Ideal Observers and Ideal Actors

Robert Jacobs
University of Rochester

This talk will overview Ideal Observers and Ideal Actors, Bayesian models of optimal performance in perception and action tasks, respectively. Emphasis will be placed on the importance of comparing optimal performance with human performance for the purposes of discovering the strengths and weaknesses of human information processing. Three models will be discussed: (i) an Ideal Observer for visual motion perception (due to Weiss, Simoncelli, and Adelson, 2002); (ii) an Ideal Observer for visual contour integration (due to Geisler, Perry, Super, and Gallogly, 2001); and (iii) an Ideal Actor for adaptive control (due to Chhabra and Jacobs, 2006).


Presentation (PDF File)

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