The title is a trap for the dirty-minded as the post is going to be something else. (Sorry!).
I was reading “Thinking Fast and Slow” by Daniel Kahneman. I have just reached to 6% of the book. (Yes, I am a proud owner of a Kindle). In the book, he talks about two systems of thinking: System 1 operates automatically, intuitively. System 2 requires slowing down, deliberating thinking not jumping to quick conclusions. Till now, I found the book interesting, I hope to finish it.
In the intro of the book, the author discusses an illusion, “The Invisible Gorilla”.
Watch this video before you proceed to read.
1:41 seconds – NOP (Bear with the jargon. I am an assembly language girl !)
I hope you have watched the video.
Almost everyone misses out watching the gorilla. And even few argue that there was no such gorilla. (We cannot help but ignore this kind).
Failure to spot the gorilla is quite common as we were focusing on counting the number of passes.
Kahneman explains saying
We can be blind to the obvious, and we are also blind to our blindness.
Now that you know the happening of gorilla event.
Please watch this.
Now while watching the video, you succeeded at noticing the gorilla.
But did you notice any other unexpected events? No right!
There were two other unexpected events: Curtain changing the color and a player leaving the game. Even though you tried to focus on unexpected results, you might have failed to notice the other peculiar events.
Moral of the story is:
Firstly, if we pay attention to the obvious, we lose out on unexpected things.
Secondly, even if pay attention to the unexpected event we can’t succeed in noticing other unexpected events.
So why even bother paying attention in the first case! (half-suppressed laughing).
The worst part is one of my profs keeps on repeating these words while teaching,
“Don’t miss the gorilla” and am puzzled each time.(Face Palm!)
There are loads of such videos based on illusions on YouTube to make you look stupid. Check’em out.
Deep In Reverie 