And the input from the eye simply adjusts what is wrong with the predictions. As most of the predictions will be correct, because our visual system spent many years learning what is there in the world, there won’t be much to adjust. So most of the spontaneous spikes in your visual cortices will be telling the rest of your brain an accurate version of what is there in the world, before your eye has even “seen” it. That’s the theory, anyway.12 Bayesian hierarchical inference, to the cognoscenti; bootstrapping, if you prefer; educated guessing to the rest of us. Whatever we call it, it means
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