# Penn & Teller: Fool Us - Season 10 Episode 17
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/penn-teller-fool-us-season-10-episode-17/999597
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Tags:** reality-or-game-show
**Created:** [March 30, 2024, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/penn-teller-fool-us-season-10-episode-17/999597 "2024-03-30T03:12:33Z")
**Posts on this page:** 7
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [May 20, 2024, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/penn-teller-fool-us-season-10-episode-17/999597/21 "2024-05-20T19:43:35Z")
There’s a lot of assumptions in your question. Purely mechanical tricks usually don’t hold up to close examination. Throwing in some forms of misdirection and technique will make the trick look very different from what actually happens.
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### Author:  [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)
#### Post date: [May 20, 2024, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/penn-teller-fool-us-season-10-episode-17/999597/22 "2024-05-20T21:35:45Z")
> [@TriPolar](#):
>
> Purely mechanical tricks usually don’t hold up to close examination. Throwing in some forms of misdirection and technique will make the trick look very different from what actually happens.
Well, yeah; that’s what I was alluding to with the quick mention of “a sleight-of-hand expert”: that _I’d_ be unable to convincingly manage the effect if you handed me a mechanical prop like that — but that, if you give _him_ enough time to practice with it, he’ll fool people up close and on camera while drawing attention away from the crucial stuff and getting everyone to focus on an irrelevancy or two.
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### Author:  [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)
#### Post date: [May 22, 2024, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/penn-teller-fool-us-season-10-episode-17/999597/23 "2024-05-22T18:22:04Z")
One of two methods that I suspected was behind this trick is explained [here](https://youtu.be/Wxyd_yHyD30?t=141). Balls in half shells. It even explains, indirectly, how he managed to bounce two whole, heavy white balls. I noticed the shrunken white ball right away in the original video.
Why this would fool P&T is beyond me.
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### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [May 22, 2024, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/penn-teller-fool-us-season-10-episode-17/999597/24 "2024-05-22T19:09:43Z")
> [@ftg](#):
>
> Why this would fool P&T is beyond me.
He did it very well and they didn’t get to review it in close up slo-mo. They probably assumed shells were involved but there was enough complication that maybe they weren’t sure if they caught every technique.
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### Author:  [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)
#### Post date: [May 22, 2024, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/penn-teller-fool-us-season-10-episode-17/999597/25 "2024-05-22T22:45:42Z")
But P&T will often offer a guess as to the trick. They have to use coded language and such so as to not reveal it to the public but they could have tossed out a word or two that magicians know.
That they didn’t guess at all is weird.
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### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [May 22, 2024, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/penn-teller-fool-us-season-10-episode-17/999597/26 "2024-05-22T23:01:19Z")
They are inconsistent. Sometimes they seem to like an act so much they don’t guess. And sometimes if they don’t know how one small part is done they’ll say they were fooled. It’s their show, they can do what they want.
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### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [May 24, 2024, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/penn-teller-fool-us-season-10-episode-17/999597/27 "2024-05-24T13:33:36Z")
[ ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5zOlGSx1LY)
The explanation at the end of this act may explain why they didn’t guess about Javi Rufo’s performance.
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