Ames Demonstrations in Perception

The Ames demonstrations consist of about 25 laboratory set-ups that were designed and constructed, from about 1934 to 1950, by a U.S. artist and optical physiologist named Adelbert (Del) Ames, Jr. They became commonly known as the Ames demonstrations in perception in the early 1950s, when one of Ames's associates, perceptual psychologist William H. Ittelson, published a users' manual (with instructions on how to rebuild them) with that phrase as its title.

Although there has never been consensus about the validity or significance of these demonstrations, they are most often said to show the ambiguity of retinal images when an object is perceived from a single static point of view. It is also often claimed that they show that the process of seeing is not merely ...

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