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Next up: people discovering that not everyone hears an internal voice either. And probably many other variations of the same kind. The funny thing is that nobod

Next up: people discovering that not everyone hears an internal voice either. And probably many other variations of the same kind. The funny thing is that nobody really talks about their internal experience in such detail, so there's little opportunity for observations like this to surface. A rigorous multidimensional classification of "thinking styles" would definitely be interesting.

barrucadu 8y ago
Not hearing an internal voice is, if anything, harder for me to imagine than not being able to conjure mental images. While images are a significant part of how I think, it's nothing compared to the constant internal voice narrating my thoughts every moment I'm awake. If I'm not "seeing" something, I'm "hearing" it.
- k__ 8y ago
  Sounds strange to me. If I want to think about sound, I hear it. If I want to think about an image, I see it. But if I "just" think a thought, it doesn't have a form like a video, audio or text; it's just ... I don't know ... an amorphous idea?
k__ 8y ago
Wasn't there some misanthropical meme about some people being "real" because they have an inner monologue and some being NPCs, because they don't? Like, if you don't have one you're just "reacting" to the world and not really deciding anything etc.
drcode 8y ago
I'm a zombie without any consciousness but never realized it until last week. I just go about my day like an automaton without any internal subjective experience and am perfectly happy doing so. I was talking to my friends and they were saying "it feels like there's somebody actually inside of me, experiencing things" and I was like "Oh that's funny, I don't have that sort of feeling at all." (kidding)
- hug 8y ago
  There is a legitimate term for this, by the way, and it is "p-zombie" or "philosophical zombie". It is an important concept in the philosophy of mind.
- cr0sh 8y ago
  In theory, this is possible - in fact, I think Oliver Sacks (RIP) wrote about something very close to this in one of his books; probably https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_Who_Mistook_His_Wife_for_a_Hat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_Who_Mistook_His_Wife_f...
- gwern 8y ago
  You joke but there are examples at least back to the 1700s: "Simon Browne: the soul-murdered theologian", Berman 1996 https://www.gwern.net/docs/psychology/1996-berman.pdf https://www.gwern.net/docs/psychology/1996-berman.pdf
huffmsa 8y ago
A while ago I took to asking people who speak fluent English as a second language what language they think in. To my surprise, a lot of them said they don't really think in a language or voice. I've got a King Arthur's damn round table up there having a roiling debate most of the time (not the norm), but I was surprised that so many people don't really have any sort of representation or "source" from which internal ideas originate.
- vidarh 8y ago
  Like you absolutely verbalize my thoughts to - if anything - an annoying degree. I'm Norwegian, but have lived in the UK for 19 years. I find myself switching languages mentally all the time. My "voice" is different, and when I think in English, I think with an accent even though I don't really "hear" my voice when I think (it is very strongly distinct from sound).
gwern 8y ago
I've actually been compiling notes to do this! I've been fascinated by how every time aphantasia comes up on HN or Reddit, there's always several people who either discover they have aphantasia because of the article or had recently discovered it, because they had always assumed that expressions like "mind's eye" were just another figure of speech or idiom. It's made me wonder if one could create a survey of mental/physical experiences which would double as a way of informing everyone about the various possibilities & what is the norm. Aphantasia is just the tip of the iceberg - there's a whole laundry list of 'abnormal is normal' mental stuff out there. A partial list: they vary from the various kinds of color blindness to anosmia (unable to smell!) to blind people regularly having vivid visual hallucinations (Charles Bonnet syndrome) to hearing voices (something like 10-20% of people occasionally hear voices) to lack of inner monologue to musical anhedonia (being unable to enjoy or be moved by music) to ASMR to misophonia to the nasal dilation cycle to 'intrusive thoughts' like 'the call of the void' to hypnagogia (hallucinations while falling asleep) to being aware of one's facial expression when talking to synesthesia to faceblindness to crying (I was shocked to learn that many women report shedding physical tears from sorrow on a weekly or monthly basis) to repetitive PTSD-like school dreams to long-running elaborate daydreams ('maladaptive daydreaming')... (There's also the funny little lifestyle ones. Like, do you take shoes off or not? Do you take 'navy showers' or let the water run the entire time? Cereal then milk or vice-versa? Do you eat the same thing for lunch every day?)
- russelldc 8y ago
  I don't mean to take away something so small from your great posts, but... > repetitive PTSD-like school dreams I'd really like to know how common this is. I'm now almost ten years removed from my school years, but the vast majority (90%+) of my dreams are based there.
  - gwern 8y ago
    Disturbingly common, judging from the people I've asked about it. It took at least a decade for my own to go away. I too am curious exactly how common they are...
- jxelam 8y ago

barrucadu 8y ago

Not hearing an internal voice is, if anything, harder for me to imagine than not being able to conjure mental images. While images are a significant part of how I think, it's nothing compared to the constant internal voice narrating my thoughts every moment I'm awake. If I'm not "seeing" something, I'm "hearing" it.

k__ 8y ago
Sounds strange to me. If I want to think about sound, I hear it. If I want to think about an image, I see it. But if I "just" think a thought, it doesn't have a form like a video, audio or text; it's just ... I don't know ... an amorphous idea?

k__ 8y ago

Wasn't there some misanthropical meme about some people being "real" because they have an inner monologue and some being NPCs, because they don't? Like, if you don't have one you're just "reacting" to the world and not really deciding anything etc.

drcode 8y ago

I'm a zombie without any consciousness but never realized it until last week. I just go about my day like an automaton without any internal subjective experience and am perfectly happy doing so. I was talking to my friends and they were saying "it feels like there's somebody actually inside of me, experiencing things" and I was like "Oh that's funny, I don't have that sort of feeling at all." (kidding)

hug 8y ago
There is a legitimate term for this, by the way, and it is "p-zombie" or "philosophical zombie". It is an important concept in the philosophy of mind.
cr0sh 8y ago
In theory, this is possible - in fact, I think Oliver Sacks (RIP) wrote about something very close to this in one of his books; probably https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_Who_Mistook_His_Wife_for_a_Hat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_Who_Mistook_His_Wife_f...
gwern 8y ago
You joke but there are examples at least back to the 1700s: "Simon Browne: the soul-murdered theologian", Berman 1996 https://www.gwern.net/docs/psychology/1996-berman.pdf https://www.gwern.net/docs/psychology/1996-berman.pdf

huffmsa 8y ago

A while ago I took to asking people who speak fluent English as a second language what language they think in. To my surprise, a lot of them said they don't really think in a language or voice. I've got a King Arthur's damn round table up there having a roiling debate most of the time (not the norm), but I was surprised that so many people don't really have any sort of representation or "source" from which internal ideas originate.

vidarh 8y ago
Like you absolutely verbalize my thoughts to - if anything - an annoying degree. I'm Norwegian, but have lived in the UK for 19 years. I find myself switching languages mentally all the time. My "voice" is different, and when I think in English, I think with an accent even though I don't really "hear" my voice when I think (it is very strongly distinct from sound).

gwern 8y ago

I've actually been compiling notes to do this! I've been fascinated by how every time aphantasia comes up on HN or Reddit, there's always several people who either discover they have aphantasia because of the article or had recently discovered it, because they had always assumed that expressions like "mind's eye" were just another figure of speech or idiom. It's made me wonder if one could create a survey of mental/physical experiences which would double as a way of informing everyone about the various possibilities & what is the norm. Aphantasia is just the tip of the iceberg - there's a whole laundry list of 'abnormal is normal' mental stuff out there. A partial list: they vary from the various kinds of color blindness to anosmia (unable to smell!) to blind people regularly having vivid visual hallucinations (Charles Bonnet syndrome) to hearing voices (something like 10-20% of people occasionally hear voices) to lack of inner monologue to musical anhedonia (being unable to enjoy or be moved by music) to ASMR to misophonia to the nasal dilation cycle to 'intrusive thoughts' like 'the call of the void' to hypnagogia (hallucinations while falling asleep) to being aware of one's facial expression when talking to synesthesia to faceblindness to crying (I was shocked to learn that many women report shedding physical tears from sorrow on a weekly or monthly basis) to repetitive PTSD-like school dreams to long-running elaborate daydreams ('maladaptive daydreaming')... (There's also the funny little lifestyle ones. Like, do you take shoes off or not? Do you take 'navy showers' or let the water run the entire time? Cereal then milk or vice-versa? Do you eat the same thing for lunch every day?)

russelldc 8y ago
I don't mean to take away something so small from your great posts, but... > repetitive PTSD-like school dreams I'd really like to know how common this is. I'm now almost ten years removed from my school years, but the vast majority (90%+) of my dreams are based there.
- gwern 8y ago
  Disturbingly common, judging from the people I've asked about it. It took at least a decade for my own to go away. I too am curious exactly how common they are...
jxelam 8y ago