10种视觉幻象

Seeing isn't necessarily believing, as the Ames Room proves.

就像艾姆斯屋所证明的那样，眼见未必为实。

Optical illusions are popular again thanks to the internet. This article explains several classic optical illusions and the reasons why they continue to fool people to this day.

因为互联网，视觉幻象再次流行起来。这篇文章介绍了几种经典的视觉幻象以及直到今日它们依然能继续欺骗世人的原因。

Young woman vs. old woman

年轻女子VS.老妇人

Cartoonist William Ely Hill published 'My Wife and My Mother-in-Law' in the magazine in November 1915 with the caption 'They are both in this picture — Find them.'

漫画家威廉·伊莱·希尔于1915年11月在杂志上刊登了一幅画“我的妻子和我的继母”，并配文称，“她们都在这张画中——找到她们。”

"My Wife and My Mother-in-Law" is arguably one of the most famous optical illusions in the world. Some people see a young lady with her head turned towards the background while others see an elderly woman's side profile.

“我的妻子和我的继母”可以说是这个世界上最有名的视觉幻象之一。一些人看到了一位把头转向背景的年轻女子，而其他人则看到一位老妇人的侧面像。

A 2018 study from Flinders University in Australia says that who you see in the image depends on your age. The young persons saw the young lady while old persons saw the elderly woman.

澳大利亚弗林德斯大学2018年的一项研究表明，从这幅图中能看到谁取决于你的年龄。年轻人会看到年轻女子，而年长者会看到老妇人。

"The results therefore demonstrate that high-level social group processes have a subconscious effect on the early stages of face processing," the study's authors note.

这份研究报告的作者表示，“结果表明，高度的社会群体经历对面部识别的最初阶段有下意识影响”。

Curvature Blindness Illusion

曲度视觉缺失幻象

What do you see in the center of the above image: curvy lines or zigzag ones? Most people see both — double wavy lines and double angled lines alternating. Now look at the lines as they appear over the black and white area of the photo. What do you see now? The truth is all the lines are wavy.

从上述图片的中间部分你看到了什么：曲线还是锯齿形线条？大多数人两种线条都会看到——双曲线和双锯齿形线条交替出现。现在看看这张照片黑色和白色区域的线条。现在你看到了什么样的线条呢？事实是所有的线条都是曲线。

When a wavy line is perceived as a zigzag line, it's called curvature blindness, according to a new study by Kohske Takahashi, an associate professor of experimental psychology at Chukyo University in Japan.

日本中京大学实验心理学副教授高桥孝助的一项新研究表明，当一条曲线被看成一条锯齿形线条，这被称为曲度视觉缺失。

“I'd say that our eyes and brain may have been evolutionarily adapted to detect corners more efficiently than curves,” he said. “We are surrounded by artificial products, which have more corners than natural environment does, and hence our visual. This visual phenomenon doesn't cause the problem in our everyday life, otherwise someone should have found this illusion earlier.”

“我认为，与弧度相比，我们的眼睛和大脑在进化的过程中可能适应于更有效率地发现角度，”他说道。“我们周围都是人造产品，这些产品与自然环境相比有更多的角，因此我们的视觉也能更有效率地发现角度。这种视觉现象在我们的日常生活中并不会引起什么问题，否则人们早就发现这种幻象了。”

The Spinning Dancer Illusion

旋转舞者幻象

Is this figure spinning clockwise or counter-clockwise?

这个人在顺时针旋转还是逆时针旋转？

This image shows a female dancer pirouetting in a continuous loop. The illusion has to do with the direction in which she is spinning. Viewers will initially think that she is turning in either a clockwise or counterclockwise direction. However, when observing the image at other times, the same viewer may feel absolutely certain that the dancer is spinning in the opposite direction. In reality, this animation is on a continuous loop and does not suddenly change directions.

这幅图展示了一位女舞者在不断进行单脚尖旋转。这一幻象与她旋转的方向有关。观察者最初会认为她在顺时针旋转或逆时针旋转。然而，在其他时候观察这幅图的时候，同一位观察者也许会觉得这位舞者一定在朝另一个方向旋转。事实上，这位舞者就是在不断旋转，而且并没有突然改变方向。

Why is it impossible to define the direction of the spin? This optical illusion tricks you with depth perception. Because there aren't enough clues about the depth of the dancer image, no one can define the direction of her spin with absolute certainty. The image is a silhouette, so the dancer’s pony tail or extended arm can only be seen when she's facing to the side. They disappear from view at the critical moment when we need them to provide information about depth and direction.

为什么要确定她旋转的方向是不可能的呢？这一视觉幻象用深度感知欺骗了你。因为关于这幅舞者图的深度并没有足够的线索，没人能完全确定她旋转的方向。这幅图是一个剪影，所以只有当这位舞者面向一侧的时候我们才能看到她的马尾辫或伸展的手臂。当我们需要它们提供关于深度和方向的信息的时候，它们在这个重要时刻从视野中消失了。

Ames Room

艾姆斯屋

The Ames Room is one of the best (and most famous) examples of how perception is not always the same as the reality of what's in front of them. When viewed from the front, an Ames Room appears to be a normal, square room with walls perpendicular to floor and ceiling. However, the back wall is in fact built at a sharp angle and the floor and ceiling are steeply slanted.

艾姆斯屋是“感知到的并非总是事实”的最佳（也最有名的）例子之一。从正面观察，艾姆斯屋看上去是一个墙壁与地板和屋顶垂直的正常的方形屋子。然而，实际上后墙是以一个很尖的角度建成的，而且地板和屋顶也倾斜地很严重。

This creates an illusion that makes people and objects on one side of the room seem much smaller or larger than people or objects on the other side of the room. Since perspective is important, many Ames Room models have some sort of pinhole viewing device so that the viewer sees the room from an angle where they cannot perceive the slanted floor and the different lengths of the walls. The idea behind the Ames Room has been used in movies such as "The Lord of the Rings" series to make some actors seem much shorter or taller than they really are.

这个屋子创造了一种幻象，使房间一侧的人和物体看上去比房间另一侧的人或物体小得多或大得多。因为视角很重要，所以许多艾姆斯屋模型都有某种针孔式查看设备，这样观察者从一个角度观察这个房间，却不会注意到倾斜的地板和墙面的不同长度。艾姆斯屋背后的理念被运用于各种电影中，例如《指环王》系列电影，它使一些演员看上去比他们实际上要矮得多或高得多。

Simultaneous Contrast Illusion

同时对比错觉

In this image, the horizontal bar in the middle of the picture is one solid color. However, the changing gradient behind the bar makes it seem like the color of the bar itself is changing as it goes from left to right. If the viewer uses their hands to block the background, it becomes obvious that the whole bar is indeed only one shade of gray.

在这幅图中，中间的横条是纯色的。然而，横条后面变化的倾斜度使它的颜色看上去就像从左至右在不断改变。如果观察者用手遮住背景，显然整根横条确实只有一种颜色。

This trick shows that people tend to make assumptions based on surroundings rather than looking only at a singular object.

这个小把戏说明，人们往往会根据周遭环境做出假设而不是只观察单一物体。

Penrose Stairs

彭罗斯阶梯

The Penrose Stairs, also known as the Impossible Staircase, is perhaps one of the most famous of all optical illusions. In this two dimensional image, the four flights of stairs appear to link together so that a climber would go up or down the steps in a continuous loop but never arrive at a higher or lower point.

彭罗斯阶梯也被称为不可能楼梯，它可能是最有名的视觉幻象之一了。在这幅二维图片中，这四段楼梯似乎连在一起，所以爬楼梯的人会不断爬上或爬下楼梯，但永远不会到达更高或更低的一个位置。

In fact, this is just one example of the kind of perspective tricks that painters and artists working with two-dimensional mediums have employed for centuries.

实际上，这只是几百年来画家和艺术家们用二维媒介来进行创作的一种视角手法。

Ponzo Illusion

庞佐错觉

The Ponzo Illusion relies on geometric shapes to trick the eye. The idea is similar to the Simultaneous Contrast Illusion: People will make assumptions about an object based on the information that they get from the background.

庞佐错觉依靠几何图形来欺骗你的眼睛。这一理念与同时对比错觉相似：人们会根据他们从背景获得的信息来对他们看到的物体做出假设。

The illusion is very easy to recreate. When he first came up with it, Italian psychologist Mario Ponzo drew two horizontal parallel lines that were exactly the same length. By then drawing vertical lines that gradually got closer together, Ponzo was able to trick viewers into thinking that the parallel line in the background was much longer than the one in the foreground.

这种幻象非常容易再现。意大利心理学家马里奥·庞佐最初想到这个主意的时候，他画了两条长度相同且平行的横线。然后他又画了两条逐渐靠近的竖线，这样庞佐就能使观察者觉得背景中的横线比前景中的横线要长得多。

Necker Cube

奈克方块

The Necker Cube is a drawing of a square that has no clues about depth. This means that it's virtually impossible to decide which part of the square is the front and which is the back. The basic illusion is that some people will perceive a three dimensional cube with one side in the front while others will imagine that the very same side is the back of the cube.

奈克方块就是画一个深度不确定的正方形。这就意味着几乎不可能确定这个正方形哪边是正面，哪边是背面。这一基本幻象就是一些人会觉得这是一个一侧朝前的三维正方体，而其他人会觉得相同的一侧是正方体的背面。

So often the challenge is not to decide which side is the front and which is the back, but to try and see the cube from another perspective.

所以这里的挑战往往不是确定哪一面是正面，哪一面是背面，而是尝试从不同的视角来观察这个正方体。

The Rabbit Duck Head

兔头还是鸭头

One of the earliest examples of an ambiguous illustration, the Rabbit-Duck Head Illusion was first published in Germany in the late 19th century. Such hidden images were quite popular at the time. In this particular example, the duck's beak becomes the rabbit’s ears and the eye is drawn in such a way that it fits for both the right-facing and left-facing animals.

兔头还是鸭头幻象最早于19世纪末在德国公布，这也是最早的模糊幻象之一。当时这样的隐藏图像非常流行。在这个特例中，鸭子的嘴变成了兔子的耳朵，而图中的眼睛设计的既可以当作鸭子的左眼，又可以当作兔子的右眼。

The image was used by early 20th century philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, who studied the idea of perception and wrote academic papers that discussed the ways in which people perceive things.

20世纪初的哲学家路德维格·维特根斯坦使用了这幅图，他研究了感知的概念，并写下了探讨人们感知事物的方式的学术论文。

Optical art

欧普艺术

Optical art images seem to be moving even though they aren't animated. Most theories about the illusion of motion in optical art have to do with the brain’s inability to process the different colors and shapes simultaneously.

欧普艺术图像看上去就像在移动，尽管它们并未被动画化。关于欧普艺术移动错觉的多数理论都与大脑无法同时处理不同的颜色和形状有关。

These images are most often associated with psychedelic art, but other schools also use optical art techniques, which have their roots in impressionism, dadaism, cubism and other more-classic forms of art.

这些图像往往与幻觉艺术有关，但基于印象派、达达派、立体主义以及其他经典艺术的学派也会用到欧普艺术技巧。

（翻译：Dlacus）