It is possible to perceive something, to feel certain about it, and still be wrong. And that’s ok.
Certainty is a feeling, not a fact.
This image contains no yellow.
(Illusion credit: Akiyoshi Kitaoka)
#mentalhealth #psychology #science #perception #illusion #vision #learning #growth #humble #leadership
The perception isn't "wrong." It's a product of the brain's adaptability for perceiving *relative* colors.
Here's the mechanics of how this illusion works, and how your brain manufactures the "yellow."
Blurring the image, reveals the "yellow" circle is indeed grey. But it also reveals that the entire image is biased toward blue, as if you were seeing this image under a strong blue light.
Removing the color cast from the image, reveals that the "yellow" existed on a relative basis. (Blue is "minus yellow," and yellow is "minus blue").
The human visual system does all this automatically, so that you can percieve accurate color under all types of changing lighting conditions.
You removed the blue color from that zoomed in image. The point is that the blue stripes on the gray background in the original illusion leads to the brain "seeing" minus blue, which is yellow.
The illusion is also aided by the fact that many people have seen that cyan magenta yellow diagram without the blue cast and so their memory fills in the yellow as well.
Understanding how an optical illusion functions to fool our brain, helps us understand ourselves. There's a narrative out there that because our brain is easily fooled, that means we can't be sure of anything in life. And that's the narrative I'm trying to debunk.
The illusion makes a very narrow point about the human visual system, that's not really extensible to a larger philosophical context.
No, the cropped image is correct, it's just missing the context of the surrounding blue stripes. (Which is what fools the brain into believing that a relative grey is yellow). The black and white stripes, which sum to grey, are yellow-er than the background since blue is white minus yellow. Hope that makes sense 🙂
For sure if you're only seeing part of the picture, you're in trouble.
Although, aren't statistical methods accurate to within a known margin of error?
In science nothing is certain, but a lot can be established with such high probability that it doesn't matter.
A physicist friend of mine pointed out that it was statistically possible, though extremely unlikely, that every molecule in the air in a given room would randomly rush out at once leaving that room a vacuum.
But it wouldn't be likely to happen within the age of the known universe.
This link deals with sample size vs. confidence level.
https://uncw.edu/irp/ie/resources/documents/qualtrics/determining-sample-size-2.pdf
Not trying to be a smart-ass. I was a TV and film colorist for many years. So we dealt with removing color casts and balancing background colors on a daily basis.
Something can be wrong even if millions of people believe it.
i.e flat Earth, or 2+2=5
Mark,
There are subjective truths such as "how I'm feeling right now."
There are objective truths like the air temperature outside my house, which has nothing to do with my mind.
I think you know they aren't the same.
No, temperature is a measurment of the kinetics of particle motion. And measuring it does not change it.
Scot,
That's not the same. Take a look at the series of 3 images I posted. The 2nd and 3rd image were taken directly from the first. The second image is blurred. The 3rd image removes the blue color cast from the *entire* image (not just the lower right circle). This demonstrates that the *relative* color yellow is indeed present in the first image.
mark henick 
🇺🇦 Sean Prophet ⚛
Scot Close