#magicillusions

Why does the moon look bigger on the horizon? An explanation of the “Moon Illusion”. When you look up at the evening sky as the moon begins to rise above the horizon, it seems to swell and then retract as it goes higher in the sky. This effect, where the moon looks bigger along the horizon, is known as the “moon illusion”. It’s not only limited t

The Disappearing Dot Illusion: We bet you can't see all 12 at once The Disappearing Dots Illusion is making the Internet insane.  There are 12 black dots at the intersections in the image below, but we bet that your brain won't let you see them all at once.  Try as you might, you'll only see 2, maybe 3 dots at a time:  never all 12.  So what's go

The Brick Wall Illusion - if you haven't seen it yet, here's the answer... Yet another optical illusion has made the rounds on the information superhighway and social networks.  It is known as the brick wall illusion, and admittedly, had us stumped.  Completely.  In fact, it wasn't till we saw the answer that we yelled a collective, "HOW DID WE NO

Mahatma Gandhi’s face on Mars? Mahatma Gandhi’s face has been found on Mars! Sort of. On first glance, it is a very compelling image, and Matteo Ianneo was quick to point that out using Google Mars. Located at 33°12’29.82?N, 12°55’51.21?W, the blurry image looks like a picture of Mahatma Gandhi in while in profile view. This is a classic case

How do levitating street performers work? If you've had the opportunity to travel around the world, then at some point you may have encountered "levitating" street performers.  The "floating man illusion" is usually set up with one or two people.  In both cases, it's made to look like the performer is floating in mid-air, supporting his or her

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