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Scientists Find Believing Can Be Seeing
Posted by
samzenpus
on Thu Feb 21, 2008 07:58 AM
from the the-mind-is-quicker-than-the-eye dept.
from the the-mind-is-quicker-than-the-eye dept.
Ponca City, We Love You writes "Scientists at University College London have found the link between what we expect to see, and what our brain tells us we actually saw revealing that the context surrounding what we see is all important — sometimes overriding the evidence gathered by our eyes and even causing us to imagine things which aren't really there. A vague background context is more influential and helps us to fill in more blanks than a bright, well-defined context. This may explain why we are prone to 'see' imaginary shapes in the shadows when the light is poor. "Illusionists have been alive to this phenomenon for years," said Professor Zhaoping. "When you see them throw a ball into the air, followed by a second ball, and then a third ball which 'magically' disappears, you wonder how they did it. In truth, there's often no third ball — it's just our brain being deceived by the context, telling us that we really did see three balls launched into the air, one after the other." The original research paper is available on PLOS, the open-access, peer-reviewed journal."
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News? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
But then, I could be wrong. That's why I asked.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
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Re:News? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:News? (Score:4, Funny)
These are not the droids you are looking for.
Parent
Just one more reason to be careful (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Just one more reason to be careful (Score:5, Funny)
What are you, a T-Rex? ^_^
Parent
Re:Just one more reason to be careful (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
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Re:Just one more reason to be careful (Score:4, Interesting)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
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Re:Just one more reason to be careful (Score:4, Insightful)
Take a normal English Class. The bulk of the class is trying to teach people to get meaning out of litature and learning to read between the lines to get the underlining meaning. So you learn that you get an A+ when you read when Tess got off the tractor and her hands felt numb, then translate it to the numbing dehuminizing effect of the approaching indrustral revolution. Vs. a C+ when you read the the same part and you stated it was a means to express the feeling that you get after you ride a tractor for a long time, the author probably wrote it because most people who is his book proably isn't a farmer, so they would be learning how it feels to drive a tractor.
We are trained to look so deeply and make meaning out of everything that it has driven our society batty. 20 Years ago a local grocery store called Price Chopper use to have a picture of a coin with a woman face on it with an Axe cutting the coin, the had to change the image of the coin because people beleaved that it was portraiting woman abuse. With the downfall of Science and Math education we are loosing the ability to see things at face value.
Parent
seeing is believing... (Score:3, Informative)
But apparently we (the dutch) are completely wrong.
Re:seeing is believing... (Score:4, Insightful)
On the contrary. I think the saying is there exactly _because_ we naturally tend to do things the other way around. We believe something, and then we try to fit the evidence to our beliefs. The saying tells us to regard the evidence, and base our beliefs on that.
Parent
Pretty old news... (Score:5, Informative)
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First thing that comes to mind... (Score:4, Interesting)
It's not always what they want to see. (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
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Never heard that one before, but man is it accurate, esp regarding various cults and religions.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Which is why... (Score:2)
Re:Which is why... (Score:4, Insightful)
The US is however probably a lost cause for gun control anyway with the genie being out of the bottle so to speak. Nevertheless, even acknowledging that reality, the situation there is obviously insane to anyone outside the US. There should at the very least be ongoing research and strategising as to how to normalise the situation there. Having more guns than people is *not* a normal situation, it's just a recipe for disaster.
Parent
Re:Which is why... (Score:4, Insightful)
That is the problem in the states imo, we don't focus on these lower income demographic (typically) people to the degree that we should. If we brought those lower classes closer to middle class, the proerty rights issue would be of far less concern, as most people would see the error in acting like primitve animals, taking what they want as long as they feel they'll get away with it, at the cost of my life and others.
Parent
Believing is Being (Score:2)
"Alive to this phenomenon" is precisely how an illusionist would want you to perceive the effects of their knowing how something really was. What a perfect idiom.
It helps to be a little dumb too... (Score:4, Funny)
I always looked at things this article covers along the lines of we make a decision and justify it later, not the reverse.
I am shocked.... ...... (Score:5, Informative)
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Scientific principle doesnt mean much if we cant believe what we see.
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Any decent scientific experiment will attempt to remove human bias etc. Just because you can't prove anything 100%, doesn't mean everything is equally valid.
If one group said "we don't believe in ghosts" and another group said "we could not find any evidence for ghosts, despite extensive testing" then which opinion would you trust more?
Eighteen observers... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
I think 640 observers would have been more like it...
Magicians and artists (Score:2)
The most important thing one learns in art school is how to see. By this I mean that non-artists see like non-mathemeticians calculate.
Now I have to go and read the research paper.
Obligatory Groucho Marx Quote: (Score:3, Funny)
"He thought he saw..." "He looked again..." (Score:3, Insightful)
I've always supposed Lewis Carroll's poem, from _Sylvie and Bruno,_ was referring to this effect. Certainly "He thought he saw... he looked again and found it was..." is happening to me more frequently.
He thought he saw an Elephant,
That practised on a fife:
He looked again, and found it was
A letter from his wife.
"At length I realise," he said,
"The bitterness of Life!"
He thought he saw a Buffalo
Upon the chimney-piece:
He looked again, and found it was
His Sister's Husband's Niece.
"Unless you leave this house," he said,
"I'll send for the Police!"
He thought he saw a Rattlesnake
That questioned him in Greek:
He looked again, and found it was
The Middle of Next Week.
"The one thing I regret," he said,
"Is that it cannot speak!"
He thought he saw a Banker's Clerk
Descending from the bus:
He looked again, and found it was
A Hippopotamus.
"If this should stay to dine," he said,
"There won't be much for us!"
He thought he saw a Kangaroo
That worked a coffee-mill:
He looked again, and found it was
A Vegetable-Pill.
"Were I to swallow this," he said,
"I should be very ill!"
He thought he saw a Coach-and-Four
That stood beside his bed:
He looked again, and found it was
A Bear without a Head.
"Poor thing," he said, "poor silly thing!
It's waiting to be fed!"
He thought he saw an Albatross
That fluttered round the lamp:
He looked again, and found it was
A Penny-Postage Stamp.
"You'd best be getting home," he said:
"The nights are very damp!"
He thought he saw a Garden-Door
That opened with a key:
He looked again, and found it was
A Double Rule of Three:
"And all its mystery," he said,
"Is clear as day to me!"
He thought he saw a Argument
That proved he was the Pope:
He looked again, and found it was
A Bar of Mottled Soap.
"A fact so dread," he faintly said,
"Extinguishes all hope!"
I can attest to it (Score:2)
How old is it? (Score:2)
Idealism (Score:3, Interesting)
All our experiences come from our senses, our eyes/ears/nose/skin/tongue send electrical impulses to our brain, the mind interpreters these groups of sensory experiences and we call it reality.
Idealism says (as best i can describe) that "reality" is the mind's interpretation of these sensory experiences, what causes our senses to send a particular sensory experience to the brain isnt directly knowable, therefore not as relevant as the experience itself.
It is the sensory experience itself that defines reality, i.e. reality is the effect not the cause.
The Wikipedia page doesnt do the topic justice.
AKA... (Score:3, Insightful)
I think this phenomenon is often referred to as religion.
Perhaps.. (Score:3, Funny)
Part of the brain may know what is right (Score:2)
Professor Bob (her last name is Li...) (Score:5, Informative)
NOT the actual source. (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Here's an example (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, here's an example. Suppose some guy picks up various scattered bits of facts -- a story on slashdot here, something about Mars kooks there. Now, he has an instinct -- or maybe it's hardwired at an even lower level than that -- to make up patterns around those scattered facts, to fill in the blanks. So he imagines a category of people who 'see things where nothing exists'. Before long, he's convinced enough of this specific phenomenon -- of this entity which is purely a product of his own tendency to create patterns to explain the phenomena he senses -- that he actually starts posting about this group of people on slashdot, as if there actually were one specific kind of person who has this trait!
And then other factors, psychological, move him to assume that he's 'better' than this entity that has popped up in his mind and that he now believes is an actual thing. He even begins to give patronising advice. To him, it's just as if he's *interacting* with this thing, this 'people who see things where nothing exists'. His self-deception is complete!
Far fetched? Maybe. But maybe not...
HTH
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Makes no sense - It's either there, or it isn't (Score:2)
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