Oi! Derren Brown! NO!

[torqueofthedevil]

The point about the car has been laboured but it makes me laugh that people are buying this whole "he didn't seize opportunities so he doesn't make his own luck" - I always help people out, scratch scratch cards, take opportunities etc. And I wouldn't say I'm particularly lucky. And like somebody else said, he'll know about it if he seizes those opportunities from Nigeria!

And basically he ended up benefiting from this journey of discovery that DB took him by gambling his life savings! Great, why not just take that money (and each weeks wages) and take it to the casino! Why don't we all seize the opportunities of the roulette table?

But moving on, DB obviously would not go to the trouble of making that show and carrying out a public performance if that dice wasn't 100% definitely going to land on the right number! That goes without saying - so there mustve been a trick. As others have tried to say, I have no problem with tricks, magic tricks are entertaining, but give up with all the other rubbish before it!

And the same applies to all the other shows!

[carmonk]

I must admit I hope I don't get a reply about the wheel-changing, it is getting a bit boring whatever the explanation.

In terms of the whole show I agree with you. The theme was actually an interesting one, basically that networking provides opportunities and to a certain extent you make your own luck. The problem came with the life savings thing. Anybody who puts their life savings on a 6 to 1 chance can either afford to lose them or has the brains of a louse. Obviously the butcher had been told he would win, so clearly he made the right choice to 'make the bet' adn take home a guaranteed £5K, but mindless gambling has little to do with searching out and assessing opportunity.

[carmonk]

Bedazzled said:

carmonk said:

I call it making an informed decision based on observational and circumstantial evidence

There you go again, referring to your own ill-informed speculation as 'evidence', you don't even understand the basics of personality types and their likely reactions.

But we've seen that you're nothing more than a fan-boy, unwilling or unable to present any other argument but 'I believe', so I'm not sure where that leaves us. What's next, are you going to post up one of these for DB? http://youtu.be/kHmvkRoEowc. Leave Derren Alone!

[carmonk]

I happened to switch on to a repeat of 'Fool Us', where magicians attempt to fool Penn and Teller with a routine or trick and if Penn and Teller can't guess how they did it, the magicians wins. One guy went down the Derren Brown 'psychology' route, allegedly hypnotising Jonathan Woss into seeing a 10 of hearts on an apparently blank playing card. P&T very quickly deduced that it was a trick pack of cards, essentially sleight of hand. Penn then forcefully made the statement (paraphrased, as I can't remember it all) - 'I just want to make the point that these tricks are NOT done by hypnotism or psychology, whatever people may tell you. That's all bullst. Absolute bullst!" So I'm wondering which DB supporters on this thread know more about magic than Penn Jilette

Edited by carmonk on Monday 28th November 12:56

[Mr GrimNasty]

I do actually believe such things as hypnosis, trance like states, power of suggestion, brain washing, mass hysteria etc. are demonstrable phenomena to an extent, it's just that I don't think they are powerful or controllable or predictable enough for DB to use them as a basis of his tricks when there are very easy alternative explanations using pretty standard ‘magic’ techniques.

[Melvin Udall]

carmonk said:

I happened to switch on to a repeat of 'Fool Us', where magicians attempt to fool Penn and Teller with a routine or trick and if Penn and Teller can't guess how they did it, the magicians wins. One guy went down the Derren Brown 'psychology' route, allegedly hypnotising Jonathan Woss into seeing a 10 of hearts on an apparently blank playing card. P&T very quickly deduced that it was a trick pack of cards, essentially sleight of hand. Penn then forcefully made the statement (paraphrased, as I can't remember it all) - 'I just want to make the point that these tricks are NOT done by hypnotism or psychology, whatever people may tell you. That's all bullst. Absolute bullst!" So I'm wondering which DB supporters on this thread know more about magic than Penn Jilette

Edited by carmonk on Monday 28th November 12:56

Because, like that chap, it's part of the act. He is, after all, an illusionist.

[carmonk]

Melvin Udall said:

carmonk said:

I happened to switch on to a repeat of 'Fool Us', where magicians attempt to fool Penn and Teller with a routine or trick and if Penn and Teller can't guess how they did it, the magicians wins. One guy went down the Derren Brown 'psychology' route, allegedly hypnotising Jonathan Woss into seeing a 10 of hearts on an apparently blank playing card. P&T very quickly deduced that it was a trick pack of cards, essentially sleight of hand. Penn then forcefully made the statement (paraphrased, as I can't remember it all) - 'I just want to make the point that these tricks are NOT done by hypnotism or psychology, whatever people may tell you. That's all bullst. Absolute bullst!" So I'm wondering which DB supporters on this thread know more about magic than Penn Jilette

Edited by carmonk on Monday 28th November 12:56

Because, like that chap, it's part of the act. He is, after all, an illusionist.

But it's not part of his act (and he wasn't performing, merely on judging). It doesn't benefit his own act to say psychology and hypnotism is bullst, and I've never heard him discredit other methodologies (apart from woo).

[erdnase]

carmonk said:

But whilst we're at it, I find it suspicious that you just happened to browsing a forum you've never posted on before, whilst looking for 'something else', less than 24 hours after the programme you were involved with was aired, and just happen to see this thread. That seems more in keeping with PR back office work, like many companies that trawl the net to gauge feedback of their products or services.

No sign of Frederick after this post? Hmm

[durbster]

carmonk said:

But it's not part of his act (and he wasn't performing, merely on judging). It doesn't benefit his own act to say psychology and hypnotism is bullst, and I've never heard him discredit other methodologies (apart from woo).

I didn't see it (magic shows bore the hell out of me ) but I seriously doubt Penn said that psychology was bullst. If you think that then there's really not much discussion to be had. Nobody's claiming that everything Brown does uses psychology or hypnotism. All I'm saying is that it's one part of his game. The wallet trick I put forward earlier is a nice example of it; card tricks are obviously not.

[carmonk]

durbster said:

carmonk said:

But it's not part of his act (and he wasn't performing, merely on judging). It doesn't benefit his own act to say psychology and hypnotism is bullst, and I've never heard him discredit other methodologies (apart from woo).

I didn't see it (magic shows bore the hell out of me ) but I seriously doubt Penn said that psychology was bullst.

He absolutely did. He said that psychology and hypnotism as an explanation for tricks is bullst. He appeared quite angry about it, understandably so. Had a look online and can't find it as I don't know the episode but maybe someone else can find it. I only saw that one act so I don't know what else was on unfortunately.

durbster said:

If you think that then there's really not much discussion to be had. Nobody's claiming that everything Brown does uses psychology or hypnotism. All I'm saying is that it's one part of his game. The wallet trick I put forward earlier is a nice example of it; card tricks are obviously not.

I don't want to go over old ground but IMO the only psychology DB uses is getting his audience to believe in his explanations. The card trick in the 'Fool Us' wasn't presented as a card trick, it was presented as the magician using 'suggestion' to get Woss to see something that wasn't there, just like DB does.

[carmonk]

erdnase said:

carmonk said:

But whilst we're at it, I find it suspicious that you just happened to browsing a forum you've never posted on before, whilst looking for 'something else', less than 24 hours after the programme you were involved with was aired, and just happen to see this thread. That seems more in keeping with PR back office work, like many companies that trawl the net to gauge feedback of their products or services.

No sign of Frederick after this post? Hmm

Funny that, eh?

[Carless Fury]

I only managed to get to page 5 of this thread, and so can only comment on what I've read, which appears to be "Derren Brown says he doesn't use stooges, but I say he does, therefore I am right and he is a fraud".

Am I close to the mark, or has there been some sort of evidence submitted one way or the other in the 12 pages I didn't go through?

Just curious, by the way. Not picking sides, as I don't know enough about the man to make a judgement call.

[cazzer]

Ordered my turkey of Wayne the Butcher at weekend.

I asked him "How you dealing with being famous"
In his own special way he said....

"Some dheads want fking signed photos, I'm a fking butcher"

But he did say that "It was only 5k ffs"
Which does sort of bely that 1k was his "life savings"

But he also said "I haven't a bloody clue how he did it"

[carmonk]

cazzer said:

Ordered my turkey of Wayne the Butcher at weekend.

I asked him "How you dealing with being famous"
In his own special way he said....

"Some dheads want fking signed photos, I'm a fking butcher"

But he did say that "It was only 5k ffs"
Which does sort of bely that 1k was his "life savings"

I'll be passing soon so I'll drop in and ask for a signed photo...

cazzer said:

But he also said "I haven't a bloody clue how he did it"

None of us know how he did it, but we all know how he didn't do it - by hypnosis or psychology.

[durbster]

carmonk said:

...I don't want to go over old ground but IMO the only psychology DB uses is getting his audience to believe in his explanations...

And in my opinion, the wallet on the ground is a perfect example of him using a psychology trick, proving it is part of his arsenal.

[erdnase]

durbster said:

And in my opinion, the wallet on the ground is a perfect example of him using a psychology trick, proving it is part of his arsenal.

I think I remember Derren doing two wallet type tricks - one was the wallet in the street with a yellow circle painted around it, and the other one was using his jedi mind tricks to have a guy hand over his wallet?

I'm sure the wallet in the yellow circle relied on a degree to psychology, and most likely a bit of favourable editing too. All magicians have "psychology" in their arsenal, from misdirection, cleverly worded phrases and exploitation of human tendancies in order to baffle us. It doesn't mean they're always using it, or that it's the default explanation when we can't come up with how the magician performed the trick. I'm sure it's in the mix, though.

Oh, while I'm remembering - does anyone recall that trick that kinda made people talk about Derren? It was phoning up public payphones and causing the person to fall asleep. I'm prepared to believe the people answering the phone weren't stooges, but I'm not buying the hypnosis explanation either.

I'm sure of we could hear what Derren said over the phone, we'd think "Aah, that's clever". I suspect it's something a little more sophisticated than "You're being filmed for a TV show, and if you play along, you'll be on tv", but closer to that than nlp/psychology/pattern-interupts and all the woo.

Derren hasn't done that trick for a while now, though.

[carmonk]

erdnase said:

durbster said:

And in my opinion, the wallet on the ground is a perfect example of him using a psychology trick, proving it is part of his arsenal.

I think I remember Derren doing two wallet type tricks - one was the wallet in the street with a yellow circle painted around it, and the other one was using his jedi mind tricks to have a guy hand over his wallet?

I'm sure the wallet in the yellow circle relied on a degree to psychology, and most likely a bit of favourable editing too.

Yep, 90% editing, 10% psychology in that the odd person will think, "Ah, there's a line around that wallet, it must be a trick."

erdnase said:

All magicians have "psychology" in their arsenal, from misdirection, cleverly worded phrases and exploitation of human tendancies in order to baffle us. It doesn't mean they're always using it, or that it's the default explanation when we can't come up with how the magician performed the trick. I'm sure it's in the mix, though.

Oh, while I'm remembering - does anyone recall that trick that kinda made people talk about Derren? It was phoning up public payphones and causing the person to fall asleep. I'm prepared to believe the people answering the phone weren't stooges, but I'm not buying the hypnosis explanation either.

I'm sure of we could hear what Derren said over the phone, we'd think "Aah, that's clever". I suspect it's something a little more sophisticated than "You're being filmed for a TV show, and if you play along, you'll be on tv"

I agree. I reckon it would be, "You're being filmed for a TV show, and if you play along, you'll be on tv and get £50"

I remember one when DB stared out of a window at someone and we were told that the power of his gaze caused the person to turn around. Hyuk! Hyuk! We're idiots! We'll believe that!

[erdnase]

carmonk said:

I remember one when DB stared out of a window at someone and we were told that the power of his gaze caused the person to turn around. Hyuk! Hyuk! We're idiots! We'll believe that!

I remember that, and think it was one of the key events in turning me off of Derren - the lottery stunt and some others too.

From what I've heard, his live stage show is spectacular, and I'd love to see it. I just don't get why someone like Derren - who is incredibly skilled and entertaining - resorts to camera trickery and making people turn round by staring at them and other hypnotic/nlp related flim-flams. I'm a fan of magic, but won't even watch Derren when he's on telly now (other than his very good debunking programs).

[hairykrishna]

erdnase said:

I remember that, and think it was one of the key events in turning me off of Derren - the lottery stunt and some others too.

From what I've heard, his live stage show is spectacular, and I'd love to see it. I just don't get why someone like Derren - who is incredibly skilled and entertaining - resorts to camera trickery and making people turn round by staring at them and other hypnotic/nlp related flim-flams. I'm a fan of magic, but won't even watch Derren when he's on telly now (other than his very good debunking programs).

Most of his live shows are available on 4od. They're generally excellent.

[durbster]

carmonk said:

erdnase said:

durbster said:

And in my opinion, the wallet on the ground is a perfect example of him using a psychology trick, proving it is part of his arsenal.

I think I remember Derren doing two wallet type tricks - one was the wallet in the street with a yellow circle painted around it, and the other one was using his jedi mind tricks to have a guy hand over his wallet?

I'm sure the wallet in the yellow circle relied on a degree to psychology, and most likely a bit of favourable editing too.

Yep, 90% editing, 10% psychology in that the odd person will think, "Ah, there's a line around that wallet, it must be a trick."

I work in video production. I know how easy it would be to set that up, but I also have enough imagination to see how it works as a psychology trick? I am enjoying your complete ignorance of the other video where somebody recreated the trick successfully btw. Convenient

When I was at Uni, we put a sign up at the bottom of the stairs saying, "out of order". We didn't think anybody would pay attention, I mean how can stairs be "out of order", and yet almost everyone looked at it, thought for a minute and went elsewhere. That was exactly the same trick, played in a different way. It just exploits our acceptance of authority.

Have you ever seen a show called The Real Hustle? That also relies heavily on psychology to affect people's behaviour. Some of Brown's tricks are exactly the same.