Is this the real life?

You know the picture of a cube that looks like either side of it could be in front, and they switch? There’s a whole bunch of images like that and consciousness researchers find them really interesting: nothing changes in the picture, but the way we perceive it changes. If we figure out how the brain chooses which way to interpret the picture we get an idea of how the brain creates conscious perception. I’ll describe how I study this using transcranial magnetic stimulation: sending powerful magnetic pulses into people's brains to disrupt their activity and see what it does to visual awareness.

Have you ever heard someone call your name, felt a tap on your shoulder, or sensed someone following you yet when you turn around no one is there? What we perceive is usually based on what we believe and what we hear, see and think. Reality distortions are not unusual but are often a feature of psychosis and the condition of schizophrenia, major psychiatric disorders where a person’s perception is significantly altered from reality. I'll discuss how we perceive our environment, what we can learn from alterations in perceptual processing and what light they shed on the science of psychosis.