We reached deep into our archives and pulled out a list of our great­est hits — our favorite sci­ence videos from the past five years. 125 videos in total, and the list will grow from here. Right now, it cov­ers every­thing from Astron­o­my and Space Trav­el, to Physics and Biol­o­gy, and then Psy­chol­o­gy and Neu­ro­science. Our rec­om­men­da­tion? Just jump right in here. But if you want a lit­tle pre­view, then let’s start you off with ten slam-dunk videos from the col­lec­tion:

(Note: In the future, you can access this col­lec­tion by click­ing the “Great Sci­ence Videos” link under “Essen­tials.” Top of the cen­ter col­umn.)

• Earth­rise in HD – Video — In Novem­ber 2007, Japan’s Kaguya space­craft orbit­ed the moon and cap­tured the first HD footage of an “earth­rise” and “earth­set.”
• Tour­ing the Earth from Space (in HD) – Video — Give NASA 7 min­utes, and they’ll show you the Earth’s most impres­sive land­scapes — as seen from space.
• “First Orbit”: Cel­e­brat­ing 50th Anniver­sary of Yuri Gagaran’s Space Flight - Video — 99-minute doc­u­men­tary recre­ates the Sovi­et cos­mo­naut’s his­toric launch into space on April 12, 1961.
• Arthur C. Clarke Presents the Col­ors of Infin­i­ty – Video – The futur­ist brings us inside Mandelbrot’s world of frac­tal geom­e­try.
• Physics from Hell: How Dante’s Infer­no Inspired Galileo’s Physics – Video – Fas­ci­nat­ing pre­sen­ta­tion by Mark Peter­son, physics pro­fes­sor at Mount Holyoke Col­lege.
• Lawrence Krauss: Every Atom in Your Body Comes From a Star- Video – The­o­ret­i­cal physi­cist talks about his work at the World Eco­nom­ic Forum in Davos.
• What It Feels Like To Have a Stroke - Video — Har­vard neu­roanatomist Jill Bolte Tay­lor recounts her expe­ri­ence hav­ing a stroke. One of the most pop­u­lar TED Talks of all time.
• Nature by Num­bers - Video — Well-known geo­met­ri­cal and math­e­mat­i­cal for­mu­las (The Fibonac­ci Series and Spi­ral, The Gold­en and Angle Ratios, The Delauney Tri­an­gu­la­tion and Voronoi Tes­sel­la­tions) present them­selves in nature.
  
• Tsuna­mi Rip­ples Across Globe: Ani­mat­ed Video — Video — The Nation­al Ocean­ic and Atmos­pher­ic Admin­is­tra­tion shows Japan­ese tsuna­mi rip­pling across the Pacif­ic.
• Daniel Pink: The Sur­pris­ing Truth About What Moti­vates Us - Video — Research reveals what real­ly, tru­ly moti­vates us. And it’s all shown with ani­ma­tion.

Find the full list of Sci­ence Videos here…

We’re a bit embar­rassed to admit that it took us three times to spot the change in this fas­ci­nat­ing video illu­sion at New Sci­en­tist, even after read­ing about the research behind the video. The test was devel­oped by Kevin O’Re­gan and his team at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Paris Descartes as part of their work on per­cep­tion. O’Re­gan is best known for his work on change blind­ness, our rel­a­tive inabil­i­ty to per­ceive grad­ual change, and our ten­den­cy to focus sole­ly on what we per­ceive to be the most dynam­ic or inter­est­ing ele­ment of a scene.

If this video isn’t enough to con­vince of you of O’Re­gan’s the­o­ries, he’s post­ed a whole slew of demon­stra­tions at his web­site. Bet­ter yet, you can dis­pel any remain­ing doubts (or self-esteem) by tak­ing this aware­ness test, which is even more dra­mat­ic. It bowled us over. Let us know in the com­ments if it did the same for you.

via Kirstin But­ler

Sheer­ly Avni is a San Fran­cis­co-based arts and cul­ture writer. Her work has appeared in Salon, LA Week­ly, Moth­er Jones, and many oth­er pub­li­ca­tions. You can fol­low her on twit­ter at @sheerly.