Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!rutgers!mit-eddie!mit-amt!mit-caf!herb
From: herb@mit-caf.UUCP (Herbert Neuhaus)
Newsgroups: sci.misc
Subject: Re: quick question
Message-ID: <676@mit-caf.UUCP>
Date: 24 Jan 88 15:58:35 GMT
References: <760@aucs.UUCP> <1170@petsd.UUCP> <3033@zeus.TEK.COM>
Reply-To: herb@mit-caf.UUCP (Herbert Neuhaus)
Distribution: na
Organization: Microsystems Technology Laboratory, MIT
Lines: 30

In article <3033@zeus.TEK.COM> rob@amadeus.UUCP (Dan Tilque) writes:
>C. J. Henrich writes:
>>In article <760@aucs.UUCP> 820785gm@aucs.UUCP writes:
>>>	So just why DOES a mirror reverse left and right, but not up and down?
>>The mirror, by itself, reverses front-to-back.  Our sense of vision,
>>seeing the result, mentally applies a rotation to the mirror image.
>>... close as possible to one's "body image.  ...
>Not quite true.  Mirrors do reverse front-to-back.  But we interpret our
>body image as if we were meeting someone else.  Thus we expect our image's
>right hand to be on the left.  ...

If our interpretation of mirror images is related to expectations of meeting
"someone", then why do inanimate objects seem to beahve the same way in 
mirrors as people do?

I agree the trick is in our sense of vision, but reject the idea that
its an anthropomorphic reaction.

Consider the image of a object which is lying on its side.  Is the image 
reversed from top to bottom or left to right.  If you say its left to right,
would that be with respect to you (upright) or the with respect to the object
which is on its side.

The answer is that text is always backwards in the mirror, no matter how you
rotate it.  Perhaps somethings are not symmetric (people, text) to mirror
inversion, and other things are (like gravity?).

What do you think?

Herb ( on his side in front of a mirror).