Aphantasia

I once [possibly more than once, I forget] gave an example of the differences in the
way we perceive things and how we cannot just assume that other people think like
we do.

The example was of a long-standing debate in philosophy between those who argued
that when people say that they are 'picturing something in their minds eye' they are
not really 'seeing' what they are imagining, but are instead just recalling facts about
the thing they are picturing, and those whom argued that people were in fact seeing
things in their mind just like you see things with your eyes.
The person from who I heard about this went on to say that what they found out was that
people lie along a spectrum with those at one end unable to produce mental images and
those at the other able to see things as clearly as if they were looking at them.
And that those debating this issue were at one end or the other and simply assumed that
the way they saw the world was the same as everyone else.


When I gave this example some people asked for more information on this topic out of
interest... However in the ebb and flow of forum life I never got around to it and forgot.

However I just came across this current BBC article that talks about this exact effect
[although not the philosophy part, just talking about the condition's] and thought that
those that asked last time might be interested.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-34039054

Originally posted by googlefudge
I once [possibly more than once, I forget] gave an example of the differences in the
way we perceive things and how we cannot just assume that other people think like
we do.

The example was of a long-standing debate in philosophy between those who argued
that when people say that they are 'picturing something in their minds eye' they are
not r ...[text shortened]... t
those that asked last time might be interested.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-34039054

Originally posted by googlefudge
I once [possibly more than once, I forget] gave an example of the differences in the
way we perceive things and how we cannot just assume that other people think like
we do.

The example was of a long-standing debate in philosophy between those who argued
that when people say that they are 'picturing something in their minds eye' they are
not r ...[text shortened]... t
those that asked last time might be interested.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-34039054

Originally posted by Ghost of a Duke
Saw that news report this morning. Very interesting. (Especially the chap who has never been able to create images in his head).

To digress slightly, and following on from what Sonhouse said about dreams; the holy grail of dreaming is to have awareness while having a dream, that you are in fact dreaming. (Very rarely happens). If you know you are ...[text shortened]... possible. (Only once in my life had such an 'awareness dream' and flew over fields and oceans).

Originally posted by wolfgang59
I have a lucid dream about once a week but the frequency is random.
Apparently there are various things you can do to train for lucid dreaming
including drugs (legal ones) and setting your alarm for silly o'clock.

Some people are more visually-oriented than others, whilst others are more audio-oriented or verbal-descriptive-oriented. Mozart could write down the notes of piece of music he had heard only once; good example of an audio-oriented mind. Other people can recall verbatim what someone said; such people were charged to deliver messages in ancient times. It is also not uncommon for Muslims to commit the entire Koran to memory.