Trick 17: Media stories between magic and science
Sebastian Vehlken, Katja Müller-Helle, Jan Müggenburg, Florian Sprenger

The magic of media stems from its mystery: for today's users, laptops, smartphones, and tablets are black boxes that captivate their senses and conceal the technological tricks within behind an opaque surface. Yet such enchantment is nothing new. To explore it, this book approaches the media history of magic at the threshold between the magical moment and disillusionment. A seemingly supernatural magic performance is often followed by a scientific explanation and disclosure of its tricks. Such an act of disenchantment may unmask magical moments as mere magic. However, it shines a spotlight on the technologies of deception: only the exploitation of physical laws, the construction of mechanical magic devices, and the play on the audience's perception make their "enchantment" possible. This allows us to reexamine the question of knowledge, media access to our senses, and sensory access to our world.