A Bayesian Perceptual Model Replicates the Cutaneous Rabbit and Other Tactile Spatiotemporal Illusions

BACKGROUND: When brief stimuli contact the skin in rapid succession at two or more locations, perception strikingly shrinks the intervening distance, and expands the elapsed time, between consecutive events. The origins of these perceptual space-time distortions are unknown. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Here I show that these illusory effects, which I term perceptual length contraction and time dilation, are emergent properties of a Bayesian …