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What happens in a mind that can’t ‘see’ mental images - C C - Aug 4, 2024
https://www.quantamagazine.org/what-happens-in-a-mind-that-cant-see-mental-images-20240801/
INTRO: Two years ago, Sarah Shomstein realized she didn’t have a mind’s eye. The vision scientist was sitting in a seminar room, listening to a scientific talk, when the presenter asked the audience to imagine an apple. Shomstein closed her eyes and did so. Then, the presenter asked the crowd to open their eyes and rate how vividly they saw the apple in their mind.
Saw the apple? Shomstein was confused. She didn’t actually see an apple. She could think about an apple: its taste, its shape, its color, the way light might hit it. But she didn’t see it. Behind her eyes, “it was completely black,” Shomstein recalled. And yet, “I imagined an apple.” Most of her colleagues reacted differently. They reported actually seeing an apple, some vividly and some faintly, floating like a hologram in front of them.
In that moment, Shomstein, who’s spent years researching perception at George Washington University, realized she experienced the world differently than others. She is part of a subset of people — thought to be about 1% to 4% of the general population — who lack mental imagery, a phenomenon known as aphantasia. Though it was described more than 140 years ago, the term “aphantasia” was coined only in 2015. It immediately drew the attention of anyone interested in how the imagination works.
That included neuroscientists. So far, they’re finding that aphantasia is not a disorder — it’s a different way of experiencing the world. Early studies have suggested that differences in the connections between brain regions involved in vision, memory and decision-making could explain variations in people’s ability to form mental images. Because many people with aphantasia dream in images and can recognize objects and faces, it seems likely that their minds store visual information — they just can’t access it voluntarily or can’t use it to generate the experience of imagery.
That’s just one explanation for aphantasia. In reality, people’s subjective experiences vary dramatically, and it’s possible that different subsets of aphantasics have their own neural explanations. Aphantasia and hyperphantasia, the opposite phenomenon in which people report mental imagery as vivid as reality, are in fact two ends of a spectrum, sandwiching an infinite range of internal experiences between them.
“We think we know what we mean when we talk about what mental imagery is,” said Nadine Dijkstra, a postdoctoral researcher at University College London who studies perception. “But then when you really dig into it, everybody experiences something wildly different.”
That makes studying aphantasia, hyperphantasia and other internal experiences difficult — but far from unimaginable... (MORE - details)
RE: What happens in a mind that can’t ‘see’ mental images - Zinjanthropos - Aug 4, 2024
Tried visualizing an apple. Behind my eyes it is black. Thought that was normal. I had no idea people actually see an entire apple when asked to imagine one. Funny, last night I was asked to draw someone’s face from memory and totally failed. I’d be lousy at a police lineup, my facial recognition is poor, even have trouble matching a face with a photograph. Very familiar folks I recognize without much problem but with acquaintances it’s tough. I just don’t picture very much in my mind. I can think of many things but mostly it’s just faint images if I conjure up an image at all.
Across the lake there are cottages I see nearly every day for years but if you were to asked me how they were situated along the shore I can’t picture it enough to be successful. So I’m not really sure how I think. Words mostly. Just never gave the subject much attention over the years.
RE: What happens in a mind that can’t ‘see’ mental images - stryder - Aug 4, 2024
(Aug 4, 2024 08:47 PM)Zinjanthropos Wrote: Tried visualizing an apple. Behind my eyes it is black. Thought that was normal. I had no idea people actually see an entire apple when asked to imagine one. Funny, last night I was asked to draw someone’s face from memory and totally failed. I’d be lousy at a police lineup, my facial recognition is poor, even have trouble matching a face with a photograph. Very familiar folks I recognize without much problem but with acquaintances it’s tough. I just don’t picture very much in my mind. I can think of many things but mostly it’s just faint images if I conjure up an image at all.
Across the lake there are cottages I see nearly every day for years but if you were to asked me how they were situated along the shore I can’t picture it enough to be successful. So I’m not really sure how I think. Words mostly. Just never gave the subject much attention over the years.
When I think of an apple, I wouldn't see an apple per say. The main reason for this is that every source of interaction with an apple and my knowledge of an apple would end up competing for dominance to be the "perfect" apple. Instead I've just a myriad of recollections as to what an apple is and how those subcomposite points can derive when I'm eating an apple as opposed to a pear.
It is possible that a more artistically creative mind will actually attempt to build a composite of what an apple looks like. However apples can be appreciated as being easy, here's one you can try (and please don't be offended by this as a suggestion)... try to imagine a shit sandwich!?!.
It's not something people tend to make, I doubt we've ever been face to face with one, so it's entirely something that would have to be manifested from the mind using composites of things that have never been applied in that order. I would suggest a person would have to be very creative to see, feel, touch and taste such a thing. (...without actually doing it Blwuck!!!)