Some Ambiguous Objects

Here are some ambiguous objects:


http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/ambig.gif








1. The Schroeder staircase: Is this staircase rightside up or upside down (which is the wall closest to us)? You should be able to see the ambiguity without viewing this upside down.

http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/ambig0.gif






2. The Necker cube: Which face is in front?http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/ambig1.gif









2a. The Necker cube, part 2: One corner is convex towards you, one is concave. Which is which? This is one of my favorites, as I can't get one of them to stay convex or concave; it changes over and over.http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/ambig2.gif








2b. The Necker cube, part 3: Is this a small cube in a corner, or a cubic bite out of a larger cube?http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/ambig3.gif3. Slice of pie or missing slice of pie: Is this the last remaining slice of pie (seen upside down) or is it a whole pie with one slice missing?

Here are some "impossible" objects:

http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/freemish.gif











1. The Freemish crate: See the next one.
http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/freemish0.gif












1a. Asymmetric Freemish crate: I don't know which is the original. This is drawn about as often as the one above.http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/penrose.gif









2. The Penrose staircase: Often drawn by M. C. Escher. Clockwise is downstairs forever.http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/tribar0.gif






3. The tribar: Another impossible object by R. Penrose. It's hard to know how to color it, as the interior becomes the exterior.http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/tribox.gif





4. The tribox: This is just the left end of the tribar, twice.http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/triangle.gif









5. The Penrose triangle: Another famous impossible object by R. Penrose. This is sometimes called a tribar (see #3, above).http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/hex.gif









6. The ambihelical hexnut: That is what one site on the WWW calls this impossible object. I don't know who invented it.http://www.jimloy.com/puzz/ring.gif7. An ambiguous ring: I don't know who invented this. By the way, this is not a Mobius (Möbius) strip.


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