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People who have unusual, or non-existent, inner voices

theguardian.com

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Re: People who have unusual, or non-existent, inner voices

#61

Post by jeroenhd »

checkyoursudo wrote: post #24

A couple of years ago, I learned that other people see images in their minds. Now I learn that people hear voices in their minds in a way that is dramatically different to mine. When I am thinking, there is pure silence and blank-ness in my mind. I don't see anything in my blind mind's eye, and I don't hear anything in my deaf mind's ear. It seems that I can create a monologue in my mind, but I have to be consciously…

I'm the exact same way. No mind's eye, no constant internal monologue (or dialogue), mostly just calm and silence. I think I can sort of visualize voices and music, but clearly not as well as other seem to be able to.

I always thought people who hear entirely understandable voices were the mentally ill people you hear about in the news and in fiction, not for that to be the norm. I do wonder about the statistics on the "internal monologue". I think I saw some stats on aphantasia (not being able to picture things) but that didn't include the internal monologue.

All in all, while I think the capacity to actually visualize things would definitely be welcome, I think I'd go crazy with a constant internal monologue droning on in the background.

Re: People who have unusual, or non-existent, inner voices

#62

Post by ben_w »

malwrar wrote: post #14
xyzelement wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't read the article yet but since you're offering... how do you "think through" problems? Example, this was a dialogue I had in my head this morning: "Avenue X has a lot of stop signs which is annoying. But Avenue Y is narrow and it's garbage-pickup time, so I can get unlucky and really stuck behind a garbage truck. That's not worth the risk, I'd rather deal with the stop signs so I am taking avenue X" What is…

I think in terms of pictures or concepts. Your example becomes me picturing being stuck behind a dump truck, then me stopping at numerous stop signs, then I’d decide based on which one feels like it would be more painful. Do people actually think in terms of complete sentences like you describe in this passage, or is there some nuance to the experience I’m not understanding? Thinking for me feels more like watching t…

> Do people actually think in terms of complete sentences like you describe in this passage, or is there some nuance to the experience I’m not understanding?

I do full sentences when I’m thinking about how to handle a conversation.

> Thinking for me feels more like watching thoughts flow between black boxes representing some known factor than talking to a friend.

I also do that. It’s situational, I guess. [I’m learning more about myself by questions like yours, so please keep asking :)]

Re: People who have unusual, or non-existent, inner voices

#63

Post by TedDoesntTalk »

Aethylia wrote: post #6
bsid wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Question: What happens when you're reading? For me, my inner voice kind of repeats it, if that make sense. Can't wrap my head around what "understanding" would be without that lol.

This isn't directly related. It's likely a product of how you were taught to read. You can learn to read without it by trying to have the inner voice say something different like 'a, e, i, o, u' while reading. It takes practice but it increases your reading speed.

I just reread your post with my inner voice repeating “foo” over and over. Is that the kind of thing I should practice? I don’t understand.

Re: People who have unusual, or non-existent, inner voices

#65

Post by ars »

meowface wrote: post #39
kzrdude wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aphantasia: Is there a simple test or procedure we can use to make it easier to decide to what degree we have this or not? It just seems like a topic where expectations can differ a lot. Since it's hard to clearly explain what visualizing feels like and doesn't. Some people might even be very normal and yet disappointed and think they are missing something. I don't think my mind's eye is particularly strong for examp…

There are some spatial intelligence tests that essentially require mentally rotating and flipping 3D objects in your mind's eye. That could maybe be one way. Can't speak to the quality of this test, but here's one that might apply: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/tests/iq/visual-spatial-i...

According to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29087803 I have aphantasia, but I no trouble mentally rotating and flipping 3D objects - but I'm not rotating a image of the object, but more like concepts.

Re: People who have unusual, or non-existent, inner voices

#66

Post by fbanon »

checkyoursudo wrote: post #41
boc wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So wait, if you close your eyes and picture Mount Everest, you can't see Mount Everest in your head? For me it's easy to "fly" around my neighborhood just by closing my eyes and remembering what the streets and trees and houses look like as I take a lap. I can see off into the distance, I can see the sidewalk cracks, I can see people... all of them are obviously fuzzed versions of reality but nonetheless they're rela…

If I close my eyes, I can see nothing. If I keep my eyes open, I can sort of barely super-impose some ghostly relief of the thing I am supposedly imagining. My wife can see like full Technicolor motion pictures in her mind with special effects and superstar cameos. I am jealous. My mind is seriously black when I close my eyes. On the plus side for me, it is super easy for me to fall asleep whenever I want, because it…

>My wife can see like full Technicolor motion pictures in her mind with special effects and superstar cameos.

Nah, it's not like that. When we imagine something it's not like we actually see those things like real visual stimuli. The experience is more abstract than that. There is a vague visual aspect to it, but it's not hi-def like real vision, just fragments appearing then disappearing in your mind.

So it's not at all like dreaming.

* at least for me.

Re: People who have unusual, or non-existent, inner voices

#67

Post by nynx »

This is very interesting. I always thought I had an inner voice, but the experiences in this article are completely different than mine. It's just myself speaking to myself, there's never any preconception that it's someone else or a different voice. It's something that isn't present all the time—I can generally engage it when I want. Though, I notice when writing this that I'm dictating my writing non-vocally.

Re: People who have unusual, or non-existent, inner voices

#68

Post by TedDoesntTalk »

floatingatoll wrote: post #20
bsid wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Question: What happens when you're reading? For me, my inner voice kind of repeats it, if that make sense. Can't wrap my head around what "understanding" would be without that lol.

I glance at the paragraph, it glows briefly, I blink, I trace a spiral from the center counter clockwise, and if I still don’t have comprehension, I go back a couple paragraphs or try again the agonizing word by word way. Sometimes I read left to right to left depending on text width and such. I can usually keep math in the right order but I'm known to add left-to-right which involves the concept of 'one past nine' a…

> I trace a spiral from the center counter clockwise, and if I still don’t have comprehension, I go back a couple paragraphs or try again the agonizing word by word way

Wow. What?

Re: People who have unusual, or non-existent, inner voices

#69

Post by clairity »

josephg wrote: post #15

I started doing improv comedy classes a few years ago. It’s terrifying. My friends would share stories of what their inner critics were saying about their performances. “You were rubbish and everyone was knows it!”. It was weird for me - my mind doesn’t have a voice like that. “Hah maybe I don’t have an inner critic” I thought. But I still felt crippling shame after bad scenes in class. In quiet moments my mind is fu…

yes, note that nearly all of our thoughts are subvocal/subconscious. some folks have a more active and/or efficient surfacing mechanism than others though.

and a few folks have an overactive vocalization system where most of their subvocal thoughts actually come out of their mouths. i'm always partly fascinated by these folks (just walked past one today), since i tend to be relatively economical in my vocalized thoughts.

Re: People who have unusual, or non-existent, inner voices

#70

Post by GPerson »

helaoban wrote: post #48

Sometimes when I'm lost in thought a sound, a voice or a piece of music that I heard recently is almost completely reproduced in my brain, like I'm actually hearing it again. It's a subconscious act, I don't think I've ever been able to will that sensation consciously, but once it happens I can sustain it for almost a minute or two (especially music). I have a very "strong" internal monologue, talking to myself all d…

I used to have sleep paralysis a lot and during at least one episode I could hear, clear as day, a full orchestra playing in my head as if it was coming from somewhere in the house. And when I broke out of the sleep paralysis there was no sound at all.
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