Is Equestrian Magic Physicsless? · 2:33am Mar 25th, 2017
I am going to attempt to find out how the laws of physics apply to Equestrian magic (as the title implies). This is my analysis based on a purely scientific standpoint and what is specifically shown in MLP (or rather, the images I found).
Now, before we begin, we need to define a few things. One is what we mean by “physicsless.” Yes, that’s a term. No, it’s not spelled right. No, I don’t care. The second is the laws of physics and quantum mechanics in Equestria and here. The third and final thing is what we mean by “magic.”
This is what we mean by “physicsless:”
No physics; i.e. not applying to physics or having physics not applied to it.
For this to actually go anywhere, I will assume the laws of physics in Equestria are similar if not the same as in here, following what we know here on Earth and using it as the base.
What I mean by “magic” is Unicorn magic (i.e. Rarity’s spells). For my purposes I will ignore Pegasus flight, Pinkie Sense, and any other thing that a Unicorn can’t learn to do.
With that out of the way… let’s get started.
Magic in Equestria is visibly seen as some kind of energy. It can be used to do almost anything from levitation to combat. Twilight used combat spells in her duel with Starlight, allowing us to see what those look like: lasers. Also, levitation is seen as a bubble of the user’s magic color around the object being lifted. The user’s horn glows when he or she casts a spell. Teleportation is accompanied by a noise and flash of light. Let’s look at these one at a time, saving levitation for last since it gets kinda weird.
Combat Spells:
Twilight’s offensive spells are like lasers in the sense that they go in a straight line, as seen here:
It also comes out of her horn and expands in a small degree, like the spell is cast in a small arc. That alone isn’t enough to tell us anything; however, my limited understanding of chemistry and quantum theory tell me that she’s actually shooting something at the Changeling. Magic is visible as an energy in this shot, which is good enough for me to talk.
Storytime!
If you look at light from scientist James Maxwell’s perspective, you can see that light is a wavelength; in fact, we’ve measured it multiple times. But Albert Einstein tells us that light is a photon, a particle of matter, and that it has weight in his theory on photoelectric effect (yes, it’s a thing). Yet another scientist, Louis de Broglie, combined those two to create his theory on the dual nature of light, which is the currently accepted theory.
We can use this to say that energy and matter are one in the same, as light can be both, and that the magical energy being shot at the Changeling is in fact matter and has mass, weight, etc.
But wait!
If Twilight’s magic has mass, then she’s lugging around a possible several million pounds of magic on her average day. This is obviously completely wrong because she doesn’t have trouble walking at all. Therefore, magic has no weight, and therefore no mass because all mass has some kind of weight attached to it.
You science nerds out there are probably screaming at me that weight doesn’t matter because it’s affected by the gravitational pull of the planet, moon, or whatever it might be. You’re absolutely right. However, mass affects both weight and inertia, which helps us out even more. Plus, I’m pretty sure Equestria has gravity.
According to Isaac Newton, an object at rest will stay at rest until an external force acts upon it to change that state. The inertia of the magic Twilight uses is most likely proportional to both the spell she’s casting and the amount of magic she uses at the time. The more she uses, the more is cast, and, depending on her spell, sent out as whatever her intent is. In our case right now, it’s combat and a laser-looking thing.
The inertia is pretty great, considering that the Changeling is knocked back after his momentum carrying him towards Twilight is countered. For her to do that to a full-size Changeling warrior, she needed a fair amount of magic. It certainly didn’t affect our pretty purple Unicorn that much, considering she did it multiple times and still was able to run at full gallop. Because her magic obviously has that effect of having mass and inertia but still not making Twilight work hard to stand up straight, this aspect of magic is probably physicsless.
Teleportation:
Teleportation in MLP typically comes with a sound effect and a bright sphere of light:
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
It affects only the caster and whoever/whatever he or she chooses to bring with him or her. As seen, Nightmare Moon goes right through where Twilight had been. A couple of seconds later, Twilight appears where the stone Elements of Harmony are. This implies that the Twilight was placed in a temporary alternate-dimension reality during that transfer of matter from one place to another. The teleport itself is almost instantaneous; she does get to the other side of the room in a second, which is less than if she simply just ran. Not shorter by a lot, but shorter.
But is teleportation physicsless? Possibly. However, teleporting in itself does not appear to follow the laws of physics as we know them. It probably doesn’t adhere to anything but itself, therefore not strengthening either case. But the flash of light indicates energy. Energy that is expended, and expending energy requires some kind of physics. But since teleportation is really weird, I won’t go into detail and just say that it has its own laws that apply to it alone.
Levitation:
This is the really weird one. Levitation, or telekinesis, is lifting things. An example of such spell that easily comes to mind is Wingardium Leviosa from Harry Potter. But that’s in the wrong universe, so we’ll use this instead:
Both Twilight and Cadence are using their magic to lift the oversized flower. So how does levitation actually work?
The simple answer is much like teleportation: we don’t know. However, we can try to look like we do know and take wild guesses - I mean, make a hypothesis. Just by looking at this picture, we can see that larger objects take more magic to lift them. We also see that this particular spell seems to work like antigravity. But superconductors can lift things with invisible magnetic fields, creating the same effect; however, this isn’t antigravity at all, it’s magnetism.
To see if levitation is antigravity, we must look at it from an interesting perspective: how far does gravity actually affect the object? In order to find out, we find the center of the gravitational pull and use complicated math to locate the edges of its “sphere of influence” (where said gravity is anything but negligible). We can leave the SOI with rockets; it isn’t hard. But rockets go sideways really fast to stay that way. Looking at this image, we can assume that, given enough time and magic, the flower could very well be lifted to beyond Equus’ SOI without going extremely fast. This tells us that levitation is in fact anitgravity.
But then we can move the object being lifted from side to side. This is stranger. All I can really say is that magic is used to pull the object to where the spellcaster wants, like a muscle pulling your arm so you can show your biceps (I’m looking at you, workout ponies). Levitation is hard to explain, but I think I can safely say that the laws of physics do not necessarily apply.
In conclusion, magic is physicsless, but at the same time, the laws of physics do apply to it. It depends on the spell and the amount of magic used to determine what laws apply, if any. It’s hard to explain, but I hope I did a decent job trying.
That second image... grrrr.
Actually if it follows any form of defined physical laws even if they aren't the same as in our universe then it follows the laws of physics just not the same physics as us therefore all magics follows physics. Kind of like how physics would work differently here if the universe had a different shape or a different number of dimensions.
4773099
I was referring to our physics, but yeah. You're right on the front.