[net.sf-lovers] Clarke's Laws

ntt@dciem.UUCP (Mark Brader) (06/12/84)

Since a misquotation of Clarke's (First) Law was posted to sf-lovers a
week or so ago, and nobody has put in a correction, I thought I would.
The previous poster referred to a "highly placed" scientist, which isn't it.

While I'm at it, I include his other Laws and his comments about them.
The rest of this message is excerpted from "Profiles of the Future" by
Arthur C. Clarke, 1973 revised edition.


	Too great a burden of knowledge can clog the wheels of
	imagination; I have tried to embody this fact of observation
	in Clarke's Law, which may be formulated as follows:

		When a distinguished but elderly scientist
		states that something is possible, he is almost
		certainly right.  When he states that something
		is impossible, he is very probably wrong.

	Perhaps the adjective "elderly" requires definition.  In physics,
	mathematics, and astronautics it means over thirty; in the
	other disciplines, senile decay is sometimes postponed to
	the forties.  There are, of course, glorious exceptions...

[Some pages later]

	...[T]he only way of discovering the limits of the possible
	is to venture a little past them into the impossible.*

[Footnote]
	*The French edition [of the first edition] of this book rather
	surprised me by calling this Clarke's Second Law. ... I accept
	the label, and have also formulated a Third: "Any sufficiently
	advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

	As three laws were good enough for Newton, I have modestly
	decided to stop there.


Posted by Mark Brader

msb@lsuc.UUCP (Mark Brader) (02/09/86)

>>> "A sufficiently high level of technology is indistinguishable from magic."
>>>  Heinlein
>> Clarke!
> Now don't start *that* again!
> Yes, both Heinlein and Clarke are credited with the above statement ...
> The verdict?  Neither admits to being the originator.

Curious.  I've read a lot of both authors, and this is the first I've
seen of anyone but Clarke connected with the aphorism.  But I have no
involvement with organized fandom; perhaps the last quoted poster does.
I'd be interested to see a reference for Heinlein's claim to this.

Here is Clarke's claim, and note that it is a claim of authorship; did
he later retract it?  For good measure I throw in Clarke's other laws,
as they originally appeared.

Reference: "Profiles of the Future", 1972 revised edition.  Page numbers
are for the Popular Library paperback of 1977.

Page 32:

#  Too great a burden of knowledge can clog the wheels of imagination;
#  I have tried to embody this fact of observation in Clarke's Law,
#  which may be formulated as follows:
#
#	When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that
#	something is possible, he is almost certainly right.
#	When he states that something is impossible, he is very
#	probably wrong.
#
#  Perhaps the adjective "elderly" requires definition.  In physics,
#  mathematics, and astronauts it means over thirty; in the other
#  disciplines, senile decay is sometimes postponed to the forties.
#  There are, of course, glorious exceptions; but as every researcher
#  just out of college knows, scientists of over fifty are good for
#  nothing but board meetings, and should at all costs be kept out
#  of the laboratory!

Page 39:

#  The [above] list is deliberately provocative: it includes sheer
#  fantasy as well as serious scientific speculation.  But the only way
#  of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way
#  past them into the impossible[1].  In the chapters that follows, this
#  is exactly what I hope to do...

Footnote:

#  [1] The French edition of this book rather surprised me by calling
#  this Clarke's Second Law.  (See page 25 [sic] for the First, which
#  is now rather well-known.)  I accept the label, and have also
#  formulated a Third: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is
#  indistinguishable from magic."
#
#  As three laws were good enough for Newton, I have modestly decided
#  to stop there.

Mark Brader

peter@baylor.UUCP (Peter da Silva) (02/22/86)

> >>> "A sufficiently high level of technology is indistinguishable from magic."

"A sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology"
-- 
-- Peter da Silva
-- UUCP: ...!shell!{baylor,graffiti}!peter; MCI: PDASILVA; CIS: 70216,1076