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How do psychic mediums know stuff about you

One of my favourite magic tricks is the disappearing item where in front of the audience 'assistant' the magician shakes the hand containing the item up and down before releasing and throwing the item over the dupe's head, at which point they stop shaking the hand and reveal it to be empty.
What is great about this 'magic' is everyone can see what is happening and how it is done apart from the dupe. They can't see it as they are too close to where the 'magic' happens.
I suspect Scorpion is too close to his church. He can't see what is obvious to everyone else.
 
Penn and Teller said it well when they said that you never want to know how a magic trick is done because it's always extremely disappointing.
 
arthwollipot said:
Penn and Teller said it well when they said that you never want to know how a magic trick is done because it's always extremely disappointing.
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I'll have to disagree with all three of you. Sometimes a magic trick is so clever, artful and skillful that knowing how it is done fills me with awe and amazement. :j1:
 
arthwollipot said:
Penn and Teller said it well when they said that you never want to know how a magic trick is done because it's always extremely disappointing.
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I'm a great believer that the difference between a non-magician and a (potential) magician is whether or not you feel a crushing sense of disappointment when you learn how it's done.
 
I actually know what Penn & Teller mean by this. Well, Teller anyway. I had a discussion with him about it (yes, he can talk) before they became famous and such discussions became rare commodities.

What they mean is that the secret behind many tricks is dirt simple, and often far more straightforward than the viewer predicts. It's disappointing for two reasons. First, we want to believe that stage magic is uncommonly clever, and it's pleasing to be shown clever things that work. Being shown a simple something that we already suspected but couldn't prove is less exciting. Second, and paradoxically, we want to believe that we can be fooled only by very clever things. It's a blow to the ego to discover that the assistant merely arranges herself strategically in the deceptively ample box to avoid the swords. We wanted it to be more complicated than that because the whole premise of the trick -- our minds tell us -- is that the box is too small.

That's the nugget of truth for this thread. We all like to think we're smart enough not to be fooled by such "obvious" tricks as cold reading, or as straightforward a trick as someone looking up information about us that we thought was obscure. Sad fact is that our notion of what is possible and impossible is too often misinformed and misconceived.

That would seem to cut both ways. Who are we to say that spirits and mediums are impossible? Not us -- we don't say it's impossible, just that there's no evidence to support that as the explanation for our observations. What we have evidence for are such things as hot and cold readings, which are intended to play against our mistaken beliefs for what is possible. They aim to deceive, and often succeed because they are aimed well. It is the proponent of "genuine mediums" who have the entrenched notions of what must be impossible, and the so-called mediums use that to great effect. They know we won't want to believe that we were fooled by such mundane means.
 
arthwollipot said:
Penn and Teller said it well when they said that you never want to know how a magic trick is done because it's always extremely disappointing.
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Load of rubbish, not knowing how a trick is done is extremely disappointing. The flimflam of a magician's act is boring, knowing how they are doing the trick makes it interesting for me.
 
Darat said:
Load of rubbish, not knowing how a trick is done is extremely disappointing. The flimflam of a magician's act is boring, knowing how they are doing the trick makes it interesting for me.
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I'm of both minds. I frequently have to come up with stagecraft to achieve some particular effect. (Cf. my avatar) So when I see a particularly well done effect, I'm quite curious to see how it was accomplished. Professional curiosity, yes. But also just ordinary curiosity. I admire when people exhibit great skill at whatever they do. Knowing what they do to accomplish it is part of the admiration.

But sometimes -- and this is just me talking -- I want to turn off my brain and let the performance have its desired effect. Again as a practitioner of the theatrical arts, I can't let that aspect slide. Yes, stage magic is flim-flam, but so is Hamilton. It's entertaining flim-flam, and what's what I'm in the mood for sometimes.
 
I like the mystery of not knowing how it's done. Once I know the trick, there is no interesting aspect to it anymore. It's fun to just sit back and say "wow" every now and again.

My only exception would be card tricks, since I can actually do those once I learn how. I'm not about to run out and buy a box to put swords in, though, so I'd rather just be entertained by it.
 
I’m when I was a kid, I was always just like, “So that’s all there is to it? A Fake thumb?” But the gimmick is only a small part of it as I came to realize. The real trick is the skill involved in making that gimmick undetectable. That’s what I admire in a magician.

If psychics were billed as mere entertainment, I’d admire the skill involved too.
 
xterra said:
I'll go off topic for a second here.

"Atheism is a term I hate because it brands something"

AmyW, please explain what you mean by this.


Most atheists take one of two positions:

A. I am not convinced that a supernatural power (god, or whatever you want to call it) exists.

B. I am convinced that a supernatural power (god, or whatever you want to call it) does not exist.

(If the difference isn't clear, replace "supernatural power" with "colorless green squirrel.")


Neither of these positions says anything about beliefs or philosophies or dogmas, or whatever else non-atheists believe atheists believe.
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Sorry if I sounded confusing. I do not believe in a god/creator of any sort, I also don't believe in spirits etc.... I just hate that we are branded as atheists, we are realists, believing in something unseen is irrational nonsense
 
arthwollipot said:
JayUtah pretty much nailed it for me.
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Agreed. There was a study I read years back (can't find now and busy) that said that in some circumstances smarter people were easier to fool as they thought they were too smart to be fooled. I saw this with a friend who has lost the plot a bit with internal martial arts and the so-called "etheric chi" because he "was in a cynical mood and couldn't be fooled". Occam wants his razor back if nobody's using it.
 
Wudang said:
Agreed. There was a study I read years back (can't find now and busy) that said that in some circumstances smarter people were easier to fool as they thought they were too smart to be fooled. I saw this with a friend who has lost the plot a bit with internal martial arts and the so-called "etheric chi" because he "was in a cynical mood and couldn't be fooled". Occam wants his razor back if nobody's using it.
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I think that's pretty much the reason that stage magicians originally got involved in 'paranormal' research.
 
JayUtah said:
I'm of both minds. I frequently have to come up with stagecraft to achieve some particular effect. (Cf. my avatar) So when I see a particularly well done effect, I'm quite curious to see how it was accomplished. Professional curiosity, yes. But also just ordinary curiosity. I admire when people exhibit great skill at whatever they do. Knowing what they do to accomplish it is part of the admiration.

But sometimes -- and this is just me talking -- I want to turn off my brain and let the performance have its desired effect. Again as a practitioner of the theatrical arts, I can't let that aspect slide. Yes, stage magic is flim-flam, but so is Hamilton. It's entertaining flim-flam, and what's what I'm in the mood for sometimes.
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Yeah I know it's a personal thing and yes sometimes folk do want to switch off their brain and just experience something.

My comment was mainly at the Penns of the world coming up with this as a post hoc rationalisation for their professional secrecy. I've also been lucky to have conversations with the likes of Randi and Teller and it is quite obvious that not explaining tricks is a matter of professional secrets and nowt to do with spoiling it for their audience. Magicians like fooling people, they like the aura of secrecy, and they often like selling their secrets or services for money. :)
 
xterra said:
If you don't believe in spirits, why do you (appear to) believe in mediums who claim to channel spirits?
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You are doing AmyW a massive disservice with this question. A question that indicates that you have not taken as much as a minute or so to chart her journey through this thread.
 
Darat said:
Load of rubbish, not knowing how a trick is done is extremely disappointing. The flimflam of a magician's act is boring, knowing how they are doing the trick makes it interesting for me.
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I remember watching one of David Copperfield's TV specials, and it was exciting when the stage lights shifted during a trick and my knowledge of physics suddenly made me realize how the trick worked.
"Oh!! That glass is actually a partially reflective surface. Cool."
 
Regardless not wanting to know the "secret" to increase your own personal enjoyment is functionally very different from "I demand everyone help me maintain the illusion that there is no secret and it's really magic."
 
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