Re: Human vision sees 1/10 second into future (so...)

On Jun 4, 5:15 am, Simon Morden
<simon.mor...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Phillip Thorne wrote:
Researcher Mark Changizi of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (which
happens to be my alma mater), as published in _Cognitive Science_,
believes he has evidence that the human visual system can perceive
one-tenth of a second into the future.

As far as I understand it, it's an illusion based on the brain
attempting to make sense of what the eye is seeing, and not 'seeing into
the future'.

Most obviously, when looking at an analogue clock. The second hand turns
at a regular rate, except occasionally when you glance at it, and the
hand seems frozen in time for much longer than a second. Then it starts
moving.

How it was explained to me was that as we don't see 'nothing' when we
turn our heads: our brains try and work out what the blurred information
the eyes are sending means. It has the ability to shift that information
back in our subjective memory, so that we don't see "cup->blurred
kitchen->clock" but "cup->clock->clock" even when we weren't actually
looking at the clock. Hence the second hand staying still for more than
a second.

You're not seeing into the future, you're remembering the now from a
point where the now was seemingly in the future.

I've noticed the effect with a digital clock. Sometimes you glance at
it, and it seems to remain frozen for far longer than a second. I've
taken it as evidence that subjective time speeds up when we pay
attention; as in the famous "it seemed to happen in slow motion" when
we become aware of something traumatic. It certainly has some
adaptive advantage for our processors to clock into overdrive when
something important seems to be going on (too bad the decision making
ability doesn't often seem to keep up: "and I seemed to be frozen").

I've also noticed, particularly with sounds, we store a second or two
in a quick playback loop for posterior examination: typically, when
something you weren't consciously aware of suddenly stops, and you
"hear" it sounding for the first time.
.

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