theory11 — Magic Tricks & the World's Finest Playing Cards

Tricks to floor nonbelievers?

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OttoZhen

Aug 19, 2009
51
1
I'm sure at least some of use have encountered some people in their lives who deem themselves as extremely practical and have stated their disbelief in superstitions, magic, and etc. What are some tricks that would floor a person like this? A trick that has little room for error as the person is extremely detail oriented, and a trick that might make them say, "well that impossible, but you just did it"?

Thanks,
 
You could do, I forget what its called but basically the effect is this:
the spectator choses a card puts it back in the middle and takes it behind his back. You tell him to take a card and put it on the bottom and take the next card, turn it upside down, and put it in the middle. when the cards come back spread them and the card under the face-up card is the one they selected.

Just have them sign the card so they cant lie. :)
Hope I was helpful, if performed right it really fools hecklers and tough spectators.

EDIT: Here's a link to the trick, it explains better than me.
http://www.cardtricksite.com/tricks/easy/discover.htm
 
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I think you guys are taking the wrong approach. The hurdle here is not the trick, it is the attitude. If a spectator chooses to view everything he sees as a trick, how will performing another trick help? It may, in a small number of cases, but I believe there's a better way. More on this later when I have time. The key to my answer is this: What do you mean by "believe in magic"? Think about it, I'll post up a more detailed answer soon.
 
Ten for Ten by Yves Doumergue is fantastic. It was published in the September 2003 issue of MAGIC magazine, which is now hard to find.
 
I think praetoritevong brings up some good points as there is a lot to consider in the scenario you are posing.

Generally, though, if someone is very skeptical I try to select effects that are more grounded and organic. For card effects I think mentalism tends to grab the attention of a skeptical spectator more because the effects tend to be more cerebral and don't require as much belief on their part as many other magic effects might. I also try to go for effects that give up control on my part and put more of the effect and the control in their hands. I'll give you one card effect and one non-card effect that I think fits what I'm saying:

Out of This World after a spectator shuffles is great because it gives them so much control. They shuffle, they deal where they want--it's a very hands off effect for the magician and yet something impossible happens. It isn't something completely impossible either, but they know it's impossible enough that it shouldn't have happened.

Outide of cards I'd say my favorite effect for a skeptic would be the Quantum Bender 2.0 coin bend by John Sheets. The coin is borrowed and signed, and it bends in their hand (and they feel this too). There is just nowhere to go for spectators when they try and figure this out or reconstruct it. It's as tight of an effect as you can get.

So those two effects from my repertoire that have proven themselves well for me in the trenches over the years with skeptics. Hope that helped.
 
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praetoritevong said:
I think you guys are taking the wrong approach. The hurdle here is not the trick, it is the attitude. If a spectator chooses to view everything he sees as a trick, how will performing another trick help? It may, in a small number of cases, but I believe there's a better way. More on this later when I have time. The key to my answer is this: What do you mean by "believe in magic"? Think about it, I'll post up a more detailed answer soon.
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I've heard stories on here before of people performing tricks that made dropped the jaws of the most stubborn spectators. In some of those stories, the poster says that they were told later that what they just did changed their mindset and made them believe in magic.
 
if you have a problem spectator who is a non-believer sometimes the best approach is to share the spotlight. Doing a trick that involves them, or gives them the limelight can often change their attitude. making them the hero, or the magic one makes them appreciate what it is your doing and if you bring them in on the secret, sometimes whispering something or subtle hints they feel apart of the act and instead of trying to foil you, they are working as your accomplice. It can change a heckler into your biggest supporter.
 
OttoZhen said:
I've heard stories on here before of people performing tricks that made dropped the jaws of the most stubborn spectators. In some of those stories, the poster says that they were told later that what they just did changed their mindset and made them believe in magic.
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I think the best you can do is put them on the horns of a dilemma, somewhere between "there's no such thing as magic" and "there's no other way to explain it." This is Whit Haydn's theory, and has been explored in great depth on the Magic Cafe. It's worthy of your attention.

To try and make someone believe in an obvious falsehood is charlatanry. That's what mediums, con men and psychics do. I try to leave them with no explanation at all, except for magic which we all know doesn't exist. It's done with a nod and a wink.

And some tricks look and feel more like 'a remarkable skill' than magic. Cups and balls, for instance, is widely known to be sleight of hand. Don't get me wrong - it's a great trick, it's totally entertaining, it's the closer to my busking act. But I don't think that anyone believes that it's magic. To laymen, it's a skilled operator using "fast hands" and "misdirection" to move things around unseen.

The most jaw-dropping reaction I get (in the magical sense, not the 'display of skill' sense) is from the Teleportation Device routine (two parts) or the Mongolian Pop Knot.
 
"Non-believers"? I think you mean suspension of belief. I learned the term from Jay Sankey's book, Beyond Secrets. It's keeping people in awe, and entertaining them enough so they don't start thinking methods, and just pretend it's real for a little while. You're not trying to make them think you're really magical.

Let's be honest, no one really thinks you have magical abilities. You're a magician doing magic tricks. And for those mentalists out there who like to make people think it's real, you're presenting it wrong! All the best mentalists like Richard Osterlind, Andy Nyman, Derren Brown, etc. say before all their performances that they have no special abilities. They say they're using things like influence and suggestion.

But, you can put people in that state of mind where they don't know wether it's real or not, and they just choose to watch and pretend it's real during your performance. It's, as mentioned earlier, suspension of belief.

The only time you should tell anyone what you're doing is "real" is when performing for kids. They still believe in Santa Clause, so it's no big deal. And while performing for creationists. :D
 
I would contest that even though Derren Brown says he's not psychic, there's plenty of people that think he actually does have mind reading powers.
 
I agree completely with Praetoritevong and the others. When I told my girl I got into card magic and cardistry in general, she was like... 'why?' she is a complete skeptic. So I took that as a challenge. I learned a lot of 'already strong' effects, 5 speed, angle zero... A few others... performed them multiple times for random spectators to a great reaction. I knew she wouldn't go for it. So before I showed her these effects, I adapted some original ideas to them. She asked the question every magician wants to hear, 'how'd you do that?' it's not about the effect, it's being able to make whoever is watching forget, just for a second, the fact that magic isn't real. I've only been doing this for just about two years now, and I've been with her four. I'm sure she knows damn well I didn't suddenly develop 'magic' powers
 
Daniel Garcias Gator boots.....Jk jk, dont do that. well unless you really want too.
It seems mentalism Hits Hard with these people. Get away from the Cards in my opinion if you want to floor someone that is a heckler. Using cards gives them something to look for ( Slight of hand) take away the cards and preform something where they have no clue whats about to happen. Like a Quater bend, or Smoke. or something of that nature. Then again a Heckler and a Non believer are two different things. A non believer could be someone who enjoys your magic very much but just refuses to belive its more then tricks. Mentalism is as real as you can get. Cold Reading is another thing that could get you over as "real" if thats what your going for.
 
I think if anything should be considered real magic it should be the connection felt when sharing that rare moment of astonishment with your spectators. That is to say the magic doesn't lie within the effect but instead within the result of the effect.

I like to frame what I do as "I don't actually have any supernatural powers but here is what it might look like if I did. So lets play pretend for a minute k?" Winks, nods, etc. etc.
 
willabbotsm said:
"Non-believers"? I think you mean suspension of belief. I learned the term from Jay Sankey's book, Beyond Secrets. It's keeping people in awe, and entertaining them enough so they don't start thinking methods, and just pretend it's real for a little while. You're not trying to make them think you're really magical.

Let's be honest, no one really thinks you have magical abilities. You're a magician doing magic tricks. And for those mentalists out there who like to make people think it's real, you're presenting it wrong! All the best mentalists like Richard Osterlind, Andy Nyman, Derren Brown, etc. say before all their performances that they have no special abilities. They say they're using things like influence and suggestion.

But, you can put people in that state of mind where they don't know wether it's real or not, and they just choose to watch and pretend it's real during your performance. It's, as mentioned earlier, suspension of belief.

The only time you should tell anyone what you're doing is "real" is when performing for kids. They still believe in Santa Clause, so it's no big deal. And while performing for creationists. :D
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Your post is on the right track, in terms of what I wanted to say. It's about belief, but I'll talk about that below.

A quick note on suspension of disbelief, though. I don't think this is a good term to use. It's a theatrical term, but ill appropriated into magic. The process of suspending one's disbelief is not what it sounds. It doesn't mean that you stop disbelieving something or something, and start believing. Suspension of disbelief is a term that refers to an active ignorance of the nature of what is in front of you. That is to say, you go see a play. You see a man playing a piano in a bar on stage. You know that he's not in a bar. He's not in a bar, soldiers aren't entering the bar, and so forth. He's in a theatre, on a stage, and people are watching him. But you let yourself believe, consciously, what you know is not true, because you want to enjoy the play.

There are some similarities with magic, but it's still not a good term. Suspension of disbelief implies that you see the apparatus behind the illusion, and consciously ignore it. For example, if you saw thread hanging from someone's finger, but consciously ignored it to appreciate that the card is levitating. The problem is, it's not. Magic thrives on the impossible. There needs to be a compromise, yes - but not this one. It's just not a good term. I haven't read Sankey's book, but if his message is what you say, then he is infortunately mistaken about the true theatrical meaning of the term.

You are, again, on the right track with what you say about belief, but more about that below.

OttoZhen said:
I've heard stories on here before of people performing tricks that made dropped the jaws of the most stubborn spectators. In some of those stories, the poster says that they were told later that what they just did changed their mindset and made them believe in magic.
Click to expand...

Yes, but why does this occur? Does that mean that if you show someone that trick, they will invariably believe in magic? Does that mean that you have a 100% foolproof trick that, no matter who performs it, and to whom, the spectator will believe in magic? If so, why isn't every single person performing this trick?

As you can probably infer, I don't believe this to be true. The point of my post is then to say, well, when someone performs this trick, and it makes the spectator believe in magic... What do they mean? What does this mean? Why is this the case? More below, but the gist of it is - it's NOT the trick. If it was the trick, every single performance anyone ever did of that trick would make every single spectator believe in magic. That's the implication of focussing on the trick. NO. It's not the trick, or that would be true. But it's not.

necrofiend said:
I agree completely with Praetoritevong and the others. When I told my girl I got into card magic and cardistry in general, she was like... 'why?' she is a complete skeptic. So I took that as a challenge. I learned a lot of 'already strong' effects, 5 speed, angle zero... A few others... performed them multiple times for random spectators to a great reaction. I knew she wouldn't go for it. So before I showed her these effects, I adapted some original ideas to them. She asked the question every magician wants to hear, 'how'd you do that?' it's not about the effect, it's being able to make whoever is watching forget, just for a second, the fact that magic isn't real. I've only been doing this for just about two years now, and I've been with her four. I'm sure she knows damn well I didn't suddenly develop 'magic' powers
Click to expand...

Again, very close to what I'm suggesting about belief. Ok, enough "but more below". Here's what I was getting at.

Let's first talk about belief. When we say someone believes in magic, what do we mean? Do we mean that someone believes in the existence of fairies, magical fairy dust, and that your Ace of Spades is actually a time machine? Doubtful. Possible, but unlikely. What, then? We talk about the impossible, and we talk about belief. What is that? What is that "belief" that we refer to?

Many people have correctly said that logically speaking, most people don't believe in magic. They don't believe that when we snap our fingers, the card actually rises to the top of the deck. It does, but they know it's not "magic" - this vague, ambiguous, almost childish concept. They know that a coin doesn't appear out of nowhere. They know, instinctively, logically, thanks to laws of physics and other wonderful scientific things, that this does not happen. Sit them down, push them for an explanation, and they will say that you must have hidden it somewhere. Some will say that it's impossible, but if you keep pressing them for a method, no-one will say "The method was magic. Magic, that invisible force, put a coin in your hand."

What, then, is this belief we're talking about?

When we talk about belief, we know that our audiences are unlikely to have any logical belief in magic. But that's ok. Because when we talk about belief, we are talking about emotional belief. The incredible thing about magic is that, ideally, it confronts us with what appears to be impossible. Whilst people will not believe that you are actually magical, per se, people are drawn to the impossible. There's something very powerful about doing the impossible. This power stems from emotional roots.

When someone refuses to stop looking for a method, it's not that they're refusing to logically believe in magic. No-one does. It's that they're refusing to succumb to this emotional belief. There are many reasons for this, too many to go into. But they're refusing to enjoy the impossible - there is an insistence on linking everything they see with an explanation. It is not enough to say, "Wow, there's a beautiful sunset."

Well, that's what we aim to do - help them to relax, and enjoy the sunset.

This post is continued below.
 
There is a trick that I do not know the name of. However, the effect goes a little like this.

A deck of cards is split in half, of which one of the halves is taken by the spectator and the other half remains with the performer. Both the spectator and performer shuffle the halves until the spectator desires to stop. The cards on each half are then dealt, from the top, one by one and revealed to match in number / letter and colour. For example, a red King is dealt by the spectator and a red King will be dealt by the performer. The following card, a black two is dealt by the spectator and a black two is dealt by the performer. I believe this continues till the very last card.

I'm not sure how to do this, but a magician friend of mine always does this to impress hecklers and even fellow magicians. The fact that the magic happens in the spectator's hands which shuffled the deck blows people away, which is why I suggested this trick. Meanwhile, if anyone here knows the name of this trick, I would appreciate if you'd tell me and also direct me to somewhere I can buy or learn the trick.
 
This post begins above.

Ottozhen, let's look at your last post for a moment. You wrote:

"I've heard stories on here before of people performing tricks that made dropped the jaws of the most stubborn spectators."

Ok, so we have some stubborn spectators here. We have some stubborn but impressed spectators. To be honest, that's not the difficult part. Stubborn spectators are like magicians - laymen with bunny rabbits on their business cards. If you want to fool magicians, you just do a sleight well. There's no secret. Just do it well. Vernon wasn't secretly holding back thousands upon thousands of secret tricks which gave him power over life and death. He just did the tricks damn well.

"In some of those stories, the poster says that they were told later that what they just did changed their mindset and made them believe in magic."

Here's the important part. What they just did changed their mindset and made them believe in magic. First, it made them believe in magic. This is, as I mentioned above, emotional belief. Not logical belief, but emotional belief.

But I've already talked about that. What do they mean when they say "What you just did changed my mindset"?

What does this mean? What is it that they just did? What was so special about what they just did?

I don't think so, and I'll tell you why.

"What you just did" - not "The card rising to the top just changed my mindset" - not "The cards separating just changed my mindset" - not "The coin appearing in your hand just changed my mindset".

No. "What you just did changed my mindset." What does that mean? It means, that it wasn't the trick. It wasn't the trick. That's the bottom line of what I'm trying to say here in this post. It's not the trick. If it was the trick, they would talk about how something that happened in that trick changed their mindset. They would talk about it. It's the difference between "The Great Gatsby changed my life" and "Reading changed my life". Do you see the difference? We are talking about the latter here. If it was the trick (or the book, in my analogy), they would talk about the effect, something that happened (or the specific book). But what I'm saying is that it's not the book, it's not the trick, it's the whole performance (or reading - the entire act of reading).

That's one thing that suggests that it's not the trick. The other thing that suggests that it's not the trick that is important is what I said very early on. If it was the trick, then irrespective of who performed it, in what situation, and who it was performed to, the trick would make people believe in magic. I know that sounds exaggerated and silly - but that is what it means. To say that it is the trick that makes them believe is to say that silly and exaggerated line. If it was the trick - then believe me, no-one would ever tell anyone else the secret. A trick that makes people believe in magic 100% of the time? Very few people are that good. Such a trick doesn't exist. Again, I'm aware how silly it sounds. But if it was the trick, well, the trick doesn't change. The trick is there, it's in writing, or on a DVD somewhere, or in an ebook - the trick is there. What changes is the performance of the trick - the context in which the performance takes place. And since the trick doesn't get the same results 100% of the time, then we can imply from this that logically, it's not the trick that's doing the work!

That's a roundabout way of saying something that many advanced magicians know instinctively: It is not the trick which is powerful. A trick in and of itself is just a trick. It's not meaningful, it's not powerful, it's not entertaining, it's not funny, it's not interesting in any way shape or form. If you need proof, then watch a YouTube performance of an ACR (normally not meaningful), watch someone fumble through a trick (it's not powerful), watch a dull person present in a monotone (it's not entertaining), watch a boring person attempt to make a joke (it's not funny), watch a bad performer performing magic - it's not interesting.

This is a point on which I could write extensively about in and of itself, but that's not the point of this post, so I'll stop there. It's an important point, though, and a key one in this topic - that a trick is not inherently anything. It's the performer than makes magic powerful, interesting, funny, entertaining, engaging, meaningful, etc. It's the performer. Not the trick, the performer.

That is essentially what I was getting at. You now have all the pieces of the puzzle that I was hinting at in my first post - the solution to your question.

1) We're talking about emotional belief, not logical belief.
2) Magic is not inherently anything; it all lies with the performer.

So if we join those two up, we get your question: how does someone floor a nonbeliever, exactly? Well, it follows from what I've said above that the key to instilling emotional belief is with the performer.

It's an annoying answer, because the truth is, if there was just a single trick that we could perform that would impress anyone instantly - that would be a lot easier. But it doesn't work like that. To illustrate my point briefly, Draven mentioned Out of this World. A wonderful trick, and considered by many to be the strongest trick I do (or so I've been told). I once taught a fellow magician how to perform the trick - exactly as I perform it.

Never again.

He did it... And he butchered it. It was horrible, watching my beautiful pet effect being butchered. What normally gets dead silence, followed by uproarious laughter, followed by silence again, got a polite smattering of applause and cheers. I was devastated watching it.

What went wrong? The magician I taught it to was a good magician. But it just wasn't him. The presentation wasn't him. It was created by me, for me, and a product of about two years of work on my behalf, to turn that trick into what it was. But he's not me.

So if the key lies with the performer, what can the performer do? Well, I talked about non believers as an attitude. It's an attitude towards magic. But magic is strong because of the performer. So what you need to do is to engage with the audience. Through your magic, but not with your magic. Through your magic, YOU need to engage with the spectator. Not your tricks, YOU. Magic is your medium, tricks are your medium, what makes magic wonderful and powerful is the PERFORMER.

If you can engage with your spectators, then they cease to focus on logical thinking. Human interaction is very much emotionally based (this is a debatable point, but I think that in this context, this assertion in the general sense holds). Tricks are about method. Logic. Human interaction, well, you either like someone or you don't. You get along with someone, or you don't. Engage with your spectators. Once you do this, once they are interested in you - not only do they forget about the logical part (it's almost impossible to engage both the logical and emotional areas of your brain simultaneously), but you can use your relationship with your audience to guide them.

In this way, you change their attitude. You shape their attitudes, their thinking, their beliefs, through the connection that you develop with them.

I can think of no better person as an example than Eric Mead. If you've never seen it, watch his performance on YouTube (search Eric Mead ForaTV). His performance is not only amazing, but his presentation is extraordinary. It is based on an appreciation of mystery, and is designed to engage highly educated and logical thinkers, and allow them to appreciate the wonderful feeling of mystery. It is a perfect example.

Presentation is one tool to do this. Character is another.

I'm sure you've heard about suggestible people. Although it is a fallacy that hypnosis only works on the gullible, it is definitely true that some people are easier to hypnotise than others. This is another rough analogy for what I'm saying. By developing a connection with someone, you make them malleable. You make them open to new ideas. Engage them, and when they are engaged, shape them through meaning.

So here's another tool: create rapport between you and your audience. Study human communication. Engage with people. Even if you're not performing, engage with the people around you. Smile, and shine.

Finally (finally!), create meaning. Give your magic meaning. This is what takes magic out of the realm of tricks, and method (recall that this is the hurdle I mentioned so long ago). It makes magic less about tricks, and more about life. Meaning is a wonderful trigger for emotional belief.

The key to performing successful magic, to anyone, lies within the performer. Make magic meaningful. Engage with your audience. Transcend tricks - you're better than that. Magic is more important than tricks. Magic is meaning, magic is wonder.

Sorry for the long post. I'm aware that some people may not bother reading this. That's alright. Some people don't have the time, some already know this stuff. But true magic is not an easy path to take. Some, who do not care to put in the effort, are condemned to mediocrity.

For everyone else, hope this helps.
 
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