Comment by CydeWeys
9 years ago
It makes me wonder if there are species (that have full color vision) that are better at the opposite. Is shape discrimination simply harder than color discrimination, or is it related to our evolutionary history as you posit?
I would say color discrimination is easier because it's basically 1-dimensional. In the best case you could do it with a resolution of a single photoreceptor. If you account for ambient lighting, shadows, etc you still just have a 2-dimensional task.
Shape discrimination is a 3-dimensional task. In the worst case you need to change your point-of-view or the orientation of the object.