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> Close your eyes and visualize your way to the shop in the head So I guess people with aphantasia are out of luck?
by jhgb 5y ago
> Close your eyes and visualize your way to the shop in the head
So I guess people with aphantasia are out of luck?
- depaulagu 5y agoCame here just to comment this, but yes, memory palaces don't really work for people with aphantasia
- mrock 5y agoSeveral memory champions have aphantasia
- depaulagu 5y agodidn't know that! do you know if they use memory palaces? can you share info about 'em?
- mrock 5y agoDr. Lynne Kelley the author of The Memory Code and Memory Craft has it. She uses memory palaces. With aphantasia you still have a hippocampus so thinking about the concept of space to encode info works just the same. :)
- Karawebnetwork 5y agoWith aphantasia, you simply cannot "visualise" the way other people "visualise". But you can still "visualise". Not using images but using the other mechanisms you developed. Many people with aphantasia are unaware of it because they can function just fine and have workarounds that fills almost all their needs. They simply cannot add an image to it. Personally, I can make memory palace work fine. There's simply no image, so it rely a lot on the same "path finding" the brain uses to allow me to walk around town without getting lost. I like to joke that my GPU is broken but my CPU works fine. So, for the sake of etymology I guess it would not be visualise but factualize or some other word.
- mrock 5y ago> So, for the sake of etymology I guess it would not be visualise but factualize or some other word. In terms of the process, it's like imagining something using all of your senses: sight, sound, smell, taste, balance. You want to make the abstract concrete so you're recalling an experience.
- rolisz 5y agoExactly. I can't visualize visual stuff, but for example, I can imagine and "see" code very well. I have a graph in my head of how various functions call each other or how data flows through the program. Sometimes the connections have different flavours/colours, such as build time, compile time, run time, frontend/backend/network call.
- JshWright 5y agoThat's still visualization though... The idea of my thoughts having color or taste makes no sense to me.
- rolisz 5y agoI can't imagine my house from the inside or from the outside (I can't see it), but for example I can count the windows on it and I can "walk" through it in my mind.
- Karawebnetwork 5y agoWould you say that you experience synesthesia or are you describing "aphantasic workarounds"?
- rolisz 5y agoI think it's probably aphantasic workarounds.
- probotect0r 5y agoYes, that's mentioned in the article that this method might not work for people who have a hard time visualizing spaces.