Notable quotes, excerpts, and profound lines.

[WT Sharpe]

.....Jastrow scientifically demonstrated what most magicians already knew. Magic has little to do with fast movements. Instead, conjurors use a range of psychological weapons to fool their audiences. Suggestion plays a key role in the process.
..........— Richard Wiseman (1966 - ), Professor of the Public Understanding of Psychology at the University of Hertfordshire (U.K.), former magician, fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI). Quirkology (2007).

.....I showed a group of my students a videotape in which a magician apparently used the power of his mind (actually sleight of hand) to bend a metal key. He then placed the key on the table, stood back, and said, "Look, it's amazing, the key is still bending."� Afterward, all the students were interviewed about what they had seen. More than half were convinced that they had seen the key continuing to bend.
..........— Ibid.

.....[A]n expert deceiver can draw upon years of experience to deliver a sentence with such confidence that people believe they see the impossible happening before their very eyes.
..........— Ibid.

[kennyc]

I believe every bit of it Tom......yes, I believe....I do...

[FlorenceArt]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

.....Jastrow scientifically demonstrated what most magicians already knew. Magic has little to do with fast movements. Instead, conjurors use a range of psychological weapons to fool their audiences. Suggestion plays a key role in the process.
..........— Richard Wiseman (1966 - ), Professor of the Public Understanding of Psychology at the University of Hertfordshire (U.K.), former magician, fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI). Quirkology (2007).

.....I showed a group of my students a videotape in which a magician apparently used the power of his mind (actually sleight of hand) to bend a metal key. He then placed the key on the table, stood back, and said, "Look, it's amazing, the key is still bending."� Afterward, all the students were interviewed about what they had seen. More than half were convinced that they had seen the key continuing to bend.
..........— Ibid.

.....[A]n expert deceiver can draw upon years of experience to deliver a sentence with such confidence that people believe they see the impossible happening before their very eyes.
..........— Ibid.

Oh, so that's what CSI means!

[GeoffC]

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by FlorenceArt

Oh, so that's what CSI means!

Originally Posted by GeoffC

I just got it.

But I believe the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry has been around longer than the TV shows!

[kennyc]

I'm skeptical....

[WT Sharpe]

I'm inquisitive....

[BenG]

I'm a committee.

[GeoffC]

I'm me.

[kennyc]

I'm outta here!

[WT Sharpe]

I'm posting another quote....

.....So far I have spoken only of what goes on in the natural world; now I must move up to the metaphysical level, by making use of a great though not very widely used principle, which says that nothing comes about without a sufficient reason; i.e. that for any true proposition P, it is possible for someone who understands things well enough to give a sufficient reason why it the case that P rather than not-P. Given that principle, the first question we can fairly ask is: Why is there something rather than nothing? After all, nothing is simpler and easier than something.
..........— Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646 - 1716), German mathematician and philosopher. Principles of Nature and Grace (1714).


Years ago, when I was young and ignorant enough to think that I may have been the first to whom the thought occurred, I said to a minister that it didn't make sense to me that anything at all should exist rather than nothing. He replied that was a stupid statement. I was glad when I discovered I wasn't alone in wondering why something should exist rather than nothing.

[kennyc]

I'm reading and approving/agreeing with another quote. Thanks Tom!

[WT Sharpe]

.....I would permit no man, no matter what his colour might be, to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him.
..........— Booker T. Washington (1856 – 1915), American educator, author, orator, political leader. Up From Slavery (1901), Chapter XI: "Making Their Beds Before They Could Lie On Them."

[ShortNCuddlyAm]

I'm joining in this thread with a quote...

"Like everyone else he had a label, since at that time no-one could live without one, but his 'ism' was of a non-committed kind: he was not a royalist, a Bonapartist, a chartist, an Orleanist, or an anarchist - simply a book-ist"
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables
(I'm sure it's better in the original French, but I've only read it in translation, not being exactly fluent in French)

[kennyc]

Welcome AM. Nice one. Thanks!