So why not teach pilots to look at the ground just ahead of the aeroplane from day one instead of all this exotic theory which won't work if you can't see the horizon or far end of the runway.
In order to do that well, with consistent results, most people need a degree of experience to draw from. Teaching a student to look at the end of the runway and judge the touchdown using peripheral vision is like teaching them to swim in the shallow end of the pool - it's less likely to go wrong, and allows them to build confidence. By all means, once they've got the gist they should make up there own mind, but this is really the accepted practice for teaching someone to land an aeroplane (or hover a helicopter). Someone didn't just pluck this idea out of thin air - it's an application of what we know about visual perception, and it works!