Optical illusion investigated for use in ASD diagnosis

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The Age has an article about an optical illusion, being investigated as a possible screening/diagnosis tool for Autism. It describes a study by Professor David Burr (published in eLife).

I definitely see the cylinder, though I have to concentrate pretty hard to see it as the black dots in front and the white in back. I can see that they made some of the black dots overlap the white ones, but most of them do not. It kind of messes with my sensories a little bit.

The human mind is also pre-conditioned to see brighter things as closer, and darker things as further away. Most 2D videogames use this to give their art a better sense of depth.

I like the idea of subconcious tests for autism traits (like pupil tracking in this experiment) – because they do not rely on functioning level or lists of deficits. This way, I think, the science gets closer to investigating some fundamental perception differences that I believe to lay behind the ASD – apart from a list of dys-somethings that often co-ocur but are something separate.

I am able to see the cylinder but when I try, I at once spot the points that don't fit that picture. My main picture is moving constellations of points.

My interpretation changes while I look at it. I can sort of see it as a 3D tube, but also as dots moving across eachother in 2D space. I'm borderline on Aspergers though so maybe that's why.

It looks like a big rusty corroded pipe (that's been on the sea bottom for ten years) rotating around to me.

I can "switch gears" and see it as dots as well, but my mind "wants" to see it as the cylinder so that how I gravitate to seeing it because that's more aesthetically pleasing.

First I saw the dots, then I saw the cylinder (misshapen), but I still saw the dots, including the pink one which was very distracting. Then the direction changed with the black ones to the front, which made the dots rather than the cylinder the dominating focus. Interesting article overall but why is everything about diagnosing people early?

I saw both cylinder and dots. Other things that influence this is training in mathematics and 3d visualisation.

This is a rubbish test. It doesn't prove anything.

At first I didn't see a cylinder - I was focusing on the middle of picture and seen 2 "rivers" - white going one way, black another way. I could decide which "river" is in front by focusing on either black or white dots. So I would probably "pass" the test - my pupils must have react to the color of dots I was currently focusing at.

After looking at the picture for a while I found the cylinder (I think so at least - by cylinder you mean dots moving in rounds, right?), with either white or black dots in the front of my choice. The cylinder seems to also be changing direction according to my will - I can do the same thing with the spinning dancer illusion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spinning_Dancer .

Then I looked away and looked at the picture again. Now my focus stopped at the edge first and I could suddenly see dots bouncing off it and changing colors as they do. It was pretty overwhelming - I tried to track all of them and 3 dots going in the middle pissed me off - the gif is ending before they hit the edge!

Then I started playing by switching my focus between bouncing, rivers and the cylinder changing direction as I want it to.

In both cases "cylinder" wasn't what I could see at first, but I found it eventually and could control it then, by choosing which dots to focus on.

BTW. If people literally see "a spinning hollow cylinder, black on one side and white on the other, randomly changing direction" they must be nuts... It can't be literal, can it? The cylinder is gray with black dots on one side and white on the other at best.

I saw what looked like two penguins having sex.

I saw a bunch of dots moving and the red dot staying in the middle not moving and then it starts again. I can also see it spinning and then it just starts over, it doesn't change direction.

I started seeing the cylinder after it had been mentioned. I can finally see the right picture after hearing about what you are supposed to be seeing and then my mind all of a sudden changes direction and I see it. I wonder what this could mean for the doctors?