Insect Misconceptions and Misinformation   Misconceptions/Misinformation #5: Insects see thousands of identical images through their compound eyes.   Examples containing misinformation: "Dragonfly" issue. date. pp is a science magazine for children. This issue included a drawing picturing twenty individual images of a cattail plant as seen by a dragonfly through its compound eye as it looked at one plant. A kalidoscope-like children's toy is sold in many nature and learning stores that, as you look through it, a single image is broken up into a collection of individual images. "The total picture is made up of many separate pictures. When a man observes 16 to 18 pictures a second, he does not see them as separate pictures, but as one flowing picture. Insects can separately distinguish about 200 pictures per second." From: Museon a popular-science museum in The Hage, Netherlands Explanation: Insects do not see thousands of images when they view something through their compound eyes. Instead, each facet or ommatidium, which is hexagonal in shape, sees part of an imge. Thus, they see a mosaic of whatever they are looking at. A good analogy is the stipple paintings or drawings made by artists such as Seurat, where the entire image is made of tiny colored dots. This may sound similar to the pixels that form images on the computer or television sceen; now that is an analogy with which your students are likely to be familiar!   Please view the following sources on correct information about the arthropod compound eye: B EYE Let's Find Out Encyclopdia Back to Misconceptions