This, as a passing interest in HN and other sources started recently, I think, by a former big shot at Pixar who wrote (or was written about) having a blind mind's eye. Personally this article turned my world slightly upside down since I can't visualise. Instead I conceptualise ideas in total "darkness", without any visual imagery of any kind. I never thought twice about it and assumed everyone use the term "visualise" to describe what I'm experiencing. Because of the story posted, I learned after 43 years of existence in this body, that many people use the term visualise because they "visualise" imagery. I kinda felt cheated out of a really cool trait I suddenly never possessed (although it does now explain a lot of things I think might be related).
Imagine a man is walking down the street of a town. He finds the shop he was meaning to buy something in and enters it.<p>Now, were you imagining this scene from a particular viewpoint? Did the man turn to the left or to the right? Was he wearing any particular clothes? Were they any particular color? Was the front of the store of any particular material? And could you still see the man in the store even though he might be, from your mind's eye's point of view, be behind a wall?
Either it's Baader-Meinhof effect at work or this came from [1][2].<p>I can't imagine what it's like to not be able to picture things but now I wonder if I'm really picturing things at all or if I'm just imagining them.<p>[1] <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/tifu/comments/c4i94n/tifu_by_explaining_my_synesthesia_to_my_boyfriend/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/tifu/comments/c4i94n/tifu_by_explai...</a><p>[2] <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/tifu/comments/c4lzwm/tifu_by_reading_a_reddit_post_and_learning_that_i/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/tifu/comments/c4lzwm/tifu_by_readin...</a>
Something I don't see people mention much is a sense of dynamic resolution to mental imagery. I took the quiz posted here and it felt completely meaningless to me. If you want me to visualize a scene, there aren't really details until I give it details. If I'm told to imagine a wooden door with no other instructions it's like I'm seeing the door in a passing glance or out of the corner of my eye. If you ask me if it's "clear and vivid", I can make it that way to any arbitrary degree needed. Looking closer and seeing that the wood is old and somewhat warped, feel the cracks in the wood, look closer and see the brass on the handle has discolored slightly from use, etc etc. But it feels pointless to do. Certainly it's at least as detailed as a real life image, if I think about it, but it's definitely not like, crowding out my actual vision with it's sheer lucidity, which some of the answers seem to suggest.
Maybe someone has better resources, but I found it interesting that the paper linked within about the particular patient MX, says, ...mental imagery is ubiquitous..., but I can't find an example of what people consider mental imagery.<p>Is what I consider mental imagery the same as someone else? I dunno.<p>FWIW, for me, mental imagery seems to take the form of a very brief flash when I'm thinking of a simple object, like a rock, for example. But I assume it extends into less concrete things like when I'm daydreaming, where there is no distinct clear image, it's more of an inner monologue of themes/intent with a few flashes of imagery here and there.
I have this (unable to have any kind of mental imagery at all, and discovered that it was not normal via the Facebook article by Blake Ross years ago) and unscientifically correlate this condition as part of my lack of ability to remember certain things and recall events with storytelling ability.<p>I also sometimes have problems remembering names and eventually forget faces as well if I'm out of contact with someone for a long time.<p>Anyone else with aphantasia relate to this, or are my issues unrelated?<p>My wife, who describes herself as having very vivid mental imagery and says she has involuntary photographic memory at times (as in she does not know what triggers a memory to be completely photographic), has superb memory, and I personally believe it's what enables her to quickly learn so many languages.<p>So as a result (I know, based on sample size one), I'm led to personally believe that my memory-related issues may have some correspondence to aphantasia.
The linked Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire (VVIQ) wikipage only provides a hard-to-read Youtube video or software download as sources. Here's a link to the 16-question quiz from aphantasia.com (JS required): <a href="https://aphantasia.com/quiz/" rel="nofollow">https://aphantasia.com/quiz/</a><p>I'll add a YMMV, as aphantasia.com adds the following caveats: "...it can be hard to classify the vividness of a mental image on a scale from 1-5 when you have nothing to use as a reference point. It is difficult to rank your vividness of mental imagery when you can’t know how strongly other people visualize. The test asks you to compare the vision in your head with how you know it looks in real life in order to reconcile this somewhat: is the scenario you are being asked to visualize equally vivid to its real world counterpart, a little less vivid, or not vivid at all/non-existent?<p>Further, any test that relies on self-reporting will always be subject to some bias due to the fact that you are more likely to subconsciously (or consciously) choose answers that will give you the result that you want. "
I don't doubt the experience, but the fact strikes me as impossible.<p>Everything you "see" around you, that your eyes are not pointed directly at, right at this moment, is 100% visualized, in full perspective and living color.<p>So, unless you have extreme tunnel vision (which does exist, but they can't drive, or read at any speed), you have excellent visualization capacity.<p>I am forced to conclude that you have, instead, very strong suppression of non-sensory-driven visualization.
Reading the text by Blake Ross [0], I wonder: how on earth does he buy furniture, if he cannot visualize how the couch will look in his living room?<p>[0] <a href="https://www.facebook.com/notes/blake-ross/aphantasia-how-it-feels-to-be-blind-in-your-mind/10156834777480504/" rel="nofollow">https://www.facebook.com/notes/blake-ross/aphantasia-how-it-...</a>
A related subject to this is auditory "visualization" and I wonder if that could be a way to study it some more:<p>1. Get a group of test subjects who can all read music as a baseline<p>2. Get them to self-assess on how well they can "hear" imagined notes.<p>3. Give them a pitch test to see how well their "internally heard" note matches a pitch?<p>The hypothesis being that those with perfect pitch have a really great internal "ear".
A little slow, but this video is fantastic for describing the feeling of aphantasia and it's sort of doubly fascinating that the incredibly talented artist who made it suffers from it (as I'm the flip side, great at visualizing and horrid at creation)<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewsGmhAjjjI" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewsGmhAjjjI</a>
All of the articles I have seen seem to focus on being able to recall imagery. Is there a similar difference in ability of recalling other senses? I can visualize in my head to some degree and I can recall sounds to some degree, but I don't think I can "smell in my head" for example.
I wrote an article on this a while back <a href="https://medium.com/@danielwhyte/wireframes-are-a-non-inclusive-tool-why-i-avoid-using-them-19a4a5835705" rel="nofollow">https://medium.com/@danielwhyte/wireframes-are-a-non-inclusi...</a>
I first learned other people could imagine/visualize when I had trouble following meditation instructions online a few years back.<p>As neat as it sounds to visualize and see things in my head, it doesn't seem necessary for anything.
Many interesting comments on a recent previous article:<p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19618927" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19618927</a>