The science of eye-beams and the basilisk's stare

It may come as a surprise that the ancients devised scientific explanations of how seemingly magical creatures operated. Their magical powers had logical basis behind them, rather than being purely inexplicable. For example, the philosophers believed that the eyes saw by sending out beams that touched the environment and relayed its qualities back to the viewer.

This played in the deadly gaze of the basilisk. In medieval bestiaries the basilisk was highly venomous, not necessarily petrifying. The basilisk's stare was harmful because its eye-beams carried its characteristic venom, which would travel through the eyes to the brain and from there be circulated to the heart and the rest of the body. This is why mirrors were effective, as the basilisk would envenom itself when the eye-beams were reflected back at it.

The 3pp Lost Lore: Ecology of the Basilisk posits that the basilisk's eyes release a form of radiation, which is basically the same idea.

Oddly enough, these kinds of eye-beams did exist at one point in the D&D lore. According to the AD&D article "Infravision & Your Fantasy Hero," the 90' and 120' forms of infravision worked by sending out infrared beams.

This concept of eye-beams could be speculated as the basis of gaze attacks, like those of the catoblepas, gorgon, medusa, vampire, etc. Do all creatures have eye-beams of sorts, or only some, or only during certain instances? This seems like a fertile field of study.

Infravision links

• https://www.pvv.ntnu.no/~leirbakk/rpg/adnd/society/adnd_society_infravision.html
• https://web.archive.org/web/20161009085709/https://www.frontiernet.net/~jamesstarlight/Infravision.html
• http://www.seankreynolds.com/rpgfiles/rants/infravision.html