The concept of optic flow, a global pattern of visual motion that is both caused by and signals self-motion, is canonically ascribed to James Gibson's 1950 book “The Perception of the Visual World.” There have, however, been several other developments of this concept, chiefly by Gwilym Grindley and Edward Calvert. Based on rarely referenced scientific literature and archival research, this article describes the development of the concept of optic flow by the aforementioned authors and several others. The article furthermore presents the available evidence for interactions between these authors, focusing on whether parts of Gibson's proposal were derived from the work of Grindley or Calvert. While Grindley's work may have made Gibson aware of the geometrical facts of optic flow, Gibson's work is not derivative of Grindley's. It is furthermore shown that Gibson only learned of Calvert's work in 1956, almost a decade after Gibson first published his proposal. In conclusion, the development of the concept of optic flow presents an intriguing example of convergent thought in the progress of science.

光流的概念是一种视觉运动的全局模式，既由自运动引起，又发出信号，被典型地归因于 James Gibson 1950 年的著作《视觉世界的感知》。然而，这个概念还有其他一些发展，主要是由 Gwilym Grindley 和 Edward Calvert 提出的。本文基于很少引用的科学文献和档案研究，描述了上述作者和其他几位作者对光流概念的发展。文章还提供了这些作者之间互动的现有证据，重点关注吉布森提案的部分内容是否源自格林德利或卡尔弗特的工作。虽然格林德利的工作可能让吉布森意识到了光流的几何事实，但吉布森的工作并不是格林德利的衍生物。进一步显示，吉布森直到 1956 年才了解到卡尔弗特的工作，距离吉布森首次发表他的提案差不多十年了。总之，光流概念的发展提供了科学进步中趋同思想的一个有趣的例子。