Bobby McFarrin blows your mind.

Perceptual expectations got me into cognitive science, the field that shaped much of my college education and definitely my past two years as a science writer and editor. It’s notoriously difficult to write well or even convincingly about perception. When it is done well it is usually through examples that reveal our perceptual and cognitive limitations. (Here’s a famous–now internet famous–example. Don’t read the comments.) Videos like the one of this World Science Festival lecture make me want to throw in the towel. Indescribably awesome:

World Science Festival 2009: Bobby McFerrin Demonstrates the Power of the Pentatonic Scale from World Science Festival on Vimeo.