This optical illusion here: [https://n.pr/3ynKm9A](https://n.pr/3ynKm9A)
I found an explanation [here](https://n.pr/3wn5Bpv) that clarified some parts but used very technical terms for others. Any chance someone has a simpler explaination?
In: 3
So yeah, there are a lot of points there.
* The neurons that report what your eyes are seeing try to save energy by not firing when they don’t detect a change
* On high-contrast spots (black-yellow and blue-white) they rapidly work out that the image is no longer changing and stop firing quickly
* Because the contrast is high, the amount of neural activity is high
* On low-contrast spots (black-blue and white-yellow), it takes longer to work out that the image is no longer changing and keep firing for longer.
* Because the contrast is low, the amount of neural activity is lower.
This means that the highest activity regions in your vision will *start out* at the black-yellow and blue-white boundaries, but since that activity falls off rapidly, it’ll fall below the activity level of the low-contrast boundaries. Which means the “high activity” region in your vision changes. Your brain’s image processing methodology apparently identifies that as movement. And it also identifies a lot of things moving in unison as one larger thing, which makes the whole discs appear to spin.
Your vision is not like a camera; your brain does a *lot* of post-processing on it. You only have a tiny patch of sharp vision https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fovea_centralis (about twice the size of your thumbnail held at arm’s length), and your eyes [dart around involuntarily](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saccade) to sample additional data. Your brain uses that, the blurry data from your peripheral vision, and what you *expect* to see to paint over the rest of your field of vision, including the [blind spot that all vertebrates have](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_spot_(vision)).
Here’s my favorite illusion showing this filling-in effect:
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