Understanding & Reviving the Sunnah of Moon Sighting in Britain

Who has or had the best human eyesight ever recorded?
How was it assessed?
Were they able to use their eyesight to perform tasks others could not do?
What was believed to be the reason that they had this gift?
Did/has their eyesight deteriorate/d with age?

James Pitt, Harvard HEB graduate.
Answered Mar 11, 2013 · Upvoted by Ian York, Virology, immunology, biology

Depends, what kind of eyesight?
To the best of my knowledge, the highest visual acuity ever measured was in an unnamed Aborigine man, part of a study that found Aborigines have much better visual acuity on average than Europeans do. His visual acuity was 6/1.5, meaning that he could read the chart from 6 meters away as well as someone with "normal" vision could read it from 1.5 meters away.

There are no records of this man specifically doing tasks others couldn't. However, I've seen a few accounts by European colonists where Aborigines told them they spotted a whale on the horizon and the European thought they were lying. I'd say that counts as a task others couldn't do.

Why was his vision so good? Partly genetics, partly using his distance vision a lot. It used to be believed that doing lots of "close work" like reading caused nearsightedness. But that didn't explain the hunter-gatherer populations that do lots of close work like weaving and flint knapping, but have much lower rates of nearsightedness than people in industrialized nations do. Turns out it's not about doing close work, it's about not doing enough "long work" - kids who spend more time outside are much less likely to become nearsighted.

The highest color vision ever measured was in a British woman referred to as "Mrs. M." This was assessed by using the the Farnsworth-Munsell 100-Hue test and Rayleigh match tests. Simply put, she (and any other woman with tetrachromacy) can see far more colors than other people can, due to having an additional pigment in their eyes. This is entirely genetic.

Both distance vision and color vision normally deteriorate with age in everyone. There's no reason to think the people with the best vision would be exceptions.

Whatever happened to following the Jamaah of reliable Ulama? [/quote]
Which jamaah? The one that signed a document in the 80's saying they will follow Saudi for Ramadan and Eid? Or the jamaah who passed FAT fatwa upon fatwa upon fatwa making their signed document null and void Making it very very clear that following Saudi is WRONG and unacceptable?


An apology was made in advance if there was an error on my part.
[quote]Why not start digging dirt on other Ulama too while you're at it, or better still imply that thousands of thousands of Ulama don't know what they're doing.