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This Sensory Substitution Device uses the camera to gather visual data and then uses a rather nifty computer algorithm to translates this data into sound. With a little practice, blind users can identify complex objects, and even read words. More »
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A three-year-old video in which a young Chinese boy appears to demonstrate night vision is making the rounds once again, with news sources wondering if the boy really has mutant night vision or freaky alien powers. Yeah...this shouldn't take long. More »
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This newly discovered planet is just 22 light-years away. Its discoverers are calling it the "new best candidate" to support water, and possibly life. The planet's unique features could even make it the ideal home for creatures like the Predator! More »
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With The Avengers hitting theaters this summer, audiences are eagerly anticipating a chiseled parade of superhuman beefcake saving the world, not unlike if the Chippendales were conscripted as U.N. Peacekeepers. But did you know that Marvel Comics actually rated The Avengers according to hotness two decades ago? More »
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Adanson's jumping spider has eight eyes, but the way they're put together doesn't actually seem that useful for, well, seeing things. These spiders use a previously unknown trick to judge their surrounds and leap great distances...all thanks to blurry vision. More »
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If you've ever dunked your head underwater sans goggles in search of a set of keys or a pool toy, then you know how difficult it can be for the human eye to make sense of light in a subaqueous environment — but you might not know why this is. More »
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You've probably seen this optical illusion before, in which two lines of identical length appear to be different by adding opposite-facing arrows to them. It's a very powerful effect - so much so that it overwhelms all other visual information. More »
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Ever wonder what happened to Vision in Marvel's Avengers movie? So does the pissed off synthezoid who joined The Avengers long ago. Watch what happens with Vision shows up on The Avengers set. Awkward... More »
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Optical illusions just keep getting more extreme. We once examined an optical illusion in which a silhouetted figure spins in different directions depending on how you look at it. Here's the sequel, which is four times the optical illusion craziness. More »
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The Motion Aftereffect is an optical illusion in which stationary objects appear to be in motion if a person has just been looking at a moving background. And the effect appears to work on the deepest levels of our subconscious. More »
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Birds, bees, and turtles all possess the ability to navigate by the Earth's magnetic field. Humans might actually possess the exact same magnetism-sensing hardware as these other creatures, as a light-sensitive protein taken from the human eye gave flies magnetovision. More »
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Red is the color of anger and hatred, of imminent danger and deadly heat. Even the English language tells us that "seeing red" is a bad thing. And this aversion for red might go back to our earliest primate relatives. More »
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Humans and most other animals are only able to see light in the visible spectrum. But what about infrared, which the alien in Predator famously uses to see prey approaching just by their heat signature. Why can't we do that? More »
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Imagine that you woke up to discover you had somehow shrunk to a doll's size. Would you think you were tiny...or that everyone else was a giant? Some Swedish psychologists decided the world deserved an answer to that age-old question. More »
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This image of a tartan ribbon is the first-ever permanent color photograph, and it was taken 150 years ago yesterday by the legendary scientist James Clerk Maxwell. So just how did he create colors that would last for over a century and a half? More »
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The Leaning Tower of Pisa is good for at least two things: letting tourists have fun with forced perspective, and revealing a basic truth about how we understand balance. Tilting your head really can change your entire whole perspective. More »
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It turns out that the impossible buildings and bizarre objects dreamed up by artists like M.C. Escher tap into an incredibly primal understanding of the world's geometry, a knowledge that is hard-wired into all vertebrates, including newly hatched chickens. More »
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Gymnastics is one of the most physically demanding activities imaginable, and you would assume it's a good idea to have complete use of your eyes while performing aerial somersaults. But science never got anywhere by taking assumptions at face value. More »
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Relative to pretty much any other mammal, humans have an absolutely atrocious sense of smell. But even our weakest sense is powerful enough to affect how we think...starting, of course, with how attractive other people look. More »
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As people get older, their driving skills tend to diminish. Failing eyesight and heavy medication are often blamed for this phenomenon, but there might be a neurological reason...and it could help us better understand depression and schizophrenia. More »
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The world is constantly moving and changing all around us, but we're not always able to perceive these changes as they happen. A new optical illusion reveals just how powerful change blindness really is through the mental magic of silencing. More »
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This amazing optical illusion has been put forward as a visual personality test that can reveal whether you're right-brained or left-brained. That's totally bogus, of course, but it doesn't make the illusion any less amazing...and we'll explain how it works. More »
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Hiding in the shadows between the colors we see everyday are weird, impossible shades, colors that you shouldn't be able to see and generally don't...unless you know how. Here's a simple guide to seeing impossible and imaginary colors. More »
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How we perceive the world is determined by the visual cortex, but not everybody's cortex is created equal. One person's visual cortex can be up to three times bigger than someone else's, and size matters when it comes to perception. More »
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The human brain is one of the most remarkable things on this planet...but that doesn't mean it can't make mistakes, particularly when it comes to how we see the world. Here are five mind-blowing optical illusions and how they work. More »
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As people age, their eyes can lose the ability to focus on nearby objects. This is particularly bad for nearsighted people, who then struggle to see near and distant objects. But glasses with concentric micro-scratches could be the awesome solution. More »
]]> http://io9.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5655294&view=rss&microfeed=true We know that a dog is a dog, regardless of whether it's sitting, running, or trying to comprehend escalators. But one of the tricky parts of designing an artificial vision system for a computer is getting it to recognize that an object is the same, regardless of perspective, position, ambient lighting, and a whole slew of other factors that our brains process easily. More »
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It turns out that you need more than just your eyes to see things that are right in front of you. Neuroscientists have found that we can't accurately judge the distance of nearby objects without also using our hands. More »
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Need to see a thousand meters in the dark? Want one eye that's perfect for reading and another for long distances? Some eye surgeons are already at work reshaping corneas not only to fix patients' vision, but fit their careers. More »
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MIT researchers are just three years away from developing a retinal implant that can send visual information directly to the brain. Although it won't completely restore an individual's vision, they would be able to navigate rooms and recognize faces. [Wired] More »
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Are you one of those people that gets squeamish when you have to put eye-drops in? Good news! A new type of contact lens can deliver eye medication with no fuss all day, every day for 30 days. More »
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So many of our superheroes are animal-themed because we perceive non-primates as having remarkable powers. Ants have their super-strength, bats have flight and sonar, and canines have sharp teeth and the ability to detect an open bag of kibble from half a mile away. But a recent study reveals that, from the perspective of the animal kingdom, humans have a superpower of our own: “x-ray” vision. More »
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Superman used to be just strong and sort of invulnerable, but now his powers are officially out of control. According to Superman II, he can erase your mind just by kissing you, not to mention his super-breath, super-hearing and super-ventriloquism. But Superman's out-of-control power really started with his super-peepers, which have a whole arsenal of eye-related powers. Check out our list of Superman's overcharged eyeball abilities. More »
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Science fiction is terrific at helping you imagine how you'd enhance, hack, and upgrade your own body — especially your eyeballs. Humans have been trying to improve on the sense of sight since 1300, when spectacles were invented. What comes next? Take a look at our list of some of the vision enhancement tools that science fiction has offered up. It goes way beyond seeing more clearly or getting a glimpse of the infrared side of the spectrum. More »
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