Law and Magic Blog

It's Not a Real Chinese Meal Without a Fortune Cookie

Where do fortune cookie fortunes come from? It's not magic. Like the fortune cookie itself, those fortunes are the result of good old American ingenuity. Somebody makes them up. And surprise! According to Mr. Palmer, the writers apparently don't claim copyright (even though the fortunes are written down, thus fixed in a tangible medium of expression, but who knows who the author is?), so you can use them. Brooks Palmer explains more about the popular eatables here.

Want to search for more fortune cookie quotes? Check out Hotel Indigo's fortune cookie website here. More about the history and manufacture of fortune cookies here and here.

Tristan Taylor Thomas writes about allowing fortune cookies to guide his search for legal employment at Above the Law here. He says in part, "A fortune cookie would never steer me wrong, would it?" Oh, dear.

Con Man Who Sold Fake Bomb Detector Is Sentenced To Ten Years

This CNN.com report covers the career and fall of James McCormick, who sold thousands of fake bomb detectors to governments and individuals in all parts of the world, some of whom paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for the devices. British police say the ADE651 is really just a golf ball finder.

A UK judge has now sentenced Mr. McCormick to three ten year sentences on three counts of fraud, to run concurrently. He will not be eligible for parole for at least five years.

At the sentencing, the judge told Mr. McCormick he was successful in convincing customers to purchase the devices through "extravagant and fraudulent claims." Detective Inspector Edward Heath told CNN that the defendant "'is a conman. He uses sleight of hand, absurd sales tactics to actually con governments, officials, private individuals out of money to buy this device.'"

A New, Brain Teasing Show On the National Geographic Channel

Premiering tonight on the National Geographic Channel: Brain Games. Nine p.m., eight Central time. Looks like a very interesting show.

The Wonderful Ricky Jay, On Screen

A review, by Manohla Dargis.

Dr. Swami, Fortune Teller

Orson Welles on cold reading, and why he quit.

Washington Conference on Magic History To Take Place Later This Month

The Washington Symposium on Magic History is coming up. It takes place April 25-27 at the Bethesda North Marriott Hotel & Conference Center, Bethesda, MD 20852.  Here's the link to the conference webpage.

Speakers include Bill Kalush, John McLaughlin, Darwin Ortiz, Dale Salwak, David Saltman, Will Given, Shreeyash Palshikar, James Hamilton, Diego Domingo, Bruce MacNab, and Dean Arnold. Ken Trombly, the conference organizer, says topics for the conference range from espionage and magic to famous magicians such as Alexander Herrmann and Houdini to the magic of North Korea and India. Sounds both educational and entertaining. Ken tells me space is still available, so if you want to attend the conference, don't delay--sign up now. Another plus: DC should be beautiful in late April.

For more information, please click on the link.

Wizarding at Law School

I have just come across this piece, which looks like grist for this blog's mill.

Darby Dickerson, Texas Tech University School of Law, has published Professor Dumbledore's Advice for Law Deans, in volume 39 of the University of Toledo Law Review (2008). Here is the abstract.

This article, prepared for the Dean's Symposium in the University of Toledo Law Review, includes a curriculum vitae for Albus Dumbledore, the greatest wizard of the modern age, along with seven pieces of advice for law deans, culled from Dumbledore's words of wisdom and actions in the Harry Potter series.

 

Orson Welles On Houdini (and the Ladies)

Ken Trombly recommends this video of Orson Welles discussing Houdini. Excellent, although I'm not sure I agree with his gendered theory of magic. "Magic is not for the ladies. They don't like to be fooled." Most women don't like to be fooled by men. A lot of them like magicians just fine.

The Law of the Ban

Jack of Kent (David Allen Greene) on the banning of things as legal magic. Says Jack (aka Mr. Greene), in the New Statesman article,

We all want to ban something. It is a staple of our political culture. All of us are perhaps one moment away from seeking to ban what someone else is saying or doing. The nod-a-long responses of "it shouldn't be allowed" or "there should be a law against it" are the common solutions to many perceived problems.

However, to "ban" something is not actually to eliminate it, whatever "it" is. The "it" is not extinguished; the "it" may just be attended by some different consequences. The legalistic prose in a solemn document is not some magic spell which banishes horrors by invocation. To say there should be a law against a thing is often no more than saying there should be a spell against it.

In fact, "banning" things often creates new problems. In its correct legal form, a prohibition establishes certain legal and coercive consequences should the prohibited act occur: a court order for damages, say, or a prison sentence. Being banned does not thereby stop the thing from happening. It just means that the legal system will be engaged in a way it otherwise would not be.

 

Now, he's talking about "bans" and not "banns," which are the posting of the announcement of an upcoming marriage. Some people might say that "banns" mean also mean all sort of things are now banned as well, a number of them a lot of fun, but that's a discussion for another day.

Like Magic, Ohio DA Abandons Case Against Punxsutanwney Phil

Punxsutawney Phil can go back to unencumbered sleep for another eleven months. That's assuming he actually woke up to read that indictment against him which emenated from neighboring Ohio. Butler County, Ohio, DA Mike Gmoser has dismissed the indictment against Phil for deliberately mis-forecasting spring, saying Phil has a defense--someone else is taking the rap. That someone would be Phil's buddy, Bill Deeley, who says he misread Phil's weather predictions. I maintain Phil made no predictions, and if he did, he didn't mean them, and if he did mean them, no one should have taken them seriously, and if someone did take them seriously, that is that person's choice. Move along, move along, nothing to see here.