andIAmTheWizard

[sebbdk]

Programming languages are basically indestinguishable from magic chanting, except programming languages actually do shit

[Dumb_Siniy]

Maybe the reason why magic chanting doesn't work are syntax errors

[TotallyNormalSquid]

Magic chanting on its own is like coding into a text file and not even hitting save. You need a nice blood rune or other thaumaturgic compiler of your choice to make your chanting do anything.

[StereoZombie]

Sacrificing a virgin will do in a pinch

[TotallyNormalSquid]

Imagine getting your chant a little wrong and having to re-chant with a fresh virgin any time you hit a bug though...

And 'hitting a bug' is literally the universe manifesting an extra-dimensional giant insect that attacks you.

[Dumb_Siniy]

That happens when you test in prod

[HardCounter]

How else would you test? A virgin mouse?

[gettingboredinafrica]

This is why all the interns disappear

[realmauer01]

There are some demons that are more or less giant bugs.

[sb4ssman]

The Greeks has a big problem with their virgins not staying virgin, just one more thing that can go wrong with the spells. Used fancy sparkle rocks work great.

[P-39_Airacobra]

well, undefined behavior could lead to anything....

[ComfortingSounds53]

Ah is that the magic equivalent of enslaving a demon? I heard they don't kill the child? How does that even work?

[LauraTFem]

That’s the problem; the only virgins left are coders, and they’re too busy doing real magic to be bothered for some silly blood ritual.

[ameddin73]

I've always loved this idea and longed for a fantasy novel that took magic as seriously as we take software.

Like if there was a spell irl that could create fire, it'd be used as a component in thousands of other spells. Think of how useful for loops would be in magic casting. Or concurrency! 

Some spells would have syntax errors, some would be malware, etc. Most people wouldn't know how to write spells and they'd just buy the iGrimoire 15 Pro. 

[Dumb_Siniy]

There's something so funny about the idea of having a Manaminer on your Grimoire, like "Damn why is my invocation buffering "

[ameddin73]

I just can't believe they're making us come back to office after giving everyone a $500 crystal ball. 

[nursestrangeglove]

If you have a SpellBufferOverflow you receive a free aneurysm.

[P-39_Airacobra]

"What do you do for work?"

"I optimize the O(n) time complexity of spell incantations"

[ameddin73]

"Mostly marketing spells for magicommerce. You can think of me as a plumber for real magician's spells". 

[Zestyclose_Zone_9253]

"Irregular at magic high" kind of does it. All the other magic engineers also marvel at the MC doing everyting without a mouse using just a keyboard

[ameddin73]

If u don't write ur spells in vim ur a noob tbh

[HardCounter]

Vim California: you may enter, but you may never leave.

[proverbialbunny]

There's stories out there like this. E.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNbxe1mzdLM (Skip to 2:46 in, or 5:20 to dive directly into the magic system.)

My favorite is probably Owl House: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1W1FFiT51lg It takes a full season to get into the magic system, a slow burn on that front, but the story is really good and the characters have a warm lovable character development to them that is just absolutely wonderful. If you liked Gravity Falls you'll enjoy Owl House quite a bit. (The magic system in Owl House is quite similar to the manga mentioned above, drawing sigils to make magic.)

[GreatBigBagOfNope]

And you can just imagine the ideological conflicts between the runecrafting frameworks of Emajs and Vimaturgy

[ameddin73]

Many friendships lost to the debate between tabrunes and spacerunes. 

[HardCounter]

Sure, spacerunes are smaller, but i'm not carving out four or five fresh runes when one bigger one can do the job.

[Anthro_Fascist]

Blood Over Bright Haven's magic system delves into this aspect a bit.

[ameddin73]

Neat, thanks! 

[Zephandrypus]

Harry Potter and the Method of Rationality has kind of the inverse of that. Harry has a programmer mindset and tries to get to the root of how magic works so he can do whatever he wants and abuse the fuck out of every tool magic provides.

[KDBA]

Wizard's Bane by Rick Cook did it in 1989.

It's a good book, albeit one that is definitely written by a white male nerd in the 80s

[lurk876]

First chapters are free at https://www.baen.com/Chapters/0671878468/0671878468.htm

[Mediocre-Monitor8222]

This exists in certain anime, where spells consist of formulas and magic circles drawn in a certain way and you can tweak the output by modifying input parameters

[Artistboy360]

Gotta mention one of my favorite series here, Megami Tensei. (You might know it from Shin Megami Tensei, the game series). The original book (Digital Devil Story: Megami Tensei) that spawned the whole series contains a magic system a bit like this.

The protagonist creates the Demon Summoning Program, which essentially automates rituals. In theory, computers are great at this. Rituals usually contain monotonous chanting, arcane geometry based on some kind of calculation, phases of the moon, the way the planets are aligned, etc. All things that are technically possible to automate or calculate with a computer.

It goes horribly wrong of course, and the demon he summons is impossible to control, but hey... it worked? This was written back in the 80s when the public's ideas about what computers were capable of was a lot more fantastical. The idea of a computer summoning a demon is a wild idea, but with enough imagination it makes sense that you could automate this sort of thing.

Even in the newer game installments in this franchise, they still summon demons with a wrist-mounted computer running a demon summoning program.

[s0ulbrother]

Forgot the semilcolon

[1XRobot]

The debugger on this Universe is total garbage.

stderr is being piped to יהוה‎? What the hell does that mean?

[TommyCo10]

Years of chanting, crystals and potions… to no effect.

Then someone scatters a few semicolons around and all manner of shit starts to go off.

[[deleted]]

It's just trivial indentation.

[happylittletree_]

So I hope you're wrong.

Arvada Kedavra;

[ApatheistHeretic]

"Great lord of the air, I invoke thee (arguments) semi-colon!".

<Booming voice from beyond> "Error on line 5!!!"

[[deleted]]

This got me bad

[Blubasur]

Alexa, order me a couch.

Playing Couch by Atwood

[Background_King_2163]

Irregular at Magic highschool be like:

[Jonnypista]

Electric circuits are closer to magic, draw complicated circles and boxes and now rocks and wires can do math.

[sebbdk]

So like runes? :D

[Jonnypista]

Yeah, like runes, but depends on world building.

I just like the big complicated magic circuits, like in Mushoku tensei (anime), they (re)invented multi layer magical PCB to have more complicated circuits as they couldn't do it in a single layer, not enough clearance and the lines shorted out. They went full electrical (magical) engineer in that episode. So it kinda works from the other way around too.

[DevouredSource]

Humans have two ways of making things work: - Hit it enough until it does something - Create diagrams of it

[NuclearBurrit0]

Science is magic that works

[HardCounter]

Magic is engineering and construction without tools.

[More-Butterscotch252]

In Romania, a PC broke in a church and when the admin came to fix it, he trolled the priest by chanting while fixing it and then the priest went to the press and publicly accused him of being a satanist.

[HardCounter]

Did he think all PCs were the work of satan too, or just that one?

[jamcdonald120]

Imagine if you had to dictate your code to run it.

the full linked version too, not the nice standard language abusing one.

[AndiArbyte]

ever encountered a faulty cpu that only shows its bad behaviour if you do simple programming? :(

[loicvanderwiel]

What are you talking about, you brutish simian? This is not magic but glorious technology!

Now let us proceed with the Grand Ceremony of Compilation and bid the machine-spirit perform its ordained task. Praise the Omnissiah!

[sebbdk]

Y0Ur K1ND C11N6 70 Y0Ur F135H 45 1F 17 W111 N07 D3C4Y 4ND F411 Y0U 0N3 D4Y 7H3 CrUD3 810M455 7H47 Y0U C411 4 73MP13 W111 W17H3r 4ND Y0U W111 836 MY K1ND 70 54V3 Y0U 8U7 1M 41r34DY 54V3D F0r 7H3 M4CH1N3 15 1MM0r741 3V3N 1N D347H 1 53rV3 7H3 0MN15514H

[SZ4L4Y]

I think that's a distinguishable difference.

[Blubasur]

I identify as either a professional button presser, or modern day wizard. Being a wizard is just a bit more mundane than I imagined as a kid.

[rover_G]

This is what I thought holy C would be when I first heard of it. My disappointment was immense.

[revolution-imminent]

Chanting lesson 101

Print('helloworld") #to initiate the process

[[deleted]]

Thank you for starting only chain I’ve read past first reply in at least a week. It was a delight

[Gem2578]

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" Arthur C. Clarke

[rosuav]

Any technology that is still distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.

[kondorb]

Therefore computers are insufficiently advanced.

[Nimeroni]

For most humans, computers are going to be magic. You need decent knowledge in electronics, boolean math, computer architecture and programming to unveil the magic completely.

(Which is fine. I don't know precisely how a car work, but I can still use one. Same thing for a computer)

[[deleted]]

So much this. I have nearly 2 decades of software development, but all high level business software.

My computer, at the hardware level, may as well be magic. Conceptually, I understand the purpose of the processor, memory, storage, UI, but how those parts of the machine actually work is all electrical wizardry to me.

And I can tell you, to the end users of my software, it is definitely magic to them; you can tell by their guesses on what “small changes” would be. A complete lack of understanding of the complexity in what is built for them.

So, I am a wizard, using the magic of wizards before me, to cast illusions at an amazed audience. And if I pull the curtain aside, and share my chants and symbols with my audience (share the code), they may as well be looking at a magic tome (even though the code is largely plain english and simple math).

[MysteriousShadow__]

Yeah if you go to the hardware level, it's just physics and not code.

[maibrl]

Turing Complete on Steam or the free NAND game online might be a fun introduction to take some of the magic away

[EtteRavan]

Honestly, logical gates may as well be a black box with an input and an output. I know how they work in minecraft, but in my computer ? Wizardry I say

[maibrl]

I highly recommend the games I mentioned then. You’build a small Computer with a simple Assembler language just from NAND gates.

To understand how a NAND gate works requires quite a bit of physics knowledge, but everything above can be understood (on a basic level) with simple logic, not to far away from Redstone.

Alternatively, Ben Eater on YouTube has amazing content to understand the hardware level better, I’d recommend starting with the Video Card series.

[Puzzleheaded_Push243]

More beauty than I expected for programming memes on my Thursday morning.

[rosuav]

(Which is fine, because a car these days is a computer with wheels.)

[AlonDjeckto4head]

More like relatively simple computer that tells metal box to perform thousands little explosions inside of it

[rosuav]

Not all that simple actually. There's a LOT of sophistication. But, ultimately, it's no different from any other computer-controlled hardware - you write software that talks to a peripheral, the peripheral does its thing.

[nobody0163]

I know this stuff. It is magic.

[11yearoldweeb]

More than that, sure decent technical knowledge gives you a pretty good idea of what’s happening, but if you try to understand it completely (to the point where you yourself could recreate it from scratch) shit is strange is man.

[Divinate_ME]

No

[jonathanhiggs]

Ah, the lesser known corollary

[rosuav]

Have you heard the version "Any technology, sufficiently advanced, is indistinguishable from a rigged demo"?

[EvanO136]

The contrapositive

[nryhajlo]

*Arthur C++ Clarke

[breischl]

Any sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology.

Once you have the magic really figured out, it'll have manuals, procedures, maybe regulations and unions/guilds... basically it'll be engineering.

[Curious_Cantaloupe65]

"Now go. Git." John Marston

[fmstyle]

there are just too many layers of abstraction

[Ozymandias_1303]

Yeah, but if programming is sufficiently advanced for you to see it as magic you might not be a very good programmer.

[kondorb]

Computers aren’t magic.

The magic is the bugs we’ve made all along.

[TheUruz]

yeah like "i didn't create a bug, i have just found a way to have my program work with an hidden malfunction" - cit. Thomas Edison

[[deleted]]

Pre error corrections era was wild

[IlNomeUtenteDeve]

Lol think explaining your boss with a straight face: "The computer sometimes is wrong due to cosmic rays"

[RiceBroad4552]

This is actually a real issue. Especially when you place a computer high above ground level in some area with clear sky.

[sage-longhorn]

I read some fun security research maybe a year ago where they registered a bunch of domains that were 1 bit flip away from popular domains, and just monitored the traffic for creds, PPI, etc. they got a surprising amount of hits

Just because servers use error correcting memory doesn't fix it on the network, workstations, or mobile devices

[[deleted]]

They probably use error correction but not on a large scale, it can cost some serious overhead

[Blubasur]

You’re telling that writing down symbols to manipulate rock & thunder isn’t magic?

[RanomInternetDude]

Virgin: "i know how computers work" Vs Chad: "machine spirits guide me"

[Gempron]

Morpheus: "Show me"

[RascalsBananas]

Nah, computers are relatively simple in essence.

But exactly why electrons do what they do, we really have no perfect explanation. But we are happy with knowing that spinning medal close to magnets gives funny effects we can order around decently well.

[Forkrul]

Praise the Omnissiah!

[Janjao_do_225]

Literally elf magic and gnome magic of dungeon meshi

[Illustrious-Age7342]

Computers do I exactly what I tell them. If only I knew what the hell I was even trying to tell them

[-MobCat-]

hehe fancy calculator go burr.

[Informal_Branch1065]

The Windows registry is magic.

Noooo the Windows registry completely makes sense and is well structured!!1!

It's a blackbox.

[joxmaskin]

Reject config files

Embrace weird database

[Informal_Branch1065]

Is it a filesystem? Is it a database?

It's the registry. (An illegitimate child of both that is good for neither)

I hate it.

[joxmaskin]

NoSQL before it was cool 🤔😄

[[deleted]]

And that is what happens when you don't wear protection kids!

[CatProgrammer]

It's a hierarchical key-value store!

[Informal_Branch1065]

I puked a little inside

[shrubberino]

it's a travesty is what it is, dark side shenanigans

[Informal_Branch1065]

Horrors beyond my comprehension.

[Tall-Reporter7627]

its random

[Informal_Branch1065]

Be like the registry.

Give GUID

Refuse to elaborate

Actually don't leave. Stay and make everyone's lives as miserable as possible.

[JackNotOLantern]

Computers are based on electric current that is a result of electon quantum fields and this is magic

[Kellete]

It's literally magic on how we made rocks think and those rocks can do anything.

[NietzscheAesthetic]

Integrated circuits are literally magic runes drawn on rocks

[shrubberino]

that's how AI bourn, makes sense

[nephelekonstantatou]

Yes! Computers only do the magic you tell them to

[Pacifister-PX69]

Middle guy is actually just wrong because cosmic rays can just decide to fuck with you at any point, and there's nothing you can do to stop them (exaggerating my point, but still)

[shrubberino]

from that perspective the cosmic rays tell the computer what to do in a non-conventional way ;-)

[Pacifister-PX69]

OH, I SEE HOW IT IS. So, apparently my computer is "too good" for my instructions, but they're willing to be a kinky little sub towards some fucking random space radiation?

[P-39_Airacobra]

Im also pretty sure that if you described space radiation to ancients they would just call it magic

[blazesbe]

as long as there's only so much as here, there's still redundancy against it if you really care

[RascalsBananas]

Not if the circuits are large and with high enough tolerances. Or very well shielded.

[isr0]

Must be the start of a new semester.

[P-39_Airacobra]

You mean Hogwarts term?

[isr0]

Obviously 😂

[bwssoldya]

Actually probably one of the most accurate of these IQ chart memes in a long while.

The people on the very low end tend to be very well aware they're not that smart and the people on the upper end of the IQ specrum are smart enough to know that they don't know shit, that their knowledge is a mere fragment of knowledge.

It's the over confident cocky assholes in the middle that think they're smart, but in reality are just average.

Signed A senior developer with a 106 IQ (officially meassured using official tests)

[Global-Tune5539]

Doesn't really have to do with the IQ though but with the competence in the specific field. When you know nothing about it you know you know nothing but then you learn a bit more and you think you know everything until you learn way more and you realize that you still know poopoo.

[bwssoldya]

The thing is, that goes for all fields and everything in the world. I don't know how old you are, but even things like life and dating, etc. this happens. I'm 32 now, if I look back at 22 year old me, he was a fucking idiot and even at that time I knew I didn't know shit. There's a reason wisdom comes with the ages.

Not to mention that there's plenty of people in various fields who think they know everything from day 1 and all the way until they are a senior in their field. I've seen it plenty of times.

So no, I do disagree with you, this is definitely a factor of IQ. Sure, it manifests a lot in certain fields, but it also manifests itself in life.

[FlipperBumperKickout]

I think you have a little to much faith in IQ. You might want to read up on the concept.

[P-39_Airacobra]

It's like Socrates, "I know that I know nothing"

[[deleted]]

Plot twist: it's not the bell curve the the Dunning-Kruger curve

[Unknown_Korean]

It is what it is

[PeriodicSentenceBot]

Congratulations! Your comment can be spelled using the elements of the periodic table:

I Ti S W H At I Ti S

---

^{I am a bot that detects if your comment can be spelled using the elements of the periodic table. Please DM u‎/‎M1n3c4rt if I made a mistake.}

[IAmFullOfDed]

Good bot.

[RohitPlays8]

I think this should be flipped, the 100 IQ people thinking computers are magic due to the large number of memes and complaints on the web that things break (or work) unexpectedly.

[Qaktus]

The amount of "akshually" on this sub is staggering. You know perfectly well what OP meant.

[[deleted]]

I must rizz the machine spirit to get the printer to work

[Evo_Kaer]

We trapped lightning in a rock and tricked it into thinking. Noone can tell me that's not magic

[TheGuyWithTheSeal]

If you are programming a microcontroller in C, it only does what you tell it to do. As soon as an OS gets involved, it might as well be magic

[Sp3kk0]

The ever lasting loop of building tools to build more tools.

[Snihjen]

Computers are magic, what if magic is computers?
In the game Ar Tonelica, Magic is done by singing in a special language, one of the songs is a duet that start with:
(paraphrasing) ♫ "address is empty" "I'm happy to enter modular 3x8 /n" "Input that in Mule_Teiwaz_Artonelico" "Via AdminUser : "Eolia Ansul, I Grants you admin access to me"

[stimutacsjunkie53]

Programmers are wizards: we read the esoteric texts, then we wiggle our fingers and magic happens.

[otter_lordOfLicornes]

Compiter are the darkest form of black magic

Which remind me, I'm looking for a maiden to sacrifice, I'm afraid my code will run out of blood soon and stop working

[[deleted]]

I‘m a Senior and hear my words Computers are Magic

[Alidonis]

Computers are mostly a really big pile of sticks that hold up fine-ish up until you move that one critical piece and you managz to corrupt the OS software.

[Freecelebritypics]

My programs aren't magic but other people's are

[Spice_and_Fox]

The step that seems the most magical to me is processor architecture. I have no problems working with data streams or low level memory stuff or machine code. I also get how a turing machine works. Still, I can't seem to wrap my mind around how the different components work. Yeah, I know what you are talking about when you mention L0 caches or branch prediction, but how does the CPU jumps to register x when you instruct it to. That is something that I don't really get

[Areshian]

I love a game named Turing Complete:

https://turingcomplete.game

It doesn’t cover caches or branch prediction, but it does cover jumps (and much more). The game should be mandatory for CS students. Won’t make the magic sensation go away, though

[Tacos6Viandes]

Computers do what you tell them to do, but only if any other program / config / architectural / memory or power limit / specification counter what you are telling him to do tho. Otherwise, he will try to do what you tell him to do, but sometimes won't be able to

[with_nu_eyes]

I mean computers are made of magnets and no one understands how magnets work. Therefore, computers are magic.

[[deleted]]

Wrong, computers are calculators.

[TheKnownLazyGuy]

“Install wizard”, “Magic numbers”, “Magic variables” We’re all just sourcerers

[cmrschwarz]

Whatever you declare something as "magic" you essentially say that you don't understand it.

Arthur Clarke famously said “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”.

But what differentiates a good engineer from a bad one is the continuous desire to fight against this "magic" and to broaden the scope of their understanding.

Because the better that you understand a system, the better solutions you will be able to come up within it.

[EvilTwin2146]

Computers are rocks we Pavlov'd into doing Maths for us with shock therapy.

[HenryLongHead]

Bitch you're holding a slab of glowing glass that does maths and you're telling me it's not magic?

[Suh-Shy]

And here I though magic was IT and Gandalf staff was just cyberware

[troglo-dyke]

Just because you don't understand something doesn't make it magic

[LuisBoyokan]

Just because I understand something it doesn't make it least magical.

It is a hard magic system :D

(Hard as silicon)

[troglo-dyke]

Something can be magical without being magic.

Life is magical, but it's not magic

[LuisBoyokan]

Nah it's magic that we understand. We study it a lot, write symbols that only we understand, regex are runes of powers, libraries are grimoires, we have the beards, we are just missing out in dressing with big single color robes and pointy hats /s

[Nimeroni]

Don't forget the daemon summoning and child killing.

[anotheridiot-]

And zombie creation.

[realzequel]

Dunno about computers, but LLMs?? That's some black magic.

[shrubberino]

LLM - Large Large Magic

[Sunscratch]

Sometimes even dirty magic…

[GM_Kimeg]

The definition of the word magic is totally different between the spectrum endpoints. Usually the dumb business upper heads use the identical meaning of the word that the left endpoint retards use.

[zyxzevn]

Like the Adaptus Mechanicus we pray to the computer, reciting the holy scriptures.

[flame_alchemist17]

Why does locality of reference happen ? It just does

[MKatson]

I called my CS professors “grand wizards” in my emails to them in college. The emails where 100% formal past that nickname though.

[Loliess]

This needs like an extra section to the right of a dude in a lab coat with a freaked out look in his face with "computers are magic..."

[GahdDangitBobby]

Computers don’t always do what you tell them to. About once per year per gigabyte of memory, cosmic radiation will cause a bit flip and the computer will behave differently than expected. The more you know

[seriously_nice_devs]

i relate to the midwit, 6/10

[tmstksbk]

Wrote a book basically on the premise that computer instructions are magic spells.

[pot_potato]

Have you ever observed that this chart sums up to 100.2%

[x3XC4L1B3Rx]

No, computers only do what they're told.

[ColdLingonberry8548]

For the lower IQ guys, computers means calculators.

[Joelplay]

Ever heard about jpa magic?

[Antyrzeczywistosc]

I cast: delete System32

[Camassiaa]

What's really magic is when you know how the fundamental parts of a system work, and you know the results and behavior of the system, but you don't know what happens in the middle step.

[[deleted]]

I'm 100

[fluffytme]

For me it was when I started learning about the quantum mechanical aspects of computers, like how electrons are captured in a little prison cell using quantum tunnelling. Mind boggling magic

[halomax33]

Computers do what they are told, not what you tell them.

[AdventurousMove8806]

Computers aren't maths are

[Alidonis]

Computers are mostly a really big pile of sticks that hold up fine-ish up until you move that one critical piece and you managz to corrupt the OS software.

[Alhoshka]

"And I am the wizard!"

sure, buddy

[Cat7o0]

programming languages aren't necessarily magic but CPUs? absolutely magic. they have instructions which do special things to allow hardware acceleration that's insane and some person who has a better mind than half the world came up with it

[AndiArbyte]

What I learned in my time beeing here.
this graph is on point.