Look carefully…there’s something pretty special about the images above. What’s so great about four upside-down faces you ask? See for yourself. Below we have the same images when positioned right-side-up: Continue reading
Meet Joe. After suffering from years of epilepsy, Joe underwent brain surgery to have his corpus callosum severed. The corpus callosum, also referred to as the colossal commissure, is a thick band of 200-250 million nerve fibers at the longitudinal fissure that facilitates interhemispheric communication in the brain. By having this band severed, Joe prevented the spread of epileptic seizure from one hemisphere to the other.
Like most fascinating phenomena, the flashed face distortion effect was discovered completely by accident. Honors student Sean Murphy had eye-aligned pictures of faces in the University of Queensland psychology lab and was playing around with them when he first noticed the grotesque faces staring back at him. When he looked at the faces individually however, they appeared normal and some were even attractive. Continue reading
