Abstract
THERE is evidence that pressure blinding abolishes all activity of the ganglion cells of the retina1. It has been suggested2 that the after-effect of exposing an eye to a moving stimulus (the waterfall illusion; see preceding communication) may be caused by the reduction of maintained discharge of the directionally sensitive retinal ganglion cells which were stimulated during the period of inspection, leaving the maintained activity of those which would signal the reverse motion unbalanced. If this is correct, then pressure blinding the eye during the period immediately following stimulation should abolish the effect. Unfortunately, one is not clearly aware of the movement illusion if there are no objects that one can see as moving, and pressure blinding prevents seeing. One therefore has to perform the test on the illusion transferred to objects seen with the other eye. Incidentally, it is interesting to note that the existence of this transfer has often been taken as convincing evidence for the central origin of the after-effects, but the transfer would be explicable on the hypothesis that it is due to suppression of maintained discharge even if this occurred only in the retina.
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References
Bornschein, H., Z. Biol., 110, 210 (1958).
Barlow, H. B., and Hill, R. M. (see preceding communication).
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BARLOW, H., BRINDLEY, G. Inter-ocular Transfer of Movement After-effects during Pressure Blinding of the Stimulated Eye. Nature 200, 1347 (1963). https://doi.org/10.1038/2001347a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/2001347a0
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