Well, of course, they kind of can. There are drugs that make the world look like it's squashed, such as ketamine. The way that we perceive reality really is totally dependent on the properties of the observer. Of course we all, with our sober minds, assert that we are perceiving the ruler the "right way", but all this means it that we perceive the ruler in a way that most humans agree with. Jumping from that to "this is the way that the ruler looks for all possible subjects" is a leap of faith.