[imagesource: Twitter]

People on the internet are far too quick to jump onto something taken out of context and create a whole debate around it.

Kate Middleton recently bore the brunt of this phenomenon, when folks rolled with the notion that she was being shunned by a Jamaican politician when she was in fact, not.

In another corner of Twitter, people have been ferociously trying to decide what the creature is in that optical illusion pictured above.

Donkey? Seal? Mermaid?

Here’s Science Focus with the hocus-pocus:

This new viral optical illusion offered up the premise that if you’re right-brained, you’ll see a fish and left-brained people would see a mermaid.

However, there are two problems with this. The first is that, while we in the Science Focus team have our bets firmly set on it being an aardvark, the rest of the internet seems to mostly think it’s a donkey or a seal – neither of which were the available options.

I did not expect the aardvark reference.

Even JK Rowling, Piers Morgan, and Stephen Fry have joined in the debate:

Agreed – a donkey. https://t.co/KlpqaylJA3

— Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) March 19, 2022

Personally, donkey first, then seal – not finding a fish or a mermaid … https://t.co/UIRDYsFcJP

— Stephen Fry (@stephenfry) March 21, 2022

The thing about this donkey-seal fish-mermaid that is confusing everyone stukkend, is that the caption throws in a real red herring.

Besides there being five (strain hard enough and you might notice a sixth) possible creatures in the illusion to confuse the wits out of anyone, the right-brained / left-brained theory doesn’t hold water these days.

The theory, which purports that individuals who are ‘left-brain thinkers’ are more logical and analytical, whereas ‘right-brain thinkers’ are creative and intuitive, has been debunked:

“Whether you see a mermaid, a fish, a donkey or a seal – or something else entirely – one thing is for sure, it says absolutely nothing about whether or not you are right-brained or left-brained,” says Christian Jarrett, a leading cognitive neuroscientist.

“That’s because the very notion that some of us are right-brained or left-brained is a load of old neurobunk. The roots of the myth lie in the fact that our brains are divided into two hemispheres and that there is so-called lateralisation of function in the brain – for instance, most people show more language-related activity in the left brain hemisphere compared with the right.”

Most tasks require that the two sides of our brain, which are joined by a “massive bundle of connective fibres”, work together. Studies have found that people don’t actually depend on one hemisphere more than the other.

This is the point where I have to admit, somewhat unwillingly, that Rowling and Morgan were right:

While the image has nothing to do with sides of the brain, those who see a donkey or seal are actually right. The image is originally from a 2006 study into motivational influences on visual perception. The image is purposely vague, with the research describing it as ‘a donkey-seal’.

Fair play.

The point, though, as I have come to learn, is never which answer is right or wrong, but that there is a debate to be had in the first place.

Similar perhaps to that blue or gold dress debate that took up space in our lives rent-free for a time in 2015.

Or even that more recent online debate about whether there are more wheels or more doors in the world, which we all seem to have moved on from now.

Ay, the internet will be the internet.

[sources:sciencefocus]