Ever serve as a foil for a hypnotist on stage?

[Travis]

I did once. It was way back in college. He got four people out of the audience and I was one of them. Two of the others went first pretending their shoes were puppies or that their hat was a cellphone.

Then he got to me and I wouldn't do a damned thing he asked.

He moved onto to the fourth person who did as asked.

Then back to me and I again just stood there smirking at him. He then turned to the others and continued to work with them. For some reason the audience started to actually jeer at me for some reason. This provoked me into jawwing back at them. I think said something like "simple tricks for the simple minded" or something similar to my detractors in the audience.

Eventually he got done and we left the stage for the seats. Except me. I had a printed pamphlet explaining how stupid believing in hypnotism is so I went, got them and distributed to those that left the theater after he was done. For some reason this also got me a lot of dirty looks.

Didn't bother me. I've always preferred to be right than well liked.

 

[Spektator]

I've twice submitted to attempts at hypnosis. Once was by a dentist, who told me I was resisting and finally resorted to novocaine; the second time I got picked with several others for a stage hypnotist, and my experience was similar to yours, except I had no pamphlets to distribute. One of the others who was hypnotized later asked me, "Geez, why didn't you just go along with it?" Well, because I wanted to see if anything would, you know, actually happen. And as far as I was concerned, it didn't.

 

[Reno]

I have. Twice. On both occasions I played along with the hypnotist and his show was very entertaining for me and also for the audience.

 

[welshdean]

I have. Twice. On both occasions I played along with the hypnotist and his show was very entertaining for me and also for the audience.

Me too, once. I thoroughly enjoyed it but had a hard time convincing others that I was 'playing along'.

 

[welshdean]

I did once. It was way back in college. He got four people out of the audience and I was one of them. Two of the others went first pretending their shoes were puppies or that their hat was a cellphone.

Then he got to me and I wouldn't do a damned thing he asked.

He moved onto to the fourth person who did as asked.

Then back to me and I again just stood there smirking at him. He then turned to the others and continued to work with them. For some reason the audience started to actually jeer at me for some reason. This provoked me into jawwing back at them. I think said something like "simple tricks for the simple minded" or something similar to my detractors in the audience.

Eventually he got done and we left the stage for the seats. Except me. I had a printed pamphlet explaining how stupid believing in hypnotism is so I went, got them and distributed to those that left the theater after he was done. For some reason this also got me a lot of dirty looks.

Didn't bother me. I've always preferred to be right than well liked.

Hmmm, seems like Phil Plait had something like this in mind when he made his 'Dick' presentation.

 

[PGH]

I used to be a comedian so I've seen a few in my time. Normally I would ignore their part of the show as I didn't find it interesting or funny. But one time I did choose to listen and I found myself very willingly going along with what was asked of me (gripping my hands together with an increasing level of strength). I was just sitting in the back of the club but once I started feeling like it was "working" on me I got up and left the room. But I just chalked it up to the fact that I'm very much a people pleaser and fairly easily convinced. Which is part of the reason I eventually learned how important it was, for me especially, to be a skeptic.

I only ever got angry when on Sundays after the normal run of shows they would have their special "lose weight, stop smoking" shows that they charged extra for. That blatant rip off always made me angry. But the waitresses would go always go in for it. None lost weight, none quit smoking.

 

[welshdean]

I used to be a comedian so I've seen a few in my time. Normally I would ignore their part of the show as I didn't find it interesting or funny. But one time I did choose to listen and I found myself very willingly going along with what was asked of me (gripping my hands together with an increasing level of strength). I was just sitting in the back of the club but once I started feeling like it was "working" on me I got up and left the room. But I just chalked it up to the fact that I'm very much a people pleaser and fairly easily convinced. Which is part of the reason I eventually learned how important it was, for me especially, to be a skeptic.

I only ever got angry when on Sundays after the normal run of shows they would have their special "lose weight, stop smoking" shows that they charged extra for. That blatant rip off always made me angry. But the waitresses would go always go in for it. None lost weight, none quit smoking.

Yeah, the fun is, well, fun. The woo is annoying.

 

[whitefork]

"All hypnosis is self-hypnosis" - I've been hypnotized and found it instructive but you do have to cooperate, otherwise why bother? John Scarne has a pretty negative chapter on stage hypnosis in The Amazing World of but I think he's damning the whole field on the basis of a not-insignificant number of charlatans. I think there's considerably more to it than psychic surgery but I'm not going to persuade anyone of that.
YMMV

 

[Aepervius]

Didn't bother me. I've always preferred to be right than well liked.

I learned a long time ago that the option of "being well liked" rather than the option of "being right" get you laid more often as a result, which make me often discard the second option to get much more often the right "results".

 

[Reno]

After each of my 'appearances' on stage as the foil, I had girls all around me asking what it was like to be hypnotised and did I rememebr running around stage in a tutu? They were all giggly and being extremely touchy-feely. I did not tell them I was playing along. I withheld the truth. I may even have lied a little. And I got laid. Both times

 

[GrandMasterFox]

"All hypnosis is self-hypnosis" - I've been hypnotized and found it instructive but you do have to cooperate, otherwise why bother?

Because that is the entire point?
I never understood the logic behind this.

I can get you to do whatever I want, so long as you don't object...
Then that's not really all that impressive or useful.

 

[SOdhner]

We were somewhere (the state fair maybe?) and my brother got called up. He and the others cooperated, but when the hypnotist wasn't looking a few of them would smirk or shoot glances at each other. It was clear nobody was remotely hypnotized and they were just humoring the guy, which was actually way funnier (and way, way sadder) than if they had heckled him.

I remember he also "mass-hypnotized" the audience and made it so we couldn't pull our hands apart! Of course, he did this by making sure we intertwined out hands in such a way that our knuckles got in the way of each other, providing resistance. Spooky powers, indeed.

 

[AdMan]

I did once. It was way back in college. He got four people out of the audience and I was one of them. Two of the others went first pretending their shoes were puppies or that their hat was a cellphone.

Then he got to me and I wouldn't do a damned thing he asked.

He moved onto to the fourth person who did as asked.

Then back to me and I again just stood there smirking at him. He then turned to the others and continued to work with them. For some reason the audience started to actually jeer at me for some reason. This provoked me into jawwing back at them. I think said something like "simple tricks for the simple minded" or something similar to my detractors in the audience.

Eventually he got done and we left the stage for the seats. Except me. I had a printed pamphlet explaining how stupid believing in hypnotism is so I went, got them and distributed to those that left the theater after he was done. For some reason this also got me a lot of dirty looks.

Didn't bother me. I've always preferred to be right than well liked.

Most if not all of the stage hypnotists I've seen first call up a larger group of people onstage and then do some initial suggestibility tests to see who is willing to play along, sending those clearly not willing back into the audience. Looks like this guy didn't do a very good screening job, or did you start by playing along at first?

 

[Marduk]

my geography teacher was a big Paul Daniels fan, so he used to take our class once a year to see his london show, He did a hypnosis bit when he chose two male volunteers from the audience and sat them next to each other on chairs then proceeded to make them do his bidding

amazingly the second year we were there he chose the same two men from the audience and made them do exactly the same things again.
what are the odds eh,
Now that's Magic

 

[SumDood]

Is it all Woo? I saw Kreskin years ago bring about 40 people up on stage and gradually weeded them out until maybe 15 or so were left. They were all seated and he went through "the room is getting colder" and they all acted appropriately. And then "the room is getting hotter" and they all acted appropriately. One guy even took his shirt off. A few times through out the bit he said that Dean SoAndSo had left the room. Eventually he brought the dean up on stage. He held his hand in front of the dean and said to the group "raise your hand if you can see my hand." And they all did. He then held his hand behind the dean and said again "raise your hand if you can see my hand." That time only three raised their hands. The idea was, of course, because he had suggested to them the dean had left the room, they couldn't see him. He dismissed the rest of the group and had the dean pick up a chair and walk across the stage. The three people left we visibly shaken (either sincere or very good actors). He continued for a while and finally said something to the effect of "This is all done with the POWER OF SUGGESTION!" (which he had explained earlier in the show). At that time, the three participants saw the dean on stage and one even said surprisingly "Dean SoAndSo!"

Now i know he does other mind reading tricks and simple magic illusions, but I always thought this bit was real. I know he could have 20 plants in the audience who would follow the script. Or everyone could have been 'playing along', but if that was the case, why only 3 at the end? Is there anyway someone could "trick' someone's mind like that? Or have I just been hornswaggled into believing this all these years?

 

[TraneWreck]

my geography teacher was a big Paul Daniels fan, so he used to take our class once a year to see his london show, He did a hypnosis bit when he chose two male volunteers from the audience and sat them next to each other on chairs then proceeded to make them do his bidding

amazingly the second year we were there he chose the same two men from the audience and made them do exactly the same things again.
what are the odds eh,
Now that's Magic

And we always say the difference between science and woo is repeatability.

Guess we were wrong.

 

[AdMan]

Is it all Woo? I saw Kreskin years ago bring about 40 people up on stage and gradually weeded them out until maybe 15 or so were left. They were all seated and he went through "the room is getting colder" and they all acted appropriately. And then "the room is getting hotter" and they all acted appropriately. One guy even took his shirt off. A few times through out the bit he said that Dean SoAndSo had left the room. Eventually he brought the dean up on stage. He held his hand in front of the dean and said to the group "raise your hand if you can see my hand." And they all did. He then held his hand behind the dean and said again "raise your hand if you can see my hand." That time only three raised their hands. The idea was, of course, because he had suggested to them the dean had left the room, they couldn't see him. He dismissed the rest of the group and had the dean pick up a chair and walk across the stage. The three people left we visibly shaken (either sincere or very good actors). He continued for a while and finally said something to the effect of "This is all done with the POWER OF SUGGESTION!" (which he had explained earlier in the show). At that time, the three participants saw the dean on stage and one even said surprisingly "Dean SoAndSo!"

When did you see Kreskin's act?

Most notably, the well-known American magician and performer, Kreskin, has frequently carried out typical stage hypnosis demonstrations without using any hypnotic induction. After working as a stage hypnotist and magician for nearly two decades, Kreskin became a skeptic and a whistleblower from within the stage hypnosis field.

"For nineteen years I had believed in [...] the sleeplike 'hypnotic trance,' practicing it constantly. Though I had nagging doubts at times, I wanted to believe in it. There was an overpowering mystique about putting someone to sleep, something that set me and all other "hypnotists" apart. We were marvellous Svengalis or Dr. Mesmers, engaged in a supernatural practice of sorts. Then it all collapsed. For me anyway."[8]

After experimenting with his own subjects for several years until he was satisfied he could perform "stage hypnosis" without any hypnotic induction or trance, he concluded, "The battle of semantics may be waged for years, but I firmly believe that what is termed 'hypnosis' is, again, a completely normal, not abnormal, response to simple suggestion." An outspoken skeptic regarding stage hypnosis, Kreskin not only actively debunked stage hypnotists' claims, but went so far as to offer a substantial monetary reward, $25,000, to anyone who could prove the existence of hypnotic trance. The reward has been unsuccessfully challenged three times.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stage_hypnosis#Skepticism

 

[SumDood]

When did you see Kreskin's act?

Back in the mid-80s at the University of South Alabama. I saw Gene Roddenberry in the same room. My father, a professor there, got him to autograph a starfleet manual. One of my prized possessions.

"a completely normal, not abnormal, response to simple suggestion." His whole act seemed to resolve around the phrase "The Power Of Suggestion". So is he saying you can trick people's minds but just its not 'hypnotic mind control'?

 

[AdMan]

Back in the mid-80s at the University of South Alabama. I saw Gene Roddenberry in the same room. My father, a professor there, got him to autograph a starfleet manual. One of my prized possessions.

"a completely normal, not abnormal, response to simple suggestion." His whole act seemed to resolve around the phrase "The Power Of Suggestion". So is he saying you can trick people's minds but just its not 'hypnotic mind control'?

I don't know exactly what Kreskin means, but if you read further down that Wikipedia page:

...the effects of stage hypnosis are probably due to a combination of relatively ordinary social psychological factors such as peer pressure, social compliance, participant selection, ordinary suggestibility, and some amount of physical manipulation, stagecraft, and trickery.[10] The desire to be the center of attention, having an excuse to violate their own inner fear suppressors and the pressure to please are thought to convince subjects to 'play along'.[11]

[...]

According to experts such as Theodore Barber and André Muller Weitzenhoffer, stage hypnosis traditionally employs three fundamental strategies:

- Participant compliance. Participants on stage tend to be compliant because of the social pressure felt in the situation constructed on stage, before an expectant audience.
- Participant selection. Preliminary suggestion tests, such as asking the audience to clasp their hands and suggesting they cannot be separated, are usually used to select out the most suggestible and socially compliant subjects from the audience. By asking for volunteers to mount the stage, the performer also tends to select the most extroverted members of the audience.
- Deception of the audience. Stage hypnotists are performers who traditionally, but not always, employ a variety of "sleight of hand" strategies to mislead their audience for dramatic effect.

So, no, I don't think Kreskin is able to make people not see someone standing in front of them just by suggesting it. My guess is they were playing along, or stooges.

BTW, that signed starfleet manual is very cool!

 

[Loss Leader]

Didn't bother me. I've always preferred to be right than well liked.

Or liked at all, apparently.