Hey YouTube, Jim here!
Welcome to Top 10 Archive!
The mind is a fascinating thing, and one of the most incredible thing about the brain
is the ability to trick itself.
It can see one object or event but completely register another.
We all remember the white and gold dress, right?
Or was it a black and blue dress?
Get ready for a mind-bending video - here are ten optical illusions that will melt your
brain!
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If you end up enjoying this video, let us know by giving it a thumbs up and in the comment
section, tell us your favorite optical illusion!
10.
The Illusion of Movement Take a second to look at this image.
Keep your head and your eyes still and just focus on the patterns.
Now, take a look at this image.
Keep your head still again and just focus on one of the blue circles.
What if I told you that nothing was actually moving?
Yep, the motion is all in your mind.
There are several theories for why we see these images as moving things.
It’s thought by many that the way we perceive light and dark is to blame for the fact that
we see movement when the images are actually static.
The neurons in your eye encode dark differently from the way they encode light.
There’s a slight lag in the way that our brains receive information, and it could be
that lag that makes us think we’re seeing an image in motion.
Other scientists believe that it’s to do with fixation jitters, which are the involuntary
eye movements that create the illusion that objects close to where your eyes are fixated
are moving.
Another theory suggests that it’s our inbuilt motion detectors that get confused.
Who knows which theory is true, but this illusion is definitely melting my brain.
9.
Checkerboard Take a look at this checkerboard.
Square A looks much darker than square B, doesn’t it?
Well, would you believe – both squares are exactly the same color!
If you put this image through an editing program you’d see that they both have the exact
same color value as one another.
Crazy, huh?
This illusion was created by an MIT scientist to demonstrate how we humans deal with shadows.
It turns out that when we attempt to determine the color of a surface, our brains consider
the fact that shadows are misleading and that they make surfaces look darker than they actually
are.
We compensate for that by interpreting shadowy surfaces as being lighter than they actually
appear to the eye.
In this illusion, we interpret square B to be lighter because we are compensating for
the fact that it is cast in shadow.
Look at this image with the parallel lines added.
The squares should appear to be more similar now.
Do they?
8.
Parallel Lines Check out this image here.
Are the red lines straight, or do they have a curve in them?
To me, they definitely look bowed, but they are in fact parallel lines.
Did they trick you too?
This illusion is called the Hering illusion.
It was created in 1861 to prove how our brains overestimate the angle made at the points
where the red and blue lines cross.
But why do our brains get this wrong?
Apparently, it’s due to our tendency to try and predict the near future.
Not in a mystical way, but in a more scientific manner.
As we discovered with the movement illusion, there’s a short lag between the time light
hits the retina and the time the brain perceives that light.
It’s thought that the human visual system has evolved over time to compensate for that
lag by making images of what it thinks will occur in one-tenth of a second into the future.
The lines in this image trick us into thinking we’re moving forward, so our brain tries
to perceive what the world will look like in the next instant.
7.
Geometric Illusions Geometric optical illusions are probably the
most common illusions of all.
These illusions encompass anything related to shape, and they use their geometrical properties
to trick us into believing something that isn’t actually true.
Take this café wall in Bristol in the UK.
It looks as though the lines are severely sloped, doesn’t it?
But, they’re actually perfectly parallel.
If we superimpose a horizontal line over the image, it suddenly becomes much clearer that
there are no slopes in the lines at all.
It’s believed that this illusion happens because of how the light spreads from bright
to dark in the back of our eyes.
This can quickly be proven by changing the brightness of the image…
See, the illusion totally disappears, doesn’t it?
6.
Spinning Dancer You’ve probably seen this spinning dancer,
but you may not know how the illusion works.
In fact, you might watch the dander and think that there’s no illusion happening at all.
But there definitely is.
Some people see her spinning clockwise, and others anticlockwise.
Some people can even make her switch by simply focusing on a specific part of the dancer’s
body.
Are you one of them?
Let me know in the comments which one you are.
This illusion was created by a web designer in 2003.
It tricks us because the dancer doesn’t have any depth.
Her solid black silhouette doesn’t give us any visual clues for which way she’s
spinning so it’s possible to perceive her to be spinning either way.
Essentially, your brain is filling in the gaps.
5.
Hermann Grid Illusion Take a look at this black and white grid.
When you scan your eyes over it, what do you notice?
Can you see the gray discs that appear at every intersection?
Now, stare at one of the intersections – any will work – and see what happens.
Suddenly, there’s no gray disc in that intersection.
Are you seeing that?
This is known as the Hermann grid illusion, this weird visual trick was discovered in
the 19th century.
This phenomenon is said to be caused by something called lateral inhibition.
The divide between receptor cells taking in the information provided by the white lines
and receptor cells carrying information about the black squares.
When they combine, the brain sort of glitches out and creates faulty data.
Take another look at the grid.
It’s fascinating, isn’t it?
How your mind is adding in and taking away information all the time.
4.
Ebbinghaus Illusion Now, take a look at this image.
Which orange circle do you think is the biggest?
This one on the left, or this one on the right?
What if I was to tell you that they’re exactly the same size?
To me, the orange circle on the right looks much larger – is that the case for you too?
This illusion is called the Ebbinghaus illusion, and it’s even cooler when you look at the
dynamic version.
First, let’s look at the stationary dynamic Ebbinghaus.
Focus your attention on the dot in the middle of the central circle…
Did you feel as though the central circle was changing size?
Let’s try another version of this same illusion.
Focus on the dot on the upper left outer circle…
The illusion was much clearer that time, wasn’t it!
Recent studies have suggested that the reasons we perceive the circles to be different sizes
are the distance of the surrounding circles from the central circle and the completeness
of the ring.
Incredible.
3.
Lilac Chaser This illusion is very similar to the Hermann
Grid illusion.
It’s called the lilac chaser and here is how it works.
Focus on the crosshairs in the center of the image.
I’m going to give you 20 seconds to do so…
What happened?
Did the lilac circles fade to gray?
Did you see a green dot instead of the lilac dots?
My mind is officially blown, how about yours?
This illusion is officially called Troxler’s fading or Troxler’s effect, and it was discovered
in the early 19th century.
As is the case with many of the illusions on this list, this crazy effect is said to
be caused by our visual neurons.
In this case, neurons switch off their awareness of things that aren’t changing, while heightening
their perception of things that are.
The lilac dots don’t move, but the absence of the dots does.
Once your brain has had a chance to figure out what’s happening, the lilac dots begin
to disappear so that all we can see is the disappearing dot.
But, why does the dot also turn green?
Well, that’s due to a secondary illusion.
The dot changes color because your retina has been oversaturated with the lilac dots.
So, when the lilac dots disappear you begin to see lilac’s complimentary color which
is composed of white light minus lilac.
That color happens to be mint green.
2.
Change Blindness This next illusion really blows my mind.
The theory is that we humans have a limit to our attention span, and that when images
flicker or fade over a period of time you simply won’t notice that they’re changing.
Let’s put that theory to the test.
Focus on the center of this image.
We’re going to make it flash, and there will be a change in the image every single
time.
Here we go…
Did you see it?
Try again…
Did you see it?
No?
Ok - if we make the change quickly and without the flash, you’re much more likely to see
it…
That’s right, the man’s pants completely change color.
Let’s look at an example of change blindness with fading rather than flashing.
Take a look at this image of a fairground ride.
Something significant is going to change in this image and even though I’m telling you
it’s happening, you’re not going to be able to see it…
There we go.
Did you notice the change?
Let me know in the comments if you did.
If we quickly change back to the image as it was at the start you’ll immediately see
the difference.
Amazing, huh?
1.
Motion After Effect This next illusion is sort of linked to the
movement illusion that we’ve just seen.
Look at the blue dot that’s on the screen right now.
When the spiral appears in a second, continue to stare at the blue dot for thirty seconds…
What happened when the pattern switched?
Does the image continue to look as though it was moving?
Is it distorting as you continue to stare at it?
Take a look around the room – I bet your furniture is moving too, right?
FMRI scans can actually measure your brain’s reaction to this illusion, meaning it’s
so good that it actually convinces you that the movement is happening.
This crazy illusion is caused when your neurons become accustomed to seeing a repetitive pattern
of movement.
Then, when it changes, they force themselves to adapt to assume that the movement is going
to continue.
This is why you see the movement continuing – you are essentially waiting for your neurons
to adapt again: this time to the still image that it’s now seeing.
This effect is especially strong if you focus on one spot, which is why I told you to look
at
the blue dot.
Amazing, huh?