As one might expect, when people have their vision restored while still young children, they do OK. The older they are, the worse they do. For adults, it's basically nothing except the crudest things like brightness and vague large objects.
> I am somewhat skeptical if only because of an analogy with cochlear implants - deaf people can start hearing once the signal starts!
I don't think this is right. Again, kids can do ok, and the younger they are, the better. But my impression is that adults who get cochlear implants having been deaf since birth are not able to interpret almost anything. Like, they can sense there are louder or quieter noises, but they can't understand speech, match up sounds to objects, get directionality, or anything like that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recovery_from_blindness
https://www.newyorker.com/tech/annals-of-technology/people-c...
As one might expect, when people have their vision restored while still young children, they do OK. The older they are, the worse they do. For adults, it's basically nothing except the crudest things like brightness and vague large objects.
> I am somewhat skeptical if only because of an analogy with cochlear implants - deaf people can start hearing once the signal starts!
I don't think this is right. Again, kids can do ok, and the younger they are, the better. But my impression is that adults who get cochlear implants having been deaf since birth are not able to interpret almost anything. Like, they can sense there are louder or quieter noises, but they can't understand speech, match up sounds to objects, get directionality, or anything like that.
Let me know if you have cites to the contrary.