ABSTRACT
There were two golden eras during which scientists were able to forge links between visual perception and the brain mechanisms responsible for them. The first era was in the 19th century during the life and times of the Austrian physicist and philosopher, Ernst Mach. Together with Ewald Hering and others, Mach showed that how we perceive the world can reveal a great deal about the code used by the brain. The second era was in the 20th century during the life and times of Floyd Ratliff. It was during this time that the neural networks themselves were studied directly and related to phenomena of visual perception.
