Why Does Every Animal Look Like This?

Thank you to Brilliant for supporting PBS To learn more, go to: https://brilliant.org/BeSmart/ ↓↓↓ More info and sources below ↓↓↓ In the race to survive, both predators and prey use visual tricks to get ahead. One nearly universal trick is countershading, a color pattern that helps animals erase their own shadows or blend into different backgrounds. It’s worked well enough that nature has produced this pattern over and over again, all over Earth, for at least tens of millions of years. 0:00 Why does every animal look like this? 0:52 A painter s big idea 1:49 Disappearing shadows 2:22 Testing the idea 3:48 Countershading everywhere! 6:10 What about water? 7:22 Making light to hide shadows 8:19 Outro References: https://sites.google.com/view/countershading-references/home SUBSCRIBE so you don’t miss a video! ►► http://bit.ly/iotbs_sub We’re on PATREON! Join the community https://www.patreon.com/itsokaytobesmart ----------- High fives to all our Brain Trust Patrons: Millennial Glacier paul andre bouis Mark Littlehale Ali Freiburger Mehdi Damou Barbora Bei Burt Humburg dani bowman David Johnston Salih Arslan Baerbel Winkler Robert Young Eric Meer Dustin Karen Haskell Join us on Patreon! https://patreon.com/itsokaytobesmart Twitter http://www.twitter.com/DrJoeHanson http://www.twitter.com/okaytobesmart Instagram http://www.instagram.com/DrJoeHanson http://www.instagram.com/okaytobesmart Merch https://store.dftba.com/collections/its-okay-to-be-smart Facebook https://www.facebook.com/itsokaytobesmartpbs/ This episode of Be Smart is licensed exclusively to YouTube.