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Yet Still More Quick Snippets

Published on Sunday, July 15, 2012 in , , , , , , , ,

Luc Viatour's plasma lamp pictureJuly's snippets are fresh out of the oven, and ready for your enjoyment and amusement!

This month, the snippets are all about math-based magic.

• Back in January, I mentioned a TV show called Square One TV, including the fact that Harry Blackstone, Jr., used to teach math-based magic tricks on the show. I've taken a little extra time to find all of these Backstage With Blackstone segments available on YouTube, and have linked them below:

5 envelope spelling
20 cent trick
1089 Trick
Cardless card trick (Addition)
Cardless card trick (18)
Dime, Penny, Nickel
Fibonacci Dice
Heads and Tails
Imaginary Dice
Magic Safari
Name the Number

There are several more Backstage With Blackstone segments, but not all are available via online video.

• Over at Futility Closet, there was a recent post titled Blind Dates, about a calendar prediction routine developed by Mel Stover. Interestingly, a similar routine was performed on Square One TV, but not in the Backstage With Blackstone sement.

If that catches your interest, and has you puzzled, check out my Easy Magic Square Cheat post from 2010. There are several resources there to help you understand it, and even expand the possibilities. (Note: Werner Miller's Age Square has moved here.)

• Speaking of Futility Closet, just as I was writing this post, they put up an entry called Order and Chaos, with a link to a similar 2009 post called So Much for Entropy. My post on the Gilbreath Principle (as it's known) helps you understand why this works. My write-up was even recommended in episode 152 of Scam School. You can find several more discussions of this amazing principle here, as well.

Professor Peter McOwan, of Queen Mary, University of London, has some excellent videos over at the Maths Careers site. Check out The Maths in Magic, a brief demonstration of mathematical magic without explanations of the routines. He also has a full lecture on how math is used to cheat people, titled Maths Hustle.

If you enjoy those, you'll probably also enjoy his other sites Illusioneering and CS4N (Computer Science For Fun).

That's all for now, but if you have any favorite links concerning math-based magic, feel free to share them in the comments!

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