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Arthur Kurzweil's Business Card
Activation Instructions

 

Hello.

If you have one of my business cards, you can discover seven different illusions on it. (If you don’t have a card and want one, send me an email with your address and I’ll mail you one ( arthur.kurzweil@verizon.net ).

Here is an explanation of each of the illusions. I hope it provides you with fun and food for thought:

  1. HYPERCARD. Unfortunately, I can’t credit the inventor of the Hypercard. This fascinating paper construction has been written up in many places and the most thorough source I know on the subject is a book called The Hypercard Project by Tom Frame, who reports that Dr. Kim Iles learned it from a fellow student when he attended the University of British Columbia. Dr. Iles indicated that he was told the phenomenon is used on the entrance exam for the school of architecture at the University of Leningrad (now St. Petersberg State University) Dr. Iles sent the idea to Martin Gardner, the well-known mathematics and science writer who has written dozens of books and also wrote the “Mathematical Games” column in Scientific American for 25 years (1956-1981).

    Basically, by cutting my business card in three places and twisting it in the correct way, you can create what appears to be an impossible phenomenon. Here is what you will be making:

    My explanation is based on the instructions provided by Martin Gardner (see illustration below):

    A.) Carefully cut the three lines (A, B, and C in the following illustration).
    B.) Fold the flap upward 90 degrees (in the following illustration, the fold is along the dotted line).
    C.) Turn over the section of the card labeled Y (below) 180 degrees…and you have made the       HYPERCARD!
    D.) Place the HYPERCARD down on a table with the flap you folded (in step B) pointing up towards the       sky. To the unsuspecting viewer, it looks like an impossible construction.



    I will now explain each of the illusions on this side of the card:



  2. The word ILLUSIONS. On the right side of the card it says “This card contains seven Illusions,” but it is not easy to read the word “illusions” until you put the card at eye level, a few inches from your face, and turn the card so that it is almost parallel to the ground. I wish I knew who originally designed this strange typeface. All I do know is that when I was in school I used to make words and even sentences in this style with a fine point pencil and a straight edge when I was bored in class (I must have made hundreds of them over the years!)

  3. CARBON DIOXIDE. On the lower left corner of the card the words “CARBON DIOXIDE” appear, with the word CARBON in black and the word DIOXIDE in red. If you put the card behind the stem of a wine glass and read the words through the stem, the word CARBON appears upside down while the word DIOXIDE appears as normal!  (In the illustration below different colors are used).

    You can show this to people and explain that it has to do with the fact that on my card the word “DIOXIDE” is in red, and the red color makes it immune to the flip of the word (Note: the color has nothing to do with it, but after drinking a few glasses of wine the unsuspecting person just might believe it!)

    You don’t need a wine glass to enjoy this illusion. Stand in front of a mirror and hold the card in front of you so that you can see the words in the reflection. Then turn the card upside down and only the word “Carbon” looks strange; the word “Dioxide” can be read normally!
  4. What is the drawing on the left side of the card? If you turn my business card  vertically, you see three curved lives and two straight lines. What is this a picture of? Some say the left side (the curved lines) looks like the top half of.  Tweetie Bird’s head

    One of my daughters suggested it looks like the top half of a pig’s nose next to a set of antennae. I say it’s actually a drawing of a woman on her knees scrubbing the floor next to her bucket! See the bottom of her shoes? This illusion makes me giggle!
               
    This drawing, according to Diane F. Halpern in her book Thought and Knowledge: An Introduction to Critical Thinking illustrates the influence of meaning on memory.

  5. The Opened Book.  Stare at the drawing of the opened book (right above the word “Dioxide”). Which way is it opened? Is it opened as though you were reading the book or is it an opened book placed so that the pages are faced down?

    There are two more illusions on the other side of my business card:

  6. A Beach Ball or a Tunnel? Stare at the drawing with the two circles and lines connecting them. Is it a beach ball or are you looking into a tunnel?

  7. THE STROOP EFFECT.   This is not exactly an illusion (although some have called it so). In 1935 John Ridley Stroop published this effect in English, but it was published earlier by E.R. Jaensch in 1929 in German. In the field of experimental psychology, it demonstrates interference in the reaction time of a task. Here’s how it works: Turn the card so that you can read the list of colors. As fast as you can, identify the colors of the words, not the words themselves. If you notice that it takes longer to identify the last five colors, you have demonstrated the Stroop Effect!