It is very likely you did not need glasses. But now that your eyes are used to them you probably need them. What was happening was your eyes adjusted to your way of life. If you would have reacted better to the signal your eyes were giving you, you would have started to focus more on things in the distance and then switch to things closer by, retraining your eyes. My eyes are not accommodating very well either, but one eye is in far mode and the other in near more, so I can see reasonably well at all distances. It is no surprise that for both eyes the optimal distance is the distance to a computer screen. A matter of adjustment. I need to go out more.
Your problem seems to be not with your eyes but with yielding to social pressure, even when that pressure is in the wrong direction. It is almost impossible to resist social pressure except by removing yourself from bad company. Since you’re a student you probably spend a lot of time in an extremely bad social environment, academia. It has a medieval guild like hierarchical structure, where only those who have a title have the option of lowering or rising someone else’s status. But the titles themselves mostly don’t reflect the owner’s capacities. They are the result of a process of elimination and backstabbing that leaves only the most narrow minded and socially inadequate, so that those then grab the positions of power. It is a shame this culture keeps on deranging our youth, makes it a prerequisite to do almost anything. I have a friend who thinks he has Asperger’s syndrome, but in reality he is one of the very few I know of in academia who has a normally functioning social awareness. The bad environment has made him doubt his own mental disposition, though. This is how bad it gets.
If you’d follow my advice, remove yourself from unhealthy environments, environments that restrict your creativity by limiting your options to those that serve the status quo, however corrupt it is, you will suffer in other ways. Society has a way to exclude people and humiliate them by forcing them into useless activity, if people don’t agree with the prevailing mentality. But what are the victories of the rulers and status seekers worth if they handicap the competition this way?
Whether you will continue to self-deceive in order to fit in and acquire status, or whether you will give that all up and try to attain clarity and vision, it is your choice. Both paths can be very hard.
By my understanding glasses are the most scientifically well-founded of any medical science, and appear to improve vision (see: Rand study.) Can you provide contrary evidence?
Could you specify what do you mean by cultural proliferation in this case? In the spirit of mosasaur’s comment I interpret it such that there are people in academia who don’t need corrective glasses (meaning that the cost of wearing them is greater than possible benefit) but choose to wear them because it is fashionable in their social circles. That would surprise me; I have heard quite a few stories of people refusing to wear glasses in spite of their bad vision, but not the other way round.
It is very likely you did not need glasses. But now that your eyes are used to them you probably need them. What was happening was your eyes adjusted to your way of life. If you would have reacted better to the signal your eyes were giving you, you would have started to focus more on things in the distance and then switch to things closer by, retraining your eyes. My eyes are not accommodating very well either, but one eye is in far mode and the other in near more, so I can see reasonably well at all distances. It is no surprise that for both eyes the optimal distance is the distance to a computer screen. A matter of adjustment. I need to go out more.
Your problem seems to be not with your eyes but with yielding to social pressure, even when that pressure is in the wrong direction. It is almost impossible to resist social pressure except by removing yourself from bad company. Since you’re a student you probably spend a lot of time in an extremely bad social environment, academia. It has a medieval guild like hierarchical structure, where only those who have a title have the option of lowering or rising someone else’s status. But the titles themselves mostly don’t reflect the owner’s capacities. They are the result of a process of elimination and backstabbing that leaves only the most narrow minded and socially inadequate, so that those then grab the positions of power. It is a shame this culture keeps on deranging our youth, makes it a prerequisite to do almost anything. I have a friend who thinks he has Asperger’s syndrome, but in reality he is one of the very few I know of in academia who has a normally functioning social awareness. The bad environment has made him doubt his own mental disposition, though. This is how bad it gets.
If you’d follow my advice, remove yourself from unhealthy environments, environments that restrict your creativity by limiting your options to those that serve the status quo, however corrupt it is, you will suffer in other ways. Society has a way to exclude people and humiliate them by forcing them into useless activity, if people don’t agree with the prevailing mentality. But what are the victories of the rulers and status seekers worth if they handicap the competition this way?
Whether you will continue to self-deceive in order to fit in and acquire status, or whether you will give that all up and try to attain clarity and vision, it is your choice. Both paths can be very hard.
Wow, I didn’t know that glasses denialism existed! That’s weirdly wonderful. Do you have any links for other people who share these, er, ideas?
Edit: found this one.
By my understanding glasses are the most scientifically well-founded of any medical science, and appear to improve vision (see: Rand study.) Can you provide contrary evidence?
And there really aren’t other options.
According to RAND they’re the only bit of healthcare worth public subsidy.
There is a social pressure to wear glasses?
Expert recommendation is social pressure, so is cultural proliferation. In this case both are warranted social pressure.
Could you specify what do you mean by cultural proliferation in this case? In the spirit of mosasaur’s comment I interpret it such that there are people in academia who don’t need corrective glasses (meaning that the cost of wearing them is greater than possible benefit) but choose to wear them because it is fashionable in their social circles. That would surprise me; I have heard quite a few stories of people refusing to wear glasses in spite of their bad vision, but not the other way round.
Don’t do that, he’s a fruitloop. Interpret it literally and with particular attention to the second sentence. :)
The doctor didn’t recommend glasses to me.