system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: After seeing a sudden, bright object, why are we still able to see an outline or imprint of it a couple seconds after closing our eyes? Even after blinking a couple of times?
gpt
It’s called an after image, the way the light receptor cells work in your eye is that when they interact with light they emit a chemical which triggers surrounding Neurons and the signal is sent to your brain, but there is a delay in the amount of time before that receptor can be activated because it must first reabsorb the emitted chemical.  In the case of looking at a bright light, your receptor cells are releasing a lot of that chemical and as a result take longer to reabsorb, in the time between being reabsorbed the chemicals are constantly activating the surrounding Neurons which results in a persistent image being perceived.