Why we experience illusions - The Brain as a Predicition Machine | Thomas Fraps | TEDxMünchen

The audience at TEDxMünchen "At Second Glance" saw a mind boggling performance talk from brain researcher Dr. Peter Wittmann who turned out to be the professional magician and expert on perceptual illusions, Thomas Fraps, who performed as a fake guest-speaker and Trojan Entertainment Device. The Munich-based magician showed our audience that reality is slightly overrated and we can't protect ourselves from experiencing illusions, even if we want to! He played his role very convincingly, as you can find out via http://www.tedxmuenchen.de! In 1994 Thomas Fraps acquired his diploma in physics at the LMU, but then decided to leave the laws of nature behind and turned his passion into a profession. For over 20 years now he has been entertaining and astonishing audiences worldwide, either as a magician or as a false guest speaker, performing - among other events - at a supercomputer conference in San Diego, the Magic Castle in Los Angeles, at a cardiologist-meeting in Beirut, or at the opening of a sewage sludge incinerator in Schongau, Bavaria. In 2005 he was the first and only professional magician featured in the scientific journal "Nature" and since 2009 he also collaborates with brain researchers in London and Munich. He is the co-founder of the annual magic festival "The Munich Magic Weeks" and author of numerous articles on the psychological and technical aspects of magic. What he enjoys and thrives most at however, is to amaze audiences live on stage, with his unique blend of adrenaline, dopamine and Merlin! This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx