[theoh]

I think the GP didn't mean to imply that humans have an innate cat representation from birth.

It makes more sense to interpret the comment as saying that humans don't learn an internal image representation. Humans do learn representations of bridges, aircraft, cats, etc. But those are built on top of an image processing/representation system that we are born with, analogous to raster graphics?

Edit: Maybe I'm misreading the comment. What's definitely built in at birth is things like edge and orientation detectors. A zebra detector would be a surprise.

[lisper]

> I think the GP didn't mean to imply that humans have an innate cat representation from birth.

Actually, that is what I meant, though I don't have a reference for cat detectors per se. But there is ample evidence for innate feature detectors of comparable complexity (e.g. human facial expressions), even if the actual target is something other than cats.