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A Humboldt's squirrel monkey is fooled by the "French Drop" magic trick. Credit: E. Garcia-Pelegrin et al., 2023 The key to a successful sleight-of-hand magic trick is how well a magician manipulates ...

As kids, we loved a good magic show—we were fascinated by it, and now as adults, we're just as mesmerized by magicians. Even ...

A team of researchers performed magic tricks for several species of monkey, and they found that the animals’ gullibility may depend on the structure of their hands. Specifically, the team found that ...

An illusion involving a hidden thumb confounds capuchin and squirrel monkeys for the same reason it does humans -- it misdirects expected outcomes of actions they can carry out. However, marmosets ...

Stephen has degrees in science (Physics major) and arts (English Literature and the History and Philosophy of Science), as well as a Graduate Diploma in Science Communication.

A magician playfully tricks a monkey with a surprising illusion.

Psychologists used a sleight-of-hand trick called the French drop, in which an object appears to vanish when a spectator assumes it is taken from one hand by the hidden thumb of the other hand. The ...