7 thoughts on “These Balls Aren’t Rotating

  1. Mikeyfex

    If the red base was rotating also then the balls would trace a curved line relative to the angular velocity of the red base but to our eye they would still be travelling in a straight line across the screen.

    Imagine 4 kids sitting equally spaced on the edge of a merry-go-round, facing inwards. If the first kid rolled a ball straight across to the kid facing him/her and the merry-go-round was rotating, then looking down from above the ball would still be travelling in a straight line but actually appear to curve off and reach the kid to the right of left (depending on direction of rotation) first.

    *skip something*

    *one more leap of logic*

    And that, my friends, is why toilets flush in opposite directions on opposite sides of the equator.

    Coriolis, bitches.

      1. Mark Dennehy

        In that it’s a framed abstract view of points in motion, but lacks the context to determine that it’s not the outline of a wheel in motion on the frame of the view. And the size of that frame has been chosen to allow for either interpretation to be accurate (if the frame was larger, it wouldn’t be possible to interpret the image that way). Our brain chooses one interpretation; the framer says “oh, silly brain, it’s the other” even though there’s no possible way to determine which of the two scenarios was the real one and it had been set up that way.

        TL;DR – it’s not the brain suffering from an optical illusion, it’s a faked scenario being interpreted as intended.

        With the shade illusion though, even when you’re shown it working, even when you’re told what to expect and how it happens and it’s done as slow or as fast as you specify, you can’t avoid it or counter it; it’s an actual processing error in your brain, not some cheap trick.

    1. pedeyw

      Don’t they both count as cognitive optical illusions? Like the rabbit duck? All the data is there but we unconsciously choose to see one interpretation over another. I think.

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