For a while now I have concerned myself with engaging people’s beliefs. A large part of me wishes to have people retain a scepticism about what I do … - Derren Brown

Just talking about the illogicality behind so many of these systems: Tarot cards, which are obviously very, very popular. The deck is mixed and you choose a number of cards, they’re laid out and then your fortune and fate is read from them. Of course, the interesting conundrum there is that if you did the same thing five minutes later you’d pick out very different cards so presumably your fate and the reading would be necessarily very different if it’s relying on those cards. Five minutes later it would be completely different and when there have been questions about this the answer is ‘oh, that’s because your fate changes from minute to minute’. But then you have to think, presumably, to get a Tarot reading you’d have to constantly be having a Tarot reading over and over again in order to know what the accurate situation is, if it constantly changes from minute to minute.

The desire to impress is an efficient means of bringing out one’s least impressive qualities.

One minute she is a sweet old silly, knitting herself a set of syringe covers and talking about her favourite flowers, and the very next moment she has told you and your friends she has a ring supporting the back of her vagina.