By Taylor Brown
The dark has been a place were our worst nightmares hide. Urban legends often times took shape when streets and paths were lit by candlelight. Could our eyes be playing tricks making us think we see real objects in the dark?
West Virginia’s snarly yow became popular in the 1700s as a ruthless beast that would stalk its prey in the dark. The understanding of how our eyes work has grown widely since then, and it may explain why we’ve created these monsters of the night.
If you close your eyes, you may see shapes and possibly even flashes of light. These shapes are known as phosphenes and there are different levels with their own unique properties. Higher levels are caused by LSD and should not be attempted*
Phosphene is light produced by atoms in our eyes which you can see in the dark. This could explain why early settlers in West Virginia may have seen the eyes of the snarly yow watching in the pitch darkness of the night.
The phenomenon has been known to produce a variety of shapes and even fuzz like that of a television.
The easiest way to see these light and shapes is by closing your eyes. However, truck drivers have been known to see this phenomenon after driving long hours at night. This gives us a very good possibility that settlers were only seeing these luminous atoms as they traveled through the woods. The only thing that phosphenes can’t explain is that oftentimes settlers heard the snarly yow breathing and growling at them.
Could the snarly yow be a real creature that lurks around Harpers Ferry, or is it just the cells in our eyes buzzing about? Have you ever seen something that wasn’t there? let us know in the comment section!
Wild and Weird 
Incredibly interesting and unique post to say the least. I am one of those people terrified by the dark and someone who probably makes up monsters that aren’t there. Glad to know now that it is probably just my eyes tricking me. This is a cool take on what could possibly be the monster people are worried about. Imagine that, it’s just our eyes haha.
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This was an interesting point that I had never thought about. It actually makes a lot of sense that there is a scientific explanation for seeing things that aren’t there. This was a really cool idea that I’m glad you thought to look into!
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The saying ‘your eyes play tricks on you’ was the first thing that came to mind when I read this. It’s an interesting post, and I think it was a good idea to bring in a scientific explanation for something West Virginian’s claim to be seeing. When you talked about higher levels in correlation to LSD I had to laugh, but maybe drugs are a factor behind people seeing things as well.
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I think you took a unique, yet realistic, approach to this. It can be kind of hard to figure out if you actually saw something. The idea of Phosphene helping you make up and create visuals that aren’t real is crazy and something I haven’t completely thought of. It was tied in well with the Snarly Yow story and I really like how you pulled this whole post together!
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This is crazy and never really thought of this. The fact that your mind can play with your vision freaks me out anymore. Those inner fears being brought out by the fears that you’ve always had. I loved the way you pulled this whole post together including the descriptions and imagery.
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