This is a new self working card trick based on a very clever psychological principle. It was shown to me by a four year old child last summer and I was astonished by its simplicity and it's effectiveness. It is with that in mind that I share the method with you now:

Take a full deck of cards, have a card freely selected and returned to the deck. You then deal the cards in the following "flower" pattern. Take six to eight cards and arrange them in a circle face down so that the corners of the short sides touch and form a hexagon (or octagon, or whatever). Repeat this with the entire deck arranging as many flowers as possible on the table or ground.

One by one have the person select flowers to discard. Once a flower is discarded, the cards are collected and placed off to the side face down.

Once four flowers have been discarded collect the remaining cards, shuffle them and deal them into new flowers (again between six and eight cards per flower). Have the spectator eliminate the flowers one by one until there is only one left.

With the last flower, have the spectator choose "petals" (individual cards) to discard until only one remains.

Take that remaining card and turn it over and ask if this is the card that they selected.

The trick is based on the following psychological principle:

51 out of 52 times you will have the wrong card. The spectator (out of fear that you might try to repeat the experiment) will say "Yes, that's my card" and congratulate you for being so clever.

1 out of 52 times you will have the right card. If this happens, it is a miracle of a semi-religious nature. If there are any knowledgeable magicians in the audience, they will be completely fooled and a stories of your accomplishment will spread through the magical community like wildfire and the trick will become legend, much like Stuart James and "51 Faces North"

HA!! Nice.

Hm, thanks for wasting my time with that post. But I guess seomthing like that could be reconstructed so that it works every time. It probably wouldn't be self-working anymore.

Picard,

You had to read the post. I had it performed for me three times.

After reading this, I tried this effect and it was quite the uproar, I do it with the patter that it is very difficult so if I don't get it the first time "We'll try it again". When they say it's not their card, I say "Alright, we'll try it again" as I start to collect the cards.