Some Birds Can See Magnetic Fields 238
jamie found a post on the Not Exactly Rocket Science blog on research indicating that some birds can literally see magnetic fields, but only if the vision in their right eye is sharp (abstract at Current Biology). "The magnetic sense of birds was first discovered in robins in 1968, and its details have been teased out ever since. Years of careful research have told us that the ability depends on light and particularly on the right eye and the left half of the brain. The details still aren’t quite clear but, for now, the most likely explanation involves a molecule called cryptochrome. Cryptochrome is found in the light-sensitive cells of a bird’s retina and scientists think that it affects just how sensitive those cells are. ... The upshot is that magnetic fields put up a filter of light or dark patches over what a bird normally sees. These patches change as the bird turns and tilts its head, providing it with a visual compass made out of contrasting shades."
Re:Why haven't we evolved to see IR or microwave? (Score:1, Insightful)
Put it simple would it allow you to have more sex (implies all other things that allow you to have it, like being successful in gathering food)? If yes then you can be assured that in the long run we as a species will get it.
Re:augmented reality (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:augmented reality (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm able to see stupid people at work all the time. Does that count?
No, most people have the ability to see stupid people.
But some people are also able to see the limits of their own ability, a far rarer skill.
Re:augmented reality (Score:5, Insightful)
But you're missing the fact that, from the bird's perspective, it's simply reality. It's not augmented, it's part of it.
If you and I strap on a device which gives us the same vision as a bird that can see magnetic fields, that is augmented reality. If the bird closes its right eye and then re-opens is, that is not augmented reality, that's blinking. That is the natural vision of the bird.
Augmented reality means enhanced with technology, not just better than yours. The bird has a reality which sees more than we do, but it is not, strictly speaking, augmented. Cooler maybe, but not augmented. For the same reason that relative to a color blind person, I don't have augmented vision -- I have perfectly 'standard' vision, mine just happens to see more than his.
Now, show me a bird wearing night-vision goggles, and I'll cede the point of it being augmented reality. In the mean time, you're arguing a semantic difference that isn't valid.
Interesting (Score:2, Insightful)
This can explain why birds never stop moving their heads. I always thought they were scanning the area for possible hazards, food or companions, or positioning their heads to receive sounds better, but this gives a new possibility to their constant head tilting (which I find adorable by the way).
Birds are so underrated by us humans.
Re:augmented reality (Score:2, Insightful)
But you're missing the fact that, from the bird's perspective, it's simply reality. It's not augmented, it's part of it.
You clearly failed philosophy (I mean that in a good way.) One of the big differences between philosophers and scientists is that philosophers still think that there's something interesting about human perceptions and human scales, rather than them just accidentally being the ones we happen to have access to.
By limiting themselves to the scale of human perceptions in every respect philosophers ensure that their conclusions will virtually never be about reality, but only about the irrelevant accidents of human perception. Oddly, Kant actually pointed them in the right direction, but because philosophers are so steadfastly innumerate and hostile to testing their ideas by systematic observation and experiment (which would make them scientists) they have consigned themselves to a permanent backwater of irrelevance.
Re:You entered a normal man! (Score:4, Insightful)
An armed society is a polite society.
Then why are Americans so rude compared to Canadians? And why has not American courtesy increased with the expansion of concealed and open carry laws in the past decade or two?
Re:Tech version? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:OK, I should probably call Randi (Score:3, Insightful)
Some people claim to be able to see people's 'auras'. Maybe they're also seeing E&M fields.
Or maybe its confirmation bias, as suggested by geekoid. Or maybe they're lying for gain or attention, as so many are prone to do. Or maybe they're really seeing auras, whatever those are.
Scientists typically study things that can be measured and repeated reliably. If your senses do something that's unusual and difficult to demonstrate to others, there's a class of people that assumes you're probably delusional. Its different from their experience, therefore it must be unreal or unimportant. And of course a very large number of people are delusional. But I also know that there are very many real phenomena that aren't generally recognized or understood by scientists. So it does not surprise me at all to hear that some people can see E&M fields.
Re:augmented reality (Score:5, Insightful)
You clearly failed philosophy (I mean that in the bad way).
Philosophy has moved on quite a bit since Plato. Contemporary philosophy does understand that things exist outside of a human scale, and discusses it quite a bit. Philosophy is a moving target, it generally is always one small step ahead or behind science, but there is always a decent amount of interlap.
A lot of scientists do philosophy, and a lot of modern philosophers are giant science junkies.
Re:augmented reality (Score:2, Insightful)
But you're missing the fact that, from the bird's perspective, it's simply reality. It's not augmented, it's part of it.
I am (almost) with you.
If you and I strap on a device which gives us the same vision as a bird that can see magnetic fields, that is augmented reality
No, this is also reality. You have only augmented your vision, but the reality was always there for the beholder to behold. If humans couldn't perceive it, that does not change that "reality".
So, augmented reality is when you wear a device on your eyes that make you see ugly women as hot. Since ugly and hot are too subjective - let's take another example. A device that "labels" things - someone "sees" you with that device and he also sees a "label" on your head saying : gstoddart, slashdot ID 321705. That is augmented reality. Because there is no label on your head - this is the reality. But the perceiver sees it - that is the augmentation.