Philosophy Wire: Watch the birds fly…

Researchers have developed an innovative animal-borne data-collection system assisted by artificial intelligence to track previously unobserved behaviors in wild animals. The method uses low-cost sensors to automatically detect and record behaviors of specific interest. The new system greatly outperformed previous random sampling methods in capturing the target behavior and the researchers were able to observe previously unreported foraging behaviors in gulls. These findings can be applied to support further data collection in the wild. [1] Watching the birds from afar. But the bird is flying where it is. No you cannot see it from where you are. You cannot feel the wind in its wings. You cannot view the Earth from above. You cannot feel its excitement when flying high. You can only see it...

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: Look into the Eye…

In a big step for ophthalmology, scientists created a method to view the inner workings of the eye and its diseases at the cellular level. Currently, researchers can only see a broad section of the retina. This new technology allows them to zoom into just one part of a cell. In their words, they have accelerated the process for vision restoration. [1] Looking into the eye. Seeing into seeing. A world of mirrors. And we like it so much we enjoy polishing them until we forget they are there. Until we speak about them. And we analyze what we say about them. By speaking about what we said about them. Words for words. An eye for an eye. A cosmos for a life. How can you believe you are here? If you cannot see yourself breathing?

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: Seeing through…

Using a new algorithm, researchers have reconstructed the movements of individual particles of light to see through clouds, fog and other obstructions. [1] So funny. We have tried so hard to see everything, that we never truly questioned what is that we see. Think. How can you see through fog and mist, without the Moon seeing you back? Can you feel it? If you can see everything, does this mean that everything can see you back? Try not to cry. You will stop seeing things so clearly…

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: Looking inside…

Using properties of light from fluorescent probes is at the heart of a new imaging technique that allows for an unprecedented look inside cell membranes. [1] Looking inside. The main goal from the beginning of time. Looking inside. For the outside is obvious. Transparent. Nothing hidden under the Sun. Fool. Can’t you see? What is out there, is nothing else than what is inside. You are already looking at your precious prize. But you just cannot admit that you do. Because if you did, you should admit that there is no Sun illuminating anything. But only the pale silver Moon… Getting its light from you… With only one wish… To look inside you… But you were too preoccupied to allow it… Close your eyes to the light... Did you ever wonder… Why did you start seeing in the first place?

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: Never alive… Always there…

For decades, an ancient Egyptian known as Merit Ptah has been celebrated as the first female physician and a role model for women entering medicine. Yet a researcher now says she never existed and is an example of how misconceptions can spread. [1] Does it matter though? If the dead can affect the living? If the non-existent can convey enthusiasm to the existent? We will grow. We will die. And at the end, the cosmos will stop being. But what is important is that at some point it was there. Close your eyes. Everything goes away. But you still know its there…

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: Making the blind see… But what?

Scientists are investigating new ways to provide visual signals to the blind by directly stimulating the optic nerve. Their preliminary study uses a new type of neural electrode and provides distinct signals. [1] An interesting idea which poses another interesting question: with what should we stimulate the optic nerve to make someone see? What are the optical triggers that should (should?) be there in order to experience the cosmos properly? (Properly?) How should we know them? How could we know them? Could it be that the blind sense the cosmos better than us? And even if that were so, would we ever be willing to accept it? It is scary, but in the same way we cannot convince the blind for what we do see, they cannot convince us for what they cannot… Do you see? There is nothing you cannot…

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: Seeing. Without seeing…

Researchers have identified how the human brain is able to determine the properties of a particular object using purely statistical information. Our brain has the ability to break up the continuous stream of information received by our sensory inputs into distinct chunks. A pickpocket is able to interpret the sequence of small depressions on his fingers as a series of well-defined objects in a pocket or handbag, while the shopper's visual system is able to interpret photons as reflections of light from the objects in the window. Our ability to extract distinct objects from cluttered scenes by touch or sight alone and accurately predict how they will feel based on how they look, or how they look based on how they feel, is critical to how we interact with the world. [1]

Close your eyes and the cosmos will disappear.
Do you really believe that it did?
You really don't see anything.
Until the moment you decide to.
Well before we sensed the cosmos, we laughed as children…

We can't see anything.
And what best proof that there is nothing to see.
Than the fact that we see everything?

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: Adapting… Being… Seeing…

Brains of blind people adapt to sharpen sense of hearing, study shows. [1] Listen. For you are not seeing very well. Think. For you cannot hear anything. Feel. For you have lost connection with the cosmos. Die. For the only thing remaining is you. In a closed room, silence... For you to start speaking again…

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: Can’t see well…

An eye disorder may have given Leonardo da Vinci an artistic edge. [1] Not surprising at all. For only those who cannot see well can see at all. In a cosmos full of light, there is no way to distinguish anything. Unless the dusk starts to fall…

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: Seeing while being blind…

Scientists have studied color vision by probing individual sensory cells in the human eye. The results confirm that the photoreceptor cells of the retina are especially sensitive to colors corresponding to their visual pigments, even when stimulated in isolation. A new observation is that proximity effects play a key role: sensitivity varied depending on which cell classes were located in the immediate neighborhood. [1] We analyze vision. Thinking of colors. But the cosmos was not always like that. The cosmos wass black. Void of any colours. No blue. No red. And then came Homer. And an ocean dark as wine came to be. And a sky bright as bronze manifested into existence. The fire of Troy was lit. And suddenly, due to an old blind man, we all started to see…

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: Seeing the unseen…

Scientists try to photograph a black hole. [1] We see the invisible. Because we see the visible… We see the visible. Only because we see the invisible…

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: Brain synapses. Seeing. Before seeing.

He couldn’t see these gaps in his microscope, but he called them synapses, and said that if we think, learn and form memories in the brain then that itty-bitty space was most likely the location where we do it. This challenged the belief at the time that information diffused in all directions over a meshwork of neurons. [1]

Long before we see things, we imagine them.
Other people deny it.
Other people call it intuition.
What if it is neither?

What if it is a self-fulfilling prophecy waiting to be fulfilled? What if we determine what we see? What if the senses are the result of our thinking and not vice versa? Think about it.

Have you ever “seen” anything you have not thought of before?

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: A star fleeing... Humans dreaming…

Philosophy Wire by Spiros Kakos [2015-04-10]: A star is leaving the galaxy in speed as a result of a supernova explosion. [1] Or at least we think so. We see something and we instantly try to recreate the past which led to the present we live. How different would things be if we just saw what we saw. Without adding more things we do not see…

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…

Philosophy Wire: Let me see... errr, I mean eat you!

Philosophy Wire by Spiros Kakos [2014-09-19]: Babies see the world through their mouths. Literally. Babies were able to recognize shapes they had not seen but they had... eaten them. [1] We have eyes everywhere. We only have to learn how to use them...

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective…