Incredible Optical Illusions Will Change The World Before Your Eyes - Unexplained Mysteries

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Optical illusion are fascinating! They also teach us about our visual perception, and its limitations. Emphasis here is on the beauty of perceptual phenomena, on interactive experiments, and explanation of the visual mechanisms involved – to the degree that they are understood. There's nothing like a good optical illusion to give your brain a workout. The best illusions strike a balance of generating interest without causing frustration. And you know how frustrating some illusions can be. An optical illusion (also called a visual illusion) is characterized by visually perceived images that differ from objective reality. The information gathered by the eye is processed in the brain to give a perception that does not tally with a physical measurement of the stimulus source. There are three main types: literal optical illusions that create images that are different from the objects that make them, physiological illusions that are the effects of excessive stimulation of a specific type (brightness, colour, size, position, tilt, movement), and cognitive illusions, the result of unconscious inferences. Pathological visual illusions arise from a pathological exaggeration in physiological visual perception mechanisms causing the aforementioned types of illusions. 1.) Watch the little cross for long enough, and the dots will vanish. 2.) Keep an eye on one of the yellow dots and the other yellow dots vanish. Physiological illusions, such as the afterimages following bright lights, or adapting stimuli of excessively longer alternating patterns (contingent perceptual aftereffect), are presumed to be the effects on the eyes or brain of excessive stimulation or interaction with contextual or competing stimuli of a specific type—brightness, colour, position, tile, size, movement, etc. The theory is that a stimulus follows its individual dedicated neural path in the early stages of visual processing, and that intense or repetitive activity in that or interaction with active adjoining channels cause a physiological imbalance that alters perception. The Hermann grid illusion and Mach bands are two illusions that are best explained using a biological approach. Lateral inhibition, where in the receptive field of the retina light and dark receptors compete with one another to become active, has been used to explain why we see bands of increased brightness at the edge of a colour difference when viewing Mach bands. Once a receptor is active it inhibits adjacent receptors. This inhibition creates contrast, highlighting edges. In the Hermann grid illusion the gray spots appear at the intersection because of the inhibitory response which occurs as a result of the increased dark surround. Lateral inhibition has also been used to explain the Hermann grid illusion, but this has been disproved. More recent "empirical" approaches to optical illusions have had some success in explaining optical phenomena with which theories based on lateral inhibition have struggled. 3.) If you stare at the red dot for long enough, the blue circle will disappear. 4.) The blue bars will fade away the longer you look at the black dot. 5.) Staring at the black cross will cause the pink dots to fade away. You may even see the pink dots replaced by green spots. 6.) Lock your eyes on the middle of this picture. It will disappear after a few seconds 7.) The gray area fades away the longer you stare at the black dot. comments powered by Disqus Submit News/Videos/Links | Discuss article | Article Link | More Unsolved and Unexplained Mysteries