Brain games compilation: The secret life of the mind

Our brain pulls a lot of tricks on us while we stay unaware. All of us have seen so many optical illusions and common mind tricks in our lifetime. Do you remember seeing these? If not, then try attempting them!

The cafe wall illusion

Image credit: By Fibonacci – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1788689

This actually originated from an observation of the tiles of the cafe wall at the bottom of St Michael’s Hill, Bristol by Steve Simpson, a lab member of British psychologist Richard Gregory.

Try this one:

• Pick a number between 1 and 10
• Multiply by 9.
• If it is two digit number, add the two digits together.
• Subtract 5 from the sum.
• For the result obtained, choose the corresponding letter from the English Alphabet (Eg. 1=A, 2=B, 3=C and so on)
• Think of a country using that letter.
• Now think of an animal using the last letter of the country’s name.

You thought of a Kangaroo from Denmark, isn’t it?

Try another:

Divide 30 by half and add ten to it. What do you get? Did you get 25? That is incorrect! The correct answer is 70. Can you guess how?

Re-read the question. We are dividing 30 by half, i.e. 30/0.5, which gives us 60. When we add 10 to it, we get 70. The correct answer would have been 25 if the question was to divide 30 in half.

Ebbinghaus Illusion

Distortion time!

Play the following video and look at the center for about 10 seconds. Then look at any other object in front of you.

Did the object distort? This is called the motion aftereffect!

Filling-in

Stare at the red dot in the center for 20 seconds at least. You will see that the surrounding circle disappears and is filled in with the background instead.

Image credit: Mysid, CC BY-SA 3.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/, via Wikimedia Commons

Optical illusions in nature

Nature also shows us several optical illusions, which we have assumed as a regular part of life, but are still illusions. For example, a rainbow is just an illusion produced by the refraction of sunlight as they pass through raindrops. Even the mirage (puddle of water that disappears as we approach it) we see on hot days is due to the refraction of sun rays at different angles through the cooler layers of air.

Mirage image credit: Ashabot, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Play along with these new mind games

Move past these common optical illusions and puzzles. We have new brain games in town. These simple tasks will reveal a lot to you about your own brain!

Bouba and Kiki – gibberish that can mess with your brain!

Look at the images above. Which one would you classify as Bouba and which one as Kiki? Don’t worry. These words have no meaning of their own. But what does your gut say about naming these two shapes? Which shape would be called Bouba, and which one is Kiki?

Did you say the one on the right is Bouba and the one on the left is Kiki?

Surprised how I know? This shape to word correspondence is seen in kids as young as 2 years of age. We tend to associate the shape with the shape our mouth makes when we say the word. Saying the word Bouba creates a more rounded formation of our mouth, hence the perception; and likewise with Kiki. If you would like to read more about this effect, you can start here.

Filling sound spaces

Illusion is not just visual. It can be auditory as well. Press play and listen to the following audio.

Did you hear a continuous rising tone? As a matter of fact, it is actually a discontinuous rising tone, i.e. the rise has a small break in it. But most of us cannot catch that break because our brain tends to cover spaces in the foreground music if the background music remains constant. This is called the illusory continuity of tones. Replay and try to catch the break if you can!

You hear what you see, but don’t see what we hear

Take a look at the following video from Mark Milton. What do you hear? The first section is the sound Ba. The second section is Da. And finally, the third section is Va. Is that what you hear?

Now, replay the video but don’t look at it. Only listen to it with your eyes closed. What do you hear?

Do you hear only Ba sounds in the entire video? But earlier there were Da and Va sounds as well in the same video. So what happened? You just experienced the McGurk effect. You only hear what you see. The visual input overrides the actual sound to match the visuals.

We all need closure!

See the image below. Do you see a white triangle on top of the black triangle and the circles in the corners?

Actually, the white triangle does not exist at all. It is only a gap in the other shapes and our brain completes the remaining contours for us automatically.

Do I have two noses?

Let’s do something easy and fun! Cross your middle finger over your index finger. Now close your eyes and touch the tip of your nose with both fingers. What do you feel?

Did you get a perception of having two noses? But how is it possible? What you just experienced is called Aristotle Illusion. Our brain is not used to touching things with fingers crossed, so the tactile sensations are reversed. Hence, our brain makes us its own explanations of reality. Read more here.

Did you know Deja vu is also coming from your mind playing tricks on you? Turns out, not all tricks are negative. Check out my article here on Deja vu if you haven’t already, to find out why Deja vu is not to be taken lightly.

Are there more such mind games being played by our brain which you know? Let me know in the comments.

Stay mystified! Stay Priyafied!