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Illusion of the Week: Taxidermy Dreams

This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American


Ed. Note: This blog post originally appeared on Sleights of Mind.
The illusion of the week is an interesting twist on the Rabbit-Duck illusion, presented in the German magazine Fliegende Blätter in 1892.

I haven’t been able to locate the precise source, but here’s how you make a rabbit-duck in real life (death?) with a little help from taxidermy.


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http://www.blameitonthevoices.com/2010/10/duck-rabbit-illusion-irl.html

Do you see a rabbit or a duck?

Also, check the Duck! Rabbit! animation of Amy Krause Rosenthal’s children’s book, and John F. Kihlstromdiscussion of the history of theRabbit-Duck illusion.

 

Susana Martinez-Conde is a professor of ophthalmology, neurology, and physiology and pharmacology at SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University in Brooklyn, N.Y. She is author of the Prisma Prize–winning Sleights of Mind, along with Stephen Macknik and Sandra Blakeslee, and of Champions of Illusion, along with Stephen Macknik.

More by Susana Martinez-Conde