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Is this cat going up or down a flight of stairs?

It's a visual enigma—and it's adorable.

 

Dylan Love

IRL

Posted on Apr 9, 2015   Updated on May 29, 2021, 2:57 am CDT

Optical illusions are multiplying on the Internet, and increasingly, we don’t know what to believe.

It began with “the Dress,” which was clearly blue and black. (Or was it white and gold?) But the latest magic trick for your eyeballs is even better suited to the viral Internet—because it involves a cat.

Look at this picture of a cat and see if you can figure out whether it is ascending or descending the stairs.

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Our initial reaction was definitely that the cat was going down the staircase. But the more we look at it, the more we can see it both ways.

In the interest of ending on a lighthearted and thoroughly uncomplicated note, here is a video of a different cat that is definitely going down a flight of stairs.

H/T Mirror | Photo via greyloch/Flickr (CC BY 2.0)

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*First Published: Apr 9, 2015, 12:44 pm CDT