Lauren Moore's Response to Assignment 1

I find that math is filled with rigid structure as well as cleverness. There is structure in following a certain procedure to solve a certain problem. If you want to solve for a variable, you do the opposite of PEMDAS until the variable is alone. The more complex math becomes, the more lever it becomes. For instance, in a proof one might note that (x-y) = (x+a) – (y+a) where a is a constant. The equation itself has not changed, but it is still a crucial step in a proof.

Magic tends to follow the same idea as math. There is a certain structure that is followed. Show the audience the deck of cards. Shuffle the deck of cards. Split the deck of cards. Basically, try to prove that the magical object is as ordinary as possible. Then the magician uses a mixture of skill and deception, which some would call cleverness, to perform their trick. Thus, leaving the audience in awe.

Magic and math are related, for certain tricks at least. Math is the logic behind the magic, an explanation for why the trick works. Tricks such as sawing a person in half is not related to math. Illusions are not related to math. These are two instances where we should not force math and magic to be the same. They are completely different.

A magician displays a standard deck of blue cards. He shuffles and splits the deck repeatedly and continues to show the audience that the deck has not changed. It is still 52 cards with blue backs. An audience member selects a card, in this case say it is a 10 of diamonds. The magician shuffles the cards once more and slips the selected card back into the deck at a random place. After shuffling once more, the magician lays all the cards out again. There are still 52 cards, 51 are blue and 1 is red. The red card is the 10 of diamonds. Next, the magician leaves this red card out of the deck, so there are 51 blue cards. He shuffles the deck, shows the audience that there is nothing strange about the deck of cards. An audience member once again selects another card, say it is an ace of spades. The magician shuffles the deck and slides the selected card back into the deck shuffles and lays all 51 cards out. All the cards are blue, which does not follow the previous pattern. The magician picks up the red card that was never touched and shows it to the audience. It is no longer a 10 of diamonds but an ace of spades.

I found this trick to be very impressive. I’m sure there is some math behind this trick, but it is not apparent to me.