[codeflo]

I know there are lots of funny theories about vision on the internet, but as a simple empirical fact that everybody can verify, dimming an LED works. Whatever idea about vision someone might have, if it doesn’t account for that fact, it’s wrong, disproved by everyday experience. (More generally, photons hitting cones are actually also discrete events, and we don’t see everything flickering all the time. But that’s a more complex argument that depends on a prior understanding of quantum physics. In contrast, the LED example is simple and deterministic.)

However, the complexity of the biology behind this doesn’t actually matter for my argument. My point is that we need proper signal processing in order to not irreparably damage the signal before it reaches the eye, when we’re still in the realm of precise technology. I’m not sure if I explain this poorly or if you’re a tiny bit motivated to misunderstand me, but of course, it is a complex subject.

As a last honest attempt, can we agree in the simplest possible case — that an LED blinking at 1 MHz filmed at 1 million still frames per second can’t ever reproduce a signal that can be interpreted as being dimmed? If so, we already agree that we have an artifact. Then the question is only how to remove it, and signal processing theory gives an answer.

If not, I’d recommend that you work through it with pencil and paper: what is the LED doing, what are the still images showing, what is the monitor showing to the eye? You can’t miss the conclusion if you do this carefully.