What Remains

Frogs don’t see like us. They don’t see things that stay still. They will starve to death surrounded by food if it is not moving. They only see things that move, things that change.

Sean Costello recounts how he has developed his own way to selectively cultivate such Frog Vision.

However, the most important factor for me is that I have heard “Tom’s Diner” so many times that I no longer hear it. Like frog vision, I no longer notice what remains the same, only what has changed. I don’t hear the song anymore, just the different ways that my DSP algorithms respond to it.

I find this interesting, not just as a practical technique, but as a general principle, for times when we should not focus on what is, but what has changed.