[adamc]

Totally a tangent, but he's right about that. It was a flaw in Harry Potter as well. There was no logical system to how magic worked; spells did whatever plot requirements said they did. And it detracts from the sense of realism in a world when the magic just does whatever is needed at the moment.

[0cf8612b2e1e]

Acknowledging it is a children’s book…

I take significantly bigger issue with the lack of societal change from having magic. Way too much of wizard society was “Muggles + occasional party tricks”. When you can conjure food, water, automatons, etc from nothing, nature of living would change completely.

You can brew luck? I would be mainlining that stuff every day. Time travel is given to children? Why is there a train when there are a dozen different ways of magicking yourself around the world?

Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality touched on these inconsistencies.

[dylan604]

But. It's. Magic.

Magic can do anything. That's why it's magic. How does it work? Magic. It's a perfectly complete circle in logic.

[0cf8612b2e1e]

The very much NSFW web comic Oglaf had a strip about this.

In this rare instance, the comic is SFW, but still be wary. https://www.oglaf.com/claret/

[adamc]

Compare to, say, "A Wizard of Earthsea", where magic is explained in a different way that points out that while a wizard could transmute one substance into another, no wizard would, because of the far-reaching ramifications.

The system was not fully elucidated by any means, but the subtlety of it was suggested by such things as Ged deducing that the doorkeeper was one of the seven masters of Roke.

[jajko]

Sounds like most religions. And most modern folks having issues with religions they were brought up in don't have this as their main issue with it.

One addresses child's imagination which just wants to be wowed, the other our eternal fear of unknown and death.

[Aerroon]

Well, magic still needs to follow some kind of rules for it to be usable. Otherwise "magic" would just be something random (or maybe chaotic - we just haven't figured out the rules well enough).

[mrkstu]

Or, you can do the Brandon Sanderson thing, and have a comprehensive system that has limits and a consistent expression of magical power.

[dylan604]

but then it's no longer magic. it now becomes some sort of metaphysical science. magic is magic. once you understand it, it is no longer magic.

[Sammi]

I don't think kids enjoy Harry Potter for the sense of realism...

What the Harry Potter books have is very well written characters, and character stories, and a great sense of adventure and fascination.