Vision from the perspective of Islamic philosophers and contemporary empirical scientists

he concept of “vision” has been explored by both Islamic philosophers and empirical scientists. Considering the developments of empirical science in the recent decades, it would be rewarding to test the accuracy of natural science theories of Islamic philosophers against contemporary empirical science theories to see how these two compare to each other. In this article, we will first compare the theories of Islamic philosophers on vision with those of empirical scientists, and then discuss the differences between sensation and perception and how they would help determine the accuracy of mentioned theories on vision. With regard to the sense of vision, analyses show that while the theory of Beam Production is not accepted by contemporary empirical scientists, they accept the generalities of Impression Theory. Moreover, analyses show that Creation theory, a theory of vision in perception arena, is an acceptable theory, and when considered together with Impression Theory, forms an integrated overarching theory of vision. Hence, it is concluded that the philosophical propositions of Impression and Creation Theories, and their natural science bases, stand the test of contemporary empirical science findings