As a one-time member of the International Brotherhood of Magicians, let me inform you that we prefer to call ourselves "Illusionists!"
The issue is not whether to believe it, but whether you have enough dexterity and the ability to distract the attention of the audience.

Tom Robbins gave the best reason for belief in magic:
“Disbelief in magic can force a poor soul into believing in government and business.”
he also said:
“The magician and the politician have much in common: they both have to draw our attention away from what they are really doing.”
He expresses my view of government better than I can!

Well...that guy Criss Angel is really Incredible...He actually split a girl in half in one of his videos...But it's hard to believe that...don't you think that...But maybe he's a specialist surgeon and he fixed her
But all magic is nice to see and i really like watching all kinds of magic videos....

Better thing is tricks like bar tricks with coins and bottles which YOU can actually do

Why is everyone intressted in videos xD
I try to use magic myself
I don't like to watch people watch magic.. I want to learn how to use it..
Maybe you think I am mad, but the magicans that uses "tricks" ain't magicans.
Magicans are people that uses real magic

Well yeah, I agree that a lot of whom wants to learn some tricks to entertain friends or family, for example I know a trick with cards, every time I could find a card from the log somebody has picked, even though he or she was putting it back to the log and mixed the cards log.. After a while some people could get the trick, some weren't interested and some said it is incredible, how do you do it.. but eventually after some time when I told them, most of them said "pfffff" thats so easy.. and I felt, that yeah it is very easy.. I guess thats why usually magicians don't give away their tricks.. Even though I saw some TV shows where they do or at least somebody does..

Still.. Magic is not tricks Tricks are something else I don't call them magicans so please stopp calling them magicans xD
Magic is something else.. Something special. I am still trying to figure out what

Sorry folks, as a voodo performer, it seems that I am the only guy really able to talk about magics at the present moment.
So, without wanting to be offending against anyone, I would like you to pay attention to a small detail.
Magc is neither science nor technology. Science is now able to perform things like levitation or holography which seemed magic some hundreds of years ago.
However, what we name magic today concerns things that cannot be explained neither by sciene nor by technology.
That's why I moved the present topic off the "Science and Technology" forum, to "The Einstein Factor" forum.
Regards
Yordan

I don't believe in magic. It's all trick. But trick is brilliant.

"Magic" from a magician is an illusion. That I believe in. The magic with the powder and the the wands? Pure BS, I think. I think it makes a good story, though.

Now I understand my own problem. In french language we have two separate words.
"Le prestidigitateur" is the guy whose hands are very fast, and sometimes he also use powders and mirrors in order to make you believe things.
"Le magicien" is the guy who calls the supernatural powers around here, in order to obtain effects which are impossible by human standard means (like making rain fall without shipping rockets in the clouds). Sorcerers do that kind of things, but they use some artifacts which are not purely magics.

1. the art of producing illusions as entertainment by the use of sleight of hand, deceptive devices, etc.; legerdemain; conjuring: to pull a rabbit out of a hat by magic.
2. the art of producing a desired effect or result through the use of incantation or various other techniques that presumably assure human control of supernatural agencies or the forces of nature. ---Dictionary.com

I would like to note here the fact that magic is for entertainment. Also, if you look at the second definition it does say "techniques that presumably assure human control". So I would have to say I believe in magic. The magic of David Copperfield, Cris Angel etc. With this definition I have found, there is no doubt in my mind magic is real. Now when we start talking about putting hexes on people or other strange things of that nature, then I don't believe that.

This post has been edited by lonebyrd: Feb 20 2008, 02:32 AM