On Seeing
Thoughts about seeing from Maria Popova expounding upon Alexandra Horowitz' On Looking: Eleven Walks with Expert Eyes
Maria Popova on Alexandra Horowitz:
“Cognitive scientist Alexandra Horowitz invites us to believe in her breathlessly wonderful On Looking: Eleven Walks with Expert Eyes — a record of her quest to walk around a city block with eleven different “experts,” from an artist to a geologist to a dog, and emerge with fresh eyes mesmerized by the previously unseen fascinations of a familiar world. It is undoubtedly one of the most stimulating books of the year, if not the decade, and the most enchanting thing I’ve read in ages.”
![Dog in Window](https://jeannemoutoussamy-ashe.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/New-Dog-in-the-window-1.jpg)
Horowitz marvels at our brains’ magnificent plasticity, the same adaptability behind the “limbic revision” of love:
“Our brains are changed by experience — in a way directly related to the details of that experience. If we have enough experience doing an action, viewing a scene, or smelling an odor to become an “expert” in a field, then our brains are functionally — and visibly — different from nonexperts.”
And yet: “The brain is plastic, and can creatively adapt to a new situation, but it changes right back when it no longer needs to be creative.”
![Houston Street](https://jeannemoutoussamy-ashe.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Houston-Street-Wall-edited-Pixlr.jpg)