Suppose that you are setting up a laboratory to study thedecision making behavior of rats. You will have them running a mazeand will put wires in their brains while they run it in order tomeasure what they are thinking as they make choices about where togo.
Suppose also that you want to be outside the room so as not todistract them while they are doing their tasks in case you need tointervene for some reason. You can think immediately think of twostraightforward approaches . (1) Put up a mirror in the room so youcan watch them while you are in the next room. (2) Put a webcam inthe room so you can watch them from anywhere.
There are various advantages and disadvantages to these choices,but you get distracted from making a decision by the followinginteresting question. In both cases, an image of the same volume ofspace containing the same objects is displayed on a two-dimensionalsurface â in one case the surface of the computer screen, in theother the surface of the mirror. Yet there is an interestingdifference. If you move away from looking at the center of thecomputer screen and go off to the side, the objects on the surfaceof the computer appear distorted â squashed along the horizontaldirection. (This is what it means to be a 2D image.) On the otherhand, if you walk off to the side of a mirror, nothing isdistorted. Everything looks normally 3D â you just see somewhatdifferent parts of the room.
Explain why this difference occurs in terms of the physics of lightand mirrors as you have learned them in class.
Suppose that you are setting up a laboratory to study thedecision making behavior of rats. You will have them running a mazeand will put wires in their brains while they run it in order tomeasure what they are thinking as they make choices about where togo.
Suppose also that you want to be outside the room so as not todistract them while they are doing their tasks in case you need tointervene for some reason. You can think immediately think of twostraightforward approaches . (1) Put up a mirror in the room so youcan watch them while you are in the next room. (2) Put a webcam inthe room so you can watch them from anywhere.
There are various advantages and disadvantages to these choices,but you get distracted from making a decision by the followinginteresting question. In both cases, an image of the same volume ofspace containing the same objects is displayed on a two-dimensionalsurface â in one case the surface of the computer screen, in theother the surface of the mirror. Yet there is an interestingdifference. If you move away from looking at the center of thecomputer screen and go off to the side, the objects on the surfaceof the computer appear distorted â squashed along the horizontaldirection. (This is what it means to be a 2D image.) On the otherhand, if you walk off to the side of a mirror, nothing isdistorted. Everything looks normally 3D â you just see somewhatdifferent parts of the room.
Explain why this difference occurs in terms of the physics of lightand mirrors as you have learned them in class.
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