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My Brain Doesn’t Picture Things

nautil.us

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Re: My Brain Doesn’t Picture Things

#41

Post by loa_in_ »

rogerclark wrote: post #26

"In my head, the way it happens is..." Okay, sure, man. Whatever you say. Decades of research have proven that people cannot be trusted to describe how their own minds work. We are unreliable narrators of our own experience even in the best conditions, and having a zeitgeisty, quirky trait like aphantasia to wear as a badge will obviously skew the results even further. Personally, I don't believe for a second that th…

If you stop listening to arguably the best autonomous systems around describe how they work you lose hope to find out how they're working. Provable and true are two separate things.

Re: My Brain Doesn’t Picture Things

#42

Post by k9unit »

japostoles wrote: post #3

I'm struggling to figure out if my mind's eye "sees" anything, or if I'm just imagining the concept of the item I'm thinking about. If I'm comparing this vision to having a dream, say, it's certainly not visual. "...there is a simple and helpful test that can give you a clue into whether you may have it: Close your eyes and try to imagine an apple, seeing it mentally in your mind's eye. If you can see anything (anyth…

When I visualize something, most often I cannot literally see it, but it's as if my brain is processing the information like Im looking at it. It also applies to feel and touch. If I try to see a dice I can "see" it, zoom in, and even feel the indent for each black dot. But I don't literally see a dice.

When it comes to doing math, it is a similar story. When working with matrices I can see the array and transformations in my mind, and when working with 3d trig and calc I can visualize each vector and how they interact with the world.

I can visualize two colored planes perpendicular to each other, but I can't render it.

I think when I take cannabis edibles, it improves these abilities slightly but noticably. I don't usually take big doses of THC, but a lower dose of THC with a higher dose of CBD.

Re: My Brain Doesn’t Picture Things

#43

Post by lll-o-lll »

jddj wrote: post #5
japostoles wrote: post #3

I'm struggling to figure out if my mind's eye "sees" anything, or if I'm just imagining the concept of the item I'm thinking about. If I'm comparing this vision to having a dream, say, it's certainly not visual. "...there is a simple and helpful test that can give you a clue into whether you may have it: Close your eyes and try to imagine an apple, seeing it mentally in your mind's eye. If you can see anything (anyth…

I think I'm with you, but I'm not sure if you're putting too much emphasis on visual. It certainly doesn't seem to come from the same place as regular vision does, but they do say "mind's eye". I can imagine an apple, and even slice it up, spin it around, pour water on it. It has a colour, and can have any colour. I always wondered how memories seemed (TFA touches on this but not in detail) to people who claimed to b…

> I always wondered how memories seemed (TFA touches on this but not in detail) to people who claimed to be minds-eye-blind. Can you not put yourself back on that beach when you were in your mid twenties? Can you not remember his/her eyes/hair/smile/etc at all? Isn't it kind of an image?

The short answer is no. No to all of that.

The longer answer is that the condition tends to be correlated with severely deficient autobiographical memory (SDAM). So, yeah, can’t remember things like I was there, or with any emotion attached. Which is sad I guess, but comes with the upside that I can’t remember bad things that happened in that way either.

Also can’t really imagine the future in a daydream kind of way, which I suspect is a downside for goal motivation.

Re: My Brain Doesn’t Picture Things

#44

Post by InSteady »

LiquidPhD wrote: post #4
japostoles wrote: post #3

I'm struggling to figure out if my mind's eye "sees" anything, or if I'm just imagining the concept of the item I'm thinking about. If I'm comparing this vision to having a dream, say, it's certainly not visual. "...there is a simple and helpful test that can give you a clue into whether you may have it: Close your eyes and try to imagine an apple, seeing it mentally in your mind's eye. If you can see anything (anyth…

I've talked extensively to friends about this because I see nothing. I can picture nothing. It's just a void. Interestingly, it hasn't always been this way for me. I remember when I was in elementary and middle school, I could take exams and see the page the answer was on in the textbook in my mind. I'm not sure when or how I lost it, but it's gone. I do sometimes dream in video, though. For me, most of what happens…

The Feynman anecdote was pretty cool. Feynman counted 'verbally' in his mind, so he was able to keep a steady and consistent count while reading and writing, but not while speaking or listening. His friend kept count by visualizing the numbers in sequence (like a clock, kind of) so he could keep steady and accurate count while holding conversations but not at all while reading.

Re: My Brain Doesn’t Picture Things

#45

Post by Nevermark »

circuit10 wrote: post #36
throw1234651234 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an absolutely correct question to ask. It's also a good question to ask people who claim they can visualize things well, but can't draw. I think people vastly, vastly overstate how well they can actually visualize something in their mind. Most people can't visualize a circle of a solid color and change the color in their mind, let alone visualize a face or anything significant.

I can definitely visualise those things in a way that sort of feels like seeing it but when I do that my brain really works with abstract concepts where if you focus on something in particular you make up the finer detail on the fly

Yes, I can visualize almost anything, but there is a huge fovea aspect where my focus has to zoom around to check/see all the details.

But if the details are unconstrained conceptually, or not tied to a remembered object, then details won’t be consistent as I move around.

The memory palace thing works for me too, if I am not constantly moving things around.

Re: My Brain Doesn’t Picture Things

#46

Post by ManuelKiessling »

PortiaBerries wrote: post #28
ManuelKiessling wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m currently not sure if I have aphantasia or not. I don’t remember the number of windows in my house, and I’m currently not in or near my house, but no problem — I simply wander through my house in my mind, and count the windows: 9. So I cannot have aphantasia, right? How can I “visually” count the windows in my house without the capability to “see” in my mind? But all those tests? I never really “see” that darn ap…

Wow, you don't have very many windows.

Yeah, I’m more of a macOS and Linux guy these days.

Re: My Brain Doesn’t Picture Things

#47

Post by Nevermark »

circuit10 wrote: post #37
htss2013 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think I see detailed renderings, eg, of a person's face. But if I try to focus on the face and really examine its details I can't. It's like that experience of trying to read a book in a dream but when you go to read the lines, they're blurry. I suspect when we see what appear to be detailed renderings in our imagination, we are really seeing a compressed "essence" of the thing and our brains trick us into thinking…

Or you make up the details on the fly as you focus in

Or fill in from memory, up to the detail you do remember.

Which may be a variable skill too? It’s clear all our minds are tuned differently.

A basic understanding of our individual wirings, uncovered by tests of these internal capabilities, would be enlightening to ourselves and for communicating with each other.

Re: My Brain Doesn’t Picture Things

#48

Post by InSteady »

bassrattle wrote: post #6
japostoles wrote: post #3

I'm struggling to figure out if my mind's eye "sees" anything, or if I'm just imagining the concept of the item I'm thinking about. If I'm comparing this vision to having a dream, say, it's certainly not visual. "...there is a simple and helpful test that can give you a clue into whether you may have it: Close your eyes and try to imagine an apple, seeing it mentally in your mind's eye. If you can see anything (anyth…

Yes, I see it in the mind but not with my eyes. In a way, all vision is in the mind, but the origin of the image is like a different channel of information. I'm aware of the blackness behind my closed eyelids, but it's easy to let that go, switch focus to a different channel of information. There is a perfect image of an apple in a white space.

Yeah, I think there are two distinct types of visual spaces in the mind. When I'm tired, meditating long (rare), or otherwise in an unusual state I can sometimes access the one that feels much more eyeball derived. Very rarely I have been able to access it just by trying in a quiet place with the right kind of mindset.

This kind of visual feels like it is coming from my eyes, as opposed to the more common and controllable (but less compelling) kind of visualization. This 'channel' is in the grainy blackness space of closed eyes, in front of the face, like where you see color blotches when you press on your eyes or look from very bright conditions to darkness with eyes closed. Except that it can become no longer very dark at all and even sometimes have rich, vivid colors when I get a good session going.

I can't lucid dream btw, and this state is exclusively around the boundary between sleep and wake, and it's distinct from a dream IMO because every dream I have ever remembered I am a subject experiencing the dream, whereas this is pure visual like watching a scene TV (except I can sometimes decide what happens, though it's much easier to morph what comes on automatically than shift to an entirely new scene without breaking the spell).

But usually I just visualize things in the channel well behind my eyeballs, in brain-space. I can do this second kind with eyes open (though with better clarity with eyes closed). The first kind is only eyes closed. For me the background can be dark, white, or complex scenes(abstract or real-world). I have very fine control over detail in the objects if I want, but they feel much less real especially in the sense that they disappear the instant I stop focusing entirely on them, unlike the first channel which persists since I am in some sense in an unfocussed state already.

Re: My Brain Doesn’t Picture Things

#49

Post by d-lisp »

ManuelKiessling wrote: post #25
d-lisp wrote: post #18

When I decide to see things in my mind, if I don't focus enough to keep them still they never cease to become something else than they represent. If I imagine a luxurious green field with an apple tree, immediately if I don't control the scene mentally to conserve it, some apple will fall producing a noise, some mad cow will run into the fov, trying to hit the apple with its horn, yelling and distracting me or whatev…

I’m currently not sure if I have aphantasia or not. I don’t remember the number of windows in my house, and I’m currently not in or near my house, but no problem — I simply wander through my house in my mind, and count the windows: 9. So I cannot have aphantasia, right? How can I “visually” count the windows in my house without the capability to “see” in my mind? But all those tests? I never really “see” that darn ap…

For the software part it's weird because most of the time ideas happens instantaneously.

I think solutions appears once I understand something about the problem. Solutions are then explored by my own mental compiler or interpreter, I can run them mentally and see where it fails or not. Problems are mostly a language problem, if I can describe the problem then it's not a problem anymore but almost the recipe to bake a solution. Complex problems appears when the sentence to describe them becomes too long (That's what it feels to me).

Having a focus problem doesn't make you unable to solve complex problems, but rather forces you to break down complex problems into blocks, or to use abstractions to describe solved parts of a complex problems, or something else of that type (again, that's what it feels to me).

Having a focus problem is like having too few RAM.

If I count the numbers of windows in my house, I can do it mentally, by flying through my house, but I can also fill my house mentally with water and swim around to count them (and I would almost feel the cold water on my face and body and hear what you usually hear when you are underwater and etc...). I can also go outside and count the windows of my neighbors, and take a walk in some place I saw one time in my life. I can visit Roma if I want and all of that stuff.

It's like I can trick my brain into thinking I am really in the situation I am thinking about.

It's different from reality, but I don't know how to explain why and how it is different.

Re: My Brain Doesn’t Picture Things

#50

Post by InSteady »

throw1234651234 wrote: post #21
weinzierl wrote: post #19

"I have what is called “aphantasia,” the absence of voluntary imagination of the senses. I know what a top hat is. I can describe its main characteristics. I can even draw an above-average impression of one on a piece of paper for you. But I can’t visualize it mentally. What’s wrong with me?" How can you draw a thing without visualizing it? Do the coordinates of the vertices appear in your head or instructions about…

This is an absolutely correct question to ask. It's also a good question to ask people who claim they can visualize things well, but can't draw. I think people vastly, vastly overstate how well they can actually visualize something in their mind. Most people can't visualize a circle of a solid color and change the color in their mind, let alone visualize a face or anything significant.

I can draw sort of ok, but only because I've practiced a bit. I can visualize quite well, I assume because of some innate ability + I practiced extensively as a child for fun.

It is definitely a skill that requires focused training, at least in my experience, so it makes some sense that the average person wouldn't spend too much time going out of their way to practice. If I get out of the habit for whatever reason, I'll slowly lose proficiency at quickly and easily picturing objects in near life-like detail, manipulating them skillfully, rendering complex scenes, holding images with eyes open or under distraction / activity, etc.

Objects will start off grainy/foggy by default and only clarify if I really can focus. Scenes and large complex objects will be much harder to hold together as a whole with distinct parts/areas. Changing an object results in more fog or losing the image temporarily. That kind of thing.

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