"Not believing in something is not in itself a belief or a philosophy: it is the 'ism' at the end that tends to cause the trouble. Both atheists and believers can be as arrogant and witless as each other in frustrated debate, and people may choose strong and unapologetic words to raise awareness of the agenda. But despite the name-calling, it is still a fair point that to not believe in God is no more a 'belief in itself' than to not believe in the Loch Ness Monster, Poseidon or anything else one might personally consider far-fetched. Beyond that, there is only how you choose to express yourself."

“Séances date back to the 1800s after three sisters by the name of Fox claimed to be able to contact the dead. They toured America with their demonstrations and attracted the rich and famous and by the end of the century séances had taken off all over the western world. Spirits were manifested, tambourines flew, ectoplasm impossibly erupted from entranced mediums. Then, after forty years of this, rather embarrassed by what they’d started, one of the sisters, Margaret Fox, confessed that they were frauds. The miracles which had started it all off had been a scam. But her confession made very little difference and spiritualism continues to appeal to many people today.”

“Since the 1920s, grand illusion on stage has been synonymous with the restraint and mutilation of female assistants, as if the first act a lucky mortal, newly endowed with the ability to overturn the laws of the universe, would wish to carry out would be the casual torture of the fairer sex for our entertainment.”

“There is no hypnotic phenomenon, no matter how remarkable it may appear, which cannot be re-created outside of a hypnotic state through such ordinary devices such as suggestion, hype and the exercise of charisma.”

“A good communicator affects our physiology. The power of voice can entrance us – even induce or remove pain.”

“Hello and welcome to Mind Control Night. Three hours of watching my smug balding head so make sure you have plenty of night time snacks, depilatory cream and really good drugs to hand.”

“Music is arguably the most affecting of the arts; intelligible to all people yet untranslatable into any other idiom. To Schopenhauer it was a direct expression of the ‘world will’... and was good when he had guests over.”