The Age of the Magician

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
Arthur C. Clarke.

We live in the Age of the Magician. We crossed into this age at some point in the latter part of the 20th Century. Perhaps it was the day Bill Gates became the richest man in the world. Or perhaps it was earlier, when the first MacIntosh rolled off the assembly line. Or as late as 1995, with Netscape's IPO or the introduction of Java. But the Magician energy from the Collective Unconscious is in the ascendancy now and a new age is upon us: The Age of the Magician.
There has been much discussion regarding the Information Age. We are, no doubt, in the midst of major shifts in world civilization: post-Industrial Age, Information Age, New Economy, New World Order.....all these terms and more have been in vogue when it comes to describing the changes we see taking place in our world. And all refer to the advent of information itself as the primary agent of change. But it's not the information that's causing these changes. It's not simply the fact that information in the world is doubling every twelve months. It is the use of, the application of information that is bringing about these changes, not simply the information itself. And it is the application of information that is the domain of the Magician.
Gillette and Moore illuminate the venerated psychologist C.J. Jung's work in their book "King, Warrior, Magician, Lover," discussing the psychology of the mature masculine archetypes insofar as such energies manifest themselves in personal psyches. In the healthy mature human being (not exclusive men), these energies lead to integrated personalities which offer nurturing, devoted, commuity-serving parents, citizens and leaders; energies to be embraced and celebrated. But, according to the authors, the absence of ritual rites of passage in modern cultures (especially for young men) has yielded an immature society incapable of producing mature masculine energies or role models. Robert Bly's "the Sibling Society" draws a similar conclusion.
Gillette and Moore argue that when the archetypal energies are not encouraged to mature they will manifest themselves in individuals (and hence in society) in immature and predictable ways. In the case of the Magician, the bi-polar shadow of the archetype they call the Trickster (the detached manipulator) and the Dummy (the denying "innocent" one); the active and passive poles of the inevitable energy that originate in the collective unconscious of the human species.
The Trickster is the grown-up version of the Know-it-All; that kid in class who always had his hand up, not to provide information but to demonstrate his superiority to others.
The Trickster is the manipulator, using information to control others. The Dummy does the same thing, but passively; denying or pretending to not understand, using information to thwart others, again a form of control.
If we understand that the manipulation of information is the domain of the Magician energy, and accept that as a society, those energies are suffering from arrested development, arguably due to the absence of ubiquitous rites of passage, then it follows that in this Information Age, this Age of the Magician, we should see bountiful examples of the Magician energy and its shadow forms manifest themselves in this new world.
Jon Katz, Linux evangelist and contributor to slashdot.org, wrote a review about Bill's Gates' new book recently. Regarding the Redmond CEO's testimony during the federal government antitrust trial against Micro$oft, Katz wrote, "When Gates appeared as a witness in the Microsoft trial he was shockingly arrogant, and - to put it as generously as possible - forgetful." Recall Gates sitting on the witness stand, alternatively smug and just plain stupid? Active and passive - the bipolar shadow of the Magician.
On March 1, 1999, I awoke in Singapore to read on the front page of The Straits Times and article entitled, "Hackers Seize Military Satellite." Sending blackmail threats to the British government, "hackers" changed the course of one of her majesties communications satellites and were demanding money in exchange for the return of control; the Trickster thumbing his nose at the Warrior.
We live in the Age of the Magician. On a societal level, the energies that now move us and shape us come from a primary source we haven't seen for a long time, if ever. We've know the energy of the King - the growth of great religions, great empires, great civilizations. We've shaped the atlas with the energy of the Warrior, battling on behalf of the King, land, borders, national security, nations themselves. We've seen these energies and followed their prompting, often the immature shadows of those energies leading the way. But at some point, not that long ago, there was a subtle but certain shift. And we now live in the Age of the Magician. Know then, that the rules have changed.