- Optical illusion number one:
I actually have long, flowing dreadlocks.
I wish.
So optical illusions have fascinated
humanity since, well, forever.
And they've gotten more intense over the years
as certain people have figured out ways
to trick our eyes that trick our brains
into thinking something's there that isn't.
So I've gather some of the most intense optical illusions
that have ever existed.
Some of which, or all of which,
are going to simply melt your mind.
Oh, and I'm also going to explain
who created them and how they work.
So without further ado,
here are 10 Optical Illusions That Will Melt Your Mind.
Number one is The Hermann Grid.
The Hermann Grid is a famous optical illusion
in which white lines cross over a black square
to form a grid.
It's named after Ludimar Hermann,
a German psychologist and speech scientist
who originally discovered it in 1870.
What's interesting about this illusion is that
unlike many others, the effect happens
almost instantaneously as at every point
where the white lines intersect,
a tiny grey shadow appears.
Or at least to your eyes.
However, the moment that you look
directly at the point where those lines cross,
the shadow (popping noise) disappears.
Those intersections are like tiny, little ghosts,
and then the second you look at them
just (ghostly howl) they're gone.
(sniffling quietly)
I'm scared!
Number two is The Kanizsa Triangle.
While this one looks like a crazy, multi-player
game of Pac-Man, it's much more.
The Kanizsa Triangle is an optical illusion
in which no triangle actually exists
in what you're looking at, but yet you can see one.
Named after Gaetano Kanizsa,
an Italian psychologist and artist who served as the founder
of the Institute of Psychology of Trieste,
he was one of the first to report on the effect in 1976.
When you look at the picture, your brain creates contours,
which basically outlines, in this case,
the shape of a triangle.
But it can be used in other shapes as well.
See, where your mind expects to see completed circles,
you see a piece missing and all together,
the missing pieces tell your brain
an invisible triangle must be there.
But the truth is, it's not!
It's like witchcraft.
Number three is The Ponzo Illusion.
A lot of these are created by Italians.
Italians are tricksy!
First discovered by Italian psychologist
Mario Ponzo in 1911, the Ponzo Illusion
has had countless variations ranging from chairs,
to blocks, to simply squiggly lines.
But the trick behind it is always the same.
What is the trick?
Well, it might surprise you, but the two objects
that you're looking at are actually the exact same size.
And the objects always differ.
Sometimes it's monsters, sometimes it's trucks,
and sometimes it's simply lines.
The reason that one looks larger than the other
is because of the image behind them.
See, your brain is always compensating for distance,
expecting whatever is further down the line
to be smaller than if you were close.
See, once again, it's your brain playing tricks on you.
By the end of this video,
you're not going to believe anything.
I'm not even here.
(ghostly sounds)
That was Putty from Power Rangers.
I don't know what that was.
On to the next one!
Number four is The Fraser Spiral.
Also known as the false spiral
and the twisted cord illusion,
the Fraser spiral is another optical illusion
named after the person that discovered it.
In this case, it was British psychologist James Fraser
who found it in 1908.
When you look at it, it may seem like there are
spiraling lines rolling down into infinity.
However, the pattern you're actually seeing
is a series of concentric circles.
What?! Okay, let me 'splain.
The reason that your mind is telling you it's a spiral
is because of the misaligned triangles in checkered style
which causes your eyes to see false twists and deviations.
Like this.
Okay, no, actually that was just me moving my body.
Just keeping you on your toes!
Number five is The Munker-White Illusion.
What if I told you that in the image
that you're looking at right now,
the two colors are actually the exact same color?
Yeah, they are.
There are literally thousands of variations
of the Munker-White Illusion, some being boxes,
while others are circles or even corkscrews.
Regardless, the effect that you're looking at is the same.
It's tricking your eyes into seeing a distinct difference
between the two colors.
Or, as Mr. M. White first witnessed it,
two different shades of grey, which are exactly the same.
The reason this illusion is possible is because our brains
judge colors by comparing them to the surrounding colors.
If you can't quite see it, or simply don't believe me,
take a screenshot of that image, throw it into Photoshop,
and test the two different colors.
You'll find that they aren't different.
They're exactly the same.
Number six is The Zollner Illusion.
This illusion is an old one.
First discovered in 1860 by a German astrophysicist named
Johann Karl Friedrich Zöllner in a letter that he wrote to
physicist and scholar, Johann Christian Poggendorff.
It consists of several long lines,
each crossed over by tiny lines.
Now, while the image seems to show the longer lines
running at different angles, it's going to amaze you to know
that every line that you're looking at
is perfectly parallel to the others.
There are two easy ways to prove this.
The first, is by using a ruler to measure the distance
between the bottoms of the two lines and the tops.
The other is by matching each line to one line
that is two lines away, and thus has the same angled
small lines crossing it.
This is another example of how lines can seem
distorted by their backgrounds.
For example, it may seem like I have a crazy face right now.
(monkey sound)
But it's actually just because there's a sloth behind me.
See that? Okay, I actually did that.
I just wanted to fit a sloth into my video at some point.
Missing accomplished!
Number seven is The Troxler's Effect.
This another optical illusion that takes a few moments
to really appreciate.
Take a moment to stare at the center
of this blurry image for about 30 seconds.
See what happens.
What should happen is that is should begin to fade
until it's almost invisible to your eye.
This occurs because of the Troxler's Effect,
which basically tells us that if we fixate our gaze
on a particular point for even a short amount of time,
unchanging stimulus around the area will gradually
fade away and disappear.
The effect was first discovered all the way back in 1804
by a Swiss physician called Ignaz Paul Vital Troxler.
That's a mouthful.
Since then, there have been a number of other
optical illusions that have used this effect.
Does this effect work on people?
Cause I would love to stare at Donald Trump for a while
and just see what happens.
Number eight is The Hybrid Image.
This illusion is actually quite new
compared to the other illusions on this list,
having only been proposed in 1994,
and then recently perfected by Aude Oliva of MIT
and Philippe G. Schyns of University of Glasgow.
The most likely famous example that you're going
to find online is this one:
the Albert Einstein and Marilyn Monroe illusion.
Look closely at the image.
You'll see the finer details of Einstein
on a blurry background,
but backing away or shrinking the image will reveal
an underlying image of Marilyn Monroe.
Now this one's really trippy, but the reason that it occurs
is because of the way that your brain processes visual input
and the hybrid image's combination of the lower number
of pixels in Monroe's picture and the larger number
of dense pixels in Mr. Einstein's.
Try it right now for yourself.
Look at the image closely
and then back all the way up from it.
You'll see what I'm talking about.
Number nine is Illusory Motion.
Whoa man! Psychedelic. (giggles)
The person who originally discovered this illusion
is actually a highly debated topic
in the scientific community.
However, the Motion Illusion was proven by
Roger B. H. Tootel and his team by showing images
to patients while they underwent an MRI.
Look at the image.
It seems to move when you look away from it
because of the cognitive effects of interlacing
color contrasts and shape positions within it.
In fact, this is actually a trick that many advertisements
have used on billboards and signs to catch your attention.
Nothing that you're looking at is actually moving,
but it's essentially that your brain just can't handle it,
so it appears to be moving cause
it's just trying to make sense of it.
See?
I'm not even moving!
But your brain's just trying to figure out why
there's this eraser-shaped headed man
just staring at me.
And number ten is The Thatcher Effect.
Oh look, a completely normal picture that's upside-down.
Okay.
Let's just spin that right-side up and wait, WHAT?!
Originally discovered in 1980
by psychology professor Peter Thompson,
The Thatcher Effect is actually named after
the former Prime Minister of Britain, Margaret Thatcher.
It was named after her because it was her image
that Thompson used to initially demonstrate this illusion.
See, our brains have trouble discerning the differences
in the obviously introverted features
when the picture's upside-down.
This is because the part of the brain devoted
to face perception is rarely used
to discern features in that position.
Essentially, we see the features but can not
properly perceive how ridiculous they look until
we see them on a face oriented the way
that we're used to seeing it.
For example, I'm smiling right now.
Can you tell?
And now, your brain should be sufficiently melted.
However if you still have your wits about you,
be sure to click that red Subscribe button
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So, have a great day guys,
and I will see you in the next video.
Peace.