Close friend of mine gave me this animation. It’s quite obvious the author was heavily influenced by M.C. Escher, more specifically by his Ascending Staircase Castle and Waterfall Illusion. We all know in real world, this could never work. The same way forever-dream of scientists, Perpetuum Mobile can’t exist due to existing rules of physics. However, at least we can dream of it, and make visualizations with little help of the computers. You should read an article about this topic on Wikipedia, it’s quite interesting. When I was a kid I had constant ideas to build one of my own, something to do with balloons filled with helium and a water tap. Never tried it though… You can see another example done by Escher here. If the ball isn’t moving, wait for the .gif to load, or simply open the picture in new window, or simply click it.
