“SEEING IS NOT BELIEVING”
The human brain contains many mysteries.
Hard wired to perceive the world about it and store a record of what it has experienced.
Therein lies its brilliance and its greatest design fault.
We see what we think we see.
We see what we want to see.
We are at the mercy of an entity which modern technology and living confuses such that our conscious awareness is a series of best guesses and what has gone before .
Example: take the occurrence of colour.
Everything is black and white but our brain expects an orange to be orange a tomato to be red.
If we see a red orange our perception expects it to be orange and that difference is what we notice.
Light is defined by shadow or the ‘expectation of shadow’.
These unexpected truths are the basic framework of seeing that this brilliant National Geographic film sets out to explain.
In demonstrations of sleight of hand by magicians, and explanations of complicated concepts by world class experts we are shown how our brain works and how it functions.
It is fascinating to watch and is seriously good fun and leaves one scratching one’s head as to whether what we see as “real” is in fact real?
It also begs the question how advertising manipulates us into a state of seeing and believing.
After watching this film I now understand why billions are spent in advertising in all forms of media and communication and why the internet is such a quantum leap forward in mankind’s evolution.
It also suggests that if creation allowed humankind to “start again” we would not start with the brain that we occupy.
This is truly one of the most assumption challenging two hours that I have ever sat through.
A true case of “Seamus through the Looking Glass”.
Watch and be convinced.
Essential viewing.