Derren Brown style entertainer has me beaten......
Discussion
Help!
In a nutshell, bloke at party gets me to write down "Name of someone not here", I fold paper and put in top pocket.
"Imagine the person has just walked in and sat next to that lady there"......I laughed a bit, I was thinking about my 10 year old.
"It's a relative"
"It's a female ralative"
"Perhaps your daughter?"
I'm getting worried.
Bloke puts his hand on my shoulder.
"I'm going to go through the alphabet out loud, try not to give away any clues"
I concentrate REALLY hard on the letter 'L', simply because it has no relavance.
"It ends in 'E'!"
F:censored:K
"It's got an 'S' in the middle!"
Double F:censored:K
"It starts with S or R......so it's either 'Susie' or 'Rosie'!!!"
Bo:censored:ks...her name's Rosie.
How did he do it???? Please...anyone....?
In a nutshell, bloke at party gets me to write down "Name of someone not here", I fold paper and put in top pocket.
"Imagine the person has just walked in and sat next to that lady there"......I laughed a bit, I was thinking about my 10 year old.
"It's a relative"
"It's a female ralative"
"Perhaps your daughter?"
I'm getting worried.
Bloke puts his hand on my shoulder.
"I'm going to go through the alphabet out loud, try not to give away any clues"
I concentrate REALLY hard on the letter 'L', simply because it has no relavance.
"It ends in 'E'!"
F:censored:K
"It's got an 'S' in the middle!"
Double F:censored:K
"It starts with S or R......so it's either 'Susie' or 'Rosie'!!!"
Bo:censored:ks...her name's Rosie.
How did he do it???? Please...anyone....?
D told me her name FFS.There was this geezer on radio 1 once who was one of these Derren Brown types.
Anyway he asked listeners to think of a letter and to concentrate hard on it, so I picked S, then just before he was about to give the answer he said change it for something else. I changed to D and somehow just knew that that was what he was going to say and it was.
I know it's a 26-1 shot but I felt as if I could have bet my house on him saying D. Strange.
Anyway he asked listeners to think of a letter and to concentrate hard on it, so I picked S, then just before he was about to give the answer he said change it for something else. I changed to D and somehow just knew that that was what he was going to say and it was.
I know it's a 26-1 shot but I felt as if I could have bet my house on him saying D. Strange.
Ok - without giving the trick away:
"Mind reading" as he is suggesting, is impossible.
The trick, therefore, is to ask questions designed to elicit a 'typical' set of answers. For each specific answer that is given, there are a set of pre determined possible answers. The questions asked are dependant on who is being asked the question. They are tailored to a specific 'type' of victim shall we say. Thats the maths part. Probability.
This probablity is then honed by reading a persons reactions to the questions asked.
You would be amazed at what can be learned by simply observing someones facial expressions & body language when asked a question.
There are lots of variations to this theme but they all work pretty much the same.
"Mind reading" as he is suggesting, is impossible.
The trick, therefore, is to ask questions designed to elicit a 'typical' set of answers. For each specific answer that is given, there are a set of pre determined possible answers. The questions asked are dependant on who is being asked the question. They are tailored to a specific 'type' of victim shall we say. Thats the maths part. Probability.
This probablity is then honed by reading a persons reactions to the questions asked.
You would be amazed at what can be learned by simply observing someones facial expressions & body language when asked a question.
There are lots of variations to this theme but they all work pretty much the same.
Arthur Jackson said:
But my daughter's name?(Although I accept he really had two goes at it...)
Getting actual names is slightly harder but along the same lines. Although the clue is here...
Arthur Jackson said:
Bloke puts his hand on my shoulder.
"I'm going to go through the alphabet out loud, try not to give away any clues"
That is just the point, you will, whether you like it or not, be giving away clues. The clever part is him saying "try not to give away any clues". That just makes you more concious of not giving anything away, and can have the oposite effect.
Once he has sensed your reaction to a letter it again comes down to probability. How many girls names end in e? Rosie & Susie perhaps? (probably, especially with a middle letter 's').
It does take a lot of practice and is still very very clever when done right.
It's all down to mathematics & psychology mate.
What I love about watching Derren Brown is the way in which he blends everything together so effortlessly. You know more or less how he's doing it, but he still leaves you totally amazed. He is exceptionally good at what he does.
Some of what he does still has me scratching my head thinking... "how the..... "
Some of what he does still has me scratching my head thinking... "how the..... "
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