How do we operate in the present when we perceive the past?

Because visual signals take time to process, we live slightly in the past. So how do we ever catch a baseball? And what does this have to do with certain visual illusions, or the view in New York City, or the things you were never taught in school, or the warp drive in Star Trek? Join Eagleman this week for a mindblowing look at the strange relationship between vision and time.

Episode Audio

Stare at these blobs for a few moments. What do you see? Can you make anything out?

Episode Video

More Information:

Changizi MA. ‘Perceiving the present’ as a framework for ecological explanations of the misperception of projected angle and angular size. Perception. 2001 Feb;30(2):195-208.

Changizi MA, Widders DM. Latency correction explains the classical geometrical illusions. Perception. 2002 Oct;31(10):1241-62.

Changizi MA, Hsieh A, Nijhawan R, Kanai R, Shimojo S. Perceiving the present and a systematization of illusions. Cognitive science. 2008 Apr 5;32(3):459-503.

Vaughn DA, Eagleman DM. Spatial warping by oriented line detectors can counteract neural delays. Frontiers in Psychology. 2013 Nov 1;4:794.

Eagleman DM. Visual illusions and neurobiology. Nature Reviews Neuroscience. 2001 Dec 1;2(12):920-6.

Griffiths TL, Tenenbaum JB. Predicting the future as Bayesian inference: people combine prior knowledge with observations when estimating duration and extent. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. 2011 Nov;140(4):725.

Schmolesky MT, Wang Y, Hanes DP, Thompson KG, Leutgeb S, Schall JD, Leventhal AG. Signal timing across the macaque visual system. Journal of neurophysiology. 1998 Jun 1;79(6):3272-8.

Picture of blobs from: Ahissar M, Hochstein S. The reverse hierarchy theory of visual perceptual learning. Trends in cognitive sciences. 2004 Oct 1;8(10):457-64.

Here’s the hint. Now scroll back to the top and you’ll never again be able to not assign meaning to these blobs.

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