The second presentation in the Philosophy Café series is 'The Nature of Perception and Perceptual Illusions' which will be facilitated by Dr. Jon Opie from the University of Adelaide.

We are all familiar with various ways in which our senses can mislead us: a straight stick looks bent when sticking out of a glass of water, a cat seen out of the corner of your eye turns out to be a sheet of paper blowing on the lawn. But what may not be so familiar is just how significant illusions and failures of perception are for the science and philosophy perception. This session will provide an opportunity to see and discuss various kinds of visual illusions, and consider their significance for the nature of perception. Dr. Jon Opie’s aim is to convince you that our experience of the world is a clever construction of our brains: a kind of virtual reality that we all inhabit and treat as the real thing.