What Can Magic and Science Tell Us About the Experience of Thought Insertion

Mentalism is a magic genre that deals with mind reading, clairvoyance, prophecies, and thought insertion. Magicians often proclaim (performances, lectures), that they can insert specific thoughts into people’s minds, or unconsciously manipulate their behaviour. For example, magicians may give the illusion that they influence a person’s thoughts through telepathy or psychological priming (e.g., Derren Brown). In most instances, these demonstrations rely on a secret method that simply mimics thought insertion. These fake demonstrations can misinform the public and researchers about what may or may not be possible. This chapter will present in three sections how magicians provide the illusion that there are inserting thoughts into people’s minds and the recent scientific studies showing (1) magicians’ techniques that significantly influence simple thoughts and behaviours and (2) why magic provides a useful tool to mimic thought insertion and (3) how to mimic thought insertion with magic. We will try to distinguish fact from fiction and provide some insight into the type of thoughts magicians can or cannot reliably insert in people’s minds, and discuss the benefits of using magic to induce thought insertion-like symptoms in non-clinical populations.