Published: 2018-09-031

The Visual System as Cognitive Spectrometer: (Part I)

Mirosław Zbigniew Harciarek
Humanities and Natural Sciences
Section: Articles
https://doi.org/10.31648/hip.490

Abstract

In this paper it is proposed to understand the visual cognitive system on the basis of spectrometer’s model that enables the understanding of perception’s objectification, selection of information in environment and the after effect’s phenomenon’s role in perceiving. Presented model has dual aspect characteristic and distinguishes observations and internal impressions that are experienced as after effects. The prototype of describing the visual system as a spectrometer is Helmholtz’s outflow theory, which explains the problem of stabilization of world’s image despite eyes’ movements and describes the relation between perception and motility, which is today referred to as embodied cognition. The visual system as a whole constitutes a feedback system in which, according to Helmholtz’s concept, the after effect is a signal that controls the perception and is a manifestation of cognitive intentionality. Number of arguments that support understanding of the visual system as a spectrometer are presented in thispaper. The most important among them is the perception of the figure as brighter than the background, what has been already noticed by Gestalt psychologists. In the description of the visual system as a spectrometer two visual systems described by Milner and Goodale were included. In the end of this work propositions of use of spectrometer’s model in examination of cognition processes were presented, with emphasis on significance of after effect’s phenomenon as the manifestation of processing of visual information

Keywords:

spectrometer, after effect, Helmholtz’s outflow theory, brightness (luminance), two visual systems, perception’s objectification

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Harciarek, M. Z. (2018). The Visual System as Cognitive Spectrometer: (Part I). Humanities and Natural Sciences, (20), 161–175. https://doi.org/10.31648/hip.490

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