It's common for people to say that if a time traveler or an alien displayed advanced technology to ancient or medieval people, that they'd assume it was magic, and either worship him as a god or burn him as a witch.
But if aliens visited the Earth tomorrow and had technology hundreds of years in advance of anything humans have yet invented, I'd think few if any would suppose it was magic. You might say, "Yes, but we are technologically sophisticated people, unlike those medieval people." But people in the Middle Ages built complex clocks and other mechanical devices, and cathedrals and other buildings at least as grand as anything we build today. Ancient people built the Coliseum and the pyramids. The Greeks built complex mechanical devices -- like the Antikythera machine. Would the ancient Greeks have assumed that, say, a flying machine must be magical? Or would they have said, "Ah, like Daedalus built"?
So my question is, Is there any evidence that ancient or medieval people would be unable to distinguish advanced technology from magic? For example, are there documented historical examples of, say, 19th century Europeans encountering a primitive tribe and the primitive people thinking the European's machines were supernatural?
Later Thought
My intent here was not to get into a discussion of whether there really are supernatural forces in the universe. Whether there really is a God who performs miracles, or ghosts, or people with psychic powers, doesn't affect what I was driving at with this question. You may think that people are foolish and gullible to believe in religion, but even if you're right, it's not a matter of confusing technology for the supernatural, it's a debate about whether the supernatural exists.
I admit I may be splitting hairs here, but I think it's a fundamentally different idea. Suppose a con man tries to convince people that he can read minds. The issue isn't that people are confusing technology with magic, but that they are being duped by a con man. Odds are he isn't using any particularly advanced technology, but simple stage magic tricks. Very little stage magic depends on high tech gadgets: it's almost all slight of hand, a box with a hidden compartment, smoke and mirrors. I know some mind-reading tricks, and none of them involve high technology, they're all about having an accomplice who uses code words to pass you information and that sort of thing.
Very Late Update
I see a number of posters here have made comments on the order of, "If you don't understand it, it's the same as magic." No, it's not. It's true that people use the word "magic" colloquially to mean "stuff I don't understand" or even "stuff that's really impressive", as in, "we talked via the magic of cell phones" or "wow, this new cleaning product works like magic!" But my intent with this question was that I meant "magic" in the literal sense: something supernatural, ghosts, psychic phenomena, etc. I'm sure 90+% of the population of America and Europe don't know how cell phones or computers work. But they don't suppose they are literally evil spirits captured in a box.
Answers:
As far as I can determine, the closest we have to hard data on this (which is not that close) would be first contact with people who have been isolated for a long time and have not developed or used technology themselves. This page lists six relatively recent incidents:
Based on that article, (not from a great source, but hey), I searched and read several other sources, like:
- http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-2958291/The-tree-dwellers-New-Guinea-Amazing-images-offer-glimpse-secretive-Korowai-tribe-living-rickety-treehouses-140ft-remote-rainforest.html
- http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-30500591
Among others. I searched and read a lot, looking for anything along the lines of "the long-isolated tribesmen were amazed at seeing a cell phone for the first time, and asked 'what kind of magic is this?'" But I have not found anything that relates a story of confusing technology with magic. Just to be clear, I can't say that has never happened, just that a fairly lengthy (and work productivity destroying) search of the internet has not turned up any documentation on that.
What is documented multiple times is the mistaken impression of the more "advanced" peoplebeing mistaken for supernatural beings - either gods or devils. What is fascinating about this is it could lead one to a more supported and also surprising maxim: "Any mildly different human morphology is often mistaken for inhumanity". Meaning, just having white skin, thinner noses, and different hair can make one seem to be not even human (at first) to someone who has only ever seen other humans with dark skin, broad noses, and curly dark hair. Rather chilling when you think about it.
Attempting to extrapolate what the long-isolated peoples in these first contact situations might think of about technology, they would likely see it as works of supernatural beings, and maybe not magic so much as miracle (or devilry). I suppose that's a form of magic, but it's interesting that the culture shock experienced by these peoples does not seem to be secular.
Now if we imagine that a group of humans were somehow whisked away from earth 10,000 years ago, have developed on another planet, and now return to earth with no head hair and greenish skin, one good guess at how our current culture would react would be to mistake them as completely alien, and not human at all. From there, most people would probably spare little thought to whether these "aliens" were wielding magic, technology, or anything else, and would instead be more concerned about whether they mean us harm, or will steal our jobs, or threaten our religious beliefs, etc.
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