than the king.
[1] Low German was a way of getting crap[4] past the radar for the Grimms. Compared to the Juniper Tree[5] (Van den Machandelboom - Low German, again), this fairy tale is harmless.
[2] https://de.wikisource.org/wiki/Vom_Fischer_und_seiner_Frau
[3] https://de.wikisource.org/wiki/Kinder-_und_Haus-M%C3%A4rchen...
[4] What he translates as "filthy shack" is literally a "pissing pot", i.e. a chamber pot. He seems to have a hard time telling it as it is. Maybe, the Straussian reading makes sense.
[5] https://sites.pitt.edu/~dash/grimm047.html - you have been warned.
1) Listen to your conscience & speak up unambiguously
2) Something like "Victim blaming is correct in moderation"?
I don't know if I agree with that but it seems like an interpertation
Or it could mean that due to the transient nature of all material things, anything gained will invariably break down eventually. All desire leads to loss.
Maybe it's both. I think it's both.
The more jaded you are the less of them you'll reject but also the less of them you needed to be told.
https://de.wikisource.org/wiki/Von_dem_Fischer_un_syner_Fru_...
His interest in colors certainly left a trace in the elaboration how the sea and the sky are colored and change their colors.
Runge contributed another tale, “Von dem Machandelboom” ‘Of / about the juniper tree’. Both tales were held in high regard by the Grimms. They saw some traits as typical or classical for the genre, e.g. the repetitions, parallelisms with rising tension.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philipp_Otto_Runge#Runge_and_c... –
In the Russian version, the fisherman's wife's final and mistaken wish is to be the Queen of the Sea, with the fish as her servant.
https://sites.pitt.edu/~dash/grimm055.html
It's easy to read this story and think "Hah! Look at that greedy wife, I would not keep asking for more." But... would you ask for anything at all, then? And if you did and got it, would you be satisfied forever? All of history suggests that it is human to keep ratcheting it up.
And on the other hand, is it really "better" to be the fisherman? He may be satisfied with living in a filthy shack, but hey, he's out fishing every day. She's living in it. Is he really in a position to judge his wife for wanting something better?
I don't see the AI connection in any case.