We all have a strong survival instinct, one that kicks in the moment that we sense danger. For some of us, our 'fight or ...

Peer into The Economist’s decision-making processes with Edward Carr, our deputy editor, who explains how we select and design our front cover. Cover Story shares preliminary sketches and documents ...

Abstract: Authors created a new optical illusion solid, the 3D Necker cube, which is intended to provide that an optical illusion occurs even when an observer gazes it from various viewpoints with ...

Take part in a personality experiment devised by the Open University in conjunction with the BBC. The test should take about 5 minutes to complete. It was developed by Dr Peter Naish. The BBC is not ...

The quantum tunneling (QT) effect discovered in the 1920s was a major achievement in the field of quantum mechanics. Since there is a major fundamental difference between artificial and biological ...

Imagine staring at a drawing of a cube, a simple, elegant shape made of intersecting lines — a child’s toy, in essence. Yet, stare long enough, and suddenly the orientation of the cube appears to ...

Optical illusions come in all forms, from simple tricks of the eye to complex geometric designs, but my personal favourites are the simple illusions that leave my brain well and truly frazzled. While ...

A quantum neural network capable of perceiving optical illusions similar to the human brain has been developed, according to newly published research. “This work may also shed light on the question of ...

Optical illusions, quantum mechanics and neural networks might seem to be quite unrelated topics at first glance. However, in new research I have used a phenomenon called ‘quantum tunnelling’ to ...