Fascinating article, but I'm surprised at how non-relatable it is to me in some places where it clearly was supposed to be. For example:
> We can see this in dreams. Those disturbing dreams which wake us from sleep are purely graphic. No one speaks.
Either I'm misunderstanding something, or that's not what I have (ever?) experienced. My dreams (and nightmares) are stories; people talk to me and I talk to people there. I "hear" my thoughts forming into words as usual. Sometimes I may see myself from a third person perspective, or there may be some unspecified narrator, or perspective may suddenly change from one to another... but there sure is language, there are sounds, there are thoughts and it's definitely not "purely graphic".
Other people often describe their dreams as similar "stories", so why does the article seem to assume that no one speaks there? I never heard someone describing their nightmare as just "falling" or "snakes eating their tails", but rather something like "we were at this event together and you were very mean to me and my parents that somehow appeared there as well were even worse and then I suddenly found myself driving a car and crashed".
Movies also seem to depict dreams in this way, and there are common tropes such as "this was all just a dream" or dreams where you dream of waking up and starting your day as usual, so what's up with this paragraph? Does the author only have non-verbal dreams?
Another example:
> A picture can be recalled in its entirety whereas an essay cannot.
Can anyone really recall a picture "in its entirety"? I can recall a ghastly thing that has some overall characteristics of the whole picture. No details whatsoever except some specific things that somehow caught my attention. This is absolutely not unlike an essay, which I'm also able to recall in general ideas and maybe some single phrases that caught my attention. I may learn to remember and recall a specific highly-detailed picture if I put a lot of conscious effort into it, but I can also learn to recall an essay the very same way. Why does the article assume that one is obviously not like another?
Anyone else had this kind of cognitive dissonance while reading this article? (there's a working link in a sibling comment) It seems to somewhat undermine several of the points it makes, so I'm not sure what to think about it.
Aphantasia doesn't seem relatable to me at all. I certainly can imagine mental pictures at will, even pretty detailed ones if I try really hard. What I certainly can't do is to recall a picture I've seen "in its entirety". I can imagine Mona Lisa and somewhat describe how it looks like, but I can't recall many things about it - like the actual background behind her head or the way her hands are placed. I can only make it up based on some clues I remembered (for example: I remember a popular novel describing Mona Lisa's background as being higher on one side and lower on the other, but which one was it?)
Now, if I spent many days studying Mona Lisa with intention to memorize it, I would probably be able to recall it "in its entirety", maybe even sketch it pretty well - but the same would apply to an essay.
Maybe the author actually has hyperphantasia instead?
Same. Even when I dream. The images I see aren't complete images but ideas, or very staticky halos of what it might be. When I dream about, say, shopping in a mall.. I don't actually see the mall or myself or anyone at the mall, but dream the idea of the mall. None of the visual details are available to me.
Never knew other people didn't have the same thing until very recently for me. It was eye-opening.
I, too, am an aphant (which I believe affects only 3 to 10 percent of the population), but I understood this to still apply to us: the picture is merely replaced with the small kernel of a concept it represents.
> We can see this in dreams. Those disturbing dreams which wake us from sleep are purely graphic. No one speaks.
Either I'm misunderstanding something, or that's not what I have (ever?) experienced. My dreams (and nightmares) are stories; people talk to me and I talk to people there. I "hear" my thoughts forming into words as usual. Sometimes I may see myself from a third person perspective, or there may be some unspecified narrator, or perspective may suddenly change from one to another... but there sure is language, there are sounds, there are thoughts and it's definitely not "purely graphic".
Other people often describe their dreams as similar "stories", so why does the article seem to assume that no one speaks there? I never heard someone describing their nightmare as just "falling" or "snakes eating their tails", but rather something like "we were at this event together and you were very mean to me and my parents that somehow appeared there as well were even worse and then I suddenly found myself driving a car and crashed".
Movies also seem to depict dreams in this way, and there are common tropes such as "this was all just a dream" or dreams where you dream of waking up and starting your day as usual, so what's up with this paragraph? Does the author only have non-verbal dreams?
Another example:
> A picture can be recalled in its entirety whereas an essay cannot.
Can anyone really recall a picture "in its entirety"? I can recall a ghastly thing that has some overall characteristics of the whole picture. No details whatsoever except some specific things that somehow caught my attention. This is absolutely not unlike an essay, which I'm also able to recall in general ideas and maybe some single phrases that caught my attention. I may learn to remember and recall a specific highly-detailed picture if I put a lot of conscious effort into it, but I can also learn to recall an essay the very same way. Why does the article assume that one is obviously not like another?
Anyone else had this kind of cognitive dissonance while reading this article? (there's a working link in a sibling comment) It seems to somewhat undermine several of the points it makes, so I'm not sure what to think about it.