Derren Brown

[jonnyrocks]

All this talk of being able to predict the lottery based on history and statistics is basically ****, check out this recent article in New Scientist: http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg2 ... mbling.htm , go to page 2 'In it to win it' for the lottery specific part of the article. Even if one set of numbers came up one week, that exact set of numbers is just as likely to come up as any other.

 

[Gavin]

No it wasn't a trick.
It's based on probability and they just happened to get it right.

If there was a way to predict lottery numbers based on probability, it would have been done before. The only reason that a lottery can exist, and can't be exploited, is that there is no mathematical way to predict the outcome. Derren Brown is absolutely not the first person to try and predicit lottery numbers mathematically. It can't be done.

Bollocks if I'm gonna believe that its a camera trick, Derren wouldnt cheapen his rep like that.

Well, he just has. Why did he work out those averages himself, instead of one of the group doing it as they had before? Why weren't the group allowed to see the numbers before, or even during, the draw? Because the "predicted" numbers didn't exist.

That split screen thing is a trick, and would be totally past the point. It was not used, the only people who think so are the ones fooling themselves.

No, you're right. He actually predicted the lottery numbers.

 

[mrclam]

No no no.. I'm sure you're 100% right.. he REALLY DID predict the winning numbers..

That's why he didnt buy a winning lottery ticket... And thats why no-one won on Wednesday.

Do you HONESTLY think if he was sooo sure he'd win, that he wouldnt have bought the ticket (and then donated money to charity?). That would've been a MUCH more impressive trick.

As would showing the numbers BEFORE they appeared on tv.. Afterall it would've been too late to buy a ticket (machines close at 7.30).

If you REALLY think he predicted the numbers using averages - then you're a fool.

BTW - Using my own derren brown powers of prediction.. What'll happen next is that someone WILL win the lottery by total accident by using this technique - it'll be all over the papers.. and someone will post here and say "see - it worked!"

 

[Ormerod]

Right, we get it... your sceptical.

All the things you question were explained if you watched the show more closely. If you can prove it was a camera trick, then that's fine. But no proof has come forward and I know how the media & public are, if they were involved in such a trick, they'd be quick to expose it for cash in hand.

Anybody can call me silly for not thinking it's a camera trick, but it's yet to be proven apart from a few teenagers on youtube speculating.

 

[SaiyanHajime]

Ormerod, what did you think the snow-flake in the ad was about then?

 

[Ormerod]

Haven't got a clue, but it doesn't mean 'everything I tell you is a lie tonight'.

Like somebody pointed out there were the lottery numbers on the lamp-post, but it didn't mean they would be the winning numbers, and they weren't lol.
I am not entirely sure what to believe, but I don't believe it was a camera trick. I will if it's proven to be.

To be honest, I've got over the whole lottery bit, I was more looking forward to the next episode - How to control the nation.

 

[SaiyanHajime]

I think the snow flake was a way to warn us that he won't actually tell us how to do it.

A mathematician told me today that it doesn't make any sense and explained how Penney's game works (I still don't understand, if I'm honest) to me. It's pretty cool, but wisdom of crowds cannot make a judgement of something random. It's not possible. And it's common fallacy to expect that past draws affect future ones.

I think the whole show was mind trick in itself and follows through into the title of next weeks show perfectly. Most people are now skeptical, or like Ormerod gullible, and he'll blow us away next week. That's what I recon. Or something along those lines.

The camera trickery which undoubtedly made the lottery prediction possible isn't the sort of thing he usually does. But doing the opposite of what we expect is what he usually does. We expected mind games, we got the sort of thing normal magicians on the tv have been doing for decades, but he cleverly concealed it up in a bundle of red herrings which sound plausible because they are the sort of thing he specialises in.

I am looking forward to next week, but I'm also expecting another snow-job now of some kind. But that's probably the point.

 

[Ormerod]

I am not gullible.

Gullible would be thinking you know how the 'Lottery Prediction' was done. Too many people seem to be treating it as though they know it was a camera trick. Yes I am sure most of you were in on the prediction to know that, how awesome.

I don't know how the prediction was done, and neither does anybody on this forum If they do think they know, or treat their opinion like it's fact then that would be gullible.

 

[mrclam]

*face palm*

 

[Screaming Coasters]

This trick was unlike anything else he's done before. And I can't help but wonder if he's, almost, duping his biggest fans - the ones likely to believe any explanation he gives.

It's not unlike anything else he's done. Hes always messing with probability, hell, most of his tricks are based around maths and patterns. So really, it's exactly the same as all the others.

 

[SaiyanHajime]

Except, that's not what he did.

You explain to me how wisdom of crowds and the coin trick helps what he did? They are both factual things on their own, but they don't help you predict the lottery. Penney's Game is a phenomena of game theory. Probability states you have higher odds with certain combinations against others, because for example against three heads, since it's a 50/50 chance to get heads or tails, you're more likely to throw a tails in there somewhere. How does this help the lottery? In which there are 6 numbers to correctly guess, not 3, and any of those can be one of 49... not 2? It DOESN'T. In the lottery you cannot get the same number twice, so it's the SAME probability for ALL numbers in that machine. Thus, there is no messing with probability in the lottery. Unless you can explain to me otherwise?

You're probably failing to understand that past lottery draws DO NOT affect the next ones. The wisdom of crowds cannot work here, because the crowd has nothing to be wise about. When inspecting the weight of a bull, everyone can make a VALID judgement on it's weight. So the average of the guesses will be pretty damn good, if not perfect. If, however, everyone had to guess the weight of a bull they'd never seen before... They wouldn't guess right. Regardless of any writing technique. You cannot draw upon information you do not have. Judging the weight of a bull is drawing upon a life's experience of experiencing weight visually and relating it to abstract numbers that we use as a weighting system. In fact, judging the weight of an unseen bull isn't all that hard either, you've still got a rough idea of how heavy a bull should be. Judging the next numbers of the lottery, isn't drawing on ANY past knowledge, because NO past info is RELEVENT because it's RANDOM.

OR, you actually think that those people psychically predicted the numbers. If you do, then you're going against everything Derren Brown has EVER taught us about what he and others like him do.

Most of his work is based around the power of suggestion. So, yes, in that sense - it's not unlike what he normally does. You and Ormarod are proof of that I guess.

 

[Screaming Coasters]

Except, that's not what he did.

Thats exactly what he did, otherwise there would be no point in using a calculator. It's all probability.

 

[mrclam]

Thats exactly what he did, otherwise there would be no point in using a calculator. It's all probability.

*face palm*

Yes - you're correct.. probability...

The probability of getting the numbers right based on averaging peoples guesses is a few hundred million to 1.

The probability of him using a simple camera trick - evens.

 

[SaiyanHajime]

Except, that's not what he did.

Thats exactly what he did, otherwise there would be no point in using a calculator. It's all probability.

Wth does the calculator have to do with anything? My God this is like having an argument with a theist. Please explain how you think he did it, in your own words. Actually, you perform the same trick on next weeks lottery. I want to see you win. Oh, whats that? You won't be able to? Why's that?

-----

Do you not understand what a red herring is?

Those 24 people were chosen because they are the type of person unlikely to question his actions. Chosen because they are easily convinced. Or easily "hypnotised" into wanting to believe Brown. And that the WHOLE thing was a elaborate way to show how easily convinced we all are. Alternatively, they were all actors, but I don't think this is likely. This kind of trickery relies on there being an air of truth and things we expect from the performer. That entire thing was a fabrication. None of it had anything to do with how he actually performed the trick.

 

[Ben]

Derren Brown is a complete and utter ****-shaft.

 

[Ormerod]

Those 24 people were chosen because they are the type of person unlikely to question his actions.

I agree with you here. Like Brown previously showed us how he controlled that guy into a state of fear, with the whole cup/knife thing. He can play people and make them believe something, by gaining their belief.

That entire thing was a fabrication. None of it had anything to do with how he actually performed the trick.

I don't believe the probability method. However I don't believe it's camera trickery because even a 2 year old could point out that. He would surely go for something which involves him as part of the trick, and not rely on the skill of camerawork.

 

[SaiyanHajime]

Sounds like you've changed your mind Ormerod. *thumbs up*

As for your last comment, I sort of agree. I'm starting to wonder if it was slight of hand of some kind now. There was a marker on the floor.

Whatever it was, it was a post-event trick.

How he did it is pretty unimportant to me. I wanna know why. Like, what his "point" was.

 

[Ormerod]

Sounds like you've changed your mind Ormerod. *thumbs up*.

Haha, I never actually believed the probability side, I just stood up and said that I disagree with the camera trick speculation.

At least this next episode we will all be able to judge and have a say on his next illusion/trick - subliminal video.

 

[mrclam]

I don't believe the probability method. However I don't believe it's camera trickery because even a 2 year old could point out that. He would surely go for something which involves him as part of the trick, and not rely on the skill of camerawork.

I know this is going to be hard for you.. but lets try common sense here..

if it wasnt a camera trick - why not have a live audience?

if he really did predict the numbers using averages and the like - why didnt he buy a ticket?

 

[Lain]

I agree with Joey completely (never thought I'd say that ).

It obviously wasn't a genuine prediction. That's impossible, and I don't think anyone here is saying that's what has happened.

Everything in the show was just entertaining stuff to do with probability, and clearly had nothing to do with the trick. The wisdom of the crowd thing cannot work on something like the lottery, as Joey pointed out already.

I am skeptical about the camera trickery business, though. Proponents of that theory seem to be clutching at straws a little bit. People seem to forget this is an illusion, and unfortunately, these people don't like not being able to figure out how magic tricks are done.