Remember, on a bike you’re a magician…

…and your ability is to make yourself invisible!

Three years ago, Duncan McKillop wrote this perceptive statement:

“Human beings refuse to believe that their eyes can be fooled yet stage magicians have been fooling people’s eyes for centuries! This is because we do not understand that the world we see ‘out there’ is in fact a construction that has been built entirely ‘in here’ inside our brain.

“The magician knows this and knows how easy it is for us to construct an incorrect model of the world in response to the way he performs his craft. People know that if they go to a night of magic that the magician is going to fool their eyes, but even with that certain knowledge the magician still manages to pull off their tricks.

“If we know we are going to be fooled and still get fooled what does that say about the link between knowledge and perceptual ability?

“In SMIDSY’s and similar collisions it’s the rider that’s taking the place of the magician and fooling their audience into thinking they are not really there.”

Duncan hits the nail on the head.

Understanding that the world ‘out there’ is a construct of our brain is absolutely essential, as is understanding that we need to KNOW we can be fooled.

Unfortunately, when it comes to riding and to SMIDSY-style collisions between cars and bikes, we have two additional problems:

  • our car-driving audience isn’t aware that they can be tricked by the biker!
  • the motorcyclist isn’t aware that he / she is a magician and about to fool the audience of drivers!

And that’s why I have spent a lot of time working on my Science of Being Seen (SOBS) project here and over on my www.facebook.com/survivalskills page. It’s time for riders across the world to learn how the magic works!

ORIGINALLY POSTED MARCH 2018 on FB

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COPYRIGHT © 2011 – 2021 Kevin Williams and Survival Skills Rider Training
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Photo credit Paul Townsend https://www.flickr.com/photos/brizzlebornandbred/20001313491

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