Image Hackers - New Take on Illusionists

[Pieh]

OK, here's my idea:

There exists a database known as the Collective. It is essentially a place our brains tap into to explain the obvious and supply us with what we can see.

My new take on Illusionists would be like modern-day Hackers. They tap into the Collective and alter things to suit their needs. Much like calling a picture to display using HTML, you could substitute the called image with another by altering the code.

So, a talented Illusionist would be able to replace or delete something in the Collective to alter it's appearance or make it invisible to our eyes or even make something appear that wasn't there before!

Of course, these things can't be permanent. That would be game-breaking. So, instead of the Collective letting these Hackers mess up reality on a whim, it would constantly run scans on it's most active files to ensure they are always correct.

Individuals may have certain "Firewalls" in place to prevent their image from being duplicated.

I can see this turning into a School of Magic similar to modern computers. Except that the Collective exists in some sort of mental realm. More analogies to technology are welcome, as are other expansions of the idea and how to use it. Have fun with this. I will post more ideas as I have them.

[Dragonlordmax]

That's very intriguing.

it would constantly run scans on it's most active files to ensure they are always correct.

This makes me think of some kind of a reality-defining Wikipedia.

But I guess I still want to know how people access it - is the Collective an actual computer network sort of thing, or is it more metaphysical (like magic, I guess).

Perhaps people who hallucinate could have a virus in their system?

[Pieh]

Everyone has basic mental access to the Collective. The Collective is a database of the things that are the same for everyone, or mostly everyone.

 The blind, or the color-blind, may have a messed up connection to the Collective in the visual node, but may have an overload in the hearing or smell nodes. Thus, hearing of smelling things more vividly or from farther away while having less capably, or glitched, sight.

Different areas of the brain rely on different nodes of the Collective to supply them with data. People with hallucinations may have some crossed wires that cause data to show up where it shouldn't. People with a 6th Sense may hear something and accidentally receive visual data with the sound data, being able to see what made the sound.

I like the reality-defining wiki comment, but I have a question. Is this starting to sound too much like an expansion of The Matrix to anyone? I've got a bad feeling about this... Thought and comments are still welcome, thank you.

[manfred]

Not a bad idea... you know, there are philosophical schools, that claim the things of this world are only shadows of the real ideas of things. Coming from that, it is imaginable someone could hack into this 'database' of ideas and partially transpose one image over another - creating exactly your illusion. You could base it on this thought and avoid the Matrix syndrome.


If this were the case, one could do the ultimate trick: to exchange one idea for another, exchange one thing for another. Of course, every mortal is also such a reflection of an idea... and the price would be another exchange, replacing the 'hacker' for something  else, erasing him out of existence. It's better to stick to illusions.