6 ms·
What Do You Care What Other People Think?, a book of Richard Feynman stories, has a chapter that ties into this. You can read the chapter here: http://calteche
by mayoff 7y ago
What Do You Care What Other People Think?, a book of Richard Feynman stories, has a chapter that ties into this. You can read the chapter here:
http://calteches.library.caltech.edu/607/2/Feynman.pdf http://calteches.library.caltech.edu/607/2/Feynman.pdf
He discovers that he can read while counting in his head at a steady rate, but he cannot talk while counting. When he tells his friends, one of them claims to be the opposite, and indeed proves that he can count while talking but not while reading. It turns out “he was visualizing a tape with numbers on it going by.”
That friend was John Tukey. You may have heard of him. He invented the Fast Fourier Transform.
- mc3 7y agoFast Fourier Transform? Maybe he counts by increasing the frequency of his voice then.
- ktm5j 7y agoI just picked up a used copy of this book, great read!
- oh_sigh 7y agoThis has gotten me into a lot of trouble in my life. I don't use internal monologue to read - that means that I can be reading and listening to someone at the same time, and comprehend both. But, even if I can prove I heard and understood everything someone said, they inevitably view it as rude if I am reading something while listening to them.
- jhayward 7y agoI used to get in so much trouble for this in primary/secondary school. Listening to someone talk was boring beyond belief. So I read sci-fi in class. I could always respond correctly when called upon, and could recite virtually word-for-word the entire class lecture if need be, so I eventually got a pass to just do my thing. At this great distance in time I can see how this was impolite to say the least. But, really, it was bordering on abuse to make me sit there and listen with nothing else to keep my mind occupied.
- rendall 7y agoInteresting. Do you program? If so, can you at the same time both program and comprehend, say, an audibook or podcast? Or even talk to someone? A colleague told me once that he listened to podcasts while programming and I found that intriguing but baffling. I can do it but only if my task is rote, and I have to turn the podcast off if I'm truly concentrating.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- irjustin 7y agoIs this a left/right brain split specific thing or is there another thing going on? ever explore it? I can do neither of these things. One voice dominates, self speaking, reading, listening to another person talk to me - the rest of them get 'left behind'.
- fouc 7y agoThe trick is to read without sounding out the words in your head. Then since you're not thinking in speech when reading, you have room to listen.
- irjustin 7y agoHrm... I'll have to try it. When I speed read I shut down the internal monologue, but if someone was talking to me I'm skeptical I'd be able to read effectively still, but maybe I'm being too negative. I'll give it a try.
- etrk 7y agoI’d heard that this is, to some extent, impossible, because everybody subvocalizes when they read. Wikipedia supports this, but I guess the goal is to minimize subvocalization rather than to eliminate it completely? “Micro-muscle tests suggest that full and permanent elimination of subvocalizing is impossible.” I know this is true for me. If I press the tongue to the roof of my mouth while reading, I can’t stop the muscles from moving very slightly as I read.
- jdbernard 7y agoSometimes I wonder how many things we've "proven" because our studies aren't large enough to observe all the edge cases. I sometimes wish I could contact the researchers and volunteer myself as a counter-example. I haven't hooked myself up to electrodes and measured nerve response, but as far as I can tell I don't subvocalise when I read. I can also turn off my internal monologue; I don't have to hear the words in my head as I read them though I typically do.
- kazarnowicz 7y ago
- fouc 7y agoThat makes a lot of sense. It's hard to think in speech while talking. And it's hard to think visually when reading. But conversely easy to think in speech while reading, and think visually while talking.
- ec109685 7y agoWhat do people do without a monolog when they are asked to count something silently? Isn’t keeping track of the current number a form of monolog?
- keymone 7y agoIt is, but it helps. A nice way I found to detach myself from racing thoughts is through these steps: - count - count some physiological process within you (breathing or heartbeat) - recognize that you can count it without thinking numbers - recognize that same “emptiness” can continue for a while even after you stop following the physiological process - rinse and repeat until you can drop into that “emptiness” and stay there at will
- not_kurt_godel 7y agoThis sounds like a nice form of meditation, but: > count it without thinking numbers ...what? Are you telling me you can do this for some arbitrary period of time and then tell me the number of breaths you took, if asked? I find that really difficult to believe...
- keymone 7y agono, i count to four or ten and reset