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People who can't picture anything are rewriting the science of imagination

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Re: People who can't picture anything are rewriting the science of imagination

#51

Post by boothby »

misthop wrote: post #3

Aphantasiac here, happy to discuss or answer any questions

I'm fairly but not perfectly aphantaiac (I dream without images; I can see briefest flashes of people's faces if I've known them for years). The discussion is often flattened to "can't picture anything" but I also have some cool inner-mind tricks: namely, I have rich access to my inner senses of touch and hearing. To a lesser extent, I can imagine flavors well -- well enough that it helps me in the kitchen at the least. What about your other senses?

Re: People who can't picture anything are rewriting the science of imagination

#52

Post by _ink_ »

chiefgeek wrote: post #17

I’ve worked as a professional photographer for twenty years and I visualize absolutely zero with my eyes closed. It’s only recently that I learned of aphantasia. Even on most psychedelic journeys I don’t have closed eye visuals, NN-DMT being the consistent exception. Everything is more of just a “knowingness”.

Have you worked mostly as documentary photographer, or did you also do stages setups, like portraying people? I am only a photo enthusiast without any mental images and I struggle with portraits. Since I know about aphantasia I am wondering whether it has something to do with the absence of mental images.

Re: People who can't picture anything are rewriting the science of imagination

#53

Post by misthop »

badgersnake wrote: post #34
misthop wrote: post #3

Aphantasiac here, happy to discuss or answer any questions

I’m pretty sure I have this. How did you find out?

When I learned through my sport career that visualize the race actually meant visualize and not just talk it through with your inner monologue. It was deeply reinforced when my wife first told me she sees an entire movie when she reads books.

Re: People who can't picture anything are rewriting the science of imagination

#54

Post by IshKebab »

suddenlybananas wrote: post #4

I still think this is fundamentally about how difficult it is to describe qualia.

Yeah I agree - how would you ever know if this is real or if it's just some people saying "sure of course I can visually imagine things, just like dreams" and other people saying "omg I can't visually imagine things at all, it's just like dreams".

I guess you can maybe do better than nothing but it doesn't sound like they have got very far. Also...

> Why This Matters

Come on guys at least try.

Re: People who can't picture anything are rewriting the science of imagination

#55

Post by passive »

I've got a moderate form of Aphantasia, where there are images in my head, but I'm unable to fix them in place and extract information from them. So I might think you have green eyes, but if you tell me they are brown, I wouldn't be able to refute you from my own memory.

Practically, it means I'm rubbish at remembering people. I've developed some techniques that help, but if someone changes their look significantly, it's very hard for me to identify that it's the same person.

I'm still learning how this has impacted by life, and strategies for working with it. As a simple example, my wife's family was really into cars, so when I got to know them I learned all about cars. When I met my wife, I couldn't identify a single vehicle on the road, except maybe a Hummer, but after 2 years, I could quickly pick out the make and model of 95% of traffic.

Looking back, I can see this is because rather than remember what different cars looked like, I created a taxonomy of ALL cars in my head, and became able to sort any vehicle I saw to fit there somewhere. So when I identified something, I wasn't matching it against previously seen things, but rather eliminating all the things it couldn't be to arrive at the remaining possibility.

Re: People who can't picture anything are rewriting the science of imagination

#56

Post by Akronymus »

Swizec wrote: post #31

For anyone who doesn’t believe this is real, I recommend reading Thinking In Pictures. It’s a great book. Explains 3 types of thinking that people use in their day-to-day: Linear verbal, schematic conceptual, and photo realistic. It’s all a spectrum so you likely use all 3 to an extent. Most people think linearly and sort of describe things in their mind that they’re trying to imagine. It’s a picture but not really.…

> Engineering types most commonly are strong in conceptual thinking. You can imagine complex systems and how they connect but it’s hard to describe and linearize this into words. You have to translate. Again it’s sort of an imagined picture but not really.

I guess I have that ability, in that I can relatively easily figure out spatial relations or can map out code mentally. The photorealism I am a 0 on.

Is linear thinking just a stream of conciousness thing where you basically list attributes? If so then I guess I have that too.

But id still describe myself as an aphant.

Re: People who can't picture anything are rewriting the science of imagination

#57

Post by dataviz1000 »

A couple weeks ago, Neil deGrasse Tyson had neuroscientist David Eagleman as his guest on Star Talk. David discussed his friend and co-founder of Pixar, Ed Catmull, has aphantasia and that Catmull tested the directors and animators at Pixar, discovering that many of its top artists are also aphantasic! [0]

They have a theory that artists who have to struggle more during the training and developing of being able to express on medium develop into better artists.

[0] https://youtu.be/2wiqPPICQP0?si=CK_4M8dghGl-oaX_&t=2104

Re: People who can't picture anything are rewriting the science of imagination

#58

Post by misthop »

boothby wrote: post #51
misthop wrote: post #3

Aphantasiac here, happy to discuss or answer any questions

I'm fairly but not perfectly aphantaiac (I dream without images; I can see briefest flashes of people's faces if I've known them for years). The discussion is often flattened to "can't picture anything" but I also have some cool inner-mind tricks: namely, I have rich access to my inner senses of touch and hearing. To a lesser extent, I can imagine flavors well -- well enough that it helps me in the kitchen at the lea…

I have an inner monologue, that is the extent of my inner senses.

Re: People who can't picture anything are rewriting the science of imagination

#59

Post by _ink_ »

pohl wrote: post #48
chiefgeek wrote: post #17

I’ve worked as a professional photographer for twenty years and I visualize absolutely zero with my eyes closed. It’s only recently that I learned of aphantasia. Even on most psychedelic journeys I don’t have closed eye visuals, NN-DMT being the consistent exception. Everything is more of just a “knowingness”.

What’s it like to dream while you’re sleeping? Do you ever “see” anything then?

Not GP, but also fully aphant: yes, I have visual dreams. I is very hard for me, to tell whether I also hear things in my dreams, but I think yes. For other senses, I am quite sure that I don't experience them while dreaming.

Re: People who can't picture anything are rewriting the science of imagination

#60

Post by nhinck3 »

pohl wrote: post #48
chiefgeek wrote: post #17

I’ve worked as a professional photographer for twenty years and I visualize absolutely zero with my eyes closed. It’s only recently that I learned of aphantasia. Even on most psychedelic journeys I don’t have closed eye visuals, NN-DMT being the consistent exception. Everything is more of just a “knowingness”.

What’s it like to dream while you’re sleeping? Do you ever “see” anything then?

I sometimes experience dreams when I go back to sleep repeatedly, but in all normal circumstances it is nothing
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