My new book, Card Collective, has a few things in it too - based on The Penelope Principle.

Paul Gordon

Where in Elmsley is this published? 1 or 2 and page. Thanks.

It's in volume two. I don't have the book with me right now, so I can't give you the exact page number, but it should be in the table of contents as Penelope Principle (if not there, it's with his work on the faro).

What it is exactly is hard to explain, without exposure that is, but it is truly a thing of beauty. I believe Martin Nash has some work on it as well.

Anyone know of any work on this combined with the Gilbreath principle?

Josh

Not the penelope principle per se, but the closely kindred late-night location, also from around the same part of Elmsley II, allows for similarly baffling locations, though with a stay stack (or S*** S****, for those two or three people in the history of the world for whom just saying "Stay Stack" reveals something they didn't already know, and that isn't revealed by the dopey asterisk contrivance).

I think there's one item by George McBride can be found in Peter Duffie's Scotland Up close (if my memory serves me correctly).

I can't believe a thread I started 9 years ago is still active.

Check out Woody Aragon's "A Book in english"
There are some nice applications of the principle in there...

Speaking of Woody Aragon's book, I'm working on one of the effects that utilizes the principle, but for some reason I'm always off by one card and don't know why. For those that are familiar with the contents of the book could you PM me so that I can explain further?

Thanks!
Bill

Hi Bill,

If the item involves a Faro Shuffle it might be that the shuffle must go bottom to top or vice versa.

Which trick in the Aragon book are you working on?

Mike

Hi Mike,
I'm working on "Maverick". That could definitely be a possibility. I've been doing the Faro Shuffle from top down.

-Bill

In reading through the most recent Genii magazine (March 2012), I noted "Rendezvous in Lugano" by Dr. Giorgio Tarchini on pg. 51. Apparently, the effect is based on the "Penelope principle"; while I don't know what it is -), I can see a mathematical working out of this mysterious card location.

I always try to come up with an explicit or formulaic explanation for these types of mathematic/card principles. I guess I should read Persi Diaconis' recent book. -)

Larry S.

Hi Bill,

I'll check out Maverick. The reason I thought that the bottom up or top down issue might be the problem is from personal experience. I had an item in Top Secret Stuff that required a bottom up Faro. Marlo taught it shuffling bottom to top in the Revolutionary Card series. I thought everyone did it that way and didn't say in my write up that the Faro must be done from bottom to top. I received a phone call sometime after the book came out from someone who told me that the trick only worked some of the time. I checked my write up and told him that it should always work (still assuming that he was shuffling as I did). I finally realized that he was shuffling top down and solved the problem.

Mike

Having just gone through Maverick which, BTW, is a very cool application of the Penelope Principle, it appears that you must Faro shuffle from the bottom up. That's very clear from his initial way of getting his BC to position 26. His method is to start with the card on the bottom and then run 13 cards ending with the card 14 from bottom. At this point you don't need a perfect 26/26 split. You take say, less than half from the top of the deck in your RH and Faro (from the bottom up) so that the bottom card on the left side stays on the bottom - an OUT Faro so to speak. The BC ends up 26 from top. You can easily see why this happens if you look at where the card starts and how many cards are added under it. As Woody mentions, a discrepancy in the shuffle above the card does not matter. It'll end up 26 from the top. Take a look at what's going on and this will be obvious without any algebra!

After the spec cuts and hands you the larger upper half you must shuffle from bottom up just as described above. Again, cutting exactly in half is not important and discrepancies above the key are not going to cause trouble. The math will work - but only if you shuffle from the bottom up.

I think there a way to modify the handling so that the shuffling takes place from the top down but it would likely adversely affect the way things feel.

If you turn the packet FU before performing a top down faro, you'll effectively be doing a bottom up faro. That's one solution if you're addicted to the top down faro.

Hope this helps.

Mike

You guys confuse me, which btw does not take much. When you mention bot. to top do you mean, take the bottom half and faro into the top half? And vice versa top to bottom do you mean taking the top half and faro into the bottom?

I ask because I'm left handed, and I cut the cards at 26 and faro the bottom half into the top half, meaning I do an in or out faro, but the bottom half is always on the top.

So guys, please help me understand the difference, if there is a difference.

Thanks guys

It means the cards start weaving at the bottom instead of the top as a normal faro.


Kingman

The concept of IN and OUT is unambiguous when the deck is split 26/26. OUT means that the original top card ends up as the top card after the shuffle. IN means that the original top card ends 2nd from top after the shuffle. It doesn't matter if you shuffle bottom up or top down as long as you obey this rule with the 26/26 split.

With the Penelope Principle, you are cutting a pack which may have an even or odd number of cards. Furthermore you don't need to cut it exactly in half for the principle to work. So here OUT means that the original bottom card remains on bottom AND that the shuffle is made from the bottom up. Specifically let's say you cut some cards from the top of the packet and hold them in the RH. The LH then holds the bottom group. When you shuffle you must insure that the lowermost card of the RH group goes 2nd from bottom and that the weaving is perfect up to the key card. After the key, a discrepancy won't matter.

If you're left handed just be sure that the same conditions described above occur viz. the bottom card stays on the bottom and the weave starts at the bottom and goes up from there.

Hope this makes sense!

Mike

Thanks Mike and Kingman. I've got the idea now.