James Randi shows his ESP

now I this is sort of a challenge I'd like to tell are there any amateur magicians or professionals as matter of fact in the audience today let's see some hands oh we've got a few here Oh on sorry you were that close I got the vibrations I didn't know what they were coming okay I want to tell you you ladies and gentlemen of science that I do this next demonstration just to make the magicians nuts because this is something that they have not solved it's not on sale and not in any of the catalogues or nothing like that not in the instruction books and I've never shown anyone how to do it but it's a very simple demonstration and it involves some mathematics I'm sure you'll forgive me these that I have in my hand here are what they call the ESP cards the circle the plus mark the wavy lines the square and the star these were designed by a man named Zener a psychologist in Switzerland many years ago who made up these cards usually they're much smaller these religious display kinds so the whole audience can see them clearly he made these up for tests in psychology particularly in parapsychology to test ESP powers of prediction powers and and of reading powers of telling what people were looking at now I have also here a brown manila envelope with a clasp on it this time that's good and a piece of black paper of photographic quality which is quite opaque and I'm going to take this whole works and I'm gonna give it to someone here in the audience where is it well I can give it to and this Sharleen gentleman right here if you don't mind would you okay I want somebody severely far away from me so I can't peek now here's what I'd like you to do sir I'd like you to take the five cards and mix them now I should say shuffle them but it's very difficult with only five cards you know so just take them and face down shuffle them up so they're thoroughly mixed in such a way that you and people around you that no one will know which card is which when you've done that let me know okay that was quick now I want you to take any two of them keeping them all facedown take any two of them and put the other three on the floor underneath your chair facedown done men okay now the other two you have in your hand you must not know what they are I want you to be sure that you don't know what they are but here's the tricky thing look at me for a second you've got the two cards look away and turn the two of them quickly face to face I think I heard that yes okay take that little package you card you have that pair of cards put them inside the piece of black paper just unfold it put them inside the piece of black paper okay and take that little package and put it inside the envelope and use if you will both the glue and the and the little see if they glue it really nasty I tried one of those previously but it glue the envelope and use the little of catch on it as well if you would got it okay so it's all sealed up now now make sure that when I approach your chair I can't see the other cards that are underneath hold your legs in front them or put something on top of them because of I were able to see what they are then I would know what the two in the olive were right okay now let me have the envelope I'll keep looking away from you and make sure I don't fall off the stage here okay now this will call the front of the envelope this will call the back this is a technical thing I want to get clear from the very beginning all right now what are the odds and this this is the the big question where's my pen there we are the big question right now is what are the odds of me being able to tell what one of the cards inside the envelope is this is the easy part 1/5 20% 1 in 5 ok that's it you suspect me of skullduggery you're right I know I don't know this gentleman I haven't met you before am I correct sir okay the chances of my final what one of the cards are correctly that is is one in five what are the chances of my funny or what two of them are come on this is statistics I know you hate it but you have to do it every now and then what are the chances are by knowing what both cards are inside the envelope one in twenty okay how did you get that one over five times one over four uh-huh what are the chances of my knowing what the two cards are without knowing in what position they are though think about this for just a second for years I was going around giving people the wrong figures the chances of my finding out what the two cards are by some superpower or something like that are not as easy to calculate as you might think you might think it's one over five times one over four but to tell you on which side of the envelope they're located that's a different matter I used to double a you say one in twenty no it's one in forty it's actually what 120 if it's on which side of the envelope they are if I just say I've got a and B and I don't say in what order they are that's a different matter altogether funny huh now this is the back of the other because you see the clasp right here and this is the front of the envelope very obviously I'm going to tell you right now that I know what cards are in here for example and on the back of the envelope here I have a sneaking suspicion that there we have the plus mark and I think that on the other side of the unload we have the circle that's the easy one and just to make sure of that I'm going to draw a circle on here and I'm going to draw our plus mark on there okay now this is what we call the moment of truth I'm going to open the envelope very carefully and who is Hickey you really look that didn't get making sure that no time to my fingers leave my hands and remember I said that on this side we had the plus on this side we should have the circle and let's see you see how correct we are and indeed when I open up the piece of paper we find that we do have all right want to take money on it just put money on it who's going to bat me come on let's get some calculations going here you what you see he was right when I asked what did the chances of my guessing what these cards are he said 100% that was my line that I'm supposed to come up with at the end of it all you see after they had done all the calculations yes the chances are 100% because this is a trick now wait a minute there's some other possible solution here I took the envelope from the gentlemen like this right and I walked across here with it I might have just very quickly just gone in here and done a switch for an envelope that was already inside my jacket well that's not true because you can see how can we prove that that's not true look at the other three cards of cards let's see the other three cards who you would please sir and hold them above your head and show them the aah we got the wavy lines we got the square and we got this or the start right hey very good okay now this is another example of what they call in the trade mentalism it appears to be done with the mind but it's done by sheer trickery I have had solutions for this offered me by scientists to say oh there's a computer chip buried in the envelope and there's a scanner inside their little camera on the end of your finger here and when you hit me well I've had every kind of solution offered me it's actually very simple you all know how I did it tough for more of James Randi and the Educational Foundation make sure you visit Randy's org

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Views: 709,515

Rating: 4.7301469 out of 5

Keywords: james, randi, educational, jref, the, amazing, paranormal, investigator

Id: sHN2kngOtk4

Length: 7min 45sec (465 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 04 2010

Reddit Comments

[u/trua]

He did this trick in July 2010 in Helsinki and got one card wrong. He got really apologetic, "sorry folks, sometimes even a magician messes up, it can't work every time, let's try this again..."

[u/znk]

The only part of the trick that's visible is when he opens the black paper. The cards aren't in the right order so he starts talking changes hands a couple of times while flipping it over.

[u/[deleted]]

Don't forget he gives specific instructions on which way the cards need to be facing inside the envelope; with their backs facing outwards. There's really no need for this other than it must allow him to identify them, as others have said, probably with embossing.

[u/spearo]

ESP.

James Randi is the world's most powerful psychic and spends his time: 1. attempting to convince us psychic phenomenon is not real by debunking fake psychics 2. feasting on the souls of the genuine psychics he discovers, thus increasing his own powers

[u/more_exercise]

Everybody agrees that he can switch the cards around if he needs to, right?

He has two guesses - the front and the back. Let's step back and ask:

"What are the chances that he doesn't name either of the cards in the envelope" (6/20)

This is the same as asking if he names exactly two out of the three cards on the floor. To get the first one, the odds are 3/5 and for the second one the odds are 2/4. Multiplied, you get 6/20.

Total abject failure odds: 6/20 Therefore, chances of guessing something: 14/20

"What are the chances that he names exactly 1 of the cards in the envelope" (12/20)

His guess on "front" matches one of the cards in the envelope, "back" matches one on the floor: 2/5*3/4 = 6/20

His guess on "back" matches one of the cards in the envelope, "front" matches one on the floor: 2/5*3/4 = 6/20

Total chances of getting one right, and the other wrong*: 12/20

(*Remember, he can switch the guesses around, so if Front is correct to the back, all he has to do is turn it around)

"What are the chances that he names both cards correctly (in either order)" (2/20)

His guess on "front" matches one of the cards in the envelope, "back" matches the other: 2/5*1/4 = 2/20

Total chances of getting both right, and being able to swap them to get the right answer: 2/20

Those odds simplify: 3/10 - abject failure. 6/10 - 50% success. 1/10 - resounding success.

Even with only the sneaky switcheroo, and nothing else, James Randi produces something amazing with a probability of 7/10.

[u/I_like_ice_cream]

Bear with me, 'cause I have a question that may not be related to how the trick is actually performed, but when he says that the odds of knowing one of the cards is .2, is that correct? If only one card were placed in the envelope, a random guess would be right 20% of the time, but if you only guess one, and two cards are envelope, doesn't that increase your odds to 40%? Did he just phrase is incorrectly?

[u/gayguy]

Here's my guess:

1. Someone in the audience knows which cards are in the envelope and gives him the cards as an answer to his "what are the odds?" question.

2. He has no idea which is on which side, he flips it so he is correct.

[u/PatternWolf]

I can't tell you how he did it, but I do know that James Randi is a great speaker and skilled magician. Part of his "Magic" is done through the audience making immediate assumptions with out them even thinking about it.

He has a TED video destroying the psychics.

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/james_randi.html

[u/Crynth]

He should perform that trick on Penn & Teller: Fool Us.