Clipped from: Penn & Teller - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Penn & Teller

Sometimes, the pair will claim to reveal a secret of how a magic trick is done, but those tricks are usually invented by the duo for the sole purpose of exposing them, and therefore designed with more spectacular and weird methods than would have been necessary had it just been a "proper" magic trick.

Clipped from: YouTube - Penn and Teller Explain Sleight of Hand

Penn and Teller Explain Sleight of Hand

Clipped from: YouTube - Penn and Teller - cups and ball trick

Penn and Teller - cups and ball trick

Clipped from: Penn & Teller: How to Do the Saw Trick Video – 5min.com

Penn & Teller: How to Do the Saw Trick

Clipped from: Penn and Teller Explain Flag Burning Trick Video – 5min.com

Penn and Teller Explain Flag Burning Trick

Magic and the Brain: Teller Reveals the Neuroscience of Illusion

For Teller (that's his full legal name), magic is more than entertainment. He wants his tricks to reveal the everyday fraud of perception so that people become aware of the tension between what is and what seems to be. Our brains don't see everything—the world is too big, too full of stimuli. So the brain takes shortcuts, constructing a picture of reality with relatively simple algorithms for what things are supposed to look like. Magicians capitalize on those rules. "Every time you perform a magic trick, you're engaging in experimental psychology," Teller says. "If the audience asks, 'How the hell did he do that?' then the experiment was successful. I've exploited the efficiencies of your mind."

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2009-04-24

Penn and Teller Explain Magic Tricks