Cool Optical Illusion Will Make You See A Ghost

If ‘That Dress’ taught us anything, it’s that the internet loves optical illusions as much as it loves witty graffiti artists and handsome dogs.

So it’s little surprise that the latest piece of internet brilliance doing the rounds is another retina-warping, mind-melting illusion - though thankfully this time it’s not quite as frustrating as that dress.

This illusion in particular tricks your eyes into seeing the eerie image of a lady that’s not there. Like a ghost. A phantom in your eyeball.

To try it out yourself, stare at the white dot for around 15 seconds in the ‘negative’ image and then shift your eyeline to the blank space on the right. Blink multiple times to improve the effect.

Related: The Illusions Of The Year Winners Will Blow Your Mind

Crazy, right?

The results are caused by what’s known as “negative afterimage”, caused by the way that cells in the eyes send messages to the brain.

In a nutshell, here's the effect explained to the The Daily Mail by Dr Juno Kim from the New South Wales School of Optometry and Vision Science: “The code for all the hues we can experience in the light spectrum… this information is relayed from the back of the eye to the brain via three opponent neuron channels.

“When you the direct your gaze at a uniform background – let’s say a grey wall – then what happens is that the cell doesn’t return to its resting activity, it goes much lower than that.”

Which obviously makes perfect sense, right? Yeah, us neither.

[Via: Daily Mail]