Perceiving the truly alien

How much of what we see is actually based on "icons"?

"Chair", "person", "machine", "mammal", that sort of thing. I would argue a lot of our perception of the world is tokenized in this way. So what happens when you move into a world where literally everything is new, far outside our token-library?

Here's a fascinating account of one of the first deep-sea bathysphere dives, and how the view out its porthole affected the observer.