Seeing through mirage is kind of a tricky topic.
I have some empirical experience with that since I find the subject interesting and I have been looking into it, but I have comparatively little fundamental knowledge on the subject.
When @covertnoob and I were looking at a bunch of 56 mm scopes for this test a while back, one thing that jumped out to both of us was that at 100 yards the differences between the better scopes were minor, but beyond 600, TT edged ahead of everyone else.
One thing that definitely makes a difference is depth of field. That is a simple experiment: set up and optic and look at a target on a hot day. Then put in an aperture reducer which increases depth of field. You will see through the mirage better if the aperture reducer is in place.
Other differences that seem to be apparent likely pertain to how we perceive images. Optics that offer a lot of subtle tonal detail (TT, Leica, etc) do well with mirage. I suspect that it just makes it easier for our eyes to process the image. Mirage washes out a lot of the color and our brain needs those details to comprehend what the eye is looking at.
At closer distances, I think ZCO outresolved TT slightly, but at longer distances, TT's color rendering and microcontrast gave it an edge.
ILya
