Fixing My Gaze: A Scientist's Journey into Seeing in Three Dimensions

Barry, Susan R.

ISBN 10: 0465009131 / ISBN 13: 9780465009138

Published by Basic Books, 2009

About this Item

First printing with full number line 1-10. Inscribed by author on title page: "For Maria, Elaine, and Susan - For changing people's vision & transforming people's lives. With admiration, Sue Barry Oct., '09". Otherwise, inside is clean and unmarked. Book slightly bowed. Dust jacket has shelf wear and creases along top but is intact. See photos.

Seller Inventory # ABE-1720808339836

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Fixing My Gaze: A Scientist's Journey into Seeing in Three Dimensions
• Publisher: Basic Books
• Publication Date: 2009
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0465009131
• ISBN 13: 9780465009138
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition.
• Condition: Good
• Dust Jacket Condition: Good
• Signed: Inscribed by Author
• Seller catalogs:
  • First Edition
  • Signed

About this title

Synopsis

When neuroscientist Susan Barry was fifty years old, she took an unforgettable trip to Manhattan. As she emerged from the dim light of the subway into the sunshine, she saw a view of the city that she had witnessed many times in the past but now saw in an astonishingly new way. Skyscrapers on street corners appeared to loom out toward her like the bows of giant ships. Tree branches projected upward and outward, enclosing and commanding palpable volumes of space. Leaves created intricate mosaics in 3D. With each glance, she experienced the deliriously novel sense of immersion in a three dimensional world. Barry had been cross-eyed and stereoblind since early infancy. After half a century of perceiving her surroundings as flat and compressed, on that day she was seeing Manhattan in stereo depth for first time in her life. As a neuroscientist, she understood just how extraordinary this transformation was, not only for herself but for the scientific understanding of the human brain. Scientists have long believed that the brain is malleable only during a critical period in early childhood. According to this theory, Barrys brain had organized itself when she was a baby to avoid double vision and there was no way to rewire it as an adult. But Barry found an optometrist who prescribed a little-known program of vision therapy; after intensive training, Barry was ultimately able to accomplish what other scientists and even she herself had once considered impossible. A revelatory account of the brains capacity for change, Fixing My Gaze describes Barrys remarkable journey and celebrates the joyous pleasure of our senses.

About the Author

Susan R. Barry is a professor of neurobiology in the Department of Biological Sciences at Mount Holyoke College. She speaks regularly to scientists, eye doctors, and educators on the topic of neuronal plasticity. She has been featured on NPR and in a New Yorker article by renowned neurologist Oliver Sacks entitled “Stereo Sue.” She and her husband have two grown children and live in South Hadley, Massachusetts.