Optical Image and Vision: From Pythagoras to Kepler

Igal Galili*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapterpeer-review

Abstract

This chapter outlines the consolidation of the concept of image in optics. We start from classical Greece where scientists suggested several theories for the understanding of vision. Early Hellenic theories provided nonmathematical, qualitative, holistic accounts. The later Hellenistic optics of Euclid refined the holistic conception but suggested the erroneous concept of “active vision” by means of visual rays. Alhazen, a distinguished Arab scholar during the medieval era, split an image into points, each “transmitted” to the eye by a single ray. Further progress in the Renaissance noted the similarity between the eye and the Camera Obscura, but scholars were puzzled by the inverted image in the eye. The solution was due to Kepler, in Germany, who introduced light flux to create an image and understood that human cognition provides the “inversion.” The whole history of optical image—from holistic to light flux created and interpreted by the mind—reconstructs the theory of vision and sheds light on the nature of science. This is through a consideration of the scientific discourse of competing theories, a complex cumulative process, not a simple accretion, but a conceptual change. Research has revealed a similarity of students’ accounts for vision with the old ideas, intromission and extramission, holistic and differential images, and the central role of light rays or light flux. This similarity suggests that historical debate may be included in teaching to remedy common misconceptions and upgrade the meaningful learning of optics.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationScience
Subtitle of host publicationPhilosophy, History and Education
PublisherSpringer Nature
Pages103-144
Number of pages42
DOIs
StatePublished - 2021

Publication series

NameScience: Philosophy, History and Education
ISSN (Print)2520-8594
ISSN (Electronic)2520-8608

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2021, Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Optical Image and Vision: From Pythagoras to Kepler'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this