If someone can explain this to me, I'll be impressed (1 Viewer)

[Holadem]

Hey... this reminds me of the mantra that seems prevalent in the high end audio world:
"Perception is truth"
Where are the cable and equipement break-in believers when you need them ?
--
Holadem

 

[RobertR]

Where are the cable and equipement break-in believers when you need them ?

Coming up with reasons why this is "different", or deciding that the only relevant "truth" is that they are happy being fooled.

 

[andrew markworthy]

My favourite example of belief over perception happened to a friend of mine at a wine tasting. Utterly naive of wine, he'd been given a blind tasting of a cheap supermarket bottle of plonk versus an expensive vintage. He'd chosen the cheap plonk as an honest opinion, and got the sublime reply from the wine tasting expert - 'well, it has a more *obvious* appeal'. To which my friend had replied, 'you mean it tastes better?'. Apparently that was secondary to the bouquet, aftertaste, rich undertones, etc. Yeh, right, and that's a nice set of new clothes you've got on, Your Majesty.

 

[Alex Spindler]

I love how you can't even make yourself believe they're the same color. No matter how many times you put them side by side in paint, they're definitely different colors.

Damn you brain.

 

[Dominik Droscher]

Link Removed to relieve your brain.

 

[Blu]

So then the letter "B" must be black instead of gray as it appears?

 

[Chuck C]

I actually jumped and swore a little bit!

 

[Clinton McClure]

Inconceivable!

 

[Seth Paxton]

One thing about illusions like these is that they are basically "holes" in our perception logic. But it's that perception logic that normally allows our brain to injest so much visual information so quickly.

CPU/robotic systems don't normally get fooled like this, and they also suck when it comes to quickly comprehending visual info. Like trying to create a CPU system to autodrive a car by mostly visual info, a real pain in the ass mainly for reasons touched on by Andrew.

Normally it's actually a GOOD thing to recognize the black and white pattern on the checkerboard and indentify them "correctly" as different colors.

 

[TedE]

That's one of my favorite illusions. I majored in cognitive science and did grad work in the field. I've got a collection of them at home that amaze and astound. My second favorite is this one:
Table Top Illusion
Print it out and try it (cut out a piece of paper and fit it over both table tops)
It is essentially the same as the shadow illusion: higher level cognitive organzation can override fundamental low-level perception. We know from experience in the 3D world that depth matters. It is impossible to turn this off when looking at 2D representations of 3D objects. Same thing with the shadows. We KNOW how light interacts and have the assumption that all of the white tiles are the same shade of white, and that the gradation between the white and black tiles is constant. You can see similar effects in other modalities (hearing, touch). I'll see if I can dig up some online demos for auditory illusions.

 

[Brian Perry]

Ted,

Maybe there's a problem with my computer or printer, but the two tabletops are definitely not the same. Perhaps the total area is the same, but the one on the left is longer and narrower than the one on the right.

 

[TedE]

Damn, Brian, you're right. That was the only example I could find online and I didn't check to see if was exact. I'll see if I can find another example that isn't such shoddy craftmanship But, rest assured, it does work.

 

[TedE]

OK, here's a better one (PDF though). I guarantee them to be the same size
Table Top Illusion

 

[Scott Dautel]

Amazing ... here's proof for you disbelievers using MS Paint:
Link Removed

 

[RobertR]

I showed this one to people at work, and they were all astounded. I even printed the image on a color laser, and one of my coworkers looked at the squares through two cutouts on a sheet of paper. They're the same!

 

[Artur Meinild]

nevermind...

 

[Lee L]

The table top one is a little misleading. The lines that form the tops are the same length, that is true. The 2 tables reprsented by the drawings are not the same size, shape or relative ratio of length to width. Because this is a 2D representation of 2 differnt sized 3D objects that are veiwed at different angles, the lines representing them are the same length. If you were somehow able to build these 2 tables and put them on the same surface you would see them as totally different.

 

[TedE]

Lee,

That's exactly the point. There is NO difference in the 2D representations, but your brain finds it impossible to turn off processing them as 3D objects. We automatically adjust the "real" dimensions of the table tops to fit what we know about the real world. Hence, the illusion.

 

[Scott McGillivray]

Well that is really amazing! Possibly the neatest optical illusion I have seen (or...not seen?)
I used a laser printer and printed off two copies of the picture. Then, after showing a co-worker, cut out the "B" square while he watched and then...like friggen magic...placed it next to the "A" square. It was a great reaction!
I think a guy could make a few bucks making bets on this!