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jlustick's picture

Seeing as Revealing

We learned this week that what we see is not the only image out there, but one of many guesses that the brain has. I am interested in the way that the brain decides which image is the best guess. Why was it that some of us saw a scull while others saw a woman in a mirror? How much does what we see reveal about who we are? According to proponents of the Rorschach inkblot tests, image identification is quite psychologically significant- what we see says much about the "demons" lurking within our unconscious. So are those who saw a scull more morbid or plagued by fear of death? Are those who saw a woman in a mirror obsessed with appearance and beauty? Or is that going too far? Why are the Rorschach tests more revealing than our interpretations of our ever-day world? To what degree can a person be blind to certain aspects of the world and how can such blindness be overcome when it proves problematic? In other words, is seeing a learned behavior rather than a simple input, and can it be re-learned? Does a person undergoing psychological treatment, whether therapeutic or medical, exhibit a change in vision?

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