Hello Earl, that is an easy answer.

Do you "see" the mesh?
Or?
Do you "see" the texture?

It is textures we see, and it is textures we render.

The mesh is only a rough wirecoat to hang the texture on.

And with bump, normal, and displacement map, even the mesh does not "have" to be very detailed.

The trick of the trade is to find the golden middle road between mesh and texture.

But in the end? Texture is what we see and render.

Best example are all the remappings DP did between V3 and V4 so that one mesh could take the textures of the other mesh. The textures stayed, but the meshes where different.(V3-V4)

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Edit : Textures can be "textures" or procedurals from the material room.
Of my 14 outfits here, "none" have "textures" but all have material room procedurals.

Poser 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, P8 and PPro2010, P9 and PP2012, P10 and PP2014 Game Dev
"Do not drive faster then your angel can fly"!