I would suggest not using the phrase “visual image” because there may be no images when perception is direct.
For present purposes, for the sake of absolute simplicity and the avoidance of ambiguity or confusion, could we agree to use the word ‘image’ for what our thoughts are producing, and use the word tree 
for the percept tree ?
That is, we don’t see an image of a tree , we see an actual tree when we look at an actual tree .
Can we provisionally agree to this ?
We are not talking about the mechanics of the eye, the optic nerve, etc
But I think we want to point at the distinction between things that we see with our eyes (visual images) and things that we imagine (memory, imagination, conceptualisation)
Though I’m sure we’re going to get very confused soon (I’ve already started)
The brain limited to thought deals with “things” because it is not in direct contact with actuality, but the brain free of thought is in contact with the movement of life which is more than things.
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We are saying that there are trees out there that we are calling trees, and there is the image of the tree (or trees) in my memory, which we are calling the" image of the tree".
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Yes. We look with our eyes 
at the actual thing we have agreed in English to call ‘tree’
And, as a distinctive action, we recall in our memory an image we have made of a tree - an imaginative copy, an ‘image’ (which I was calling a mental image)
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Ok? Good. 
So the next question is (which is simply a question for now, with no right or wrong answer):
Can there be a looking, a seeing - with our eyes 
- at an actual tree
without having any mental images about the object - the actual tree - we are looking at ?
I want to say yes.
When I’m sitting in front of the fire, staring into the flames, zoning out, my brain is not always narrating, naming, calculating. (and there is still an experience of the fire, the movement, the heat)
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So maybe we can put a pin in this conversation for tonight because I think we’ve come a long way already?
Let’s allow the question to remain without answering it immediately - although what you are saying about looking at the fire 
without a narrative movement, without naming, etc, is very much relevant.
It took time to clarify it in a way we can both understand, so we can leave it as a question for when we have more energy to explore it. Is this ok with you Douglas?
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The thing itself refers to the actual object we say is “out there” - by “visual image” I mean what is perceived by us through the eyes (neurology says this is a projection/visual experience created by the brain)
When I look at the tree - just gazing at it without a thought - am I seeing the tree or a visual image of the tree?
A visual image. Info hits the retina, brain interprets and ‘tree’ appears. You can walk up to the ‘thing’ and check how accurate the image is, we call that seeing. Next question.
So perception is interpretation? What about direct perception?
So far, in this thread, we have agreed to define 3 terms :
-
The thing - the object that we are all able to say actually exists out there (eg. the tree out there in the garden)
-
The visual image - what we see when we look at something with our eyes (what the tree looks like to us)
-
Our idea of the thing - the mental image we have stored in memory, or conceptual idea of it, the visual(ish) image we can conjure up by imagination. (eg. its an oak tree)
When we look out at the world, the brain produces the experience of seeing (with the help of the lightwaves hitting the eye, and its past experience - this, biologically speaking, is as basic a perception as we can get. We are directly interacting with the world through the mental interface of this biological body and brain.
Does this count as direct perception in the Kinfonet sense? I don’t know.
Usually when we look at something we know what it is, and we know stuff about it above and beyond the simple visual image. (eg. my grandad planted this oak tree)
Let us put direct perception aside for the moment and deal once and for all with biological or visual sensory perception. Just to make this clear to all of us:
GPT: In the retina, the process of forming an optical image involves the interaction of light with the eye’s structures. When light enters the eye, it passes through the cornea and lens, which focus the light onto the retina at the back of the eye. The retina contains light-sensitive cells called photoreceptors—specifically, rods and cones.
Cones are responsible for color vision and detailed visual perception, while rods are more sensitive to low light levels and contribute to peripheral vision. When light strikes the photoreceptors, it triggers a series of chemical and electrical signals. These signals are then transmitted through the optic nerve to the brain, where they are interpreted as visual information, forming the basis of the optical image that we perceive. The brain processes these signals, creating our visual experience of the external world.
As we have said above, when we talk about mental images we are not referring to the brain’s 
perceptual cognitions (in this case the perceptual mechanics of visual seeing).
So the ‘optical image’ is not what we are calling an image - at last not in this dialogue, and not in the context of Krishnamurti’s teachings.
To repeat: what is called the ‘optical image’ in neurobiology is not what we are referring to as a ‘mental image’. The former has to do with our neurobiological hardware (as explained previously), while the latter has to do with our psychological software.
I hope this is clear to everyone.
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Theres the “optical image” or “visual experience” on the one hand, and what we know about the thing we see on the other hand.
Are we going to get confused about this word “psychological” - because of all that we know about “practical” and “psychological” thought in the teachings?
Maybe we can articulate this a little more simply Douglas, in line with what we already clarified yesterday?
-
We agreed to talk about seeing or looking
in the context of visual seeing. -
We took the example of looking at a tree
, or a flower 
, or a cloud 
. -
We said that this is distinct from having in our memory or imagination a picture or image of a tree
, a flower , a cloud ; and we agreed to call this a mental image. -
And we closed by asking ourselves whether it is possible to look
at a tree , a flower , a cloud , without having a mental image about it, without mental images interfering in that looking .
Right?
We haven’t yet come to the question of direct perception.
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The word ‘psychological’ has been brought in to distinguish the kind of cognition involved in holding a mental image from an optical image. This is the hardware/software distinction we have already talked about elsewhere.
For our present purposes all thought of this kind (the software) is psychological, including so-called practical thought, the memory of words, of botanical names for trees and flowers and clouds , etc.
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Psychological means thought process. All of it - mentation.
Yes.
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