What it’s like to be unable to visualize anything
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Re: What it’s like to be unable to visualize anything
#2I have a really excellent visual imagination. I can imagine myself walking or driving great distances, and I can imagine all the scenery, the trees, the colour of the sky. I can put things in the scene, take them out, rotate them. I don't have any sounds or smells.
I have trouble imagining what a person looks like. Especially hard is their face. I don't really have any idea what my mother's face looks like except that she has blonde hair. My dreams don't have people in them, not really. Sometimes there's the concept of a person, but I can't really see them.
Is there a name for this?
Edit: before this article, I didn't know it was possible to have a condition like this. I just assumed I was misinterpreting my imagination somehow.
My sister once related a dream to me that involved several people, some, famous people she hadn't even met. I couldn't recall one that really had anyone physically present. I remember a terrifying nightmare when I was very young that my father was in, but really it was just his trousers. I couldn't see any of him.
Re: What it’s like to be unable to visualize anything
#3I have a really excellent visual imagination. I can imagine myself walking or driving great distances, and I can imagine all the scenery, the trees, the colour of the sky. I can put things in the scene, take them out, rotate them. I don't have any sounds or smells. I have trouble imagining what a person looks like. Especially hard is their face. I don't really have any idea what my mother's face looks like except tha…
Not a medical practitioner here, but it might be worth looking into prosopagnosia, or face-blindness. It more generally includes trouble recognizing faces, but maybe also what you describe. It's sometimes hard to diagnose too, since there are many non-face signals that are useful in identifying people, e.g. gait, hair, voice, context, etc.
Re: What it’s like to be unable to visualize anything
#4I have a really excellent visual imagination. I can imagine myself walking or driving great distances, and I can imagine all the scenery, the trees, the colour of the sky. I can put things in the scene, take them out, rotate them. I don't have any sounds or smells. I have trouble imagining what a person looks like. Especially hard is their face. I don't really have any idea what my mother's face looks like except tha…
Perhaps related to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosopagnosia ?
Re: What it’s like to be unable to visualize anything
#5Original: https://www.facebook.com/notes/blake-ross/aphantasia-how-it-... HN discussion (176 comments with author comments): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11554894
Re: What it’s like to be unable to visualize anything
#6I have a really excellent visual imagination. I can imagine myself walking or driving great distances, and I can imagine all the scenery, the trees, the colour of the sky. I can put things in the scene, take them out, rotate them. I don't have any sounds or smells. I have trouble imagining what a person looks like. Especially hard is their face. I don't really have any idea what my mother's face looks like except tha…
Not a medical practitioner here, but it might be worth looking into prosopagnosia, or face-blindness. It more generally includes trouble recognizing faces, but maybe also what you describe. It's sometimes hard to diagnose too, since there are many non-face signals that are useful in identifying people, e.g. gait, hair, voice, context, etc.
I might look into this. People are always surprised by how long it takes for me to notice them in a crowd
Re: What it’s like to be unable to visualize anything
#7[deleted]
Re: What it’s like to be unable to visualize anything
#8I have a really excellent visual imagination. I can imagine myself walking or driving great distances, and I can imagine all the scenery, the trees, the colour of the sky. I can put things in the scene, take them out, rotate them. I don't have any sounds or smells. I have trouble imagining what a person looks like. Especially hard is their face. I don't really have any idea what my mother's face looks like except tha…
Not a medical practitioner here, but it might be worth looking into prosopagnosia, or face-blindness. It more generally includes trouble recognizing faces, but maybe also what you describe. It's sometimes hard to diagnose too, since there are many non-face signals that are useful in identifying people, e.g. gait, hair, voice, context, etc.
Face blindness is really quite frightening. I'm not sure if it includes not being able to imagine one's face as opposed to not recognizing them in person, but there's a documentary on face blindness somewhere that show people waking up everyday unable to recognize their children, husband, etc.
As much as it's frightening for the family members, I can't imagine how much more so it is for the victim.
Re: What it’s like to be unable to visualize anything
#9I think this confuses me more than clarifying anything. His descriptions make me think other people are better at this than I am. How do I know I'm "picturing" a beach when I say I am? I don't see sand and trees and water and lifeguards unless I specifically stop to think of them. When I think beach, I suppose I think sand. Then I'll say okay maybe there's some water, and maybe there's an umbrella, but I'm kind of "seeing" each item individually, if at all. Or, I see sand and water, then I think of an umbrella so I add that to the sand, and now I see sand and umbrella, until I remind myself to see sand, umbrella, and water. I'm not sure I visualize things the way he thinks I'm suposed to.
Re: What it’s like to be unable to visualize anything
#10In 1880 Francic Galton did a survey[0] to determine the extent to which different people were capable of mental imagery and he identified much the same phenomenon. Some responses to his questionnaire:
_"These questions presuppose assent to some sort of a proposition regarding the 'mind's eye' and the 'images' which it sees….. This points to some initial fallacy…… It is only by a figure of speech that I can describe my recollection of a scene as a 'mental image' which I can 'see' with my 'mind's eye'….. I do not see it… any more than a man sees the thousand lines of Sophocles which under due pressure he is ready to repeat. The memory possesses it, &c."_
Also related, apparently some people can make it all the way to college without knowing they have no sense of taste[1]:
_"...I was stopped dead by the question of what a peach smelled like. Good. That was all I could come up with. I tried to think of other things. Garbage smelled bad. Perfume smelled good. Popcorn good. Poop bad. But how so? What was the difference? What were the nuances? In just a few minutes' reflection I realized that, despite years of believing the contrary, I never had and never would smell a peach.
All my behavior to that point indicated that I had smell. No one suspected I didn't. For years I simply hadn't known what it was that was supposed to be there. I just thought the way it was for me was how it was for everyone. It took the right stimulus before I finally discovered the gap."
[0] http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Galton/imagery.htm
[1]https://www.quora.com/Is-going-for-a-Ph-D-worth-it-if-Im-extremely-passionate-about-a-field-but-dont-really-want-to-spend-my-20s-poor-toiling-away-in-a-lab-and-living-in-a-city-that-I-dont-particularly-want-to-live-in/answer/Mark-Eichenlaub?srid=slK&share=1