Creo Herbem, creo Terram and so forth have spells to duplicate objects. If a breakthrough allowed a magus to duplicate a mid, but without breaking the limit of the soul, how would the copy which has no soul differ from the original
Look up A&A p.31 The Human Mind. You find e. g.: “The soul provides both reason (ratio) and intellect (intellectus)." That holds for the mind of humans. The minds of faeries are likely different.
So what does that actually mean? If you copy a human mind without reason and intellect (assuming the models are correct) how will it differ from a normal human mind?
Looking at that section of A&A the first thing I notice is that cognition stems from the soul and is responsible for essentially creativity. It sees that both reason and intellect in different ways pertain to the ability to determine information which is not self evident, which could be as much detriment as benefit depending on the individual. Trying to see how this would play out in terms of behavior and possibly learning, however, is another matter.
I’m not sure what the official rule is from the books, if any book explicates it, but a mind without reason and intellect operates on instinct. So I would assume something like that: someone who could perform a task demonstrated to them (but who would lack any ability to think about why the task needs to be done, or how they could improve on the task, etc), could remember things that happen to them (but not speculate on the motivations of the actions, etc), and who would of course react to pain and so on.
To be brief because I'm on my phone. In Aquinas animals have souls, but humans have a special type, the rational soul. The rational soul allows free will, in the sense that animals are controlled by their instincts and humans may choose to ignore them. Humans can also judge their own judgements, whereas animals don't. They can be taught to replace one instinct with another, but cannot force this change internally as an act of rational will.
So, basically, the empty body thinks like an animal. It's a particularly cunning animal because it has the senses of a human and the organs of a human, but it has no second order judgements. Note, though, that Ars has always shied away from historical models of the soul. It breaks Intelligo, because spells like Voice of the Lake and Stone Tell of the Mind that Sits make no sense in his view. Stones and lakes lack organs, thus senses, thus lack cognition, thus lack memory. Rocko is just a rock.
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The soul in Ars Magica humans (A&A p.31f) is this "rational soul", following the later 12th and 13th century reception of Aristotle's "On the Soul".
The soul in Aristotle is the form of living things: even of plants. Human's are distinguished by having a "rational soul". The immortality of this "rational soul" is the topic of philosophical and theological disquisitions, starting in early 13th century Europe often by dissecting Michael Scotus' Latin translation of Averroes' greater commentary on "On the Soul".
Sub Rosa #22 has an Ars Magica adventure, "De Anima", built around these.
While not directly on-point, note that per HoH:MC (p.18)
the limited experience of the House is that a child with an animal father appears to lack a soul (the normal state for mundane animals), and always has the mind of a beast (that is, possesses Cunning rather than Intelligence).
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Agreed. For those wanting to read far too deeply, might I suggest Animal Rationality by Anselm Oelze? Fomr some reason his publishers have it both free online and paid on the same page.
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If you want an idea of what might be possible with Hermetic magic in duplicating a mind I suggest looking at The Shadow of Life Renewed. Its list of randomized outcomes – none of which result in a wholly functional mind – could be adapted to what happens with a Hermetically copied mind.
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It would seem to me that only rolls 6-10 would apply, and even then it doesn't quite fit since the copied mind would have the personality of the original. In fact I would expect a break through of this sort to have better result than anything on that list. It seems to me that "shadow of life renewed" which brings a semblance of life to a corpse is really trying to model zombies rather than copy a mind.
The Shadow of Life Renewed has a Mentem requirement to get the mind as well as a living body. And it’s apparently a breakthrough – or maybe, partial breakthrough – since it’s noted as the best that Hermetic magic can do.
A breakthrough allows you to bend the rules.
Could range in my opinion from a fully functional copy that maintains a permanent bond that makes the Mind an AC to the original and only starts degenerating should the original be destroyed on passes on. I’d have it require the sacrifice of a familiar or Talisman and make it take its place. On the other scope, the mind created lacks basic human morals and seeks to be complete again (have a soul). It could crave murder, consume other souls to temporarily feel complete or align to an aura and become a creature of that aura.
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I like the AC idea, maybe a random chart to determine how it deals with the lack of a soul- it either 1) accepts it and has no creative abilities, only the ability to duplicate what it has previously learned, 2) seeks a faerie ability of pretense to compensate for the lack of a soul, 3) seeks out the divine in hopes of being granted a soul, or 4) seeks out the infernal, hoping to capture a corrupted soul that it can sacrifice and recycle into a “re-used” soul for itself.
Another option would be that it is similar to a magical spirit, possibly even including a might score that serves as a restriction on its ability to learn (after all, elementals can be created and have something resembling a mind…), or just its ability to learn non-physical abilities… muscle memory earning operates just fine.
For many years I have been assuming that this was a Hermetic adaption of a non-Hermetic magic ritual. Like Aegis of the Hearth is an adaption by Notatus of a Mercurian Great Ritual.
AotH is a non-Hermetic magic shoe-horned into Hermetic usage, but breaks some standard Hermetic rules.
I have assumed that The Shadow of Life Renewed was derived from Guorna the Foetid’s ritual to transfer souls between bodies - whomever translated it into Hermetic equivalent lacked the ability to preserve the body/soul swapping component, assuming Guorna’s ritual could actually manage that.
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