Like to fish? Pop Style Glow in the dark spinners

By FishTackler®

What do elephants and Tyrannosaurus Rex have in common?

 They both have, or at least had, better depth perception than we do.

Our human eyes average about 3 inches from pupil to pupil. The further apart the eyes are the better the depth perception. Depth perception is simply being able to tell how far away objects are by using strereo vision. Higher math uses trigonometry to find distances by using two or three known facts to solve a third unknown fact. If you have two good eyes you use stereo vision and your depth perception every time you cross a street. You look at an coming car, your brain works out the math. Then you decide if you can safely cross the road before the car gets to you. An elephants eyes average from 18 to 20 inches pupil to pupil. So an elephant can see stereo much better than we can. Now let's get down to some really interesting stuff!  Here is why this is so fascinating. The fact that our eyes are 3 inches apart from each other is what gives us the ability to see in three dimensions. An elephants eyes are about 18 inches apart so it should have even better depth perception but T Rex has eyes that are up to 30 inches apart and his kind was the king of depth perception. If you were focused in his sights and you saw him hungrily looking at you, drooling through his sharp flesh tearing teeth, you could be quite certain he has targeted you and calculated how far away you are. The prey has been spotted, the math has been done, the main course chosen, and you have been invited for dinner. Now lets see if we can create a picture that will let us see out of T Rex's eyes.
     Here is how it works. Lets pretend that we are floating in space. We see three orbs floating in the in the black void.

You look at them with just the left eye and this is all you see. A Flat picture with no depth. Is the green orb in front of the blue orb or behind it? Maybe it is even with it.

With just one eye it is impossible to tell.  When we have two good eyes we see two pictures. Our brain puts them together and makes two pictures one picture. Our brain does the  math or more precise, the trigonometry and tells us how far away objects are from us. The further away the object the less accurate the math is. The further apart the eyes are the more accurate the math  is for longer distances.  The next time you hear some one say, "Why do we need this math? We won't use it!" Just remind them that everyday of their waking hours for the rest of their lives unconsciously they will be working out complex trigonometry problems. Even if you are blind your ears use stereo to work out the same complex trigonomic functions to determine direction and distance.

Here is what we would see if we closed our left eye and opened our right eye. It is still impossible to distinguish depth

Place a stiff piece of cardboard edge wise against the picture so that it dissects the images as shown.		Now put your face up to the cardboard's edge so that it dissects your face between your eyes.  Stare at the images until they merge . Now you should easily distinguish which orb sits in front of the other. You may have to adjust your distance from the image to suit your eyes.

Now Back to the question. What would it be like to look through the eyes of  Tyrannosaurus Rex? Click on the eyes to find out! If you dare!