Which mechanism caused image distortion in early designs of Alhazen's camera obscura used for astronomical observations?

💡 Explanation

When light passed through Alhazen’s pinhole camera, spherical aberration occurred because larger pinholes allowed more parallel light rays from an object point to pass compared to smaller pinholes, degrading shape fidelity in extended astronomical images. Therefore, spherical aberration is the primary issue, rather than chromatic aberration, diffusion, or polarization, each resulting from related but distinct optical phenomena.

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