Explaining optical illusions


	Explaining optical illusions

fraynelson

6-3-2008 9:49 AM

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<div style="margin: 12px 0px; font-family: arial; color: #333333; background: #ffffff; border: solid 4px #e5e5e5; width: 100%; clear: left;"><div class="CM_CTB_Content_Wrap" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;background-color: #ffffff;"><div style="border-bottom: solid 1px #dcdcdc; white-space: nowrap; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: #eeeeee ;background-image: url(http://clipmarks.com/images/source-bg.gif); background-repeat: repeat-x; height: 24px; line-height: 24px; vertical-align: middle; padding-bottom: 4px; color: #666666; font-size: 10px;" ><a href="http://clipmarks.com/clip-to-blog/" title="see clips that are hot right now"><img src="http://content.clipmarks.com/blog_embed/face48a9-4ec1-4543-b8d2-d7371d6dbabb/2089DB36-BB60-4825-B5B3-91B895DCCF46/" alt="" width="19" height="19" border="0" style="vertical-align: middle; margin: 0px 4px; display: inline; border: none; float:none;" /></a>clipped from <a title="http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/080602-foresee-future.html" href="http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/080602-foresee-future.html" style="font-size: 11px;">www.livescience.com</a></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/080602-foresee-future.html">When light hits your retina, about one-tenth of a second goes by before the brain translates the signal into a visual perception of the world.</blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/080602-foresee-future.html">
Changizi now says it's our visual system that has evolved to compensate for neural delays, generating images of what will occur one-tenth of a second into the future. That foresight keeps our view of the world in the present.</blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/080602-foresee-future.html"><P>
That same seer ability can explain a range of optical illusions, Changizi found. 
</p> <P>
"Illusions occur when our brains attempt to perceive the future, and those perceptions don't match reality," Changizi said.</P></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/080602-foresee-future.html">Something called <A href="http://www.livescience.com/php/multimedia/imagedisplay/img_display.php?s=strangenews&c=&l=&pic=080601-hering-illusion-02.jpg&cap=In+this+so-called+Hering+illusion%2C+the+straight+lines+near+the+central+point+%28vanishing+point%29+appear+to+curve+outward.+This+illusion+occurs+because+our+brains+are+predicting+the+way+the+underlying+scene+would+look+in+the+next+moment+if+we+were+moving+toward+the+middle+point.+Credit:+Mark+Changizi%2C+RPI.&title=">the Hering illusion</A>, for instance, looks like bike spokes around a central point, with vertical lines on either side of this central, so-called vanishing point. The illusion <A href="http://www.livescience.com/health/070411_visual_illusion.html">tricks us into thinking</A>  we are moving forward, and thus, switches on our future-seeing abilities. Since we aren't actually moving and the figure is static, we misperceive the straight lines as curved ones.</blockquote></div><div style="margin: 0px 6px 6px 4px;"><table style="font-size: 11px;border-spacing: 0px;padding: 0px;" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tr><td style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;">&nbsp;</td><td align="right" style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;width:107px" width="107"><a href="http://clipmarks.com/share/2089DB36-BB60-4825-B5B3-91B895DCCF46/blog/" title="blog or email this clip"><img src="http://content8.clipmarks.com/images/c2b-foot.png" border="0" alt="blog it" width="107" height="17" style="border-width:0px;padding:0px;margin:0px;" /></a></td></tr></table></div></div>

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