Hacker News Reader

Comment by devnullbrain | Hacker News Reader

>about 5% - 15% of the population becomes nauseated.

That's just those who can use VR at all. Three members of my immediate family can't because of eyesight issues, including one who's blind in one eye. According to the Quest manual, I have a condition that means I should contact a doctor before using it.

If I worked for a company pushing this, I'd have a hard time believing any claims they made about supporting diversity in the workplace. Masses of people won't be able to take part in a society that depends on VR for communication and collaboration.

View on HN

> including one who's blind in one eye.

Interestingly, even people who are blind in one eye can enjoy VR, including the perception of depth.

Binocular vision is only one of the ways we get 3D cues, and not even the main one. The main cue is motion parallax: how things move when we move our head (or body). This one still works even with a single eye.

I have read reports of people with one functioning eye enjoying VR. Just as in real life their eyes do not give a 3D image. Just as in real life, their brain can still infer 3D just fine.

>family can't because of eyesight issues, including one who's blind in one eye

Eyesight issues don't stop you from using VR. In VR you will have the same eyesight issues as you do in real life. If you use glasses, then you can still wear glasses when you use VR.

You have problems with your eyesight?

No problem! Just strap this blurry contraption over your existing issue to make it BETTER™.

That's exactly what prescription glasses are. I don't understand the point you are trying to make.

Are you trying to suggest that prescription glasses don't actually improve people's eyesight?

They don't emit light straight into the eye globe a few centimenters away from it.

The light passes through lenses made out of plastic or glass that are a few cm away.

Not the same, as any ophthalmologist will gladly educate you on the matter.

What is your point. Your eyes have no way of detecting the origin of light. When using VR there is no way for your eyes to know that the screen is that close.

My point is that you don't have any clue how my eyes feel with two tiny TVs a couple of centimeters away from them vomiting direct light with high intensity into them, and wide open pupils.

Not a single clue, and if you think natural light is the same, I suggest a new posture to watch TV.

Maybe you will learn something, maybe not.

>two tiny TVs a couple of centimeters away

Distance doesn't matter for light. It just adds a delay that is the distance divided by the speed of light

>vomiting direct light with high intensity into them

Most VR headsets are only 100 nits. That's less intense than than the intensity of light by being in an indoor room. Going outside is many magnitudes more intense.

>natural light is the same

What is "natural light"?

Your eyes physically bend to focus at different distances.

VR can simulate a specific distance, and your eye will focus on that, but the common current tech can't simulate different distances.

Your eye focus will be telling you it's a 12ft away screen or whatever, even when your binocular vision is telling you a flying tomato is right next to you.

Using tiny screens a few cms away from the eye makes a big difference, I am also not able to use it.

The screens are usually moved to be from 1 to ~infinity meters away by the lenses. Unless you mean that glasses are hard to use with some headsets because there is not enough room to fit. Lens inserts are typically the solution for that.

Definitly you aren't an ophthalmologist.

There are more eyesight than those which can be addressed with simple corrective lenses.

Then how do these people correct for it outside of VR? Your vision in VR will be similar to that outside of VR.

I'm not saying that all eyesight issues stop you from using VR, I'm saying theirs do. This is not theoretical, they have tested it.

Did you miss that I said one of them is blind in one eye? What glasses fix this?

>What glasses fix this?

One with a strong prescription. If you are fully blind in one eye you can still use VR. You will just see monoscopic just as you do outside of VR.

No it doesn't work like that. I'm amblyopic. I only have like 10 or 20% visual capacity on my right eye. Using those devices suck even more than a 3D movie.

Even if you close an eye entirely VR still works. I don't understand what your point is. If your eye only has 10 to 20% clarity than VR headsets are already clear enough that your right eye can't see a difference in clarity between real life and VR.

Except the real world is experienced with more senses than the eyes. VR is currently still visual-only. In the real world, any visual defects are worked around by the brain using other sensory inputs. No such possibilities with visual-only VR.

Other sensory inputs such as hearing and touch which current headsets and controllers output using speakers and haptics.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com