Can’t believe a familiar visual illusion has such a secret. Moreover, it has only been discovered recently.
We have known many types of visual illusions, and one of the most classic is the following image.
Post-motion illusion.
This is an example of a “motion aftereffect” illusion. This illusion makes the images after observing the picture also tend to move in the same way.
It is known that the “after-motion” illusion is the first type of visual illusion discovered by humans. However, until today, science has realized a potential benefit of it, which is to help people improve their vision.
Accordingly, experts from the University of York and Glasgow suggest that when subjected to the illusion of “expanding motion aftereffect” , the images then also become larger. The person suffering from the hallucinogen will be able to read super-small text that was definitely unreadable before.
Specifically, the team hypothesized that the images humans observe depend not only on the eyes, but also on the processing ability of the brain. And they test this possibility with an eye chart that is usually located in the clinic.
Ophthalmology boards are still often placed in clinics.
The experiment went like this: the participants would look at the other animation for 30 seconds – this is just enough time for the visual illusion to activate. They will then quickly turn to the eye chart and compare the smallest font size they can read (if you want, you can also try it at home).
As a result, the candidates were able to read letters at least 2 orders of magnitude smaller than they were before the visual illusion.
“The worse the pre-affected vision, the stronger the benefits of this hallucinogen,” said Dr. Rob Jenkins, who led the study.
“And conversely, if your vision is already excellent, this illusion won’t help much.”
However, this effect only lasts for about 10s – 20s. But anyway, this is also one of the quite effective methods for you to train your eyes. Moreover, it also contains a sizable mining potential for future science.
The brain has an area called the visual cortex – responsible for processing information from the eyes, helping us to perceive things around us.
This illusion helps people to improve their vision.
The job is quite complex, so the visual cortex has 280 million neurons. In it, there is a group of cells that specialize in processing moving images.
When observing a still image, all moving cells will be kept low, allowing us to determine that the object is at rest. But when looking at the vortex of motion, these cells are very active to process information.
Therefore, after only a short period of time, these cells begin to run out of energy, or in other words, our brain will become tired. However, some cell types will tire faster (depending on the direction of the circle’s motion).
The difference in energy consumption between cell types is what causes this visual illusion.