Michael Shermer on Science and Perceptual Blindness.

This is a clip from a talk at TED (Technology, Entertainment, design) given by Michael Shermer [wiki], the founder of Skeptic Magazine. At around 3 minutes mark, he showed a clip about perceptual blindness (the basketball pass experiment) and even a clip from Katie Melua [wiki].

It's worth watching: Hit play or go to Link [YouTube] - Thanks Sherzod Agzamov!

Update 12/4/06: Hanan of growabrain gave us another link to the white shirt experiment: Link


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I wish I had seen this without being told about it - unfortunately I can't imagine not seeing the gorilla - and now I'll never have the chance to prove or disprove.

The video is STILL AVAILABLE through a link here: Experimental Pschology: Human Perception

The human mind is amazing!

Jeff
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I had to go back and make sure he wasn't showing two different clips. I missed the guy in the ape suit completely the first time. Once I saw him, however, I couldn't *not* see him, even when I concentrated on counting passes again.
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I noticed the gorilla on the first viewing only as he was exiting the scene, and I can't even take credit for that because I only bothered to notice him due to hearing the laughter from the TED audience!

That alone alerted me that something was amiss, and my attention refocused into looking for what it was. Without that outside cue, I'd have completely missed him.

By the way, I counted 17 passes.
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I was so focused on white that I blanked out the monkey completely (because he was dark). Wonder if I would've done the same if he'd had us count the number of passes between the black-shirted people.
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