What magic teaches us about misinformation
“The things right in front of us are often the hardest to see,” declares Apollo Robbins, the world’s most famous theatrical pickpocket. “The things you look at every day, that you’re blinded to.”
As he says these words, he’s standing on stage at a TED conference in 2013. He invites the audience to close their eyes, then to try to recall what he’s wearing. It’s not easy. We imagine that we would have filed all those details away, after a couple of minutes of looking at him speaking. And indeed we could have done. But we didn’t. When we open our eyes we see he’s wearing a dark waistcoat and jacket, a striped tie and a dark-purple shirt.