Watch This!

### Cold Open

"This is your brain. Isolated from the world, inside your skill. Your senses provide it's only clues to what's going on out there. But how can your brain take the limited information from your senses to build you a trustworthy reality? If you stick around for the next hour, we're going to show you with a series of illusions you can't help but fall for, even when you're in on the gag. So, are you ready?"

## Games

### Game #0: The Question

Is the square on top darker than the bottom one?

Result: While most people believe the answer to be true, the answer is false. They are the same shade of grey.

Why: What illusions tell us is that what we're trying to see is not the world as it is but something else. We're actually getting perceptions from a useful world, and that perception doesn't have to correspond with what's actually there. In this case, your brain uses shadows to make a decision. The light reflected by an object is converted by your eyes into electrical signals, and is sent down a pathway, called the optic nerve, to your visual cortex. the gradients and shadows painted give clues about who the squares are lighted. Shadows can lie to you, however. Our vision begins with light, but our brain generates color.

How: To prove the two gray squares are the same shade, By moving a point between the two squares, our perception changes.

### Game #1: The Basketball

Look at a how a basketball bounces with shadows.

Result: The ball bounces differently based on the shadow.

So: Your brain has learned to trust shadows for the behavior of objects in space.

### Game #2: The Tiles of a Cube

Are the two squares on different sides of a cube different or the same?

Result: They're the same.

Why: Even though you may notice the shadow, the entire cube is an illusion. There is no shadow on any part of the cube. It looks like a shadow, so your brain interprets it that way, despite it not being there.

### Game #3: Large

Which ball is larger?

Result: The golf ball is bigger even though you think the soccer ball is bigger.

Why: Because the golf ball was further away, it looks smaller. There are a lot of cues to depth. Lines that are parallel will eventually meet somewhere in the distance. Like the previous Illusions, you brain relies on past experience.

### Game #4: Exactly

Look at two bars. Does one look bigger than the other?

Result: The top one looks bigger.

Why: Because it seems place farther away, but if it were that way, it'd have to be larger. So your brain overcompensates and you see the top bar as longer.

### Game #5: Thin and Long

Which table is thinner and longer?

Result: They are exactly the same.

Why: The vertical lines appear to recede far into the background, tricking your brain into seeing them as longer than horizontal lines. Perspective cues are processed so effectively by your brain, you barely even think about it. But seeing how objects move in a 3D world is one of the most important skills your brain has. How does your brain splice moments into reality?

### Game #6: Stare at That Purple

Stare at the X. Do you see a green dot moving around in the circle?

Result: Yes, but there's nothing there.

How: Your visual cortex compares the image from one moment to the other. The missing dot leaves an afterimage. As the afterimage shifts position, your brain stitches together a pattern, causing you to see motion. And motion is important.

### Game #7: The Outline of Dots

What are these two people doing?

Result: If you said arguing, you're correct.

How: Your brain was able to figure this out by recognize biological motion, to recognize motion of anything that's living. Parts of the brain are specifically designed to analyze motion before we're even aware of it.

### Mini-Game: Motion Capture Dot Test #2

Look at the actors and try and see what they're doing inside those dot cloaks.

Result: You probably figured out most of them, but they might've gotten harder.

How: You're best at identifying activities you're most familiar with. But what the real's reason?

### Game #8: Scene Cut

Take a look at the following scene.

Result: You may have experienced pain after seeing it.

Why: When we watch someone else do something, we're convinced were doing something. Mirror neurons mimic what other people do. It's still emerging science, but it may be the reason you see things so accurately in the dot test. It does this so well, you can even be fooled by inanimate objects.

### Game #9: Rubber Hand Experience

Jonah primes participants with a rubber hand and link feelings to the fake arm.

Result: Jonah hits the fake hand with a hammer, causing a reaction in the volunteers.

How: Even though not everyone felt for it, some felt pain. 30% of your brain is devoted to sight. When your body must choose between sight and other senses, you trust your eyes.

### Game #10: BAH, GA, FA?????

Listen to our Actress. What word is she saying, and why is it easier with your eyes closed?

Result: The word is Ba.

How: By placing video footage of the different words over each other, and just like in the rubber hand experience, you change what you hear to make sense of the world.

### Game #11: The Sound/Try Again

Close your eyes and listen. What's making this sound?

Result: It's the sound of cheeseburgers hitting a dock in Cloudy by a Chance of Meatballs.

How: Foley Artists change what you hear in movies. This process reveals that your brain is built to quickly find meaning in sound.

Now try again.

Result: You may doubt your sense of hearing, but don't.

### Game #12: Mental Picture

Envision yourself based on the sounds you hear.

Result: It's a France street cafe.

How: Sound is first converted by nerve into electrical signals and into the auditory cortex. By searching with similar areas of the brain to search for similar sounds.

### Game #13: Science Fiction

Hear garbled words, then normal, then garbled.

Result: You can't unhear the words.

How: Language is magical because you can put thoughts in peoples' minds, just by making pressure waves in the air. Your brain has evolved to decipher speech. Allowing you to communicate effectively.

### Game #14: Letter

Identify the Letter.

Result: It's A or H. But it depends on the context.

Why: The context changes the letter. "The Cat" Can have two different meanings out of the same type of letter.

### Game #15: Give it a Try

Count the number of F's.

Result: The answer is Nine. But why do you miss some like "of"

Why: Because "of" sounds like V and using your past experience, your brain can decipher that.

### Game #16: Jumping To.....

Read the word.

Result: It's not what you expect.

Why: Illusions help us see how much work our brain has to do and is really good at working with limited information. But sometimes it makes mistakes. But this trick just shows you efficient we are with language.

Daniel Kish is blind and riding a bike. How?

He's using echolocation or sound to see.

Daniel is similar to how Bats use sound to navigate in the dark.

### Game #17: The Final Scene

Figure out what's wrong and why and how.

Result: If you got it, nice job. If you didn't, don't worry.

So: Your brain makes the best guesses and our reality isn't perfect, it's close enough. Tricks are needed to expose it.

## List of Experts

* Beau Lotto(Neuroscientist)
* Bas Rokers
* John Crawford
* Cynthia Moss
* Jonah Lehler(WIRED)
* Josh Mecdermott(NYU)
* Dr. Lera Boroditsky
* Daniel Kish
* Robin Harlan/Sarah Moat-Jacobs(Foley Artists)