the wallet experiment probably works due to the diffusion of responsibility
in a similar way to pedestrians doing nothing about a suffering person on the side of a busy street (bystander effect) THE BYSTANDER EFFECT
or nobody calling the cops in the murder of kitty genovese
the idea is that the larger the crowd, the less inclined the individual is to take personal responsibility if they notice something is wrong.
especially if they see inaction modelled by surrounding people before encountering the situation.
obviously the converse would be true as well.
In other forums you should not create a topic when it was created before so I post it here.
This is an interesting show since Derren Brown “converts” Atheists to believe in god. I have never believed in hypnotism but this explanation seems to rely heavily on it. Futher the fallback induction is very interesting. Have you discussed this before. I don’t think even if Derren Brown is successful in concerting Atheists to believe in god that it would last very long. I would wake up next morning and start to doubt the experience. Do you think this explanation is correct.
As I understand it, hypnotism basically shuts off the conscious mind (this is by the way not something imposed by the hypnotist but rather the subject’s ability with some auto-suggestive steps, to concentrate and let his/her mind do whatever is suggested) and lets the ‘sub-conscious’ step to the fore (this is a hypnotism 101 lesson); so the ‘victim’ would do anything (with certain limitations) instructed to do as the sub-conscious is incapable of rational thought; hence an atheist becomes ‘religious’ and certainly vice versa. Also a man becomes a bear and a woman a quacking duck; Once ‘awake’ and provided the hypnotic auto-suggestions are properly removed, rationality returns and hey presto the atheist is again just him/herself and the bear is again a man…