Blind Man's Restored Vision Is Studied (18 views)
From:  Minister Falcon (OSMFalcon)     8/24/2003 1:27 pm  
To:  ALL    
 
  684.1  
 
Sunday, Aug 24, 2003 

 
News   

 

 

 

 


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 Posted on Sun, Aug. 24, 2003   
 
Blind Man's Restored Vision Is Studied
ANDREW BRIDGES
Associated Press

After 43 years of blindness, Michael May can see again.

He can play soccer with his sons, enjoy movies and, for the first time, gaze on the Sierra Nevada slopes he has expertly skied - sightless - since the late 1970s.

But May can't recognize his sons, Carson, 11, and Wyndham, 9, by their faces alone. The same goes for identifying Jennifer, his wife of 15 years.

People "can't fathom that," said May, who owns a company in Davis, Calif., that makes navigational software for the blind.

Three years after surgery restored sight to May's right eye, researchers say May's case shows how vision is more than just eye function. Blindness has long-term effects on how the brain processes information and constructs one's view of the world.

May lost his sight to a chemical explosion when he was 3 1/2 years old. He eventually lost his left eye and remained blind in his right until the surgery in 2000.

But testing since that surgery has showed that May's ability to interpret what he sees through his good eye is decidedly mixed, said Ione Fine, lead author of a study appearing in the September issue of the journal Nature Neuroscience.

May can identify simple shapes and colors. He can interpret objects in motion. He can spy faraway peaks. He marvels at the vibrancy of plants and flowers unseen since he lost his vision.

But three-dimensional perception and the ability to recognize complex objects such as the faces of family and friends remain severely impaired. He strains to tell the difference between a man and a woman. He describes a cube as a square with extra lines.

Written history mentions perhaps 30 people who reacquired vision after protracted periods of blindness, said Fine, a neuroscientist at the University of California, San Diego. She and her colleagues leapt at the chance to study May and began testing him just months after his cornea- and stem cell-implant surgery. The stem cells formed a protective layer over his new cornea to prevent clouding.

"There has always been this question: What would happen if a blind man got his vision back? Is it something innate or is it something we learn from first principles?" Fine asked. "Is it something that happens or is it something we learn, like language?"

Repeatedly, the researchers combined vision tests with scans of May's brain activity to study how blindness had affected him.

When asked to identify a cube illustrated on a two-dimensional computer screen, for example, May failed. But once Fine commanded the cube to rotate, simulating motion in three dimensions, he immediately recognized it.

"It was really weird to have a three-dimensional sense of something on a flat surface, because it was such a foreign experience to someone dominated by a tactile ability," May said.

Scans of the region of May's brain associated with the processing of complex forms revealed patchy responses when he was shown the still cube.

But once the cube moved, his motion-processing region came ablaze with activity, Fine said. That suggests the region was fully developed when May lost his sight, Fine said.

Since May's ability to recognize complex forms showed such impairment, it suggested that region is much slower to mature, Fine said. Once deprived of visual experience, it likely ceases to develop and languishes, she added.

Since humans constantly encounter novel objects and new faces - and aging in familiar faces - the processing region in the brain must remain flexible, Fine said.

Jon Kaas, a Vanderbilt University neuroscientist, said the findings were consistent with what has been shown in studies with laboratory animals reared in darkness or with their eyelids artificially kept sealed shut.

Kaas, who was not connected with the study, said it was the most thorough of its kind on an individual.

May agreed with Fine's theory that vision, like language, appeared to be a skill honed through experience.

"I will never be fluent visually, but I get better the more I work at it," he said.

ON THE NET

Mike May's New Perceptions

http://www.senderogroup.com/perception.htm
 
 
Message 2 of 3 was Deleted    



   From:  Minister Falcon (OSMFalcon)     8/24/2003 1:48 pm  
To:  ALL   (3 of 3)  
 
  684.3 in reply to 684.1  
 
A curse for disobedience:

Deuteronomy 28:29
And you shall grope at noonday, as a blind man gropes in darkness; you shall not prosper in your ways; you shall be only oppressed and plundered continually, and no one shall save you.


Jesus gave a blind man sight:

Mark 8:22-25
22 Then He came to Bethsaida; and they brought a blind man to Him, and begged Him to touch him. 
23 So He took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the town. And when He had spit on his eyes and put His hands on him, He asked him if he saw anything. 
24 And he looked up and said, "I see men like trees, walking." 
25 Then He put His hands on his eyes again and made him look up. And he was restored and saw everyone clearly.

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I saw this article in the news and thought about these two scriptures about blindness.  There are many scriptures concerning blind, blinded, and blindness.  One becomes blind for disobedience, then blinded by darkness, and then blindness is passed on through the generations. It is because one does not listen to the voice of God, nor obey's the commands of God, nor apply the word of God to their life.  This is how blindness works.

This is why we have debate on the boards.  It makes for interesting reading but it is not holy to debate.  What is clearly written in the Holy Bible is obscure to many because of their blindness.  

Do you wear glasses?  This is a form of blindness.  You don't believe me...take your glasses off and tell me how much you can really see. 

When a person who has hit their threshold of anger, they go blank; their eyes see red and white vision no clarity at all.  This is blindness.

When a person has emotional turmoil over any issue, they cry and blurred vision is the result.  This is blindness.

When a person can not reason with another over man's doctrine vs. the doctrine of Jesus Christ, this causes debate.  This is blindness.

Pride and lust will cause you to be blind. 1 John 2:16

The question is to all of you:  ARE YOU BLIND?

[deleted by me]

         

 
  
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