The Shade Illusion--Illustrated in a Video

This classic illusion that can be found in most books usually leaves my students not believing that the two tiles are not the same color.  Their brains are unable to see the colors as the same due to the shadowing effects.  This video illustration ought to help you out.




posted by Chuck Schallhorn

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The Spinning Lady Illusion Updated

One of my students from last year found this and shared it with me. Thank you Harleen. :)

It is an update of the spinning lady illusion to make it more visible for each direction.  The original was from this link:
https://31.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_la72c3KYmq1qabovao1_r1_500.gif 

In the comments section, there were requests to have the illusion explained.  Here are a few excellent links that explain this and other illusions.  Enjoy :)

http://www.moillusions.com/spinning-girl-illusion-explanation/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spinning_Dancer
http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/left-brain-right-brain-and-the-spinning-girl/
http://psychology.about.com/od/sensationandperception/ig/Optical-Illusions/spinning-dancer-illusion.htm
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/04/28/the-truth-about-the-spinning-dancer/?_r=0



Posted by Chuck Schallhorn

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Race: The Power of Illusion and Race Sorting

I was just reading my email from Teaching Tolerance, an offshoot of The Southern Poverty Law Center trying to raise awareness of racial/ethnic issues and decreasing the conflict related to them.  In the newsletter there was a link to a PBS site called "Race: The Power of an Illusion, a video from 2003."  The main activity I was directed to was to look at pictures and sort the faces into racial categories.  Wow.  

Let's just say I was not successful.  Nor are most people.  It's a real eye-opening activity that can be done by a person on under five minutes and could be a great beginner to a social psychology unit or a mini-unit on race, ethnicity and/or prejudice/discrimination.  Great for sociology as well.

What is Race?  Is Race for Real?

Sorting Activity

Main Page of Race/Illusions Site

posted by Chuck Schallhorn

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2009 Illusion of the Year

The 2009 Illusion of the year has been announced! And its a good one - a powerful motion illusion. It works well for me on my screen and I bet it would work well for an entire class if it was projected. My challenge with these perceptual illusions is always relating them to the perception principles in the text (they are often VERY complex) but the description provided for this illusion is pretty clear. The web site also allows viewers to change the parameters of the illusion, etc.

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