Van Osten never fully accepted the commission’s conclusion on Hans’ abilities. It didn’t match his perception of animal intelligence. He wasn’t able to see the true revelation: he didn’t have a mathematical horse, he had a mind-reading horse.
We must be careful to not do the same with visualization. Sure our visual processing can speed up our capacity to take in numbers, but don’t lose sight of the other, possibly more powerful, virtue in visuals: how they engage our emotions, in ways we may not even be aware, to affect wonder, empathy, and even change in our actions.
