What’s Common to Magic and Physics?

I saw an episode of The Magic of Science on TV, a show where they use science for some of their tricks. I’ve never enjoyed learning how a trick is done; but to know when science is behind the trick…boring!

On the other hand, I did enjoy Alex Stone’s book, Fooling Houdini. Stone is a physicist who starts dabbling in magic, and his comments on the parallels between the two fields were highly entertaining.

For starters, he says:

“There’s something deeply liberating about letting go of the reins that couple cause and effect, the X and Y axes.”

Or as Stone’s guru, Wes James puts it:

“Magic is not about selling your prowess. It’s about the effect you create – a profound violation of the natural laws of the universe.”

There’s a trick in magic called the Ambitious Card trick that goes like this: Someone in the audience picks a card, signs it and inserts it into the middle of the deck. The magician then makes the card come to the top of the deck. I loved Stone’s analogy from physics:

“In the quantum realm, particles can tunnel through impassable barriers.”

Even today, magic is useful in gambling, especially the sleight of hand. But a magician can’t over-do this at the casinos because if he wins too much at a table, the casino’s alarms start sounding. That’s because casinos have probability tables. Stone’s analogy from physics:

“In physics, this is the essence of the second law of thermodynamics…a statement about what’s likely to happen over time when your sample size is extremely large.”

Many card game players on the street use magic. The best part?

“The greatest trick of all, the pièce de résistance, was that the audience never suspected that he was a magician.”

That reminded of the Kevin Spacey line from the movie, The Usual Suspects:

“The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist.”

Magicians don’t want us to look at their tricks too closely:

“(Magicians) regard magic tricks as quantum states – destroyed by the very act of examining them up close.”

And both magic and physics employ similar mental skills:

“I’d become convinced that physics and magic recruited some of the same cognitive engines. Both require a similar sort of mental gymnastics. Both are profound acts of the imagination. Both encourage you to think critically, challenging you to move beyond the quiet comfort zone of your daily experience.”

And finally, both fields share a bit of the exhilaration of power:

“Like physics, magic is all about nerds playing god with the universe.”