The Impossible Motion Contraption

Every year, The New Scientist sponsors an illusion contest, and, above, we have the winner of the 2010 edition: A contraption created by Koukichi Sugihara (Meiji Institute for Advanced Study of Mathematical Sciences, Japan) that appears to defy gravity, allowing wooden balls to roll up slopes. But, in actual fact “the orientations of the slopes are perceived oppositely, and hence the descending motion is misinterpreted as ascending motion.” You can now make submissions to the 2011 edition.


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Open Culture was founded by Dan Colman.