You know that look… when someone is staring into the distance, but not looking at anything in particular. Sometimes associated with deep thought — or a complete absence of thought! You wave your hands in front of their eyes: “anybody there?” — then they snap back to reality.
Why do humans do that? What’s happening to the eyes, exactly, that we recognize that “look” as such? Is there an actual term for it? What’s the relationship between the brain and the eyes in that context?
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Imagine you had two joysticks that point your eyes places. Normally, your brain manipulates them both at the same time to make your eyes focus on things. Your brain might point them both slightly toward the center to focus on something close to your face, or both be pointed generally to the right if you’re looking at something on that side of you without turning your head. Or point them both way inward because you’re crossing your eyes to make a silly face.
Staring off into space is your brain taking its “hands” off the “joysticks”. Your eyes aren’t pointed at anything in particular they’re just sitting there. The eyes aren’t normally that still – they’ll move reflexively to track moving objects that enter the field of view, or there are little jerky motions (“saccades”) as you examine things and your eyes move from point to point. The relative stillness of the “zoned out” look makes it recognizable.
Then you wave your hand in their face close enough to get their attention and the brain says, “Oh shit, I better grab those eyes and point them at things again.”
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