Vision and Thought are One
Strange but true, the retina is part of the central nervous system
2 million fibers from retina to LGN, 10 million from there to brain.
Primary connection is Primary Visual Cortex or V1, 2 cm2 on back of brain
- Hypothesis: V1 gets used as a sort of image buffer for higher processing in the rest of the brain
Steps:
- Saccade ends
- Retina accumulates image
- LGN opens connections, image gets written to V1
- Rest of brain accesses that info
- Meanwhile, a point of interest is being generated for next saccade
- Next saccade happens perhaps 250ms later; go back to step 1
All very automatic; that’s why pointing with eyes doesn’t work for user interfaces.