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Pointblank
MemberOvomorphJul-22-2012 7:08 PMI have always wanted to answer this question. HOW do the ALIEN creatures see?
A little about my background. I am by trade a computer scientist. BA in CS, I have read just about every science fiction book worth reading so I take this topic as with all my pursuits in understanding scientific mysteries very seriously.
First I agree that there have been some good attempts to answer this question through various posts; however, lets go a little bit deeper and see what we can understand from what the movies show and tell us.
We all know that the Xenomorphs have incredible vision. I want to completely discredit the Dark Horse novels for selling us short on there being a "jelly like eye material with sockets behind it".
You all deserve much better than that and I will deliver what it is you have always wanted to know.
We know that the Aliens can see in the vacuum of outer space. Also, have you ever wondered how the face huggers in the movies and books can see?
Since we can put these two facts together we must extrapolate that there is indeed something about the Adult Alien head and the Face huggers that answers this question.
Much like an insect that has a primitive compound eye the Xenomorphs have small groups of billions of cells that act like a compound eye and are much more complex at the molecular level. You cannot see these cells because they are camouflaged and help protect the cells that go deeper into the brain or vision cortex. The Xenomorphs have tens of thousands of eyes and you cant see them because it is a predator and it does want anything else to able to see what its eyes are looking at. At the molecular level different groups of cells ,in clusters, can be used to see optically better than 20/20 when muscles are contracted in the right way. The opposite is also true it can contract the cells and bend then to combining layers of light receptive cells to to see microscopic detail. The head in the front is round so it gives the Xenomorphs 360 degree stereoscopic sight if its entire surroundings. Nerves convey these many images to its brain where its expanded vision cortex is more densely entangle with neurons to process the greater enhanced visions. Remember this is a hunter, the ultimate killer. It uses sight as a weapon so its vision has to be as good a weapon as any other component of it's molecular biology. It has lots of eyes also so that in combat it can sustain damage to some of it's eyes and still have plenty left to see and eat you. I would like to Agree with Dark Horse and think that there is some type of "chemical" telepathy; but, this would be limited and only used in combat or to protect the hive so that as one alien saw something the rest could see it without making a noise or saying something like humans do. Chemical telepathy could be possible and be very complex almost like an evolved language. We have to consider that because these creatures are bio engineered they do not have or need bicameral vision that would go along with the development of hands and apposeable thumbs. We have the bicameral vision that we have because of millions of years of evolution. We first ate with our mouths then after a while we grew appendages to move and grasp things in new ways.
So there you have it. Remember its not always what you cant see that is important but what your imagination can create. This is my sole explanation for how the Xenomorphs see. I would hope you like it so much and agree with me that we all spread this as the canon and finally go to a place in science fiction where we truly have a creature worthy of our deepest most frightening nightmares. I am great fan of the movies and books so I thought it only right to give the Xenomorphs the credit they are do...Eye sockets! No they don't have primitive eye sockets.
I really want to go into more detail about how and why the Xenomorphs are engineered - if you would like just give me a reply and I will be more than happy to discuss them.
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Fan
MemberOvomorphJul-22-2012 7:44 PMHi!
Take a look down the list of threads, you will notice that there is a thread that poses this question.
ALL generalizations are WRONG!

Svanya
AdminPraetorianJul-22-2012 8:26 PMSomeone asked this question 2 threads before yours on the "Alien Discussions" board. Here-->[url=http://www.prometheus-movie.com/community/forums/topic/9294]how the alien sees[/url]
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