The thought that our eyes do not receive all information present in the outside world and process it exactly as it is is not a promising sign that we have a clear perception of reality. I'am pretty sure everyone's sense of reality is different or we wouldn't be arguing over it. But how different is it and is it gender or age related? And why does light excite and inhibit? What is the purpose of inhibiting?

Our eyes are not the only organs we use to obtain a picture of reality. We also use are nose, hands, mouth, etc. to obtain a more complete picture or reality. Many of us know from experience that the eyes often deceive us(magic tricks, mirrors, illusions) and can not be relied on to obtain information about reality. Once, I read about a woman, with some kind neurological problem or damage to her brain that mistook her husband for a hat. From what we have learned,that doesn't seem impossible.

Not impossible at all. And you've mentioned an additional important idea: that we constantly check what we think we see through one input pathway against the information along other input pathways. And we also check our own pictures against those of other people, so maybe, with all that checking, there is less difference in peoples' sense of reality than one might at first think? The purpose of "inhibiting"? It helps to maintain object constancy, i.e. to be sure that the signals in the brain resulting from something outside are pretty much the same even if the circumstances change. Understand how that can be from the lateral inhibition network example? PG