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From: honig@ics.uci.edu (David A. Honig)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Another Vision Question
Message-ID: <258975EB.1543@paris.ics.uci.edu>
Date: 15 Dec 89 22:53:31 GMT
References: <5772@cps3xx.UUCP>
Reply-To: David A. Honig <honig@ics.uci.edu>
Organization: University of California, Irvine - Dept of ICS
Lines: 28

In article <5772@cps3xx.UUCP> sticklen@cpswh.cps.msu.edu (Jon Sticklen) writes:
>
>i have another vision type question to ask the biologists on the net.
>which organisms on the evolutionary totem pole exhibit sacatic (sp?)
>motion of their eyes. yes - i know i am probably misspelling that word.
>what i mean is the rapid side-to-side motion of the eyes that i know
>humans do. it has always puzzled me whether or not this phenomenon is
>generally applicable to the animal kingdom.
>
>thanks,

Animal kingdom is too broad a term ---ranging from insects to humans.
Some mammals (eg, cats) make saccidic eye movements.

The general *principle* of orienting a sensor with *varying* resolution
(such as the human eye, or any eye with a fovea, or even an ear with
movable pinnae) is universal, whether its the eyeball that moves or
the whole head (as with owls).

You might check: "the gaze as a flying spot sensor" sec 5.9 in 
The Illusion of Reality by H.L.Resnikoff  It has to do with the
advantages of hierarchical organization of info-processing system.


--
David A. Honig		
...
Paternalism is a first step towards totalitarian statism.