…whether computers are actually literally magical. As in, there’s a set of spells that activate them, only they don’t tell you what the spells are, so you have to kind of guess and bang on the keys until the magic thinky box decides to relent and let you do what you want. Which I wouldn’t mind, if only I could find out what kind of rum the computer imps like. Or scotch. Or tequila. Whatever it is, dudes, I’d get you a bottle, no worries.
Seriously. I’m afraid to move until this file transfer is over*. What if my personal bioelectric field is acting as the critical component here? I just don’t know. I JUST DON’T KNOW.
Moe Lane
*The iPod alternative adventure was going swimmingly up until the moment where my youngest decided to either lose, or eat, the MicroSD chip with all my songs on it. Back to the iPod… which is working fine. Up to the point where it decided it didn’t like any of my cords. But, of course, remote syncing via WiFi didn’t work… UNTIL IT SUDDENLY DID, AND NOBODY CAN TELL ME WHY.
You know about Clarke’s third law, right? (Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.) Also the corollary (any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced).
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Also, magic smoke.
I prefer Agatha’s Law. 🙂
“Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from SCIENCE!”
That skit and the Coffee Engine sequence are my favorites …
Beat me to the magic smoke.
A friend of mine has long had the theory that computers run on obscenities. If you don’t swear at them, they get slower and slower until they stop.
Mortal terror helps them as well. At one job, I was at the point that the other computers would rat out the bad one when they saw me approach with a frown on my face and a screwdriver in my hand.
Computers are all magic, magic powered by the surplus white smoke the vatican uses to signal a new pope.
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That’s why, when the white smoke comes out of the computer, it stops working ..
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You may have noticed that advances in computers line up with periods where we’ve had the same pope for long periods, right?
The longer there’s no need for the magic smoke in Vatican City, the more wizards can figure out better computers.. and how to get the same result with less and less smoke per computer ..
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Mew
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p.s. there’s probably a half-baked halfway decent steampunk (or .. as mentioned elsewhere .. atomic-ranch-steampunk) story in here somewhere ..
electrical engineers know how to manipulate magic smoke directly. We computer scientists deal with second-order effects.
I’m a ‘tech’ guy, but I once had a computer that *required* a ‘slap up side the head’ each morning to get it to turn on…probably just a loose wire eh?
Also, IT folks will tell you that each piece of electronic equipment incorporates a Critical Need Detection Circuit that will cause it to go Tango Uniform.