Modeling and Prediction

Abstract

Perception, in general, and face recognition, in particular, requires training. The accounts provided by Oliver Sacks are illuminating on this point. A blind person, whose vision is suddenly restored, makes sense of the surrounding world only gradually, and as Berkeley has earlier anticipated, partly by connecting visual experiences with tactile ones. Perception for Helmholtz is merely inference. It is through immersion in our surrounding world and through development that people gradually learn to see and recognize objects, and in particular human faces. Nature alone is not enough and rich nurturing, i.e., learning, is paramount.