3 ms·

Well yeah. You know what a light sabre looks like, right? Now hold your hand out and see yourself holding a light sabre. Hear the wum-wum sound. How did you pl

Well yeah. You know what a light sabre looks like, right? Now hold your hand out and see yourself holding a light sabre. Hear the wum-wum sound. How did you play imaginary games as a kid? Voice in your head. What happens when you read a play? Don't see a guy holding a skull, talking about slings and arrows? Like a movie. If there's a sudden sound to one side, you turn your actual head that way. In fact the movie analogy is the best description. I can see video of everything I imagine, in fact it's pretty much what imagination is to me. You see yourself winning the race? There you are, breaking the rope, Chariots of Fire playing as you slowly push your chest forward. I do this with math as well. Geometry questions, I can move the lines around. Algebra, I can move the symbols around. To a limited degree of course, I need paper for anything complicated. But it's useful in a way that's hard to describe, because you can't explain it in words, you need to show someone the video with the constrained shape, eg a circle with a diameter and a point that moves on the circle, showing that wherever the point is there's always a 90 degree angle. Smells, I don't often imagine. Mostly they are stenches and I prefer not to.

politelemon 3y ago
I didn't play imaginary games I assume if I had visualization capabilities I probably would have! No, no voice either, and while reading I'm not visualize anyone doing anything, it's more of a "thing is happening, I understand". I do enjoy a lot of books though, I am able to read almost 100 fiction books per year. I do want to say your writing and prose is so vivid and amazing, the way you're describing what's going on is rich and beautiful.
- lordnacho 3y ago
  Thank you. Those 100 fiction books a year... don't you turn them into a movie in your head? Part of the reason I'm not so keen on fiction is that there's not quite enough to make a movie, or too much. If I get a description of some guy in a book either I have to fill in his costume with some random clothes that aren't described, or I have to remember every little detail. Inevitably I forget something and the movie makes no sense. Do you dream? That's kinda what movies in my head are like. Stuff has some form but is also partially fluid.
  - saltcured 3y ago
    I have fully immersive dreams. It's not a movie, it's like reality with sight, sound, smell, touch, temperature, proprioception, etc. Also, there generally aren't any of the fantastical, psychedelic, or other "dreamy" things I've heard retold by others or depicted in cinema. It's mostly like each dream sequence is an independent simulation and there's almost no observation of a beginning, end, or transition. I can have lucid dreams, which mostly just introduce a mild emotional detachment. The least realistic dream aspects are also what will invoke lucidity. My motor skills may break down and I start drifting or swimming when I want to walk or run. I might find it impossible to focus and read printed text or computer displays while it is important to do so. Or if I find myself driving, the dream will usually degrade and abort, with the car driving ahead and leaving me behind where I no longer see its path nor control it. If I've recently been playing video games in waking life, I might fumble for controls to walk and engage the surroundings. But otherwise, the dream sensory world is pretty much like real life, just with fictional places, people, and stories. However, I am one of those folks on the aphantasia end of the spectrum in waking life. I have no inner voice nor inner vision. All my conscious memories and simulations are abstract for every sense. I might liken it to a 2nd or 3rd order derivative. While awake, I can't really picture loved ones or remember their voices in my mind. But I can think about their present or past location and interactions. I can recollect or imagine ideas of shapes, topology, movement, rhythm, melody, intention, or emotional context. But it's nothing like real sensation. I've been a voracious reader at times in my life, but there is no movie or soundtrack to books. If anything, the literary experience is almost its own visual modality. It can be somewhat blocky, non-linear, or even atemporal. I do not experience reading as if listening to spoken words nor as seeing words in sequence. It is vaguely like looking at the page and feeling parsed grammatical structures and their semantics at the same time. I don't "see" printed words if I think of a book or think about writing. But I feel the rough outline of text and relationships of ideas. I think reading to me is almost like buffering in memories or knowledge. And, there is a meta-experience where I can reflect on and appreciate the written technique while consuming its content. But the literary meta-experience fades faster than the semantic content. People around me consider me to be very creative and imaginative. But I'd say my imagination is stilted. I don't think I'll ever produce a novel or a play or a music composition. I can easily come up with vignettes or deviations in the context of an existing story, but don't seem to have the capacity to create a whole piece from scratch. I've dabbled in drawing and writing as hobbies, but my output is very representational. I might render a landscape I like by hand, or capture a moment in verse. But I seem to have no inner drive to imagine and create entire landscapes or stories on a blank slate. With my career, I have done large scale and long term work in service of problems presented to me by employers, but I think I'd draw a blank if I tried to just "create software" of my own volition.
quitit 3y ago
Another useful example: You can go to a store and look at something, a couch or a table perhaps. Then go home and have a very good idea of whether or not this item would (1) fit in your space, or (2) match the room. Of course the abilities such visualisations give a person are on a scale, but the point is that these abilities have a lot of real world applications beyond play, and they can make work and life a lot easier than those that can't perform them.

politelemon 3y ago

I didn't play imaginary games I assume if I had visualization capabilities I probably would have! No, no voice either, and while reading I'm not visualize anyone doing anything, it's more of a "thing is happening, I understand". I do enjoy a lot of books though, I am able to read almost 100 fiction books per year. I do want to say your writing and prose is so vivid and amazing, the way you're describing what's going on is rich and beautiful.

lordnacho 3y ago
Thank you. Those 100 fiction books a year... don't you turn them into a movie in your head? Part of the reason I'm not so keen on fiction is that there's not quite enough to make a movie, or too much. If I get a description of some guy in a book either I have to fill in his costume with some random clothes that aren't described, or I have to remember every little detail. Inevitably I forget something and the movie makes no sense. Do you dream? That's kinda what movies in my head are like. Stuff has some form but is also partially fluid.
- saltcured 3y ago
  I have fully immersive dreams. It's not a movie, it's like reality with sight, sound, smell, touch, temperature, proprioception, etc. Also, there generally aren't any of the fantastical, psychedelic, or other "dreamy" things I've heard retold by others or depicted in cinema. It's mostly like each dream sequence is an independent simulation and there's almost no observation of a beginning, end, or transition. I can have lucid dreams, which mostly just introduce a mild emotional detachment. The least realistic dream aspects are also what will invoke lucidity. My motor skills may break down and I start drifting or swimming when I want to walk or run. I might find it impossible to focus and read printed text or computer displays while it is important to do so. Or if I find myself driving, the dream will usually degrade and abort, with the car driving ahead and leaving me behind where I no longer see its path nor control it. If I've recently been playing video games in waking life, I might fumble for controls to walk and engage the surroundings. But otherwise, the dream sensory world is pretty much like real life, just with fictional places, people, and stories. However, I am one of those folks on the aphantasia end of the spectrum in waking life. I have no inner voice nor inner vision. All my conscious memories and simulations are abstract for every sense. I might liken it to a 2nd or 3rd order derivative. While awake, I can't really picture loved ones or remember their voices in my mind. But I can think about their present or past location and interactions. I can recollect or imagine ideas of shapes, topology, movement, rhythm, melody, intention, or emotional context. But it's nothing like real sensation. I've been a voracious reader at times in my life, but there is no movie or soundtrack to books. If anything, the literary experience is almost its own visual modality. It can be somewhat blocky, non-linear, or even atemporal. I do not experience reading as if listening to spoken words nor as seeing words in sequence. It is vaguely like looking at the page and feeling parsed grammatical structures and their semantics at the same time. I don't "see" printed words if I think of a book or think about writing. But I feel the rough outline of text and relationships of ideas. I think reading to me is almost like buffering in memories or knowledge. And, there is a meta-experience where I can reflect on and appreciate the written technique while consuming its content. But the literary meta-experience fades faster than the semantic content. People around me consider me to be very creative and imaginative. But I'd say my imagination is stilted. I don't think I'll ever produce a novel or a play or a music composition. I can easily come up with vignettes or deviations in the context of an existing story, but don't seem to have the capacity to create a whole piece from scratch. I've dabbled in drawing and writing as hobbies, but my output is very representational. I might render a landscape I like by hand, or capture a moment in verse. But I seem to have no inner drive to imagine and create entire landscapes or stories on a blank slate. With my career, I have done large scale and long term work in service of problems presented to me by employers, but I think I'd draw a blank if I tried to just "create software" of my own volition.

quitit 3y ago

Another useful example: You can go to a store and look at something, a couch or a table perhaps. Then go home and have a very good idea of whether or not this item would (1) fit in your space, or (2) match the room. Of course the abilities such visualisations give a person are on a scale, but the point is that these abilities have a lot of real world applications beyond play, and they can make work and life a lot easier than those that can't perform them.