Powers?

[dbmagic4]

We were discussing this in the tally-ho tinychat, and it was quite biased, so i thought I'd put a thread up about it.

Do you claim to have powers? Do you think that the magician has a certain "power" over the spectator?

More nicely stated, this is one of the sides of the argument:
"Knowledge is power, and the magician has knowledge that the spectator does not. Therefore, the magician has a certain power over the spectator" -Persuasivemind

What do you guys think? What are your thoughts on the matter?

 

[kingkid]

Never looked at it that way. Now I'm going to be thinking about this for a while. My initial reaction is yes, we do. But I want to mull it over. Thanks for posting it!

 

[D ICE R]

This is a very interesting topic. When I first strated to make the transition from magic to mentalism I intitially wanted to be similar to Derren (like so many others). So essentially I wanted my spectators to believe that my knowledge was in fact my power. I wanted them to 'follow' what I was doing for the most part but there would always be parts of it that they would have to question. Like with all Derren's work there is parts that the laymen intellegent laymen question if it is possible with NLP and all that jazz.

Most mentalist either present there effects as an application of knowledge or a demonstration of power. My new show has been formated that the first half is showing what I can do using 'psychology' ending with a power piece that makes no sense if you were to believe it as a pure psychology demonstration. The second half of the show is more about expanding on this power that I toyed with in the first half so we a talking about hidden hypnosis demonstrations, blindfold routines and more.

I agree with the quote though that knowledge is power and as magicians we are using said knowledge to gain a sort of power over the audience. However do we really need to know use that power to empower ourselves, why not give the spectator the power without the knowledge.

 

[Luis Vega]

I really never claim that I have any kind of power...

but if the spectator asumes or say that I have some kind of power...I never contradict him...

that usually happens when I do Liquid Metal by Morgan Stebler....my hands gestures ae usually asociated with powers...I dunno why

 

[CorbinB]

I don't claim to have powers because if they don't believe in that sort of jazz then I just look like one of those silly 9 year olds with a plastic svengali deck. If they want to think you have powers they'll do so by themselves.

 

[LuseifHo]

Power is a very touchy subject.
I personally dont claim to have "magic" powers, but I do have human powers which are extra-ordinary. Powers such as ones used to figure out their card from their facial expression, to find cards at will, etc etc.... Power isnt limited to ""wooo...... magic electric come from my fingers... PEW PEW". Its just a strength/force you have that others dont.
As well as the general power of knowledge we have, we also have a power over our audience. We are able to cause emotions and psychological triggers in their minds that have reactions they dont have very often. We have the power to understand how to control their brain per se. We have learned in magic, how to react to certain situations, how to make your audience react a certain way, how to handle a situation when it goes wrong to make it good again. This is power. We control our audience.