Hi Ricky and Paul- One that I used at the start of every semester was easy, foolproof and a good lead in to a discussion of what psychology is (and isn't).
The effect: A student is randomly selected from the class. You pull four playing cards from a deck. Ask the student to mentally select one of the cards. Have him/her whisper their choice to another student. Ask them to come to the front of the class & hold up the card that they have chosen. You then reveal that you knew what their choice would be and had previously written it down. You then show them the proof. The setup: Get a deck of cards. I found some oversize "Texas Size" cards in a dollar store but any deck will do. Pick four of the cards. Divide the remaining cards into two piles and secure them with elastic bands. Place the four loose cards in between the two half decks and place them all back in the case. Now it is easy to "randomly" pull out the four cards that you want. On the back of one of the four cards write "I knew that you would pick this card!". Four the other three that might be chosen you need to prepare three pieces of paper that say "I knew that you would pick the (insert the name of the card here)!". Then place these pieces of paper in different places that would be impossible to manipulate after the choice. I used a sealed envelope, a middle page in a textbook and the inside of a ball point pen. Once the student holds up their chosen card just direct them to the appropriate location to "prove" that you already knew their choice. E.g. If they pick the card with the writing on the back say, "Look at the back of your chosen card!". If they choose another card say, "Pull this pen out of my pocket and unscrew it. Read what's on the piece of paper inside". I then used this to start a discussion about prediction versus post-diction and science versus psuedo- science. I point out the difference between really predicting behaviour and "explaining" it post hoc ala Freud. I pointed out everyday examples where these two things are conflated. The weather person on TV (real prediction) and the stock market analyst (post-diction) The market analyst can always tell you why stocks went up (or down) yesterday, but they can't tell you what they'll do tomorrow. I want to thank Mike for pointing out Youtube as a good source for learning magic tricks. Easy favourites of mine include basic rope tricks. Search Youtube using "magic rope trick" and you'll get hits like: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-_8dYNQ7t8&feature=fvsr I also invested a few bucks in some professional equipment such as the "Magically appearing cane". http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggfervLvWvU This was not too expensive and was easy to learn. Have fun with this. -Don. Don Allen Retired professor Langara College --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=4522 or send a blank email to leave-4522-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
