English

Dynamic transitions of blind spots in the Hermann grid illusion

Neurons and Cognition 2025-10-23 v2

Abstract

Hermann discovered the grid illusion in 1870, but its cause has remained a mystery for more than 150 years. In 1960, Baumgartner proposed a hypothesis for the illusion based on neural receptive fields, but Geier presented a counterexample in 2008. In 1995, Schrauf devised the scintillating grid illusion, an improvement on the Hermann grid illusion. I propose that a hypothesis involving blind spots (optic discs) can significantly contribute to unraveling the mystery of the grid illusion.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2408.00782,
  title  = {Dynamic transitions of blind spots in the Hermann grid illusion},
  author = {Yutaka Nishiyama},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2408.00782},
  year   = {2025}
}

Comments

10 pages, 11 figures