I provided two examples of common usages of the word "trick" that only mean "demonstration of skill". When we say that a juggler or other circus-type performer does a "trick", and when my friend Joe (Who is not an allegory, but rather an actual person in my actual group of friends) does his "pinky trick". Whether you see it or not, those are common usages. If you are suggesting that there is no astonishment, awe, or wonder in seeing amazing skills well performed, and insist something about them must be "inexplicable", then I would recommend you to go see a Cirque de Soleil show. Tell me if the entire audience was bored out of their gourds at seeing such 'explicable" phenomena.

Additionally, remember what G.O.B. thinks of "tricks."

Yup, CR, you can just change the definition of words to suit your purpose, but that does not prove anything or even support it.

"Inexplicable" means there is no explanation. Performers at Cirque may do amazing things and be very entertaining, but it can all be explained. It is not magic.

But, I understand -- you feel that as long as your audience is not bored then you must be doing something extraordinary. You probably are. Not magic, but un-boring."

So, in the new vocabulary skill and not-boring is considered magic, then what word do you use for a demonstration that actually is inexplicable?

By the way, no one I know or have ever known has used the term "trick" when referring to a juggler or trapeze artist. Different circle of friends, I guess -

and I doubt your claim of "common." No matter, if what you do keeps your friends applauding tricks it is good thing compared with playing video games.


I am glad you have found a venue that works for you. I'll stick with people who appreciate magic. You will probably make more money.

You continue to argue against things I haven’t said, and infer things about my own performance that you could not possibly know. As I said, I only meant to add a semantic wrinkle, but perhaps the semantics got too wrinkly for you to properly follow along. My apologies. In direct reference to your questions, I would say that “my” definition (you’ve honestly never heard of a juggler doing tricks?) does not exclude the inexplicable. Indeed, I agree that’s what makes a magician different from another artist. I did not claim that Cirque is magic, only that it generates awe, wonder, and astonishment. I would add overall that I attempt to distinguish “magic” and mentalism, and you don’t seem to be making any distinction, so perhaps we are just discussing very different ideas.

Interesting... Did any of these people have trapeze experience? The reason I ask is because I do. Years of it. Guess how the teachers and the students referred to the skills they were either working on or ready to perform... Yup, "tricks". As in "What trick are working on today?" and "What trick are you going to throw?"

The guy asked for help, got it, grew and used it. Perhaps the symantics and after chatter are better suited in a new thread.

To add to Tom's comment, I'll offer up that as a juggler for 30 some years, we refer to the skills as tricks also. As a matter of fact I use the term when juggling but never with magic. I want to amaze and entertain my audience, not trick them. To me the term "magic trick" just reduces the whole art to something trivial, at least in my mind. Your mileage may vary but it just never sat right with me.

I was looking at a presentation of Coinvexed using hypnosis and was curious about what I might find here. I will preface my remarks and share some of my background. My early training prior to medicine was in Psychology. So my interest in hypnosis derived more from its clinical use. I spent a month at the no longer extant Voluntary Controls Group at Menningers studying Biofeedback from people who trained with the Greens, the couple who brought biofeedback to the US from Europe. During my time there I got to look at their "copper room," essentially a Faraday Cage where they studied paranormal phenomena. My younger brother has a therapy practice in which he uses hypnosis. What is interesting about him is that prior to using hypnosis clinically, he learned stage hypnosis. I remember the first time I saw him do it I was really amazed by his performance. It was really enjoyable as entertainment and he also made a lot of it very funny. I have used hypnosis in clinical practice for a variety of reasons but have never, at least with intent, used it in my magic performances.

I say intentionally, however, because there is no doubt that while I am not doing either stage hypnosis or demonstrating hypnosis during a performance, there is no doubt that I am using similar techniques in performing magic as I would in utilizing clinical hypnosis. Hypnosis relies upon the suggestibility of the subject. The ability to both identify and exploit that suggestibility is dependant upon the training of the hypnotist. The practice of stage hypnosis depends upon the same things and in addition, a certain stage presence of the performer, perhaps a better term being showmanship.

Guess what. Doesn't magic depend upon some of the same factors involved in hypnosis? We most certainly use suggestibility as well as to a certain degree NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) in what and how we say things to spectators. I just happened to see this while looking at the Coinvexed video discussion of equivoque. We all know how to say, pick this one OR this in order to force a choice.

As has been mentioned, the audience comes with the expectation that they are going to be fooled. I would not use the word lie because the word carries the connotation of deceit. In performing magic, no harm comes to the spectator. Quite the contrary. Hopefully, the audience will enjoy the performance. I believe that anything someone does to better their craft is acceptable. In this situation, the audience is not going to be given business cards from a clinical hypnotist, they would be receiving one from a magician. Therefore, there is no deceit here. No harm. No foul.

I see this thread is just as fun and collaborative as it was months ago. ;-)