cookieman, an observation on science.

[boogieman]

I posted this in JV's thread, but I saw it was getting off track with bickering and I didn't want to derail the thread any more. I just wanted to post this, it's not meant to be augmentative, but it's more about the science of our eyes.

SCIENCE. Please explain your science as it relates to a totally visual aiming system such as CTE. There's an answer we will never get.

Science knows how eyes work. If you've ever been to an optometrist you know they can measure pupil distance. It's all trigonometry. It's not difficult. Hold a matchstick up in the center of your face/vision and focus on a distant object. You will see two match heads. Lay a ruler 3' from you and focus on the ruler, just as you would an edge of a ball. Step it if you want. Measure the distance the match head shifts as you close each of your eyes. The shift as you close your eyes is what each eye is focused on (and if you're truly in your center vision the distance on each side is the same) and the distance is important. You're measuring the difference in your eyes after they crossed at some point, as the match is between you and what you are focusing on. It's simple trigonometry. The further away the focused object is, the more "shift" you have. It's because the hypotenuse of the triangle is farther. The line from each pupil to the focused upon object is the hypotenuse. You know the distance from pupil to pupil. You can use this point to calculate where your eyes "cross" each other at the match head. Take laser focus on the match head and you will see two "object balls."

"Poking your head out" (you know, turn your head) simply makes the hypotenuse the long (non hypotenuse) side of the triangle. The short side is the distance between pupils. You're saying this isn't science, but it absolutely is. Your eyes are an unbelievable "device" and you can get damn accurate (with training) by eyeballing stuff. It can all be measured. While it might be beyond the scope or interest of most pool players, it is ABSOLUTELY measurable and repeatable. This isn't exclusive to CTE, it's how the eyes work. It would be a B**ch to measure out and diagram, but it is POSSIBLE!

They whole eye thing... I like the fact that CTE addresses it, but the dirty secret is, anyone who is having success with ANY method of aiming is already doing this right. If you have a hard time with certain cuts and not the other side, you're not doing it right. The point of practicing ANY aiming system is to get our mechanics and eyes calibrated to what we are seeing and how it translates to stroking the ball.

CTE may work great for you, and if it does that's GREAT! The thing is, you can understand how to use your eyes and other aiming methods for the same good results.

 

[cookie man]

I posted this in JV's thread, but I saw it was getting off track with bickering and I didn't want to derail the thread any more. I just wanted to post this, it's not meant to be augmentative, but it's more about the science of our eyes.


Science knows how eyes work. If you've ever been to an optometrist you know they can measure pupil distance. It's all trigonometry. It's not difficult. Hold a matchstick up in the center of your face/vision and focus on a distant object. You will see two match heads. Lay a ruler 3' from you and focus on the ruler, just as you would an edge of a ball. Step it if you want. Measure the distance the match head shifts as you close each of your eyes. The shift as you close your eyes is what each eye is focused on (and if you're truly in your center vision the distance on each side is the same) and the distance is important. You're measuring the difference in your eyes after they crossed at some point, as the match is between you and what you are focusing on. It's simple trigonometry. The further away the focused object is, the more "shift" you have. It's because the hypotenuse of the triangle is farther. The line from each pupil to the focused upon object is the hypotenuse. You know the distance from pupil to pupil. You can use this point to calculate where your eyes "cross" each other at the match head. Take laser focus on the match head and you will see two "object balls."

"Poking your head out" (you know, turn your head) simply makes the hypotenuse the long (non hypotenuse) side of the triangle. The short side is the distance between pupils. You're saying this isn't science, but it absolutely is. Your eyes are an unbelievable "device" and you can get damn accurate (with training) by eyeballing stuff. It can all be measured. While it might be beyond the scope or interest of most pool players, it is ABSOLUTELY measurable and repeatable. This isn't exclusive to CTE, it's how the eyes work. It would be a B**ch to measure out and diagram, but it is POSSIBLE!

They whole eye thing... I like the fact that CTE addresses it, but the dirty secret is, anyone who is having success with ANY method of aiming is already doing this right. If you have a hard time with certain cuts and not the other side, you're not doing it right. The point of practicing ANY aiming system is to get our mechanics and eyes calibrated to what we are seeing and how it translates to stroking the ball.

CTE may work great for you, and if it does that's GREAT! The thing is, you can understand how to use your eyes and other aiming methods for the same good results.

Good post, and it's exactly what i've been working on the last week. The eyes are an amazing thing.

 

[boogieman]

Good post, and it's exactly what i've been working on the last week. The eyes are an amazing thing.

I've been messing around with the match head deal for a few months. I need to get an accurate pupil distance so I can accurately calculate. I imagine this stuff is pretty basic as far as science goes, but it's fun to experiment and come to your own conclusions.

 

[boogieman]

Forgive the "art" it's just a sketch and yes, the lines should be straight:

The black ball is the real physical object ball. The red thing on a stick is a match head. Solid green and magenta are where you are focusing with each eye. The green and magenta dotted line is the "ghosted match head" or what you can see in your non focused (inside/toward your nose) peripheral vision. Learning to visually focus correctly will make the doubled/ghosted image be almost completely ignored by the brain.

As you focus on the match (orange and olive drab) you pick up "double vision" or ghosted images of the object ball. You're seeing the distant object ball with your non focused (outer/away from nose) peripheral vision. The peach and lighter olive drab are the doubled object balls. I think it's much easier for the brain to ignore double object ball. I don't know why other than it might be quite traumatic to have two object balls to choose from on every shot.

It's also why most focus on OB last. The only way to truly have one OB is to focus on it. The cue ball didn't move and you hit it by feel (or whatever you want to call it). You can only hit what you focus on.

If we're talking survival conditions, it's more advantageous to see danger/prey at a distance than what's going on at your feet. With traditional bows, you watch the prey and loose the arrow without thinking of the arrow or sighting. Same thing for most in pool. This is a completely non backed up statement, but I imagine most people look at OB last because that's what the human animal adapted to do. You do this, you get food in your belly and your kids don't literally starve, looking at distant objects while chasing/aiming/etc means your genetics survived.

Also Don't limit yourself to thinking of your vision as a "V". It's 3D, so it's a conical shape. Try tilting your head next time you take aim and look how things change.

EDIT: The weird looking thing at the bottom is a human looking top down.

 

[BC21]

Fun thing to freak your buddies out with:

I was standing at a mountain overlook with two friends. We were at a ski resort, drinking beer and looking out over the valley below. One of my buddies asked. "I wonder how far away that is?" And he pointed to a warehouse building down in the valley. My other buddy said it was probably about a mile away.

I asked if either of them could give me a good estimate on how wide the building was. Using a wooden fence down there as a reference, my buddy Jack said the building looked to be about 80ft wide. So I then closed my left eye and extended my right arm out and pointed at the left corner of the building, using only my right eye to line it up. I kept my finger still and closed my right eye while opening my left. The change in perspective put my finger at what looked like 3 building distances away from the right corner of the building. Since I was looking at the left corner of the building initially, the displacement of my finger was actually 4 building lengths, or 320 feet. I lowered my arm and told them the building was a little more than 3200 feet away. They looked at me like I was an idiot, then laughed and walked away.

Here's the thing... I know my pupils are about 2.6 inches apart. I know the distance from my finger to my eyes is about 27 inches. Roughly, that's a factor of 10, meaning that the distance from my finger tip to my eyes is about ten times that of the distance between my pupils. So, using similar triangles, I multiplied the distance I got from the two different finger perspectives (320ft) by 10, to come up with a distance of 3200 ft.

The cool thing is, when I got home and told my daughter daughter about it, she brought that exact place up on Google earth, on her phone, and we found that I was very close in my estimate. I think it was around 3600 feet according to the measurement on Google earth.

 

[bbb]

boogieman
your posts above are very educational and well presented
(your artwork could be improved....)

 

[French Roots]

Fun thing to freak your buddies out with:

I was standing at a mountain overlook with two friends. We were at a ski resort, drinking beer and looking out over the valley below. One of my buddies asked. "I wonder how far away that is?" And he pointed to a warehouse building down in the valley. My other buddy said it was probably about a mile away.

I asked if either of them could give me a good estimate on how wide the building was. Using a wooden fence down there as a reference, my buddy Jack said the building looked to be about 80ft wide. So I then closed my left eye and extended my right arm out and pointed at the left corner of the building, using only my right eye to line it up. I kept my finger still and closed my right eye while opening my left. The change in perspective put my finger at what looked like 3 building distances away from the right corner of the building. Since I was looking at the left corner of the building initially, the displacement of my finger was actually 4 building lengths, or 320 feet. I lowered my arm and told them the building was a little more than 3200 feet away. They looked at me like I was an idiot, then laughed and walked away.

Here's the thing... I know my pupils are about 2.6 inches apart. I know the distance from my finger to my eyes is about 27 inches. Roughly, that's a factor of 10, meaning that the distance from my finger tip to my eyes is about ten times that of the distance between my pupils. So, using similar triangles, I multiplied the distance I got from the two different finger perspectives (320ft) by 10, to come up with a distance of 3200 ft.

The cool thing is, when I got home and told my daughter daughter about it, she brought that exact place up on Google earth, on her phone, and we found that I was very close in my estimate. I think it was around 3600 feet according to the measurement on Google earth.

Do you have very short arms? I wear a 32/33 sleeve shirt & I just measured the distance from eye to my index finger when pointing out & I measured 30". I am 5'9" tall. Just curious. Not important. However, since you were off by 400 ft. or 11% you may want to remeasure the distance form your eye to the tip of your pointing finger.

 

[BC21]

Do you have very short arms? I wear a 32/33 sleeve shirt & I just measured the distance from eye to my index finger when pointing out & I measured 30". I am 5'9" tall. Just curious. Not important. However, since you were off by 400 ft. or 11% you may want to remeasure the distance form your eye to the tip of your pointing finger.

I don't think my arms short. Lol. I said about 27", but I just measured again, seeing how this incident was about 4 years ago. I came up with 29.2" from tip of index finger to eye, and my arm straight out in front of me. Pupil to pupil I get 2.9". So either I measured wrong a few years ago or I remembered the wrong numbers. It's the ratio that matters, and it's still 10:1.

My arm span is 71", which is one inch more than my height. I think it's normal or common for the arm span to match height. So I suppose I'm close enough to normal. Let's see, what else....yes....I weigh 185lbs, and I enjoy long walks through the woods and have eclectic tastes in music and a wide range interests in various UKsubjects.