Doctor reveals why we can only see 0.00035% of reality in ‘mindblowing’ viral TikTok

An NHS doctor has explained why humans can only see a tiny percentage of reality in a viral TikTok that is blowing people’s minds.

Dr Karan Raj, an NHS surgical doctor and lecturer at Sunderland University, said there is a “whole secret world that are not seeing” because it is “beyond the evolutionary capacity of our eyeballs.”

Explaining the science behind it, Dr Raj said that our eyes are not designed to see everything out there.

In fact, we are only able to see visible light, which is a “tiny, tiny fraction of the electromagnetic (EM) spectrum”. He explained that humans can only see around 0.00035 per cent of reality.

“Things like ultraviolet (UV), infrared, gamma rays, X-rays, microwaves... they’re all around us but we can’t see it,” he said in the video.

“It’s beyond the evolutionary capacity of our eyeballs. There’s a whole secret world out there that we’re not seeing.”

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A 2012 article in LiveScience explored “forbidden colours” the human eye is unable to compute, including red-green and yellow-blue.

Experts say it is to do with the retina – the part of the eye that allows you to see the colours we can.

Cells known as “opponent neurons” are activated by incoming red light, letting the brain know it's looking at something red.

But these same neurons are impeded by green light.

Another set of opponent neurons are affected by blue light.