Futility Closet

The Honi Phenomenon

Posted in Oddities by Greg Ross on June 29th, 2009

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ames_room_forced_perspective.jpg

Here’s a familiar illusion known as the Ames room. The woman on the right is not really small, she’s just far away. The room is a trapezoid but is designed to appear square when viewed from this angle.

Curiously, a woman who loves and trusts her husband tends to see no change in him even as he walks from corner to corner; apparently she resists a distorted view of him.

The same is not true of men.

(Image: Wikimedia Commons)