SCEPCOP Forum

all right
so first than all
my definition of Mentalism is

The use of psychology, magic and related methods to accomplish psychic phenomena

for me it was born in the 1850 with the fox sisters.. doing an spiritism act.. mediums and such were the base of many of the methods still in use by mentalists today.

but there are those that think mentalism as like it is today was born in Chicago
with J. Randall Brown (no spirits).. the guy discovered as a child that he can locate objects that his peers hide it in places
at first he need them to take them by the hand.. then he used scarfs.. and no contact
this is today known as Muscle Reading.. is using the ideomotor response of the spectators to guide him unconsciously to many objects.. i read that one time he located an object as small as a pin while being completely blindfolded.
this feat is still in use today by Kreskin.

Mentalism. is not only muscle reading of course
it involves all the psychic phenomena
like telepathy, mind reading, clairvoyance and pk

in telepathy, perhaps the most famous performers were the Zanzigs that in the beginning of 1900.. did a very impressive telepathy show. using a very complex verbal code.. for example.. when they did radio shows, one of them would be in the cabin blindfolded while the other would collect items from people on the street, and the one in the radio show will be describing each and every one of the objects held or saw by his spouse.
the best couple doing that is Fankelstein and Willard. (they are so good they can even pass serial numbers) .

and in PK the best performer for sure is Uri Geller
he didnt invented bending spoons, the method preceeds him by a couple of years
but he was definetly the guy that make it famous

and.. now
the best performer of Mentalism nowadays
is Derren Brown. who has been accused of charlatan for tricking people in that what he does has something to do with NLP (truth is, he has never said he uses NLP). he has replicated all the phenomena above mentioned and he is simply awesome.
here is an example of his use of suggestion


Now is mentalism real?
yeah, some of it.. but a lot of it is a trick.. now i dont expect you to think this is real, it was made for tv after all
but those techniques do work some of the time (thats why you will never see him doing the same at a live show, the chances of screwing it are way too high)

and thats is that...

it should be noticed
that houdini did mentalism before he became an escapist superstar
thats why he spoted so easily the methods used by mediums,
when you are in the knowledge of the arts of deception you can bust cheaters
if you are not on the knowledge you fell for any magician just like kevin and hf2 fall for Uri.

Mentalism is way cool. Essentially, it's using all 5 senses to make a 6th sense. Just cool stuff.

I have a love affair with Mentalism ans Bizarre Magic.

And yes. - I must agree, that for the las forty years, or so, that Uri Geller was the very best act in town.

Now as to Ciscops's stated opinion that making full use of our five natural senses to their maximum level of refinement, can easily create the illusion of psychcic abililty, I do agree with this, although only up to a point.

After 30+ years of, - (admittedly). amateur research, I am personally convinced that ESP is a genuine phenomena, albeit a rare and highly erratic phenomena.

However, that is a topic worthy of it's own thread.

I shall simply say here, and with all humility I may add. - That I am a far better cold reader than any "store front" psychic I have ever met.

Without exception every professional psychic I have ever visited was utterly pathetic at this art and seemed in my opinion, to impress only on the amiability, rather than the gullibility of VERY soft audiences.

None of that alters my opinion that ESP, mediumship, etc, are genuine phenonmena, however.

Wow! Great post ciscop. Very interesting stuff.

I had always wondered what mentalism was all about and now I know. Thanks.

Tell us more, please.

Even non-mentalists do cold reading all the time. Have you ever looked at someone who looked older than their years because of wrinkles? You know they are self-absorebed with themselves and tanned all the time when they were younger. When you see someone wearing their watch on their right wrist you know they are left handed. Clothes? Very telling as to who they really are. Throw in a couple educated guesses and presto! you're now a bonafide cold reader.

I'm pretty sure this thread belongs in the Magic Tricks forum .... which disappeared.

Thanks for the write ups ciscop. Still catching up on the older threads.