魔術表演充滿瞭戲法和幻象。當魔術讓硬幣 “憑空消失”，甚至 “預測” 你心中所想時，真正的 “魔法” 其實發生在你的大腦裡。魔術師巧妙地利用我們感知世界、集中註意力的心理過程來制造奇跡。瞭解這些不僅可以讓你更好地欣賞魔術，更重要的是能夠幫助你理解自己的思維方式，甚至識破生活中碰到的誤導性信息。本文淺析魔術表演如何幫助我們瞭解大腦的神奇和奧秘。
詞匯：magic 魔術
1 You’ve probably seen the impossible happen, or at least thought you have. When a magician makes a card disappear, or throws a ball into the air, only for it to vanish, it seems that they are using amazing powers. But the magic isn’t happening on stage. It’s actually all inside your brain.
2 These illusions work because of essential processes that happen in our brains. Our senses provide an enormous amount of information about our surroundings. Our brains have evolved ways of prioritising what’s important. We tend to notice the things that are most significant and remember those which have most meaning for us. What we perceive that we see or remember that we saw is actually a mental image.
3 These mental processes are exploited by illusionists to trick us into perceiving things in a particular way. In one famous trick, a ball is thrown into the air twice and caught and then vanishes into thin air on the third throw. This third throw is actually just a hand movement. Our brains predict that the ball will leave the magician’s hand so we think we see it. The same process makes a dog run for a stick when we pretend to throw it.
4 During a magic show, we are often manipulated to think that we have a freer choice than we actually do. Magician-turned-psychologist Gustav Kuhn highlights how a performer’s gaze can direct our attention towards some things and divert it away from others. Even babies naturally tend to follow where someone is looking.
5 Kuhn has become a researcher using the techniques behind different magic tricks to see what we can learn about how the brain works. He’s even teamed up with a toy manufacturer to produce magic sets that explain our mental processes. Understanding these could be important because while magicians use these deceptions to entertain us, others use similar approaches to mislead us or spread disinformation.
測驗與練習
一、將標題和段落配對。
Paragraph 1 ________
Paragraph 2 ________
Paragraph 3 ________
Paragraph 4 ________
Paragraph 5 ________
a. Mental processes
b. A tool for learning
c. The illusion of choice
d. Doing the impossible
e. Making things vanish
f. Using the audience’s brains
二、根據文章內容選出正確的選項。
1. Magicians have amazing powers.
a. True
b. False
c. Not given
2. Why do our brains prioritise the most important information?
a. to make tricks work
b. so we perceive a mental image
c. because we receive a large amount of information
3. Look at paragraph 3. What does ‘it’ refer to in the following sentence? Our brains predict that the ball will leave the magician’s hand so we think we see it.
a. the magician’s hand
b. the ball
c. a movement
4. What is mentioned as something that magicians can use to divert our attention?
a. telling stories
b. their eyes
c. playing cards
5. Magic sets can help teach how brains work
a. True
b. False
c. Not given
三、用下列單詞完成對本文的總結。
They look like magic, but 1) _______ harness our brains to create a 2) _______. Magicians are able to 3) _______ the way we 4) _______ the things in front of us. Our brains 5) _______ the most important information, creating a mental image.
perceive
deception
manipulate
illusions
surroundings
prioritise
mislead
（答案見詞匯表後）
詞匯表
magician 魔術師
vanish 消失
illusion 錯覺，假象
sense 感官
surrounding 周圍環境
prioritise 優先處理
significant 重要的
meaning 意義
perceive 認為
mental image 心理圖像，腦海中的畫面
exploit 利用
illusionist 幻覺魔術師
trick 戲法
vanish into thin air 消失得無影無蹤
manipulate 操縱
magician-turned-psychologist 魔術師出身的心理學傢
gaze 目光
divert 轉移（註意力）
team up 合作，聯手
magic set 魔術（遊戲）套裝
deception 騙術
mislead 誤導
disinformation 虛假信息
答案
一、將標題和段落配對。
Paragraph 1 d) Doing the impossible
Paragraph 2 a) Mental processes
Paragraph 3 f) Using the audience’s brains
Paragraph 4 c) The illusion of choice
Paragraph 5 b) A tool for learning
二、根據文章內容選出正確的選項。
1. b. False. When a magician makes a card disappear or throws a ball into the air, only for it to vanish, it seems that they are using amazing powers. But the magic isn’t happening on stage.
2. c. Our senses provide an enormous amount of information about our surroundings. Our brains have evolved ways of prioritising what’s important.
3. b. The pronoun ‘it’ refers to the ball leaving the magician’s hand.
4. b. Magician-turned-psychologist Gustav Kuhn highlights how a performer’s gaze can direct our attention towards some things and divert it away from others.
5. a. True. He’s even teamed up with a toy manufacturer to produce magic sets that explain our mental processes.
三、用下列單詞完成對本文的總結。
They look like magic, but illusions harness our brains to create a deception. Magicians are able to manipulate the way we perceive the things in front of us. Our brains prioritise the most important information, creating a mental image.
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