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Revision as of 15:35, 21 March 2004 by Dpbsmith (talk | contribs) (Link to "Eye exercises..." sigh...)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)The Bates method is a controversial system of eye exercises that is intended to improve vision. It was first described in 1920 by William Horatio Bates in a book entitled Perfect Sight Without Glasses.
The Bates method emphasizes the practice of deliberate eye movements ("swinging"); cupping or palming the eyes with the hands; attempting to see or visualize perfect black; and exposing the eye to as much full daylight as possible.
Bates maintained that the eye focusses, not by the action of the ciliary muscles on the crystalline lens, but by varying elongation of the eyeball caused by the extraocular muscles. The eyes of some animals do, in fact, focus in this way, but the theory that human eyes do is rejected by mainstream biology and medicine.
The common procedure of eye dilation used during eye examinations provides evidence for the mainstream position. Dilation involves the use of eyedrops containing a drug which temporarily relaxes the ciliary muscles. The result is that the eye cannot accommodate at all. The eyes can still be moved to look in different directions, showing that the drug has not affected the external muscles of the eye. Therefore, if the Bates theory were correct, accommodation should still be possible. Bates supporters maintain that the method works regardless of the soundness of its theoretical underpinnings.
Martin Gardner, in Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science, characterized Bates' book as "a fantastic compendium of wildly exaggerated case records, unwarranted inferences and anatomical ignorance." He suggested that the Bates method may however work, to a limited degree, by increasing the trainee's ability to interpret and extract information from blurred images.
Detractors concede that most of the Bates exercises are harmless, apart from the possibility that faith in the Bates system could deter people with eye conditions requiring prompt care from seeking conventional treatment. (One of his original exercises, however, involved looking directly at the sun, which is very dangerous; a 1940 revision of his book modified by suggesting that the sun shine on closed eyes).
As of 2004, the growing interest in alternative medicine has led to an increase in the popularity of the Bates system and other methods of visual training through Eye exercises.