Measuring Magic

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The Department of Magical Computing at Arcanorium College presents a new online course for the sixth semester of the 2011–2012 academic year: “Measuring Magic”. June 15 – July 28. Accompanying course: “Elder Gods” instructed by Peter J. Carroll.

Can magic or magical efficacy be measured? If so, how? If not, why not? What would we gain from measuring magic, and could anything be lost by it? Magic is often associated with miracles, so is it necessarily at odds with statistically normal data?

Those are some of the questions we will attempt to answer over the six weeks of this course which has two goals. The first is to map out a general survey of things one ought to consider when setting out to discover or demonstrate facts about magic using quantitative research methods and numeric data. The second goal is to engage a gathering of smart, regularly practicing magicians in an open-ended dialogue about the challenges and rewards of measuring magic.

The material will be presented mostly conceptually such that students will not need to know much mathematics beyond basic arithmetic (although progressing toward mathematical models will be encouraged, and I will have links to resources for those who wish to continue in that direction). Students will have opportunity to schedule time for interacting with a REG-1 random event generator as used by the Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research (PEAR) project for measuring the influence of conscious intention on physical phenomena.

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Some topics we will introduce over the course: measurement; feedback; probability; variability; statistics; logic; scientific experimentation; pseudoscience; cognitive bias; correlation and causation; complexity; measurable models of magic; parapsychology research; random event generation; biometric and psychometric data.

To enroll in the course, you must be a member of Arcanorium College, which is open to anyone 18 years of age or older. Tuition fees are UK£60 for 12 months or UK£20 for 3 months, and we typically do two new online courses every six to eight weeks, all of which are included the cost of tuition. In addition to the courses, members have free access one of the best and most cutting-edge occult-related online forums available today.

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