Vision and Seeing

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I typically begin writing these posts by first thinking about that particular sense and my favorite thing about it or something that sticks out to me, but I find this tricky with vision. I think it may be because sight is such a pervasive sense. Sight is so intertwined with our other senses. When one sees a beautiful flower they are draw in to take a sniff of its perfume. The presentation of a plate of food at one's favorite restaurant can add to the taste experience. When one sees a fluffy blanket in the isle of a store they will reach out to touch it, but not reach out and touch a simple plastic bottle. When one hears the crunch of leaves next to them they use their sight to see who or what is near them. Diane Ackerman describes sight in A Natural History of the Senses as "the great monopolist of our senses" because "vision can... collect bushel basket of information as it goes" (Ackerman, 229-230).
Dog smelling flowers
© Sonny Annesley 

The "bushel basket of information" that connects sight to our other senses, specifically touch, is prevalent in Darśan Seeing the Divine Image in India by Diana Eck. Darśan, meaning "auspicious sight", is connected to other senses as Eck describes in this book (Eck, 3). Eck states that "seeing is not passive awareness of visual data, but an active focusing upon it, "touching it"" and I think this is an interesting distinction to make between vision and the deeper connection found within seeing (Eck, 15). Eck describes how Hindu images act as "visual theologies" and also "visual scriptures" that are critical for the narration of traditional myths (Eck, 41). Seeing is a very intertwined aspect of Hindu culture and the connection to Hindu deities.

Eye anatomy
© Ruth Lawson. Otago Polytechnic.
In contrast to this deep connection to seeing within Hindu culture, vision can be described in a more biological sense as Ackerman does in A Natural History of the Senses. Vision can be described by how we utilize light with our eye's cones and rods in the retina and how our optic nerve transmits this information to our brain where it is processed (Ackerman, 233). Our body will naturally process this information transmitted from the anatomy of our eyes to our brains, but what we do with this information is critical to actually seeing our surroundings or for connecting to others or even connecting to deities as Eck has described.

Comments

  1. Jonathan Brumberg-KrausApril 15, 2020 at 5:10 AM

    Yes! There's that tension between the way vision functions on the one hand as an almost passive and somewhat unconscious panoramic taking in of the spaces around us, and on the other hand, to allow us laser-sharp focus on things that catch our attention, or upon which we chose to attend to. I think Professor Nelson also alluded to this when he spoke to our class. Your reflection is quite perceptive (let's run with the visual metaphors), by why contrast the "biological sense" of how vision works with Hindu darsan in the way you did in your last paragraph? Since so much of vision even biologically is about processing (i.e., interpreting") the raw data that rods and cones pick up, the neurobiology of vision is a necessary prerequisite for what we "do with this information" even "religiously." Not only is the biology of vision a necessary means for this, as you say in your last sentence, but it's also quite possible that culture, religion, or individual psychologies affect what visual information our brains process as pertinent. In other words, while it make sense to distinguish biological from Hindu religious perspectives on seeing conceptually, it's hard for me at least not to see them working together in concert in people's actual practices and experiences of seeing.

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