Standaard Boekhandel gebruikt cookies en gelijkaardige technologieën om de website goed te laten werken en je een betere surfervaring te bezorgen.
Hieronder kan je kiezen welke cookies je wilt inschakelen:
Technische en functionele cookies
Deze cookies zijn essentieel om de website goed te laten functioneren, en laten je toe om bijvoorbeeld in te loggen. Je kan deze cookies niet uitschakelen.
Analytische cookies
Deze cookies verzamelen anonieme informatie over het gebruik van onze website. Op die manier kunnen we de website beter afstemmen op de behoeften van de gebruikers.
Marketingcookies
Deze cookies delen je gedrag op onze website met externe partijen, zodat je op externe platformen relevantere advertenties van Standaard Boekhandel te zien krijgt.
Je kan maximaal 250 producten tegelijk aan je winkelmandje toevoegen. Verwijdere enkele producten uit je winkelmandje, of splits je bestelling op in meerdere bestellingen.
In The Spectacle of Illusion, professional magician-turned-psychologist Matthew Tompkins traces the evolution of the arts of magic and illusion from the 18th century onwards. Organized thematically within a broadly chronological trajectory, the book presents the art of witches, magicians, illusionists, hypnotists, mediums and faith healers, and exposes the mechanisms and the fakery behind the claims.
After discussing the art of the trick, the power of suggestion and what magic can tell us about memory, belief, bias and perception, the book examines the practices of spiritualism and mesmerism and the misuse of hypnotism and magic tricks to sway belief and fool people. It highlights how gurus, faith healers and mediums have been challenged over the last 200 years by scientists and magicians, and examines some of the scientific investigations into the paranormal. Highly illustrated throughout with entertaining and bizarre drawings, engravings, double-exposure photographs and test sheets from the Wellcome Collection, the Harry Price Library and the Society for Physical Research, the book also features newly commissioned photography of Ouija boards, trick tables, props, automata and illusion boxes. It concludes with a modern-day analysis of anomalistic psychology – sleep paralysis, change blindness, hallucination and false memories – showing how unreliable the mind is, and how complicit in the success of the illusion.