魔术表演充满了戏法和幻象。当魔术让硬币 “凭空消失”，甚至 “预测” 你心中所想时，真正的 “魔法” 其实发生在你的大脑里。魔术师巧妙地利用我们感知世界、集中注意力的心理过程来制造奇迹。了解这些不仅可以让你更好地欣赏魔术，更重要的是能够帮助你理解自己的思维方式，甚至识破生活中碰到的误导性信息。本文浅析魔术表演如何帮助我们了解大脑的神奇和奥秘。
词汇：magic 魔术
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.
测验与练习
一、将标题和段落配对。
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、根据文章内容选出正确的选项。
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、用下列单词完成对本文的总结。
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
（答案见词汇表后）
词汇表
magician 魔术师
vanish 消失
illusion 错觉，假象
sense 感官
surrounding 周围环境
prioritise 优先处理
significant 重要的
meaning 意义
perceive 认为
mental image 心理图像，脑海中的画面
exploit 利用
illusionist 幻觉魔术师
trick 戏法
vanish into thin air 消失得无影无踪
manipulate 操纵
magician-turned-psychologist 魔术师出身的心理学家
gaze 目光
divert 转移（注意力）
team up 合作，联手
magic set 魔术（游戏）套装
deception 骗术
mislead 误导
disinformation 虚假信息
答案
一、将标题和段落配对。
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、根据文章内容选出正确的选项。
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、用下列单词完成对本文的总结。
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.