PsychologyExplain Like I'm 5Beginner
How Your Brain Tricks You course icon

How Your Brain Tricks You

Like Duolingo, but for How Your Brain Tricks You. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.

For the part of you with thirty open tabs that never became anything.

54 bite-size levelsAbout 5 minutes each

Free during early access · No credit card · iPhone & Android

Benny the Brain
How Your Brain Tricks You
with Benny the Brain
54
Levels
4
Sections
5
Min/day
What you'll learn

Key ideas in How Your Brain Tricks You

  • The brain prioritizes quick survival-based guesses over raw data
  • Sensation is the physical input of data
  • Visual processing is an active construction
  • Perception is the brain's interpretation of data
  • Pareidolia is the tendency to see patterns in random stimuli
  • The brain uses pattern recognition as a survival shortcut
  • The brain's prioritization of speed and logic over raw data accuracy
  • The brain uses top-down processing to interpret new scenes
  • Past experiences create expectations that shape what we see
  • The distinction between raw sensory input and mental interpretation
  • Sensory input precedes neural processing
  • Comparison to memory is required for recognition
  • The sequence from light hitting the eye to a conscious thought
  • The brain's tendency to find patterns in random data
  • How past experiences influence current visual interpretation
  • The brain uses surrounding context to judge brightness
Why not just Google it

You've tried the other tabs

Wikipedia

Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.

YouTube

You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.

ChatGPT

One answer, then back to scrolling.

Online courses

Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.

Tomo gives How Your Brain Tricks You the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.

Try a question

Here's what playing it feels like

A real question from this course. Take your best guess.

The Brain's Quick Sketches

Why does your brain sometimes jump to a conclusion before seeing every tiny detail?

Get it right to open this lesson and 53 more in the app.

Course map

Where How Your Brain Tricks You takes you

Discover why your mind doesn't always see the truth. Learn the secrets behind optical illusions, false memories, and the mental shortcuts that lead us astray.

  1. 1

    Eyes and Lies

    • Why We See Things That Aren't There
    • How Colors Change Based on Their Neighbors
    • The Way Your Brain Fills in the Blanks
    • Moving Pictures That Are Actually Still
  2. 2

    The Memory Trap

    • Why You Forget Where You Put Your Keys
    • How We Create Fake Memories
    • The Problem with Eyewitness Stories
    • Why Old Memories Feel More Vivid
    • How Feelings Change What We Remember
    • The Truth About Deja Vu
  3. 3

    Mental Shortcuts

    • Why We Only Notice What We Already Believe
    • The Power of First Impressions
    • Why We Fear the Wrong Things
  4. 4

    Social Sneakiness

    • Following the Crowd Without Thinking
    • Why We Think We Are Better Than Average
    • The Halo Effect and Pretty Faces
    • Blaming People Instead of Situations
    • How Expectations Change Your Reality

4 sections · 18 units · 54 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.

How it's taught

You pick the voice

This course
Explain Like I'm 5

How Your Brain Tricks You is taught in the Explain Like I'm 5 style: no big words. promise.. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.

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