Holographic goodness is not that bad: Reply to Olivers, Chater and Watson (2004)

Abstract

The holographic approach (HA) to goodness (P. A. van der Helm & E. L. J. Leeuwenberg, 1991, 1996, 1999) is an ideal-observer theory at, in D. Marr's (1982) terms, the computational and algorithmic levels of description. It provides an explanation of the detectability of visual regularities such as mirror symmetry, repetition, and Glass patterns. C. L. N. Olivers, N. Chater, and D. G. Watson (2004) gave a picture of HA as if it were a flawed theory. However, they gave a flawed picture containing factual errors and misconceptions. Most of their alleged counter-evidence actually supports HA's unified account of perfect regularities, perturbed regularities, and nested regularities. Recent evidence indicates that HA may even lead to deeper implementational insight into the processing of spatial frequencies.