Benham's disk
A disk, marked with a black and white pattern, which, when spun around,
causes people to see colors. Benham's disk, also known as Benham's
wheel and Benham's top, was invented in 1894 by
the toy-maker C. E. Benham and originally sold through Messrs. Newton and
Co. as the "Artificial Spectrum Top." It is one of a number of spinning
disk color illusions first described by Gustav Fechner
in 1838. For this reason, the illusory colors are known as Fechner
colors. From the beginning, it was realized that the root of the
illusion probably lay in the variation of retinal response time with wavelength.
Related categories
• ILLUSIONS
AND IMPOSSIBLE FIGURES
• OPTICS
AND OPTICAL PHENOMENA
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