Werner Miller is up to his, well, new tricks!

Over at Online Visions, Werner Miller has posted his newest routine, Symbol Pattern Square I. In this routine, you have a standard deck of 25 ESP cards (see graphic in the upper left), and you have the spectator give it a free cut. After the cut, you place the top card, face-down, on a 5 by 5 grid in a location of the spectator's choice, marking it as the chosen card and location. The remaining cards are mixed further, and then dealt out face down in a random pattern.

After all the cards are dealt out, the cards in the same diagonal as the chosen card (which itself is left face down) are turned over, and it is shown that they all have the same design (all stars in the example). The initial chosen card is turned up, and it proves to be the one remaining card of this same design! You can also turn the other cards face up to show that each row and each column contain exactly one of each design.

Not only will those who enjoy doing magic appreciate this routine, but also my readers who enjoy math and magic squares, too.

As you'll see, it's based on the Knight's Tour approach to creating an odd-ordered (3 by 3, 5 by 5, 7 by 7, and so on) magic square. As a matter of fact, if you're not already familiar with that approach, you can learn that from this article first, and then work with the ESP cards later.

Once you read through and try this, you'll enjoy the method, but you may wonder if there's more to the effect. I can't tell you for sure, but I'm willing to bet there is. First, Werner Miller has a great knack for taking simple mathematical principles to highly entertaining levels, and second, it is called Symbol Pattern Square I.