The thing I’ve noticed, and which has almost universally held true, is that the ‘mystical’ isn’t mystical. It always has a nice, simple explanation. The nice, simple explanation for this matter has been given. That you choose not to accept it is a different matter entirely.
Sailor is right, we shouldn’t make levity of levitation because the gravity of this situation requires serious thought. Good puns all.
It’s ignorant to think everything can be explained by what we already know.
Dave Marini, what exactly do you want us to tell you? Perhaps the Invisible Pink Unicorn blessed the lifters with superhuman strength after they touch hands and utter some mumbo jumbo? If that is what you want to hear, you are going to be disappointed. This message board is not called the Straight Dope for no reason. The preconceived answer you seek has already been refuted in theory and practice (Irishman). What more do you want?
It is ignorant to think that everything can be explained by what we already know, but isn’t it just as ignorant to attribute everything you don’t understand to the Invisible Pink Unicorn?
Dave, I appreciate that it still seems weird and hard to believe. It would be interesting to get together and perform the trick, to see you do it.
I did go looking over the weekend for a magic book to explain it, but was unsuccessful. Most of the beginner’s books were on card tricks, with a few mind games and such. I did see one that had a few “hypnotism” tricks that worked on principles of body dynamics and geometry, but not the levitation bit.
Being interested is great. Trying to find the answer is wonderful. Being skeptical about what your told is good too. It takes some judgment to evaluate the possibilities.
Not witnessing how you do it, I cannot easily evaluate what you’re doing differently between the tries.
Yes, I have considered the possibility there’s more at work than we know. However, I tend to accept the simpler explanation. In this case, that explanation is provided by the people who do the trick, the ones who’s craft is the art of manipulating people’s expectations to create the illusion of mystical powers without using any mystical powers. These people provided the answer in their instruction manual. I find that an elegant solution and imminently more believable than mystical powers that the performers themselves don’t believe in, that somehow are not detectable or testable by science, but show up for a stage trick.
Anyway, try it on your own again. Try it different ways and see what happens. Play with it a while, varying how you do it. And try looking for a magic book yourself.
Good luck.
Here’s one I had learned a long time ago, and it works pretty well. Fairly impressive for an amatuer magician trick.
A magician of average build gets two people from the audience, one short and smalish, ideally a child of about 12, the other a fairly tall adult, taller than the magician. The magician then says to the audience: “I think this child is stronger than this adult” Everyone of course says no. The magician then asks the adult to hold his hands in front of him, palms facing up, elbows at his side. The magician then places his arms bent, elbows at his side, palms facing him and faces his back to the adult. The adult is then asked to place his fingertips only under the magicians elbows and attempt to lift the magician off of the ground. He will probably succeed after a bit, bit it is a visible struggle. He then asks the child to do the same thing, and the child succeeds with relative ease…
How does this work? Two principles:
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The magician when being lifted by the adult leaves his arms slightly limp and when the adult lifts, compensates by rolling forward slightly on the balls of his feet. The motion is imperceptable to the audience or to the lifter, since they don’t know what to expect, and he’s lifting from behind, and can’t tell what is going on. When the child lifts, the magician holds his elbows rigid and ankles locked. This means that while for the adult a large portion of the force is spent pushing the magician forward slightly before lifting, for the child all of the force is applied in lifting the magician. Also, it is important that the adult lift first: the change in body posture is much less evident if the failed attempt comes first and not second.
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The child is shorter than the magician, so when his fingers are placed under the magicians elbows, the magician’s weight is applied down the childs forarms, and he is in effect “pushing” the magician up. Also, the child’s forearms are fairly short, making his arms much more efficient levers. The adult is specificly picked to be considerably taller than the magician. In order to get his fingers under the magician’s elbows while performing the lift as described, he has to reach down slightly, meaning all of the magician’s weight is applied towards his finger tips, and he is pulling rather than pushing the magician up. As well, his arms are considerably longer than the childs, making them a much less effective means of transfering the lifting force.
Again, these effects don’t seem like much when describing them here, but have a profound effect on the trick. Try it sometime, it’s pretty neat.
If no one minds me jumping in on this, beleive it or not, magic can and does work if you can ground and channel your energies. Speaking as a practicer of witchcraft myself, it works. I have been practicing for a few years now and even though there are simple explanations like irishman gave, there are times when there are other forces at work. Most people don’t have control of these energies or powers, but they are fundamental parts of the earth and can be used by an amatuer if they concentrate and want something to happen bad enough. Amatuer usage works normally best in groups. Then, of course, you have people like me who might be around when this “game” or “trick” is happening and can help without giving away the fact that they are a witch or warlock.
To each his own, however, not everyone is cut out to be a beleiver and i have no grudge against that. Everyone is gonna beleive what they want to and can conceive to understand. I think after listening to Irishman, i would have a hard time trying to prove this to him. But, as I said, to each his own. 
Yup. Uh-huh. Magic works.
You want to make a load of money with your “magic?”
Try the Randi Challenge.
Do your little magic tricks, and win a million bucks. Easy, huh?
Andros,
There is no need for skepticism. For one, its like i said, not everyone is gonna believe what i said, “magic” and the practice of it, i don’t know if i could produce evidence of how i do things. But i do know that if i could prove it with science, it would no longer be magic. Therefore, so you understand, magic is not a science it is kindof like a religion of sorts. Everyone readily believes if a miracle happens that it happened because they prayed or because of their faith in God or their personal savior (whoever that may be). They do not question it any furthur. However, most of those same people refuse to see magic as existing except as a sinful satanist practice, which is simply untrue.
Back to my point, If it could be proved, it would not be magic.
per Douglass Adams,
just throw yourself at the ground, and miss. 
i have no shame.
Let me preface this by saying, Welcome aboard ttaylor.
I hate to do this, but with my name bantied around so much, I can’t resist. I hope this doesn’t hurt too much.
ttaylor said:
Gotta disagree on that one. Skepticism is very useful. We need more of it, not less.
That’s a nice way of saying, “There’s no way to prove it, but believe it anyway, because I said so.” Sorry, some of us don’t go around taking people’s word on things willy nilly. That last statement opens the door for a discussion on the meaning of “magic”, “nature”, “natural”, “supernatural”, and probably a lot of other terms. I don’t want to get into that here, as this thread was related to a different topic, and I don’t want to hijack it too badly. That’s probably a Great Debates topic.
You’re not helping yourself.
Not everyone. But I get your point - many people do.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, we could get into another Great Debate on the nature of paganism, witchcraft, and interpretations of the Bible and religious doctrines of various different religious sects. I do agree it seems hypocritical for people to accept one supernatural intervention (prayer) and reject another (magic), when the distinction between them is sketchy at best.
One more thing: andros mentioned the Randi Challenge. You don’t have to be able to explain it scientifically in order to win. You just have to be able to produce an supernatural (paranormal) effect without using trickery, under proper observing conditions. The requirements of the challenge are designed and agreed to by both parties ahead of time, and every accommodation is made to allow the claimant the ability to demonstrate the effect. There’s over a million dollars up for grabs. For someone who is sure they are producing a supernatural effect, it should be a cake walk.
Of course, no one has succeeded yet. Curiously, those most sure of their abilities are least likely to accept the challenge.
Since this has already been kicked to the top, I have to share this. Try it and see what you think.
One person lies on the floor, face down, eyes closed, arms straight out. Another person stands over them, takes their wrist and lifts their arms up behind them far enough to be uncomfortable but not actually hurt.
The one that is standing speaks in monotone to the one on the floor, setting the scene.
"You are an eagle, soaring high above the valley, picture below you the clouds, the rivers rushing by, etc. (the story can change as you see fit).
After about a minute of this, you say “and now you land”. At this point let go of their arms.
It feels like you’re going through the floor, freaky.
Sorry to get off the subject. Continue please.
BTW…As to the OP…I’ve seen it done and it is strange, no idea how it works.
I can’t let this one go …
I hope that you didn’t really mean “prove”. I can understand “if it could be explained scientifically, it would not be magic”.
However, “prove” means “To establish the truth or validity of by presentation of argument or evidence.” I can certainly admit the possibility of establishing that your claimed magical powers exist without being able to explain them in any scientific sense; just do it in front of an audience of professional magicians under mutually agreed controlled conditions. If you do that, then you have proved it. And I fail to see how that would make it “not magic”.
I have my doubts that you or anyone can do that, but I can’t prove that you can’t, so I admit that it might happen. It hasn’t yet.
I hate to dredge up dead topics, but I found some futher info on the OP.
From http://www.randi.org/jr/05-15-2000.html
James Randi Education Foundation - James Randi is a former magician and skeptic.
3rd section down on page
No, I don’t have a copy of the book.
I’ve got a copy of the book, here’s what it says:
and