Pick a card, any card .....

lugha

Hi ho. I am pretty skeptical about anything that doesn't have a scientific explanation but I recall a puzzling trick I was shown as a child which proceeds as follows. (Apologies if this has already being addressed of if my question has a blindingly obvious answer)

A number of cards (perhaps 12- 15) are selected from a pack of 52 and one person is invited to select and reveal one of these cards. He then fans out the cards, places the selected card at a place of their choosing and hold them out facing them away from a second person. Both players hold hands and concentrate intently on the card selected, repeatedly stating this card. The second player then moves their hand back and over the fan of cards a couple of time, touching each one and eventually making a selection. And hey presto, the pre-selected card was chosen.

My recollection as a child was that the trick almost always worked. There may be an element of selective recollection but I don't think that's the full story. The other obvious explanation is that there may be some subtle change in the hand contact that serves to inform the person making the selection. But again I don't think so, or at least not a conscious change. I remember trying this trick when I was a little older and it was not as successful although the actual card chosen was almost always within one card of the one pre-selected.

Anyone remember this trick and know how it works? (If you have a kid about your house perhaps you could do an experiment?)

Dave!

Magic

iamhunted

I am pretty skeptical about anything that doesn't have a scientific explanation

everything in the world is explainable once science can catch up and give the explainations.

in answer to the OP - im sure theres many sites around that explain card tricks.

Oryx

Post in magic and illusion as well, they might point out the trick.

lugha

iamhunted wrote: »

everything in the world is explainable once science can catch up and give the explainations.

in answer to the OP - im sure theres many sites around that explain card tricks.

Well its not a card trick in the usual sense. Perhaps I didn't make clear that the person who is being shown the trick is the one that selects the card at the end. If it were the "magician" doing the selecting then it would be just a standard card trick.

iamhunted

isnt that the way a card tricks works though - a willing participant chooses the card to make sure it isnt all faked etc etc.

lugha

I guess I still haven't made the trick clear. Let me by way of explanation describe how a variation on the "trick" might be done. When the volunteer selects the card at the end then the magician might create a diversion, apply a little slight of hand and swap the selected card with the target card. Impressive in a way but fairly ho hum. But importantly, the magician would have to have the skill and know how to pull off the trick. What I am describing is different in that roles of volunteer and magician are inter changeable. In fact, when I and my siblings were first shown the trick we was invited to try it with each other, alternating the role of magician and volunteer. So its not a special trick known only to the magician.

My own best guess at an explanation is that there is some covert physiological communication going on. Perhaps a slight change in voice tone or a small involuntary muscle flex in the joined hands. But I would be interested to know if anybody has a more authoritative explanation.

???

Well I'd assume when the magician does it it's sleight of hand (a quite easy one actually but your getting no more than that!)

When you and your friend do it there is between a 25% and 20% chance of geting either it or the cards bext to it. Also the chance of the card being in the end position is slim further increasing your odds to almost a 33% chance of getting it or within one. That is quite high and when you take into acount subjective validation and you misremembering the number of hits compared to the number of misses it is easily explained.

Oryx

??? wrote: »

Well I'd assume when the magician does it it's sleight of hand (a quite easy one actually but your getting no more than that!)

When you and your friend do it there is between a 25% and 20% chance of geting either it or the cards bext to it. Also the chance of the card being in the end position is slim further increasing your odds to almost a 33% chance of getting it or within one. That is quite high and when you take into acount subjective validation and you misremembering the number of hits compared to the number of misses it is easily explained.

I think it would be interesting to do a set number of attempts of this trick with a friend and write down the results. See how the stats bear out, if they are similar to those mentioned by ???

lugha

??? wrote: »

When you and your friend do it there is between a 25% and 20% chance of geting either it or the cards bext to it. Also the chance of the card being in the end position is slim further increasing your odds to almost a 33% chance of getting it or within one. That is quite high and when you take into acount subjective validation and you misremembering the number of hits compared to the number of misses it is easily explained.

Well I guess the nature of selective is that its selective but I certainly recall being most impressed as a child. And I don't think I would be terribly impressed if the selected card was within one of the target one quarter of the time. My recollection is that the selection was spot on the first hand full of times we tried it.

Happily the trick is testable. Below I will describe in as much detail as I can recall about how the trick proceeds and perhaps somebody (especially someone with younger children) might try it and see how they fare. I will take it that anybody who wants to take the challenge will assume the role of independent observer which means you will require two volunteers who I will Christian A and B.

A smallish number of cards, say 12 are arbitrarily selected from the pack and A invites B to select and name one card. A then fans out the cards in such a way that each card can be physically touched by B. A and B then hold hands, concentrate exclusively and intently on the selected card and together repeatedly and slowly recite the card's name. B very slowly moves their hand over the fan of cards, stopping at each one in turn and massaging (for want of a better word!) the card between their index finger and thumb. B should do this back and over perhaps 2 - 3 times which should take maybe 30 sec to a minute. As the process is ongoing B should acquire an inkling as to what card they should select (you may even see them hovering for a while close to it) and eventually will be "drawn" to pick one card, hopefully the target.

I would love to learn anybody's results. And needless to say, be honest. Don't just report the times it worked.

iamhunted

derren brown does these kinds of tricks quite regularly where the person in the audience ends up being the one doing the magic - its still just an illusion though which most defintely has a scientific explaination

lugha

iamhunted wrote: »

derren brown does these kinds of tricks quite regularly where the person in the audience ends up being the one doing the magic - its still just an illusion though which most defintely has a scientific explaination

I agree that there is a scientific explaination but not that it is an illusion. An illusion requires at least one person involved in the deception however well that deception is disguised. Would Derren Brown's tricks still work if two of his audience members went away, got their own deck of cards and tried the trick with each other? What I describe above does.

iamhunted

but your description proves nothing - its just a description of what you remember as a child. isnt that what the skeptics would refer to as anicdotal?

lugha

iamhunted wrote: »

but your description proves nothing - its just a description of what you remember as a child. isnt that what the skeptics would refer to as anicdotal?

Well I am certainly aware that my recollection is likely to be in part selective but I am not convinced that that is the full explanation. Even as a child I would have been wise to any attempts to encourage me to focus on the successes and discount the failures. I would be far from impressed if it had failed 9 times out of 10 as would have been likely if only guesswork was at play.

And in any case I am not offering my childhood recollections as the sole evidence (or as evidence at all for that matter. You are right, it is anecdotal and as such largely worthless). I believe the experiment can be reproduced and next time I get hold of a couple of suitable aged children I will see if I can reproduce it. If I can I will be back! If not I guess that’s the end of it and the mystery will remain as to why I was impressed by this as a child. But my feeling still is that there might be a “covert physiological” type of explanation.

jimmii

If they have planned the trick in advance they could easily set up the deck so that of the 12-15 cards "selected" 8 or 9 or even all of them are the same card so that the trick will often appear to be working. As long as all the cards aren't revealed then it'll look pretty good. Getting it wrong 10% of the time makes it look a lot more like some sort of power than 0% of the time where people will just think that it is a trick.

6th

Yeah definity check out the Mahic & Illusion Forum: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=1042

lugha

6th wrote: »

Yeah definity check out the Mahic & Illusion Forum: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=1042

Perhaps you could point me at a particular post or even thread. Thanks.

Not that I expect to find an answer there unless posters have meandered off and started talking about covert body signalling.

Once again, it is not a "magic trick" or illusion. I guess that if even after several clarification posts I have not made that clear then I need to work on my communication skills. Or … horror of horrors, folk ain’t reading by posts properly!

zuroph

TBH, as a magician, this would be fairly easy to perform.
I dont believe ur belief that its always right for you and a friend though. why does someone else need to test it, try it yourself? I've just tried with my house mate 5 times, and she got it once. not very impressive. and she was a bit perturbed by me insisting we hold hands. but i digress.
there is quite a simple explanation for this trick for illusionists. outside of that, its luck. try giving the pack of 15 a shuffle before you offer them to the other person, just to see if it increases or decreases success rate.

lugha

zuroph wrote: »

I dont believe ur belief that its always right for you and a friend though.

I haven't actually tried this with anybody for yonks and it certainly didn't always work but my recollection (even allowing for selectiveness) was that the success rate was better than chance would suggest.
I hope to try it with a couple of kids sometime if I get hold of them. (It seemed to work better with kids) Damn and blast, I had a couple of young cousins visit at the weekend who needed amusing and I clean forgot. Next time they appear I will guinea pig them.

The reasons I invite others to try it is test its credibility. Like any phenomena, if it cannot be reproduced then there is almost certainly nothing there. And in case I haven't made it clear I am not suggesting for a second that there is some psychic like explanation. I suspect if there is anything there at all then it is likely to be explained by some kind of latent physiological communication. Which wouldn't be exactly earth shattering. We can detect emotional state with a fleeting glance at somebody's face. Why not simple binary information (right card / wrong card)?

zuroph wrote: »

I've just tried with my house mate 5 times, and she got it once. not very impressive.

No I guess James Randi won't pony up the $1,000,000 for that!

humanji

OP, to clarify more, were you the person picking the card when you were young, or were you watching two other people do it?

If you were watching two other people doing it, a good explanation is that both were in on it and had an agreed signal that would indicate which card to choose. Because there's so few cards, there's a high degree of chance that it will work when two who do not know the trick try it. This makes it seem more mystical.

lugha

humanji wrote: »

OP, to clarify more, were you the person picking the card when you were young, or were you watching two other people do it?

I would have done both with my siblings. Generally we would alternate the roles of card holder and card picker.

humanji wrote: »

Because there's so few cards, there's a high degree of chance that it will work when two who do not know the trick try it. This makes it seem more mystical.

I would have said the one chance in whatever number of cards were used, typically 10-12 or so. Thus about a 10% chance. No?

Hobbes

lugha wrote: »

Anyone remember this trick and know how it works? (If you have a kid about your house perhaps you could do an experiment?)

Without seeing the trick there are any numbers of way this can be played out however the most obvious ones I can see.

1. The cards are not random but are laid out in a certain order that putting the card back in the set of cards will tell you where it is out of place.

2. Body language.

3. Someone behind you pointing to the card.

Sounds like a great excuse to hold hands though.

oeb

There is a very simple card trick involving 6 cards, it plays out like you described.

You get 6 spot (ie not jack, king or queen) cards from the deck, one diamond, and the others don't matter (as long as the face value of any of the other cards is not two or four). I can shuffle these cards, leave someone select a card, and then they can put the card back into the deck. I can shuffle it again, then take a quick look at the stack of cards and immediately tell them what card they picked. (This trick is not limited to six cards, I have seen it done with 7, 9 and 10 too, the only stipulations are those listed above. I do arrange the cards before hand, but in most cases I will be happy to allow you to shuffle the cards before selecting one).

I won't spoil it by telling you how it's done, but I could teach a four year old to do it. It involves no sleight of hand. Consider this a creative exercise.

Penny for the man who figures it out. There is no reason why it can not be done with 12 or 15 cards either.

Does that sound similar to the trick you remember?

???

I got it, I got it!!!

oeb

??? wrote: »

I got it, I got it!!!

Since you were either the only one to get it, or the only one paying attention to the thread I will confirm what you have no doubt guessed already.

On all spot cards that are not diamonds, 2, 10 or 4 there is an unequal number of symbols pointing in each direction. If before hand you arrange the cards so all the cards have the larger amount of symbols pointing up: the deck can be shuffled without effecting this.

You allow your spectator to select a card, and you simply turn the deck around before he puts it back in. You can easily tell by glancing at the cards which one he selected (It's the one with most symbols pointing down, or if all the cards have the majority pointing up ... It's the diamond)

lugha

oeb wrote: »

Since you were either the only one to get it, or the only one paying attention to the thread I will confirm what you have no doubt guessed already.

I got it too so I did but my post seemed to have fallen into a black hole.