If I saw only the text of the supposed controversy I would instantly diagnose it as a hoax for clickbait. There are colour constancy illusions, but I will not believe that this is one of them until I see two people actually taking opposite sides.
My introduction to this illusion was walking into the office yesterday morning, and having a co-worker show me the picture on their monitor while asking what colour the dress was. The office split fairly evenly between white & gold versus blue & black, and nobody seemed to be kidding/trolling.
The weird specificity of a couple of people’s experiences also suggested they were being serious. One person who originally saw white & gold, after skimming blog posts discussing/explaining the illusion, eventually said they could kiiiinda see how it could be seen as blue & black (but that could’ve been a social conformity effect). Another person saw the dress as white & gold on their computer screen, but saw it as visibly blue & black when viewing their screen’s image through someone’s smartphone, which presented it with lower brightness.
So I deem this legit. I think this illusion messes with people so successfully by turning the relatively well-known brightness/saturation illusion (as in the checker shadow illusion) into a colour illusion, by exploiting the facts that (1) very light blue looks white, (2) brown looks like yellow/gold or black depending on intensity, and (3) perceived intensity depends on the surroundings as well as the region of focus.
My introduction to this illusion was walking into the office yesterday morning, and having a co-worker show me the picture on their monitor while asking what colour the dress was. The office split fairly evenly between white & gold versus blue & black, and nobody seemed to be kidding/trolling.
The weird specificity of a couple of people’s experiences also suggested they were being serious. One person who originally saw white & gold, after skimming blog posts discussing/explaining the illusion, eventually said they could kiiiinda see how it could be seen as blue & black (but that could’ve been a social conformity effect). Another person saw the dress as white & gold on their computer screen, but saw it as visibly blue & black when viewing their screen’s image through someone’s smartphone, which presented it with lower brightness.
So I deem this legit. I think this illusion messes with people so successfully by turning the relatively well-known brightness/saturation illusion (as in the checker shadow illusion) into a colour illusion, by exploiting the facts that (1) very light blue looks white, (2) brown looks like yellow/gold or black depending on intensity, and (3) perceived intensity depends on the surroundings as well as the region of focus.