6 ms·

I am going to drop a thought here to see what happens. If there is a difference between male/female retinas. Could this affect our perception of reality?

by maCDzP 5y ago

BurningFrog 5y ago
My guess: Only in trivial ways. The fact that women see the world from a ~20cm lower point probably has real impact. For one thing, guys, your nose hair is very visible from that height.
- NaturalPhallacy 5y ago
  A few funny anecdotes in that vein. A woman complained that her very tall boyfriend had hung a mirror in the bathroom. She took a picture of it. It was her reflection holding the camera level with the top of her head, and little else. One that happened to me personally. I asked my then gf (5'1") what it was like being a small person, do you feel like a normal sized person in a land of giants? "Yes" was the instant response. One very tall guy once remarked: "The tops of your fridges are fucking disgusting."
  - xorfish 5y ago
    > A woman complained that her very tall boyfriend had hung a mirror in the bathroom. She took a picture of it. It was her reflection holding the camera level with the top of her head, and little else. As a tall guy, there is a surprising number of bathroom mirrors where my reflection doesn't include my head.
    - gweinberg 5y ago
      You people need some taller mirrors. The bottom of my bathroom mirror is several inches blow my waist. The top is about a foot and a half above the top of my head.
slver 5y ago
No
matheuss-leonel 5y ago
Holy shit
stirfish 5y ago
If it were to affect our perception of reality, what differences could we find? I'm guessing that it would affect our perception of reality in the same way eye color would.
LeoPanthera 5y ago
Surely not any more than my terrible eyesight does. I don't think my spectacles are altering my perception of reality.
- Hoasi 5y ago
  Mine certainly do, because without them I would be blind.
- astrange 5y ago
  They hurt peripheral vision if you get the kind with thick frames. You might be eaten by a lion.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
hervature 5y ago
I don't like philosophical questions like this. Let's say male blue is female red and vice versa. Our perception of the world is different yet it doesn't change anything as to how we understand and interact with "reality".
- CyanBird 5y ago
  It is well backed up by science that women can see or at least perceive/brainlog a stronger variety of colors than men, and then this is expressed on women having a stronger beefier vocabulary when it comes to naming and identifying colors So yeah, that's a thing Also, what you are describing is called Qualia, and that is intangible qualities of how the brain processes data, such as the "yellowness of a lemon", or the "foot pain of stepping on unexpected rock shoeless" Qualia can't be verbalized or compared between people because it is an inherent "brainfeel", you just need to expect others to have "at least similar-ish" qualias
  - hervature 5y ago
    Right, and children hear much higher frequencies than the rest of us. Just because you see more doesn't fundamentally change how we perceive reality. Like if someone says there is a color between eggshell white and snow white, I believe them because there is obviously a gradient there. I don't need to see their reality to agree on the state of it.
    - bobthechef 5y ago
      What's "fundamental" in this respect? If someone is colorblind, and another isn't, does that entail a change in perception? Sure. It means the colorblind guy can't discern things that people with normal vision can. A person born blind can't see anything and never has. They don't even imagine visual images (only images informed by the remaining senses). Their perception is unimaginable to me and mine to them. So if women can discern more colors than men, it follows that they experience more colors which seems like a matter of perception. Have you never argued with a woman about the color of a sweater?
  - 5y ago
wearywanderer 5y ago
> If there is a difference between male/female retinas Is this even an "if"? It's well established that men are more likely to be colorblind, and it's likely many women are tetrachromats (most people are mere trichromats). The genes for the extra cone pigments are in the X chromosome, and are seemingly expressed more often when somebody has two X chromosomes. Similarly, people with two X chromosomes are less likely to be colorblind because most forms of colorblindness are caused by defects in genes in X chromosomes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrachromacy#Humans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrachromacy#Humans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_blindness#Genetics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_blindness#Genetics Perhaps most men and women, men and women with normal trichromatic vision, have identical retinas. But with genes so important to eyeballs residing in the X chromosome, who knows. But I'm left wondering why experts are particularly surprised by this result.

I am going to drop a thought here to see what happens. If there is a difference between male/female retinas. Could this affect our perception of reality?

by maCDzP 5y ago

I am going to drop a thought here to see what happens. If there is a difference between male/female retinas. Could this affect our perception of reality?

BurningFrog 5y ago

My guess: Only in trivial ways. The fact that women see the world from a ~20cm lower point probably has real impact. For one thing, guys, your nose hair is very visible from that height.

NaturalPhallacy 5y ago
A few funny anecdotes in that vein. A woman complained that her very tall boyfriend had hung a mirror in the bathroom. She took a picture of it. It was her reflection holding the camera level with the top of her head, and little else. One that happened to me personally. I asked my then gf (5'1") what it was like being a small person, do you feel like a normal sized person in a land of giants? "Yes" was the instant response. One very tall guy once remarked: "The tops of your fridges are fucking disgusting."
- xorfish 5y ago
  > A woman complained that her very tall boyfriend had hung a mirror in the bathroom. She took a picture of it. It was her reflection holding the camera level with the top of her head, and little else. As a tall guy, there is a surprising number of bathroom mirrors where my reflection doesn't include my head.
  - gweinberg 5y ago
    You people need some taller mirrors. The bottom of my bathroom mirror is several inches blow my waist. The top is about a foot and a half above the top of my head.

slver 5y ago

matheuss-leonel 5y ago

Holy shit

stirfish 5y ago

If it were to affect our perception of reality, what differences could we find? I'm guessing that it would affect our perception of reality in the same way eye color would.

LeoPanthera 5y ago

Surely not any more than my terrible eyesight does. I don't think my spectacles are altering my perception of reality.

Hoasi 5y ago
Mine certainly do, because without them I would be blind.
astrange 5y ago
They hurt peripheral vision if you get the kind with thick frames. You might be eaten by a lion.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

hervature 5y ago

I don't like philosophical questions like this. Let's say male blue is female red and vice versa. Our perception of the world is different yet it doesn't change anything as to how we understand and interact with "reality".

CyanBird 5y ago
It is well backed up by science that women can see or at least perceive/brainlog a stronger variety of colors than men, and then this is expressed on women having a stronger beefier vocabulary when it comes to naming and identifying colors So yeah, that's a thing Also, what you are describing is called Qualia, and that is intangible qualities of how the brain processes data, such as the "yellowness of a lemon", or the "foot pain of stepping on unexpected rock shoeless" Qualia can't be verbalized or compared between people because it is an inherent "brainfeel", you just need to expect others to have "at least similar-ish" qualias
- hervature 5y ago
  Right, and children hear much higher frequencies than the rest of us. Just because you see more doesn't fundamentally change how we perceive reality. Like if someone says there is a color between eggshell white and snow white, I believe them because there is obviously a gradient there. I don't need to see their reality to agree on the state of it.
  - bobthechef 5y ago
    What's "fundamental" in this respect? If someone is colorblind, and another isn't, does that entail a change in perception? Sure. It means the colorblind guy can't discern things that people with normal vision can. A person born blind can't see anything and never has. They don't even imagine visual images (only images informed by the remaining senses). Their perception is unimaginable to me and mine to them. So if women can discern more colors than men, it follows that they experience more colors which seems like a matter of perception. Have you never argued with a woman about the color of a sweater?
- 5y ago

wearywanderer 5y ago

> If there is a difference between male/female retinas Is this even an "if"? It's well established that men are more likely to be colorblind, and it's likely many women are tetrachromats (most people are mere trichromats). The genes for the extra cone pigments are in the X chromosome, and are seemingly expressed more often when somebody has two X chromosomes. Similarly, people with two X chromosomes are less likely to be colorblind because most forms of colorblindness are caused by defects in genes in X chromosomes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrachromacy#Humans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrachromacy#Humans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_blindness#Genetics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_blindness#Genetics Perhaps most men and women, men and women with normal trichromatic vision, have identical retinas. But with genes so important to eyeballs residing in the X chromosome, who knows. But I'm left wondering why experts are particularly surprised by this result.