The Unnamed Magician Speaks
/Your first April post arrives a week early as there has been an update to a topic I wrote about last week.
If further updates occur, I’ll add them to this post.
Otherwise, I’ll see you back here Tuesday the 7th.
The Unnamed Magician has reached out to me to "clarify" the "trick" he's "selling."
He writes: (or SHE writes… Unnamed Magicians can be SHEs these days.)
This is Unnamed Magician. You can verify that this actually is my email from my profile on Lybrary.com. (So this isn’t a troll email from someone else pretending to be me.)
I have definitely thought about your offer, but as some other magicians have privately made me better offers (which were made after your blogposts), I am currently considering all my options. Hence why you haven’t heard back from me.
I do understand your position about why the effect appears to be impossible. But perhaps there is some confusion that needs to be cleared up here.
Perhaps you are thinking that I am making the claim that the spectator can truly stop anywhere they want (during the deal), and wherever they do stop, the next card will be the one I predicted.
If that’s how you’ve interpreted my trick, then you’re right to think it’s impossible. But that isn’t what I’m claiming
Since a card can’t freely float around the deck changing positions, as we both know, the spectator can’t freely stop anywhere. Thus, in reality, the spectator only has an illusion of free choice in my trick.
Without giving away my method, I can tell you this much about it (I trust that what follows stays between us and doesn’t go anywhere else):
My method is essentially a way to force the spectator to stop dealing at the correct point (a force that works about 95% of the time), but without them realizing that they’re being forced or cued to stop there.
On the other hand, consider a case where the spectator deals through the deck and you kick them or cause them to feel a vibration via some means, cuing them to stop dealing. In these cases, the signal or cue is something they consciously register / are aware of. Thus, these cases would fall in the instant stooge / dual reality camp.
With my method, the thing that’s influencing them or cuing them to stop dealing at the correct point isn’t something they are consciously aware of. Thus, after the effect if you were to ask them why they stopped dealing where they did, they will say “I just felt like it” or “I randomly did.” To them, it will appear like a free choice. Thus, they won’t be an instant stooge and they won’t be experiencing a different reality (compared to those watching).
I can’t say more without revealing the actual method, but I just wanted to explain as much as I could without outright giving away the method. I’m definitely not claiming that the spectator can freely stop anywhere as a matter of fact, only that they have an illusion of that (in reality they are forced to stop at the correct point but in a way that they aren’t aware of it, and the force only works about 95% of the time).
Of course, it isn’t a psychological force - those only work about 80% of the time in the hands of a good performer and aren’t repeatable.
Furthermore, when performing this for lay people, I can simply tell them to deal through the deck and stop wherever they want. But when performing this for magicians, I will say beforehand “When you deal through the deck, don’t decide ahead of time where to stop. This won’t work in that case. For example, if you’ve already decided right now that you’re going to stop at a particular position in the deck, then this trick won’t work. In order for this to work, you need to deal through the deck without any knowledge of where you’re going to stop and just stop randomly somewhere along the way.” This is to prevent a CAAN type mentality from arising, as my method certainly can’t work in the context of a CAAN trick (as obviously I can’t force the spectator to think of a particular number ahead of time).
I hope this clears up some confusion.
Best,
Unnamed Magician
Now, a younger version of me would probably be angry at this point. "This guy thinks I'm an idiot!" But I've evolved. Now I just feel embarrassed for him.
"I have definitely thought about your offer, but as some other magicians have privately made me better offers (which were made after your blogposts), I am currently considering all my options."
First, no. No magician is paying more than the $20,000 I offered you. I have a working relationship with the handful of people who actually spend serious money on rights, and this isn’t the kind of thing that commands that kind of price.
There are endless ways to do similar tricks already in the literature. Certainly none come with the fantastical conditions this one claims. But they would play mostly the same for a lay audience. Nobody is going to pay that kind of money just to impress magicians.
Second, my offer wasn’t just $20,000—it was $20,000 with you retaining the rights. That’s already an unusually favorable deal. So when you say you have “better offers,” it raises a more basic question: What would a “better” offer even look like?
Third, even if you were considering some other offer… you’re also still taking pre-sales on this. Why wouldn't you still want the most public skeptic of your trick to confirm it’s legitimate.
Fourth, just to get this off the table, you no longer have a "better offer." As of now, I’m offering $5,000 more than whatever your highest offer is for the exclusive rights.
You can see the shape of the escape hatch forming.
At first, the likely explanation for why this would never be released was going to be:
“Not enough sales. That’s why you’ll never see it.”
Now, with that option gone, a new explanation appears:
“Someone else bought the rights. That’s why you’ll never see it.”
Different stories, but the same outcome.
Now let's get to the method he's suggesting.
"With my method, the thing that's influencing them or cuing them to stop dealing at the correct point isn't something they are consciously aware of."
mmhmm… sure.
Over on the Cafe you have some people saying, "You can't say this trick isn't real. You can only say you don't think it's real."
Actually, that's not true. When you start putting conditions on a trick it becomes very easy to say if a trick is real or not.
A folded card is removed from a coin-purse. It's the spectator's thought-of card.
Okay, that's fine.
A spectator brings their own coin-purse to the show. They look inside. It's empty. They think of any card. They open the purse and now there is a folded card inside. It's their thought-of card. You never touch the purse or the card. Completely impromptu. The card is a genuinely free choice and never spoken or written at all. You don't even know the card until the spectator unfolds it.
That's not real. And this can be stated definitively. It's not just: "Well you can't think of a method. That doesn't mean there isn't one."
When conditions are given for an effect, they cement certain "realities" of the method. When those realities are contradictory, you can safely say the trick isn't real.
The Unnamed Magician wants you to believe that he has a way of “influencing” the spectator that reliably gets them to stop dealing the cards 95% of the time, but that they don't sense.
That's not a thing. It doesn't exist.
If an external cue is 95% reliable then it will be obvious.
If an external cue is subtle, it will be unreliable.
What he's suggesting is a technique that:
Interrupts an ongoing action at a millisecond-precise moment.
Does so without crossing the threshold of conscious awareness (no sound, vibration, visual flicker, pressure, unease, etc., that the person registers).
Works repeatably across different people, dealing speeds, rooms, and attention levels.
What is this technology supposed to be?
Subliminal audio or visual cues have a success rate of about 10%.
Infrasound or sub-audible tones don't offer controllable reactions with pinpoint precision.
Guys… you wouldn't have a 95% success rate on this thing even with the most advanced brain implants. Even in a lab, using one of those things, influencing behaviors tops out somewhere around 70%. And that's with calibration, cooperation, the other person consciously engaging with the system… AND A FUCKING IMPLANT IN THEIR HEAD!
What he's describing is science fiction.
Doing this effect with a borrowed, shuffled deck, and having an external cue that is precise + reliable + invisible = incompatible conditions = not real.
There's a logical flaw with what he's suggesting too. Let's do a thought experiment. Let's imagine a scenario where he has stumbled onto something that offers reliable, precise, and completely unnoticed behavioral control in a complex voluntary task like stopping a card deal at one exact moment.
That still wouldn't work, because you would also have to get them not to stop earlier than the point you triggered your "invisible cue."
We've all done tricks where we ask people to stop dealing through cards at any random point. And what happens? Do they just deal through the deck to the end because they never got hit by our secret pheromone laser? No. Usually they deal a few cards and stop. Does this new technology prevent them from doing that before they get to the force card?
Also, in the demo video he asks the young lady if she wants to keep dealing. So we're suggesting that not only does this technology get them to stop dealing, but then it sort of… hypnotizes them to not want to deal a couple more cards? Okay. Sure.
The truth is simple: a cueing system that could invisibly and undetectably control someone's actions with this level of precision and reliability would be worth billions. It would revolutionize neuroscience, marketing, defense, and medicine. It wouldn't be sold on The Magic Cafe for a hundred bucks.
Look, I don't love having to write posts like this. And to the Unnamed Magician, who probably thought his email might throw me off the scent and buy himself a little more time to keep selling this without a credible challenge—it probably feels particularly harsh. But this is me being nice. I could have talked wayyyy more shit about this.
Here's me being even nicer…
I know the Unnamed Magician is feeling pressure in his real life and money has become an issue. And with this attempt to make some quick cash crumbling around him—and his reputation taking a hit—he's probably feeling a bit trapped. I don't love that for him.
Here's the thing: I've seen people dig themselves out of worse holes than this. The magic community has a short memory for people who own their mistakes and a long one for people who don't.
So if he ever wants help finding his way out of this predicament, he can reach out. I'll work with him on it. I have no issue with the guy. Only with this particular approach at a cash grab.