The Dresden Files > DF Spoilers
Love Potion, Huge Violation of 3rd Law?
Arjan:
--- Quote from: Mr. Death on August 06, 2018, 12:31:37 AM ---
From what I recall, what Molly did in SF was under the table, too -- a violation that Luccio ordered and allowed -- but didn't report.
--- End quote ---
The same Lucio who could not use magic to kill LaFortier even as a completely enthralled half sleeping bomb? The captain of the wardens? I think that is unlikely.
--- Quote ---And again -- just because the Council allowed it doesn't mean it doesn't break the laws.
--- End quote ---
These are the council's laws. If they explicitly allow it then it is allowed. Don't confuse the effects of black magic on the wizard interpreted as some sort of natural law of how black magic works with the actual laws which are just a human construct created and maintained by humans.
--- Quote ---Harry's mentioned "grey magic" before,
--- End quote ---
As something that is still allowed but has a certain smell. Unless Morgan handled it because he can be anal about it.
--- Quote ---and we've also had Luccio in a short story considering killing a bunch of warlocks with a fire spell.
--- End quote ---
That was temptation. And she did not do it.
--- Quote ---In Ghost Story, Harry explicitly says the Council, in response to what I presume are the events of Turn Coat, changed how it does things in regard to mind magic:
--- End quote ---
They changed their practices, they did not change the laws. They were just prepared to get closer to the line which brings some risks they were not prepared to face earlier. But they did not change the laws. It is not that easy to declare that something is now allowed that always got your head chopped of. Besides older wizards knew how to do it so they practiced before.
--- Quote ---That's fair. But we also have Harry considering it a violation:
--- End quote ---
And Molly was under the doom. Harry can be as bad ass Morgan when he has reason to and he has. He learned that from his grandfather. When we have Lucio's actions directly contradicting it I don't take it for sure anymore.
--- Quote ---That's like saying, "Why use the word stabbing at all? That only makes sense if there's a non-stabbing way to stick a knife in someone."
--- End quote ---
It is written law, words are important and we must assume that they are carefully chosen. If every entering was bad the law would have been worded differently. All other things you can invade you can also enter peacefully if invited.
--- Quote ---Just because you use a word for something doesn't mean there has to be an opposite.
--- End quote ---
Invading is entering without invitation usually with hostile intent. This is not the opposite of entering but just a word with a narrower meaning. If all entering was forbidden they should have chosen a word with a wider meaning.
--- Quote ---I don't think Bob went in Butters' mind, but in his body, like he rode along with Mister.
And Lasciel was in Harry's soul -- part of it, even -- not his mind. They might be linked, and they might be related, but they're distinct things.
--- End quote ---
And we make a sharp distinction in the forums but in practice in the books these words are loosely used, these things are interwoven with each other. Mab just uses one word for all of them together, your essence.
It is your essence that corpstaker casts out and replaces though Lucio remarks she left some traces of the original occupant. It is Harry's essence that enters Molly's mind and spirit in ghost story while she battles with corpstaker.
Who apparently needed an invitation from Mortimer to take over, it matters.
--- Quote ---Molly has a talent for mind magic; Mortimer has a talent for spirit and soul magic; they're treated as different specialties, with different types of spells that affect people in different ways.
That's not what empathy is. Empathy is being able to understand how another's feeling, i.e., seeing signs in their behavior, or in what they tell others; in Dresden, it's the ability to feel what others are radiating out or otherwise broadcasting. Harry refers feeling emotions "coming off" of people. So does Molly. To my knowledge, neither of them refer to empathy or sensing emotions as them looking into someone.
--- End quote ---
Blaze:
Please refrain from "you" statements. Posters should not assume intent behind posts.
If you can not discourse courteously with one another, please simply do not comment upon each other's theories.
This is a new site, but they have chosen to import the old precepts. By participating here you have agreed to abide by the precepts.
Paviel:
"Invasion" implies lack of consent.
A consensual entry into someone's mind thus is not considered an invasion.
Mr. Death:
--- Quote from: Arjan on August 06, 2018, 09:12:14 AM ---The same Lucio who could not use magic to kill LaFortier even as a completely enthralled half sleeping bomb? The captain of the wardens? I think that is unlikely.
--- End quote ---
And yet, apparently, it happened. Even if, for the sake of argument, I accept the position that going into someone's mind with consent is OK, Molly went into Harry's mind without Harry's consent, and Luccio did not have the right to consent for him.
--- Quote ---These are the council's laws. If they explicitly allow it then it is allowed. Don't confuse the effects of black magic on the wizard interpreted as some sort of natural law of how black magic works with the actual laws which are just a human construct created and maintained by humans.
--- End quote ---
The Council's laws are directly based on the cosmic laws, and are deliberately and explicitly meant to cover the same thing.
That the Council allows certain violations of the Cosmic laws doesn't change that they are, still, violations of the cosmic laws.
--- Quote ---That was temptation. And she did not do it.
--- End quote ---
The story does not present it as a "temptation," but just as her calmly and rationally going over her options. And the reasons she gives for not doing it are that people might see, and that the fire could kill civilians. During her calm, rational reasoning, the whole topic of, "This would break the laws of magic" is simply not brought up.
--- Quote ---They changed their practices, they did not change the laws. They were just prepared to get closer to the line which brings some risks they were not prepared to face earlier. But they did not change the laws. It is not that easy to declare that something is now allowed that always got your head chopped of. Besides older wizards knew how to do it so they practiced before.
--- End quote ---
Apparently it is that easy, because that's what Harry describes: First, the White Council "hated" mind magic and thus didn't even practice defense against it because doing so involved breaking the laws; then, after seeing how easily their meager defenses could be overcome (Warden Luccio, "old hand" that she was, was both easily taken out by Corpsetaker and then even Morgan and the Senior Council were subverted), they deliberately changed their practices so that a thing that could get your head cut off (using mind magic) was now allowed.
--- Quote ---And Molly was under the doom. Harry can be as bad ass Morgan when he has reason to and he has. He learned that from his grandfather. When we have Lucio's actions directly contradicting it I don't take it for sure anymore.
--- End quote ---
Harry does not qualify his statement that it was only a violation because she's under the Doom. He only says, "You broke a law of magic, willingly." Luccio doesn't directly contradict that Molly broke a law, and in the book, Molly only gets away with it because Morgan doesn't report her; he admits as much.
--- Quote ---It is written law, words are important and we must assume that they are carefully chosen. If every entering was bad the law would have been worded differently. All other things you can invade you can also enter peacefully if invited.
--- End quote ---
The laws are written poetically as much as, if not more than, legally. Take the Sixth Law's admonition that one not "swim against the currents of time." Does that you could, say, "walk" against the current (on the riverbank, perhaps), and not violate it? Or fly over it? Perhaps going against the current in a "boat" is fine?
I'm positing that it's not that it's saying "invasion are bad, other things are fine," it's declaring that because it's bad, it's by definition an invasion.
Harry doesn't say, "You can only look if you have consent." He says, "You don't get to know."
--- Quote ---Invading is entering without invitation usually with hostile intent. This is not the opposite of entering but just a word with a narrower meaning. If all entering was forbidden they should have chosen a word with a wider meaning.
--- End quote ---
Again, the laws are written as much poetically. Calling it an invasion is to emphasize how wrong it is -- I do not think it's there to leave argument wiggle-room about consent, because if we know anything about how the Council enforces their laws, they hate things like arguments and wiggle room.
--- Quote ---And we make a sharp distinction in the forums but in practice in the books these words are loosely used, these things are interwoven with each other. Mab just uses one word for all of them together, your essence.
It is your essence that corpstaker casts out and replaces though Lucio remarks she left some traces of the original occupant. It is Harry's essence that enters Molly's mind and spirit in ghost story while she battles with corpstaker.
Who apparently needed an invitation from Mortimer to take over, it matters.
--- End quote ---
Even so, they are distinct -- Molly's psychomancy doesn't let her do anything with spirits or souls, and Morty's ectomancy doesn't let him do anything to minds.
Corpsetaker needing an invitation from Morty had more to do with how much power she had; it certainly wasn't out of any concern for Morty's well-being or courtesy. She didn't need or care about Butters or Molly's consent, after all.
Arjan:
--- Quote from: Mr. Death on August 06, 2018, 02:36:30 PM ---And yet, apparently, it happened. Even if, for the sake of argument, I accept the position that going into someone's mind with consent is OK, Molly went into Harry's mind without Harry's consent, and Luccio did not have the right to consent for him.
--- End quote ---
Or looking for tampering is a grey area that is OK according to the captain of the wardens and Morgan is a zealot and Harry is over concerned because Molly is a warlock and he is tutored by Ebenezer who wanted to instill the fear for black magic into him for obvious reasons.
--- Quote ---The Council's laws are directly based on the cosmic laws, and are deliberately and explicitly meant to cover the same thing.
--- End quote ---
Lucio was pretty clear about it. The laws are there to regulate the use of wizard power and nothing else. Black magic may have been one of the reasons for doing so but to confuse the cosmic laws invented on this forum with the real laws maintained by the council is wrong.
They are two different things and people can easily switch between them in one sentence and confuse everything.
--- Quote ---That the Council allows certain violations of the Cosmic laws doesn't change that they are, still, violations of the cosmic laws.
--- End quote ---
The cosmic laws are not codified, the council laws are. For the council laws invitation makes a huge difference and we know that for a lot of things in the dresdenverse invitation makes a difference so if you have an invitation it is OK according to the laws of magic.
Is it OK according to these "cosmic laws"? Who knows. Is there a double blind experiment with soul blackness meters measured before and after with a lot of wizards?
Because otherwise we can only say something about the laws of magic and not about those "cosmic laws". And for all we know invitation seems to matter for the soul blackness as well. seems logical to me because an invitation means no violation of free will and so on.
--- Quote ---The story does not present it as a "temptation," but just as her calmly and rationally going over her options. And the reasons she gives for not doing it are that people might see, and that the fire could kill civilians. During her calm, rational reasoning, the whole topic of, "This would break the laws of magic" is simply not brought up.
Apparently it is that easy, because that's what Harry describes: First, the White Council "hated" mind magic and thus didn't even practice defense against it because doing so involved breaking the laws; then, after seeing how easily their meager defenses could be overcome (Warden Luccio, "old hand" that she was, was both easily taken out by Corpsetaker and then even Morgan and the Senior Council were subverted), they deliberately changed their practices so that a thing that could get your head cut off (using mind magic) was now allowed.
--- End quote ---
It is nowhere said that they changed the laws. A far simpler explanation involving less earth shattering is that they simply adapted their practices.
--- Quote ---Harry does not qualify his statement that it was only a violation because she's under the Doom. He only says, "You broke a law of magic, willingly." Luccio doesn't directly contradict that Molly broke a law, and in the book, Molly only gets away with it because Morgan doesn't report her; he admits as much.
The laws are written poetically as much as, if not more than, legally. Take the Sixth Law's admonition that one not "swim against the currents of time." Does that you could, say, "walk" against the current (on the riverbank, perhaps), and not violate it? Or fly over it? Perhaps going against the current in a "boat" is fine?
I'm positing that it's not that it's saying "invasion are bad, other things are fine," it's declaring that because it's bad, it's by definition an invasion.
--- End quote ---
And why is it bad? It can be needed to heal people and is used that way by the senior council. There is no case in the books of someone invited in someones mind who got a blacker soul or was beheaded by the wardens. The whole idea that entering someones mind is always wrong is based on an interpretation of the law that is not supported by the text and contradicts the words used.
--- Quote ---Harry doesn't say, "You can only look if you have consent." He says, "You don't get to know."
--- End quote ---
Harry does not want to encourage Molly seeking in the grey area's. He is trying to protect her.
--- Quote ---Again, the laws are written as much poetically. Calling it an invasion is to emphasize how wrong it is -- I do not think it's there to leave argument wiggle-room about consent, because if we know anything about how the Council enforces their laws, they hate things like arguments and wiggle room.
--- End quote ---
They do like wiggle room, just not for everyone.
And nobody changed the wording of the laws so nobody changed the laws. If it is allowed now it was allowed in the past.
--- Quote ---Even so, they are distinct -- Molly's psychomancy doesn't let her do anything with spirits or souls, and Morty's ectomancy doesn't let him do anything to minds.
--- End quote ---
Skin game. Molly was needed to do the spirits delivery. She talked with IdHarry. She knows how to handle spirits. She even used the wooden skull to give bonnie a home.
The distinction between these things is fuzzy.
--- Quote ---Corpsetaker needing an invitation from Morty had more to do with how much power she had; it certainly wasn't out of any concern for Morty's well-being or courtesy. She didn't need or care about Butters or Molly's consent, after all.
--- End quote ---
Which is exactly the point. You need extra power if you do not have an invitation. Because it is different if you do not have an invitation.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version