The Brain Sees Selectively

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The brain contains many small regions which specialise in different aspects of perception.  Although many things may be happening at once, we generally pay attention only to what seems most important at the time.

In one experiment a stranger asked people for directions.  During their response, two men carrying a large door passed between the stranger and the test subject.  In the process of this interruption, the stranger was substituted with a person of totally different appearance and wearing different clothes.  Even though they'd been talking to the stranger for at least a minute, half the subjects didn't realize that they ended up talking to a different person!  The brain apparently just focused on the essential task.  By doing this, it freed up as much space as possible for its ongoing neurological processes.

In another experiment subjects were asked to count the passes made by one of the teams in a basketball game.  Half of them failed to notice that a woman dressed like a gorilla walked slowly across the scene for five seconds, actually passing between the players.  Later when asked just to look at the tape without a task to do, they easily spotted the gorilla.  Most insisted that this couldn't be the same tape because they would never have missed seeing it.

So next time you think you don't miss a thing, remember the brain not only blanks out details in our surroundings, it can also generate its own reality, which may be out of touch with the real world.