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has been mentioned in the threads on Double Back - http://www.talkmagic.co.uk/viewtopic.php?p=16640#16640 - and TT Tone - http://www.talkmagic.co.uk/viewtopic.php?p=16639#16639 - and is the keynote to most effects. Having the guts to do it, the sheer brass nerve to get away with it and similar, but far less repeatable, phrases could be used.

Practice is paramount as this brings the confidence to do something which the specs won't see. As an illustration, there was a programme on Sky a couple of weeks ago where Lance Burton showed a few of the secrets of magic (but nothing really startling) as an illustration of how science, misdirection and optical illusions are used regularly in magic.

He took a deck of blue backed Bikes, cut them about half way and asked the audience to count how many red cards were being dealt. He then dealt all the cards in the lower packet face up and, along with millions of others, I counted and got 17. Lance said there were probably about 17 or so but the thing which was far more important, all the cards dealt had red backs therefore all the cards were red. And the cheeky thing was that the only blue backed cards used were the top one and the one cut to halfway down. The rest were all normal red back cards and, when the trick was re-run, this could be seen clearly, right under the collective noses. All our concentration was on the face up pile and counting the red suits so we just didn't see the red backs being shown openly. Marvelous misdirectional stuff and I was caught, hook, line and sinker. A lesson well learned and never to be forgotten!

A similar thing comes up in the handling of wild card that I use. I can't remember who devised the handling right now, but in the middle of it you clearly turn over a DF card with an ordinary one, but no-one ever notices it, even when you do it again later in the effect. I would have doubted that it would work if I hadn't seen it performed in fornt of someone before I bought it (I wasn't close enough to watch myself, though I would definately have spotted it if I was, but it worked on another magician so that was good enough for me!).

I'm also fascinated with what people actually remember. Sometimes when I reveal a chosen card I will 'get the wrong one' then hand them what they think is that card, and then when they turn it over it is the card they have chosen - simple to do but effective.
The amazing part, though, is when it is retold it often goes something like this. "I had the ... in my hand - I saw it and then I turned it over and when I turned it back it had changed to my card" - the fact is, obviously, that they received the card into their hand face down and the only time they turned it over was to see that it was the chosen card, but they remember it as the card changing in their hands..

Nice topic

I'm not an expert in the psychology of it all but it seems to me that most people really don't concentrate properly when watching stuff. When we watch magic with a trained eye we often spot what is going on or can make accurate educated guesses. The general public don't have the pointers that we have to look in the right places so they have to make assumptions of what is actually happening if they try to work it out. I imagine that, due to the fluid nature of thought's it is quite easy for the memory of what actually happened to get mixed up with what they thought might be happening, so effectively they remember something that didn't happen. There is also the ego thing, people like to think that they would be able to catch you out, so if you had simply switched the card they should have spotted you. Hence in the retelling they edit out anything that would indicate to others that they may have missed something, once again this could become confused with the actual memory until the retold version becomes what they remember experiencing.

Since, as I said, I know little of the actual psychology at the moment this could be completely wrong, but I'm sure one of our experts will know what is going on here and be able to enlighten us!

Does anyone else want to take a guess in the meantime?

our brain's are conditioned to expect certain criteria as we grow up for example that a cup has a hollow inside for holding liquid, so that when we see what appears to be a cup our brain's make up the rest.
thats why no one notices a solid cup, another example is when you cut a rope in the middle and tie it tougether this follws with our set of schiamers laid down from birth, so when you slide the not off the rope your brain puts what it knows with what actualy happens then comes up with 5.

Someone I know who does a lot of pickpocketing in his performance says that sometimes he lifts a persons watch - then asks them if they wear a watch. Very often they will say they left it at home - they can't seem to believe that he just took it from him.
I guess the confidence to steal a watch from someone is exactly what you're talking about
I'm only really starting to get the confidence to load an object on to a spectator - still far from having the confidence and skill to lift their watch. I'm quite amazed, though, at how easy it is to put a coin on to their shoulder, or in their top pocket - just takes a bit of guts...

I'm coming to the conclusion that this sort of thing is for a large part what magic is all about. Do you agree??

That's really interesting about the cards and misdirection, etc..
I think that this could be very useful. Spectators must be really stupid to miss everything. I suppose another example would be second or bottom deals, They just assume that you're dealing from the top. and to assume makes an ass out of u and me...

Don't ever assume that a spectator is stupid just because they miss stuff. The only reason that they miss it is that they don't know what to look for and are hopefully being well misdirected. If you get into thinking that they are stupid then you will get complacent and they will spot what you're doing.