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Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My name

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Speaker 1: is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and this is

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Speaker 1: one of our from the Vault selections. Yeah, this particular

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Speaker 1: episode originally published May two thousand sixteen, and it concerns

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Speaker 1: a fantasia blindness of the mind's eye, the idea that

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Speaker 1: if you're reading a description in a book or someone's

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Speaker 1: explaining something to you, certain individuals will not be able

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Speaker 1: to form that mental picture. And this is this is

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Speaker 1: a fascinating topic. When we originally aired this, we heard

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Speaker 1: from a lot of people, some people who suddenly realized, Hey,

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Speaker 1: I think this is this is how my mind works.

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Speaker 1: I think this episode generated some of the most listener

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Speaker 1: male of anything we ever did. Yeah, we did a

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Speaker 1: whole additional listener mail episode that came out after this. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and we'll make sure to link to that on the

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Speaker 1: landing page for this episode. Anyway, we hope you enjoy

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Speaker 1: this episode from the old days. Welcome to Stuff to

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Speaker 1: Blow your Mind from how Stuff Works dot com. He

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Speaker 1: welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My name is

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Speaker 1: Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and today's episode concerns

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Speaker 1: the mind's eye concerns mental imagery, and so we decided

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Speaker 1: that the best way to kick off this episode is

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Speaker 1: to take you on a little guided mental journey. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so close your eyes unless you're driving or doing something

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Speaker 1: that requires your eyes to be open, and in that case,

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Speaker 1: don't close your eyes if you If you are able

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Speaker 1: to close your eyes, close your eyes if not. Just

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Speaker 1: imagine you're eight years old and you're walking along a

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Speaker 1: beach with your mother, your barefoot. The tide is coming

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Speaker 1: in and you see trails of footprints leading back and

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Speaker 1: forth along the beach where other people have walked the

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Speaker 1: same path today. But the waves are coming higher and

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Speaker 1: higher and slowly smoothing all those footprints way. But then

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Speaker 1: you look up at your mother and you notice something strange.

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Speaker 1: She's wearing armor, a steel chest plate and a visored helm,

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Speaker 1: with chainmail drooping across her arms and legs, rustling lightly

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Speaker 1: as she walks. Across the front of her chest plate

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Speaker 1: is a painted figure. It's foghorn, Leghorn. She raises the

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Speaker 1: visor on her helm and smiles at you. A mosquito

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Speaker 1: hovers in front of her face, and she flails one

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Speaker 1: arm to knock it away and you both laugh, but

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Speaker 1: then you notice something else. Your mother has a piece

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Speaker 1: of metal dangling from her hip opposite you. It's a

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Speaker 1: long sword. She puts one hand on the hilt and says,

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Speaker 1: don't worry, only a bit of insurance in case he

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Speaker 1: shows up. A wave of seawater rolls up over your feet,

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Speaker 1: washing dry sand from between your toes, and you ask who.

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Speaker 1: Then there's a faint rumbling under your feet. It's not

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Speaker 1: just the tickling wash of the waves. The ground is shaking,

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Speaker 1: and about two out in the water, a dark shape

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Speaker 1: begins to rise up from the waves. At first it's

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Speaker 1: just a green, black lump, but then the huge glaring eyes,

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Speaker 1: the cavernous mouth, climbing higher and higher as it approaches.

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Speaker 1: It's Godzilla. Not the friendly Godzilla who defends Earth against

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Speaker 1: all the heel monsters. This is the angry Godzilla who

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Speaker 1: breathes beams of radiation and crushes ten story buildings with

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Speaker 1: a single swipe. Your mother puts an arm across your chest.

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Speaker 1: She draws her long sword and says stand back. This

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Speaker 1: could get serious, And with the flip of a switch,

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Speaker 1: her hover boots engage, her feet lift off the ground,

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Speaker 1: and then she's rocketing towards the head of the monster

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Speaker 1: to defend the realms of humankind. Alright, so uh, we

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Speaker 1: we tried to draw in a few different types of

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Speaker 1: of imagery. They are a few different types of memories memories, right.

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Speaker 1: We wanted to have sort of generic landscape that would

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Speaker 1: be easy for a lot of people to picture, like

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Speaker 1: a beach. Most people have some kind of image, generically

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Speaker 1: of what a beach looks like. We also wanted something familiar.

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Speaker 1: Usually they say to picture a relative or familiar family member,

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Speaker 1: So hopefully you've got an image of a mother or

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Speaker 1: family figure there, but then also some pop culture images. Right,

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Speaker 1: most people hopefully know what Godzilla looks like. If you don't,

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Speaker 1: you gotta go back and watch the original Godzilla from

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Speaker 1: the fifties and right, uh and then uh and then

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Speaker 1: fall horn like horn and personal favorite of mine. You know.

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Speaker 1: It's one of the interesting things with this exercise is

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Speaker 1: to think back on it, and think back of the

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Speaker 1: specifics and ask yourself questions like who did I have

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Speaker 1: a more vivid memory of what I looked like as

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Speaker 1: a child, what my mother looked like, what Godzilla looked like?

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Speaker 1: And in these details are not necessarily telling of your

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Speaker 1: relationship with your mother versus your relationship with Godzilla. But but,

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Speaker 1: but it it kind of just raises our awareness of

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Speaker 1: the vast spectrum of visual stimuli that are informing are

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Speaker 1: our inner vision of the world. Yeah, and this is

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Speaker 1: a strange thing because the only person who can experience

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Speaker 1: your mental imagery is you. You can sort of describe

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Speaker 1: your mental imagery to other people, but nobody can take

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Speaker 1: a look at it to see what it is you're

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Speaker 1: picturing in your mind. So this is something that you

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Speaker 1: largely have to deal with entirely on your own, and

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Speaker 1: you don't know how similar or how different your own

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Speaker 1: process of mental imagery is to that of other people

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Speaker 1: unless you really put your heads together and start talking

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Speaker 1: about your mental images and detail and trying to figure

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Speaker 1: out if their difference is. It's not a standard thing

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Speaker 1: that people do, really right, because even to describe it,

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Speaker 1: if I describe my mental images to you, they become

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Speaker 1: your mental images. Like it's in a way, I'm kind

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Speaker 1: of handing off the blueprints and then you build a

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Speaker 1: different building. It's the same building, but a different building.

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Speaker 1: And likewise, maybe you paint, maybe you write um and

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Speaker 1: some other artistic medium you create music to try and

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Speaker 1: convey these images in your head. But you're still but

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Speaker 1: you're still then limited by your artist artistic ability and

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Speaker 1: then other people's interpretations of those works of art. You know,

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Speaker 1: I already realized. I didn't think about this when I

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Speaker 1: was writing this, but I did already see a contradiction

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Speaker 1: in what I told people to imagine the original angry Godzilla.

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Speaker 1: But then I also said green black, Right, Well, Godzilla

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Speaker 1: in color is sort of greenish black, but the original

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Speaker 1: anger Godzilla black and white. He's just you know, you

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Speaker 1: look at him and he just looks like this charred monstery.

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Speaker 1: So this is a this is already a mental confabulation

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Speaker 1: on my part. I'm imagining a Godzilla that never existed

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Speaker 1: anywhere in reality. But anyway, so most of you were

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Speaker 1: with us there on that journey. You were, to some

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Speaker 1: extent able to picture some of the things we were

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Speaker 1: talking about. You could see in your mind's eye the beach,

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Speaker 1: the armor, your mother, the sword, the fog horn, leg horn,

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Speaker 1: the Godzilla. But there are some people who probably couldn't

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Speaker 1: see any of that. They were there with us, they

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Speaker 1: were understanding the concepts. They were able to follow the plot,

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Speaker 1: whatever plot there was, and they could probably recount a

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Speaker 1: list of the events that happened in the little scene

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Speaker 1: we just described, but they couldn't see any of it

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Speaker 1: in their imagination. And this is the concept we're going

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Speaker 1: to be talking about today. One study has found that

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Speaker 1: this might be about up to one in fifty people

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Speaker 1: who have this kind of experience where they just don't

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Speaker 1: create pictures inside their mind the way most people do.

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Speaker 1: Uh And this condition now hasn't come to be known

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Speaker 1: as a fantasia or the blindness of the mind's I So,

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Speaker 1: the American biotech leader Craig Venter, you know about him, right.

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Speaker 1: He's famous for being a leader in the quest of

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Speaker 1: sequence the human genome, and he's famous for creating a

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Speaker 1: synthetic organisms. Uh So, he has actually described that he

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Speaker 1: has an unusual way of thinking, a way of thinking

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Speaker 1: that's essentially purely conceptual, like we've been describing, without any

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Speaker 1: mental imagery. Venter says, quote, it's like having a computer

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Speaker 1: store the information, but you don't have a screen attached

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Speaker 1: to the computer. He's describing his own mind. I don't know.

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Speaker 1: I I have trouble understanding what that would be like.

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Speaker 1: But maybe maybe to understand it better. We should first

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Speaker 1: look at some facts about what the mind's eye itself

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Speaker 1: is before we get into the blindness of the mind's eye.

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Speaker 1: What's going on when you create pictures in your head? Well,

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Speaker 1: of course we're talking about mental imagery here, but also

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Speaker 1: there's some other sensations thrown in as well. It all

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Speaker 1: amounts to a quasi perceptional experience that occurs in the

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Speaker 1: absence of the appropriate external stimuli. Um. So, I can

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Speaker 1: close my eyes, I can see a deceased loved one's face,

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Speaker 1: I can hear their voice. I can imagine myself standing

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Speaker 1: on the shore of a distant ocean, a past ocean,

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Speaker 1: or even some future sure that I haven't even walked

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Speaker 1: on yet. I mean this, this is the kind of

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Speaker 1: thing that I mean, most of us take for granted.

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Speaker 1: We use it, we employ it every day. Um well,

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Speaker 1: I mean, as I did with the Angry Godzilla and color,

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Speaker 1: you can picture things you've never actually seen, right, Yeah

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Speaker 1: you can. Yeah, there are things if you're like me,

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Speaker 1: I feel there are things in books. For instance, no

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Speaker 1: one has ever painted a picture of this character or

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Speaker 1: this scene. Uh, and yet you have a very like

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Speaker 1: crystal clear vision like I have a better visual memory

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Speaker 1: of some things that have occurred in books than things

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Speaker 1: that have occurred in real life. You know, Oh yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I know exactly what you're talking about. Uh. Isn't it

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Speaker 1: so weird to finally see a book you've read but

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Speaker 1: it's never been illustrated or made into a film, or

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Speaker 1: anything finally made visual by someone else. It's always people

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Speaker 1: always have the same reaction. That's not what I thought

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Speaker 1: so and so looked for. It's not what it looks

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Speaker 1: like now. The things we perceive in the mind's eye,

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Speaker 1: their their products of memory. There can structed from specific

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Speaker 1: or varied memories. They may be accurate, they may be

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Speaker 1: amalgams of diverse influences. Really, this runs the gamut from

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Speaker 1: something you saw yesterday that you near perfectly remember, to

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Speaker 1: have you know, vague side from your childhood that you

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Speaker 1: at least think you remember, to an envisioned future scene

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Speaker 1: in your own life, something you dreamt, something you daydreamed,

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Speaker 1: landscape be viewed from the imagined walls of a fictional world,

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Speaker 1: or your own creation of a of a an author's creation.

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Speaker 1: It's just like pretty much any time we are envisioning something,

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Speaker 1: any time we are closing our eyes or even keep

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Speaker 1: with our eyes open are imagining something, we are seeing

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Speaker 1: something in our mind that is of course the mind's eye, uh,

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Speaker 1: doing its thing. Yeah, And I think this has always

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Speaker 1: been a very interesting avenue for philosophy to investigate because

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Speaker 1: it is something that we recognized was sort of strange

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Speaker 1: about the human experience before we had neuroscience or psychology

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Speaker 1: or or any of these scientific ways of instigating it. Yeah. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean because because it obviously plays such a central

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Speaker 1: role in the way we navigate the world and the

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Speaker 1: way we think about time and a world of movable objects, right. Um.

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Speaker 1: And so yeah, we've been as long as we've had philosophers,

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Speaker 1: as long as we've had people among us with with

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Speaker 1: time to you know, look up from their labors and

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Speaker 1: think about the human condition, we've been thinking about the

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Speaker 1: mind's eye. Um. On the podcast here, we've talked about

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Speaker 1: the method of Loki before the the ancient Greek technique

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Speaker 1: in which person utilizes spatial memory to memorize nonspatial information. Uh. Look,

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Speaker 1: that kind of plays into into some of this. That

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Speaker 1: involves a certain amount of a reflection on what's on

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Speaker 1: how we're using the mind's eye, you know, I I've

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Speaker 1: tried to use the method of Loki, and I have

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Speaker 1: not been very good at it. Yeah, I wonder if

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Speaker 1: I'm just not doing it right. Like when I'm able

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Speaker 1: to to really get it set in my mind, it

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Speaker 1: does help me remember the By the way, this is

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Speaker 1: so a quick version of it is, if you need

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Speaker 1: to make a list of digits of numbers to remember,

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Speaker 1: you're not going to remember those digits. So instead you

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Speaker 1: imagine your house being full of odd characters that each

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Speaker 1: embody one of the digits in that number sequence, and

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Speaker 1: then you can remember by picturing the room and where

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Speaker 1: all of the odd characters were in the room, and

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Speaker 1: then you just remember what digit they correspond to or

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Speaker 1: something like that. Yeah, like a very simplified version of

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Speaker 1: this that I have employed frequently in the past. It's

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Speaker 1: kind of like a um uh you know, often called

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Speaker 1: the memory palace because it's an imagined place that you

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Speaker 1: fill with these examples. But oftentimes I only have room

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Speaker 1: in my mind for one example, and that is, uh,

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Speaker 1: that's when I am a swimming laps and I want

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Speaker 1: to remember what number lap I'm on, because if I

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Speaker 1: forget the lap number, then I'm going to make myself

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Speaker 1: revert to the to the lower number. So if I

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Speaker 1: if I don't know for sure I'm and four, I'm

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Speaker 1: gonna do three. And I don't want to keep doing

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Speaker 1: one less than I want to do because I'm gonna

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Speaker 1: wear myself out right. But I'm also busy swimming. I'm

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Speaker 1: having a hard time necessarily remembering which lap I am

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Speaker 1: currently on. So instead of trying to remember four, as

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Speaker 1: easy as that would seem, I find it easier to

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Speaker 1: just force myself to think of, say, the four Horsemen

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Speaker 1: of the Apocalypse, like, think of think of that, and

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Speaker 1: that'll stick in my head just a little better as

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Speaker 1: I'm you know, vigorously of swimming these laps um, you know.

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Speaker 1: So it'll just be some sort of visual association with

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Speaker 1: just a single digit. I don't know. I don't know

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Speaker 1: if anybody else out there has has done something of

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Speaker 1: that that that nature, but that is kind of a

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Speaker 1: simplified um, good crap. What's what's your visual image for eight?

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Speaker 1: I can't think of anything for eight? Oh for eight,

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Speaker 1: I think of Alan robe gerlays The Voyeur, where you

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Speaker 1: have a character who keeps making figure eights out of rope. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so I think of him setting by the shore um

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Speaker 1: not quite contemplating horrible things and making little figure eights.

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Speaker 1: That's a good thing to have in your mind here

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Speaker 1: at the gym or the y m c a guess

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Speaker 1: wherever you swim laps. So one of the important things

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Speaker 1: when when thinking about the memory palace and then ultimately

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Speaker 1: thinking about memory and the mind's eye, is just to

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Speaker 1: to refresh here a little bit about human memory itself.

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Speaker 1: Human memory is not just like a tape real rolling

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Speaker 1: in the brain that we just, oh, let's go back

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Speaker 1: and look and see what happened yesterday. Human memory in

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Speaker 1: multiple ways. It's not multiple, certainly not that accurate, right,

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Speaker 1: because human memory consists of several different types of memory

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Speaker 1: that are working in uh kind of an unequal chorus

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Speaker 1: um to create the human experience of memory that we have.

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Speaker 1: So we have sensory memory, um, you know what something

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Speaker 1: feels like, what it smells, It smells like, that sort

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Speaker 1: of thing. We have short term memory. We have long

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Speaker 1: term term memory. We have and then we divide long

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Speaker 1: term memory out. We have explicit memories of consciousness, we

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Speaker 1: have in iplicit memories of unconsciousness. We have declarative memories

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Speaker 1: of facts and events. We have procedural memories involved that

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Speaker 1: involves skills and tasks. We have episodic memory that deals

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Speaker 1: with events and experiences, and we have semantic memory that

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Speaker 1: concerns facts and concepts. So we have all these different

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Speaker 1: types of memories, each one dealing with in a way

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Speaker 1: certain you know, different types of skills, different types of

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Speaker 1: ways of utilizing memory when we engage with the world.

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Speaker 1: And studies have shown in the past that, uh, if

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Speaker 1: you have a part of the brain associated with the

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Speaker 1: one type of memory is injured, sometimes you see those

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Speaker 1: other types of memory compensating. So it's like a a

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Speaker 1: in a way, it's like a staff. It's like a

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Speaker 1: staff of different memory drones and they all have their

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Speaker 1: jobs to do. But if somebody is slacking, then it

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Speaker 1: may fall to another employee to uh to to you know,

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Speaker 1: to step up and and cover for their shortcomings. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: I think that's a good metaphor that the brain is

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Speaker 1: more like a workforce than a machine. If one part

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Speaker 1: of a machine breaks, the whole machine gen probably isn't

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Speaker 1: gonna work. But if one part of a workforce is

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Speaker 1: slacking or calls in sick today, the others can often

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Speaker 1: find a way to cover for them, right, and they

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Speaker 1: might cover you know, everyone does their job a little

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Speaker 1: bit differently, so their their skill set might allow them

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Speaker 1: to cover in a slightly different way. But back to philosophers.

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Speaker 1: So philosophers have continue to argue about the minds, and

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Speaker 1: we're certainly not gonna be able to do an exhaustive

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Speaker 1: journey through all of their their takes. But you go

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Speaker 1: back as far as Plato, for example, and Plato brought

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Speaker 1: us one of the most famous examples of this. Uh.

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Speaker 1: He utilizes mental images in his famous allegory of the Cave. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and that's sort of the idea that the world that

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Speaker 1: we perceive is not the true reality, you know. But

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Speaker 1: Plato had this whole belief in ideal forms, you know,

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Speaker 1: things that were the more true version of the thing

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Speaker 1: than the thing we're familiar with. Right. There's a realm

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Speaker 1: of forms out there, and in that realm of forms,

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Speaker 1: there's such thing as a perfect chair. But in this

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Speaker 1: world we can only build imperfect chairs that inch maybe

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Speaker 1: a little closer and closer towards that unobtainable ideal. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: And so his metaphor for explaining this was that of

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Speaker 1: the cave, where there are people who are chained up

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Speaker 1: in a cave and they don't even really realize that

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Speaker 1: they're in a cave. And uh, and there's an opening

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Speaker 1: to the cave through which light comes through, and figures

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Speaker 1: pass in front of the opening to the cave, casting

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Speaker 1: shadows on the wall of the cave, and all we

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Speaker 1: see we're facing the back of the cave, the wall,

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Speaker 1: and we see the shadows, and we think the shadows

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Speaker 1: are the real things, but they're not there. They're only

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Speaker 1: the the sort of like the vague outlines of the

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Speaker 1: things that that are the true forms. If anyone out

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Speaker 1: there is watching The Path on Hulu, there's actually a

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Speaker 1: scene um in the first episode where they roll out

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Speaker 1: this this allegory and it's it's pretty entertaining, but but

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Speaker 1: I mean, certainly it's an it's an allegory. You can

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Speaker 1: have a lot of fun with either trying to contrast

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Speaker 1: your worldview to another individual's worldview, to try and win

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Speaker 1: someone over with your true version of reality versus there

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Speaker 1: they're you know, their illusion based understanding of reality. But

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Speaker 1: it also you know, gets down to like what is

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Speaker 1: our perception of reality itself? These mental images that fill

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Speaker 1: our mind when we close our eyes those are imperfect.

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Speaker 1: But also the mental images when we have our eyes open,

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Speaker 1: we're still just in a sense, we are still just

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Speaker 1: seeing those shadows on the walls of a cave. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: So Aristotle also referred to mental imagery and his work

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Speaker 1: referred to it as a as a fantasia with an

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Speaker 1: F with a P, not an fright, not the Disney movie. Uh,

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Speaker 1: And this was central to his theory of memory. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Though you know, I can see why the Disney movie

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Speaker 1: would be called that, I mean, they it evokes the

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Speaker 1: concept of fantasy, even though he didn't I think directly

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Speaker 1: mean fantasy and the way we do, like somebody coming

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Speaker 1: up with a with a fantasy to escape from life. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it was the idea of being able to to imagine

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Speaker 1: things in your mind now. And A. Carts also thought

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Speaker 1: a lot about mental imagery and how they form in

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Speaker 1: the mind. Uh, the view that an idea is a

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Speaker 1: quasi perceptual thing, perhaps even pictorial, formed in the imagination.

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Speaker 1: And he did distinguish between images formed in the brain

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Speaker 1: and ideas in the mind because he was a duelist

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Speaker 1: he saw uh, he saw the mind and the body

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Speaker 1: as separate. The essence of mind is thought and the

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Speaker 1: body is an extension of it. Thoughts are not extended

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Speaker 1: in space, but the body is now us. Where in

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Speaker 1: philosophy you have you have like idealism, which states that

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Speaker 1: reality is equivalent to mental images, and the mental images

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Speaker 1: are reality itself. Well, yeah, I mean, if you want

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Speaker 1: to take this very far, the people who believe in

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Speaker 1: hardcore idealism would probably say that there is no like

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Speaker 1: that reality is merely the mental image of a higher

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Speaker 1: being or something like that. Yeah. So, as you can see,

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Speaker 1: you can really go down the deep end, into the

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Speaker 1: deep end, uh, contemplating mental imagery and what are the

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Speaker 1: philosophical ramifications of it? Um, there's you know, there's a lot,

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Speaker 1: there's a great deal more we can discuss this kind

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Speaker 1: of the philosophical groundwork. I guess you could say. Um.

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Speaker 1: For instance, though in the nineteen eighties, there's a great

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Speaker 1: deal of debate over the over the connection from between

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Speaker 1: mental images and language. So one side argued that representations

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Speaker 1: underlying the experience of mental imagery are the same type

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Speaker 1: as those used in the language. And then there was

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Speaker 1: the other camp, and they held that that these representations

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Speaker 1: served to depict, not describe objects. Okay, so what does

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Speaker 1: that mean in practice. Well, my understanding is that basically

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Speaker 1: comes down to, you know, to what extent is mental

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Speaker 1: imagery like the the the groundwork of language itself. Um well,

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Speaker 1: like I said earlier, at times, it feels like it's

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Speaker 1: it's very difficult to um to overstate the importance of

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Speaker 1: mental imagery in our perceptions of reality. Um So, just

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Speaker 1: how deep does that go? Does it underlie just about

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Speaker 1: everything in cognition? Does it underlie language? Does it underlie um,

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Speaker 1: you know, just every free, little detail of our experience. Yeah, well,

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Speaker 1: this does seem to sort of tie into us stuff

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Speaker 1: we talked about in the Tip of the Tongue episode,

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Speaker 1: where you can you can perhaps you can have the

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Speaker 1: face in your mind, you know, oh, I know this

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Speaker 1: actor's face, and you can picture it, and you can

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Speaker 1: know the actor's name well enough that if somebody said it,

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Speaker 1: you'd be like, yeah, that's it. You'd immediately recognize that.

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Speaker 1: But you can't make the connection. But of course, in

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Speaker 1: recent years, we've seen the study of mental imagery make

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Speaker 1: a more scientific transition. I think we we've started to

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Speaker 1: look at it from a neuroscientific point of view, where

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Speaker 1: people are saying, okay, well, let's identify what brain regions

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Speaker 1: are actually being used and activated when people are in

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Speaker 1: the process of coming up with mental pictures. And one

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Speaker 1: of the sources we used for this episode, it was

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Speaker 1: a paper by Adams Salman and colleagues and and UH,

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Speaker 1: these authors identify that essentially in the brain voluntary imagery,

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Speaker 1: that the mental images you come up with have been

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Speaker 1: associated in previous research with the brain's frontal parietal executive

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Speaker 1: systems or of the executive control you know, the president

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Speaker 1: of your brain sitting there directing traffic, and with the

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Speaker 1: posterior brain regions, which you know in the back of

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Speaker 1: the brain that's often the identified with visual processing. And

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Speaker 1: together you sort of put these things uh into a

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Speaker 1: teamwork relationship and they are what allows you to come

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Speaker 1: up with mental pictures. That's right. And UH, we've also

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Speaker 1: seen studies where we've taken f M R I, We've

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Speaker 1: done a PET and we've done PET scans on individuals

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Speaker 1: summoning mental images. You know, they're asked to summon a

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Speaker 1: mental image and then we look at the brain and

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Speaker 1: see what it's doing in real time. And UH reveals

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Speaker 1: that activation in brain areas that are used in visual perception,

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Speaker 1: which doesn't sound that surprising. Uh, this is pretty cool.

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Speaker 1: Visual and mental imaging share roughly two thirds of the

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Speaker 1: same active activated brain regions, So there's a lot of

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Speaker 1: a lot of cross over there between the usual and

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Speaker 1: mental imaging systems, a lot of shared mechanics. Yeah. Like if,

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Speaker 1: for example, if you show somebody a picture of somebody's

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Speaker 1: face and then you asked the same test subject imagine

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Speaker 1: this person's face, a lot of their brain activity is

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Speaker 1: going to be roughly similar. Right. In fact, the study

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Speaker 1: found that when the same task is performed in perception

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Speaker 1: and then with eyes closed using mental images, you get overlaps.

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Speaker 1: So so again, a lot of the same mechanisms, a

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Speaker 1: lot of the same brain equipment is being used, whether

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Speaker 1: you're dealing with just visual perception or mental perception. Of course,

429
00:23:36,880 --> 00:23:43,040
Speaker 1: that's funny because the phenomenal experience is completely different, right,

430
00:23:43,280 --> 00:23:47,919
Speaker 1: Like you, uh, somebody, to somebody who has a fantasia,

431
00:23:48,000 --> 00:23:50,399
Speaker 1: this might be new information, but it's obviously not going

432
00:23:50,440 --> 00:23:53,800
Speaker 1: to be new information to most people out there. Uh.

433
00:23:53,880 --> 00:23:57,280
Speaker 1: When you picture something in your mind's eye, it is

434
00:23:57,359 --> 00:24:00,639
Speaker 1: extremely different than seeing it in front of you, But

435
00:24:00,760 --> 00:24:05,280
Speaker 1: it's hard to explain how it's different. Yeah, you know. Yeah,

436
00:24:05,320 --> 00:24:08,280
Speaker 1: you know, there's a there's a two thousand fifteen BBC

437
00:24:08,440 --> 00:24:12,640
Speaker 1: article titled a Fantasia, A Life without Mental Images by

438
00:24:12,720 --> 00:24:15,480
Speaker 1: James Gallagher, and I'll be sure to include a link

439
00:24:15,480 --> 00:24:17,719
Speaker 1: to that article on the landing page for this episode

440
00:24:17,800 --> 00:24:20,560
Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow your Mind dot com because in addition

441
00:24:20,600 --> 00:24:24,080
Speaker 1: to running through some examples of uh, some accounts of

442
00:24:24,119 --> 00:24:27,680
Speaker 1: individuals who have this blindness of the mind's eye, which

443
00:24:27,680 --> 00:24:29,919
Speaker 1: we're going to discuss more here, there's also a quiz

444
00:24:29,920 --> 00:24:32,880
Speaker 1: you can take, uh. And it's just an eight question

445
00:24:33,000 --> 00:24:36,760
Speaker 1: quiz about asking you like the level of detail that

446
00:24:36,800 --> 00:24:41,360
Speaker 1: you experience when you are asked to mentally envision, uh,

447
00:24:41,400 --> 00:24:44,639
Speaker 1: you know, someone you see every day, Uh, A sunrise,

448
00:24:44,760 --> 00:24:47,639
Speaker 1: I believe, clouds in the sky, the clouds clearing in

449
00:24:47,640 --> 00:24:50,440
Speaker 1: the sky, a thunderstorm, the these sort of images some

450
00:24:50,480 --> 00:24:52,359
Speaker 1: of the same kind of stuff that we ask you

451
00:24:52,400 --> 00:24:54,639
Speaker 1: to summon at the beginning of this episode. Yeah, but

452
00:24:54,760 --> 00:24:56,840
Speaker 1: it doesn't just ask you can you picture it? It

453
00:24:56,880 --> 00:25:00,280
Speaker 1: asks you to rank level of details. So for each ample,

454
00:25:00,320 --> 00:25:03,160
Speaker 1: it might say picture, get someone in mind and maybe

455
00:25:03,200 --> 00:25:07,760
Speaker 1: a close friend or spouse or close family member, and

456
00:25:07,840 --> 00:25:11,159
Speaker 1: picture that person and then on a scale of not

457
00:25:11,400 --> 00:25:14,360
Speaker 1: very well at all too extremely well, how well can

458
00:25:14,440 --> 00:25:17,960
Speaker 1: you see in your mind's eye the contours of their

459
00:25:18,000 --> 00:25:21,080
Speaker 1: face and the shape of their body, and what color

460
00:25:21,160 --> 00:25:24,359
Speaker 1: their eyes are, and and so it's asking for specific

461
00:25:24,920 --> 00:25:28,480
Speaker 1: details of the image to to get at the vividness

462
00:25:28,520 --> 00:25:31,080
Speaker 1: of the picture in your mind. And that suggests to me,

463
00:25:31,200 --> 00:25:33,879
Speaker 1: and I think their findings do suggest so far that

464
00:25:34,359 --> 00:25:36,800
Speaker 1: it's not just an on off switch. It's not like

465
00:25:36,840 --> 00:25:39,359
Speaker 1: you can make pictures with your mind or you can't.

466
00:25:39,800 --> 00:25:42,520
Speaker 1: There seems to be a spectrum, that's right. Some people

467
00:25:42,640 --> 00:25:47,280
Speaker 1: seem to have very intense, very lucid, vivid mental images.

468
00:25:47,560 --> 00:25:51,400
Speaker 1: Other people have kind of hazier, blurrier or more generic

469
00:25:51,480 --> 00:25:54,800
Speaker 1: mental images, and some people have almost no mental imagery

470
00:25:54,800 --> 00:25:58,000
Speaker 1: at all, or even report having none. And it's so

471
00:25:58,080 --> 00:26:00,480
Speaker 1: at the opposite end of the scale of the main

472
00:26:00,720 --> 00:26:03,440
Speaker 1: topic today. You know, we're talking about these a fantasiacts,

473
00:26:03,480 --> 00:26:07,400
Speaker 1: but there's also what's come to be known as hyper fantasia, right,

474
00:26:08,240 --> 00:26:10,720
Speaker 1: and these would be people who I think would experience

475
00:26:10,800 --> 00:26:14,200
Speaker 1: visions of the mind ie with just extreme lucidity is

476
00:26:14,280 --> 00:26:16,800
Speaker 1: far compared to most of us. So they're not just

477
00:26:17,040 --> 00:26:20,760
Speaker 1: vague pictures, but they have bright colors and vivid details.

478
00:26:20,800 --> 00:26:24,600
Speaker 1: So if I tell you imagine a beach, you might

479
00:26:24,800 --> 00:26:29,320
Speaker 1: picture sand and waves and maybe some umbrellas. But I

480
00:26:29,359 --> 00:26:32,439
Speaker 1: bet you wouldn't naturally say, Okay, I can tell you

481
00:26:32,480 --> 00:26:35,440
Speaker 1: there are seven umbrellas in the picture in my mind,

482
00:26:35,560 --> 00:26:39,040
Speaker 1: and these are the colors of stripes on the umbrellas.

483
00:26:39,080 --> 00:26:42,520
Speaker 1: But somebody might actually be able to have that level

484
00:26:42,640 --> 00:26:46,560
Speaker 1: of vividness in their mind's eye. Yeah. This idea of

485
00:26:46,840 --> 00:26:51,360
Speaker 1: a spectrum of of of mental detail and visual imagery,

486
00:26:51,840 --> 00:26:55,760
Speaker 1: it uh, it really makes you reanalyzed just how you're

487
00:26:55,760 --> 00:26:58,800
Speaker 1: painting the picture in your head. Uh, these memories, you know,

488
00:26:58,840 --> 00:27:01,120
Speaker 1: like it. I think we both scored around the same

489
00:27:01,280 --> 00:27:04,080
Speaker 1: on this where we had kind of like typical image.

490
00:27:04,280 --> 00:27:07,400
Speaker 1: I was in the typical range. Yeah, but even even

491
00:27:07,480 --> 00:27:09,920
Speaker 1: then I was I found myself asking questions like, well,

492
00:27:09,920 --> 00:27:12,400
Speaker 1: how when I think about these people that I see

493
00:27:12,440 --> 00:27:14,400
Speaker 1: every day in my life and they are very important

494
00:27:14,640 --> 00:27:16,679
Speaker 1: to me, Uh, you know, what does it mean that

495
00:27:16,760 --> 00:27:20,160
Speaker 1: I don't have like just a picture perfect vision of them?

496
00:27:20,200 --> 00:27:22,000
Speaker 1: What does it mean that when I think back on

497
00:27:22,040 --> 00:27:24,359
Speaker 1: a beach, I find my like a sunrise on a beach,

498
00:27:24,760 --> 00:27:28,119
Speaker 1: I keep thinking of, you know, images of sunrises from

499
00:27:28,640 --> 00:27:33,080
Speaker 1: paintings and films more so than actual beach sunrises that

500
00:27:33,080 --> 00:27:35,040
Speaker 1: I've witnessed. Do you think about the final scene of

501
00:27:35,040 --> 00:27:37,320
Speaker 1: the Warriors, Yeah, that sort of thing, like I end

502
00:27:37,400 --> 00:27:40,679
Speaker 1: up like putting a fictional Instagram filter over all of

503
00:27:40,720 --> 00:27:44,600
Speaker 1: these these memories, and I'm not really remembering. I'm not

504
00:27:44,640 --> 00:27:47,760
Speaker 1: really summoning a mental image of a thing I actually saw.

505
00:27:48,160 --> 00:27:52,480
Speaker 1: I'm summoning this mental image that's composed of these varying elements.

506
00:27:52,760 --> 00:27:55,080
Speaker 1: You know. One thing I read when we were doing

507
00:27:55,119 --> 00:27:57,879
Speaker 1: our research for this episode was a first person essay

508
00:27:57,960 --> 00:28:01,359
Speaker 1: that I came across by the software designer Blake Ross,

509
00:28:01,400 --> 00:28:04,720
Speaker 1: who was involved in Mozilla Firefox on Facebook, and he's

510
00:28:04,760 --> 00:28:08,200
Speaker 1: also done some screenwriting. And he found out after reading

511
00:28:08,200 --> 00:28:10,680
Speaker 1: an article I think in either in the New York

512
00:28:10,720 --> 00:28:13,720
Speaker 1: Times or in Discover magazine by Carl Zimmer about a

513
00:28:13,840 --> 00:28:17,560
Speaker 1: fantasia that he he had this experience, and he also

514
00:28:17,960 --> 00:28:20,679
Speaker 1: was just shocked to find out that other people weren't

515
00:28:20,720 --> 00:28:25,000
Speaker 1: like him. His discovery was that, oh, I never realized

516
00:28:25,040 --> 00:28:28,160
Speaker 1: other people could see pictures in their minds. His whole life.

517
00:28:28,160 --> 00:28:31,520
Speaker 1: He thought when people said stuff like picture this, they

518
00:28:31,520 --> 00:28:34,879
Speaker 1: were just being metaphorical. He didn't realize other people could

519
00:28:34,920 --> 00:28:38,480
Speaker 1: actually hold these pictures in their brains. And in this

520
00:28:38,600 --> 00:28:41,880
Speaker 1: essay he starts he recounts how when he found out

521
00:28:41,880 --> 00:28:44,080
Speaker 1: about this, he was asking all his friends, what's it

522
00:28:44,120 --> 00:28:46,680
Speaker 1: like to picture something in your mind? And asking all

523
00:28:46,720 --> 00:28:49,360
Speaker 1: these questions I've never really thought to ask myself about

524
00:28:49,400 --> 00:28:52,040
Speaker 1: my process of mental imagery that were very interesting, Like

525
00:28:52,440 --> 00:28:54,520
Speaker 1: he was asking his friends, Okay, when you see a

526
00:28:54,560 --> 00:28:57,200
Speaker 1: picture in your mind, like you picture a beach, is

527
00:28:57,240 --> 00:29:00,240
Speaker 1: it still? Is it a still photograph or is it

528
00:29:00,280 --> 00:29:04,000
Speaker 1: more like video where things are moving? And that distinction

529
00:29:04,320 --> 00:29:07,480
Speaker 1: just hit me like a wrecking ball. I was like,

530
00:29:07,920 --> 00:29:11,320
Speaker 1: I don't know. When I picture something in my mind,

531
00:29:11,400 --> 00:29:14,280
Speaker 1: I can make it move consciously if I need to.

532
00:29:14,400 --> 00:29:17,280
Speaker 1: But when I just picture a beach, it is almost

533
00:29:17,320 --> 00:29:20,880
Speaker 1: neither still nor moving. It is it exists in super

534
00:29:20,880 --> 00:29:24,240
Speaker 1: position between these two things. It's kept for me. I

535
00:29:24,240 --> 00:29:26,360
Speaker 1: guess when I think about it, it's kind of like

536
00:29:26,400 --> 00:29:29,280
Speaker 1: the old music video for What Was It where the

537
00:29:29,400 --> 00:29:32,440
Speaker 1: people go into the painting or into the drawing Take

538
00:29:32,520 --> 00:29:35,320
Speaker 1: on Me. Yeah, I feel like my my mental imagery

539
00:29:35,320 --> 00:29:38,400
Speaker 1: is kind of like the take on Me video. It's

540
00:29:38,640 --> 00:29:42,440
Speaker 1: stuff is moving, but it's all kind of stationary as well. Yeah. Well,

541
00:29:42,480 --> 00:29:46,000
Speaker 1: I mean, I certainly can imagine something moving on purpose.

542
00:29:46,080 --> 00:29:49,760
Speaker 1: But when I just picture a thing and I don't

543
00:29:49,840 --> 00:29:52,960
Speaker 1: imagine it moving on purpose, I don't think it's still,

544
00:29:53,000 --> 00:29:56,560
Speaker 1: but it's not moving either. It's very strange. It reminds

545
00:29:56,600 --> 00:29:59,160
Speaker 1: me of two of the experience of reading a book,

546
00:29:59,240 --> 00:30:01,080
Speaker 1: especially a book to set more or less in the

547
00:30:01,120 --> 00:30:05,000
Speaker 1: real world, And at times I'll find myself stopping and

548
00:30:05,080 --> 00:30:09,040
Speaker 1: thinking about, like, oh, I'm picturing this in this living

549
00:30:09,120 --> 00:30:12,400
Speaker 1: room from that I've limp that I visited or lived

550
00:30:12,440 --> 00:30:14,400
Speaker 1: in at some point in my life, Like that, for

551
00:30:14,440 --> 00:30:16,440
Speaker 1: some reason, is the living room that my brain is

552
00:30:16,520 --> 00:30:20,440
Speaker 1: drawing in for this setting where I'm picturing this character. Sometimes,

553
00:30:20,520 --> 00:30:23,000
Speaker 1: you know, sometimes the character just is that character and

554
00:30:23,000 --> 00:30:27,280
Speaker 1: that and there's not really like a firm mental image

555
00:30:27,280 --> 00:30:29,720
Speaker 1: in your head exactly what they look like. Other times

556
00:30:29,760 --> 00:30:35,320
Speaker 1: you can't shake their um their appearance as being that

557
00:30:35,520 --> 00:30:38,520
Speaker 1: of someone you know or or you know a character

558
00:30:38,560 --> 00:30:42,040
Speaker 1: actor from a movie, etcetera. But I do find myself

559
00:30:42,160 --> 00:30:44,640
Speaker 1: like analyzing, like where are all these elements coming from?

560
00:30:44,680 --> 00:30:46,920
Speaker 1: Like some of them are obviously coming from the the author.

561
00:30:47,200 --> 00:30:51,320
Speaker 1: The author is providing the blueprint, the author is providing

562
00:30:51,320 --> 00:30:53,920
Speaker 1: the scaffolding. But then that scaffolding is kind of like

563
00:30:54,000 --> 00:30:58,760
Speaker 1: magnetically drawing in elements from my own visual memory. Yeah, definitely, Uh,

564
00:30:58,800 --> 00:31:01,640
Speaker 1: I know exactly what you're talking about there. Uh. An

565
00:31:01,720 --> 00:31:04,920
Speaker 1: interesting thing about fiction that that Blake Ross says in

566
00:31:05,040 --> 00:31:07,720
Speaker 1: his first person essay about this is he he reports that,

567
00:31:07,840 --> 00:31:10,280
Speaker 1: so he's always read books, you know, he's enjoyed fiction,

568
00:31:10,320 --> 00:31:12,920
Speaker 1: and he's written fiction. But when he writes fiction, he

569
00:31:12,960 --> 00:31:16,760
Speaker 1: has almost no visual description because he just doesn't picture

570
00:31:16,840 --> 00:31:19,840
Speaker 1: things in his head. And when he reads, he skips

571
00:31:19,960 --> 00:31:22,560
Speaker 1: visual description. He just kind of jumps over it. That's

572
00:31:22,600 --> 00:31:25,880
Speaker 1: not it has no meaning to him. Really. Huh, yeah,

573
00:31:25,880 --> 00:31:28,800
Speaker 1: it's it's it's fascinating. Okay, now it's time to take

574
00:31:28,800 --> 00:31:30,960
Speaker 1: a quick break to hear from our sponsor. But when

575
00:31:31,000 --> 00:31:40,680
Speaker 1: we come back, more on the mind's eye and a fantasia.

576
00:31:42,720 --> 00:31:47,480
Speaker 1: All right, So, just how common is a fantasia? Um,

577
00:31:47,480 --> 00:31:49,720
Speaker 1: it's a difficult question because this is something that hasn't

578
00:31:49,760 --> 00:31:53,600
Speaker 1: really been uh in the public mindset. It hasn't been

579
00:31:53,600 --> 00:31:55,320
Speaker 1: out there, it hasn't been something you get a pamphle

580
00:31:55,320 --> 00:31:58,840
Speaker 1: it on until very recently. There was one interesting study

581
00:31:58,880 --> 00:32:01,360
Speaker 1: on this from before it had a name. Before this

582
00:32:01,520 --> 00:32:04,760
Speaker 1: a fantasia term came out that was studying sort of

583
00:32:04,760 --> 00:32:08,400
Speaker 1: the lack of generative power and mental imagery, and that

584
00:32:08,400 --> 00:32:12,080
Speaker 1: that was in two thousand nine, right, study by Fall, Yeah,

585
00:32:12,080 --> 00:32:15,880
Speaker 1: Bill Fall psychologists. And what did it find? He found

586
00:32:15,920 --> 00:32:19,240
Speaker 1: that between two point one percent and two point seven

587
00:32:19,280 --> 00:32:23,360
Speaker 1: percent of participants in his study claimed to have no

588
00:32:23,560 --> 00:32:27,000
Speaker 1: visual imagination. So that's where we got that number up

589
00:32:27,040 --> 00:32:28,960
Speaker 1: at the beginning, that it might be around one in

590
00:32:29,080 --> 00:32:32,000
Speaker 1: fifty of you who just didn't see any pictures when

591
00:32:32,040 --> 00:32:34,680
Speaker 1: you were following along in the story with us. Yeah, Now,

592
00:32:34,760 --> 00:32:37,600
Speaker 1: of course we have to that that number is not

593
00:32:37,720 --> 00:32:41,239
Speaker 1: coming from like a you know, large scale study, so

594
00:32:41,800 --> 00:32:45,440
Speaker 1: results aren't really fully supported, but it gives us sort

595
00:32:45,480 --> 00:32:47,840
Speaker 1: of at least a ball park. I think, yeah, it's

596
00:32:47,840 --> 00:32:49,840
Speaker 1: something to work with. But but a lot of this

597
00:32:49,960 --> 00:32:54,959
Speaker 1: recent research has popped up because of an interesting I'm

598
00:32:55,000 --> 00:32:58,680
Speaker 1: about to use a great word here, synergy between between

599
00:32:58,720 --> 00:33:02,880
Speaker 1: actual medical rea search and some writing in the popular press. Actually,

600
00:33:02,920 --> 00:33:05,719
Speaker 1: I think like Carl Zimmer's articles had something to do

601
00:33:06,400 --> 00:33:08,720
Speaker 1: with people coming out of the woodwork to say, hey,

602
00:33:08,760 --> 00:33:12,080
Speaker 1: now I have this experience of a fantasia. I can't

603
00:33:12,120 --> 00:33:15,960
Speaker 1: make mental pictures. But it started with the research of

604
00:33:16,080 --> 00:33:19,760
Speaker 1: Adam Zaman, Right. Yeah, he's a professor of cognitive and

605
00:33:19,760 --> 00:33:23,360
Speaker 1: behavioral neurology at the University of Exeter Medical School, and

606
00:33:23,360 --> 00:33:27,160
Speaker 1: along with co authors uh Um, MICHELLEA. De Wira, and

607
00:33:27,320 --> 00:33:32,280
Speaker 1: Surio Della Sala, they coined the term a fantasia in

608
00:33:32,320 --> 00:33:36,680
Speaker 1: their two thousand fifteen paper Lives Without Imagery congenital a

609
00:33:36,760 --> 00:33:40,760
Speaker 1: Fantasia that was published in the journal Cortex. Now, people had,

610
00:33:40,800 --> 00:33:44,520
Speaker 1: as we said, previously described things along these lines like

611
00:33:44,600 --> 00:33:46,960
Speaker 1: it had always been kind of noted that, well, there's

612
00:33:47,000 --> 00:33:49,160
Speaker 1: some people out there who say that they can't create

613
00:33:49,200 --> 00:33:52,640
Speaker 1: any mental pictures. But nobody really looked very deeply into this,

614
00:33:53,840 --> 00:33:55,680
Speaker 1: and I think some of the I think the earliest

615
00:33:55,680 --> 00:33:58,040
Speaker 1: example that the authors we were looking at were able

616
00:33:58,080 --> 00:34:01,440
Speaker 1: to draw on was just the nineteen century. Now, this

617
00:34:01,680 --> 00:34:03,800
Speaker 1: condition and the condition had in these earlier works and

618
00:34:03,800 --> 00:34:07,920
Speaker 1: condition had previously been referred to as a defective revisualization

619
00:34:08,480 --> 00:34:12,560
Speaker 1: or visual ear reminiscence. What a great word, ear reminiscence.

620
00:34:13,000 --> 00:34:16,160
Speaker 1: Somebody was trying to make us say that, yeah, sorry,

621
00:34:16,280 --> 00:34:19,239
Speaker 1: not gonna work. It's a fantasia. Uh And there are

622
00:34:19,239 --> 00:34:21,839
Speaker 1: skeptics actually out there who say that that what we're

623
00:34:21,840 --> 00:34:24,440
Speaker 1: talking about here does not exist at all. I think

624
00:34:24,560 --> 00:34:27,359
Speaker 1: that's fascinating because how would you prove them wrong? Yeah,

625
00:34:27,440 --> 00:34:30,080
Speaker 1: and why why would you make that argument? I don't know. Well,

626
00:34:30,120 --> 00:34:34,520
Speaker 1: I mean, arguing about the existence of somebody else's internal experience.

627
00:34:34,560 --> 00:34:37,759
Speaker 1: I mean, that's just it's crazy. Yeah, I mean it

628
00:34:37,800 --> 00:34:39,880
Speaker 1: almost seems seems like you'd have to be making the

629
00:34:39,920 --> 00:34:42,759
Speaker 1: counter argument of saying, oh, you don't have a fantasia,

630
00:34:42,840 --> 00:34:46,360
Speaker 1: you just have a lazy mind, right, your imagination is

631
00:34:46,400 --> 00:34:49,280
Speaker 1: just a bit stunted. But I can understand why people

632
00:34:49,360 --> 00:34:52,200
Speaker 1: might be tempted to this direction because I, as I

633
00:34:52,360 --> 00:34:54,719
Speaker 1: we've said before, I think you probably would agree with this.

634
00:34:54,880 --> 00:34:58,440
Speaker 1: I can't imagine what this is like. Yeah, I have

635
00:34:58,640 --> 00:35:02,560
Speaker 1: no ability soever to put myself in a position of

636
00:35:02,600 --> 00:35:05,439
Speaker 1: not being able to make mental pictures that I don't

637
00:35:05,480 --> 00:35:09,000
Speaker 1: even understand what that means really, Right, It's kind of

638
00:35:09,000 --> 00:35:12,200
Speaker 1: like if most of us are more or less the

639
00:35:12,239 --> 00:35:16,200
Speaker 1: same computer hardware with differing software. You know, we can

640
00:35:16,239 --> 00:35:18,719
Speaker 1: talk all day about I don't understand how your software works,

641
00:35:18,960 --> 00:35:20,799
Speaker 1: and this is how my software works. But here we're

642
00:35:20,800 --> 00:35:24,799
Speaker 1: talking about essentially a difference in hardware. Um, I don't

643
00:35:24,800 --> 00:35:27,160
Speaker 1: know if that analogy completely holds up. But essentially there's

644
00:35:27,520 --> 00:35:31,920
Speaker 1: something a little more, uh, you know, base level is

645
00:35:32,120 --> 00:35:35,480
Speaker 1: different and and how do we even begin to describe

646
00:35:35,480 --> 00:35:38,400
Speaker 1: that to each other? Yeah, So Zaman first started studying this,

647
00:35:38,480 --> 00:35:41,719
Speaker 1: I think in two thousand ten, right, because of the

648
00:35:42,280 --> 00:35:47,319
Speaker 1: story of this. So there was a patient who reported

649
00:35:47,960 --> 00:35:52,960
Speaker 1: having contracted, like acquired a fantasia after a medical procedure, right, right,

650
00:35:53,080 --> 00:35:55,080
Speaker 1: So there was a sixty five year old man who

651
00:35:55,480 --> 00:35:58,759
Speaker 1: had coronary angioplastic and that's where they So if you

652
00:35:58,880 --> 00:36:01,279
Speaker 1: have a blockage in one of your arteries or something

653
00:36:01,320 --> 00:36:03,560
Speaker 1: like that, they'll open up one of your arteries and

654
00:36:03,600 --> 00:36:06,600
Speaker 1: stick a catheter in it, and somewhere along your body

655
00:36:06,640 --> 00:36:09,520
Speaker 1: wherever the blockage is occurring, they'll inflate a small balloon

656
00:36:09,680 --> 00:36:13,080
Speaker 1: or something inside your artery to widen it, essentially and

657
00:36:13,120 --> 00:36:15,520
Speaker 1: allow easier passage of blood. Yeah. It's not the kind

658
00:36:15,520 --> 00:36:20,399
Speaker 1: of thing that you would initially imagine altering your brain functioning. Yeah,

659
00:36:20,560 --> 00:36:23,759
Speaker 1: and it's generally not considered a major surgical procedure, but

660
00:36:23,920 --> 00:36:26,520
Speaker 1: it's like it's you. I think you're typically left awake

661
00:36:26,520 --> 00:36:28,440
Speaker 1: for it. They don't even necessarily put you under, though

662
00:36:28,480 --> 00:36:30,200
Speaker 1: they might need to give you some drugs to calm

663
00:36:30,200 --> 00:36:33,359
Speaker 1: you down. But yeah, it's this is this is not

664
00:36:33,440 --> 00:36:37,560
Speaker 1: like a gigantic big deal. So it's coronary angioplasty. And

665
00:36:37,680 --> 00:36:42,440
Speaker 1: after the procedure, this patient was unable to form mental

666
00:36:42,480 --> 00:36:46,399
Speaker 1: pictures and he had not had this problem before, and

667
00:36:46,560 --> 00:36:50,200
Speaker 1: so yeah, and that's where this study comes in. And afterwards,

668
00:36:50,239 --> 00:36:54,200
Speaker 1: after there were some pieces published about this, Zaman started

669
00:36:54,239 --> 00:36:58,560
Speaker 1: to hear from people who said, Hey, I have this condition.

670
00:36:59,200 --> 00:37:01,160
Speaker 1: And not only do I have it, I didn't get

671
00:37:01,200 --> 00:37:04,359
Speaker 1: it from I didn't have an angioplastic or any you know,

672
00:37:04,440 --> 00:37:07,680
Speaker 1: injury or or surgery. I've always had it. This is

673
00:37:07,719 --> 00:37:10,920
Speaker 1: just how I am. So Zaman and his co authors

674
00:37:11,000 --> 00:37:13,520
Speaker 1: they they looked at twenty one of these self reporting

675
00:37:13,560 --> 00:37:19,120
Speaker 1: cases and then they discovered most of these individuals um

676
00:37:19,400 --> 00:37:23,040
Speaker 1: kind of discovered their condition, their own condition in their

677
00:37:23,080 --> 00:37:27,080
Speaker 1: twenties when through conversations or or readings they found a

678
00:37:27,120 --> 00:37:30,560
Speaker 1: discrepancy between how other people described the use of the

679
00:37:30,640 --> 00:37:34,440
Speaker 1: mind's eye and their own experiences. Can you imagine I

680
00:37:34,840 --> 00:37:37,279
Speaker 1: just have a hard time imagining how you get that

681
00:37:37,320 --> 00:37:39,920
Speaker 1: far in life without realizing. Now, this is another thing

682
00:37:39,960 --> 00:37:42,280
Speaker 1: that's addressed yet again in that that essay I mentioned

683
00:37:42,280 --> 00:37:45,320
Speaker 1: by Blake Ross, where he just talks about how whenever

684
00:37:45,360 --> 00:37:48,480
Speaker 1: he heard people using the language of the mind's eye

685
00:37:48,560 --> 00:37:53,160
Speaker 1: were talking about, you know, picturing something, imagining something, he

686
00:37:53,239 --> 00:37:56,200
Speaker 1: thought it was all metaphorical. He thought they were just

687
00:37:56,280 --> 00:38:01,280
Speaker 1: talking about conceptually meditating on the idea of a beach

688
00:38:01,520 --> 00:38:04,400
Speaker 1: or something. So you're sitting there thinking about the concepts

689
00:38:04,400 --> 00:38:08,239
Speaker 1: of sand and water and sunshine and umbrellas. But he

690
00:38:08,280 --> 00:38:12,080
Speaker 1: didn't realize that other people were literally seeing something in

691
00:38:12,120 --> 00:38:14,880
Speaker 1: their mind. Yeah. I mean, it's like we said earlier,

692
00:38:14,880 --> 00:38:17,520
Speaker 1: when one when you have all these different types of memory,

693
00:38:17,600 --> 00:38:19,960
Speaker 1: and if one is taking uh, you know, a back seat,

694
00:38:20,000 --> 00:38:22,839
Speaker 1: the other ones are going to compensate. So it's not

695
00:38:22,920 --> 00:38:25,440
Speaker 1: like if you have a fantasia, you're not gonna be

696
00:38:25,440 --> 00:38:27,520
Speaker 1: able to function in society at all. It seems like

697
00:38:27,600 --> 00:38:30,960
Speaker 1: quite the contrary. Uh, individuals find a way to function.

698
00:38:31,000 --> 00:38:33,600
Speaker 1: They find they just end up utilizing these different modes

699
00:38:33,600 --> 00:38:36,960
Speaker 1: of memory. Okay, but of these twenty one self reporting cases,

700
00:38:37,000 --> 00:38:40,799
Speaker 1: what did Zalmon find about them? Well, so I found

701
00:38:40,800 --> 00:38:43,560
Speaker 1: that nineteen of the twenty one were male. And uh,

702
00:38:43,600 --> 00:38:45,959
Speaker 1: it's worth noting that this might have more to do

703
00:38:46,239 --> 00:38:49,279
Speaker 1: with the readership of Discover magazine. This is not a

704
00:38:49,360 --> 00:38:52,919
Speaker 1: randomized self selected because right this is where people would

705
00:38:52,920 --> 00:38:55,239
Speaker 1: have read that Carl Zimmer article, and they were the

706
00:38:55,239 --> 00:38:56,840
Speaker 1: ones who said, hey, so yeah, I just might have

707
00:38:56,880 --> 00:38:59,799
Speaker 1: to do with the male readership discover On the other hand,

708
00:38:59,800 --> 00:39:03,000
Speaker 1: they found it. Five of the twenty one reported that

709
00:39:03,080 --> 00:39:05,919
Speaker 1: it affected relatives as well. This is something I've read

710
00:39:05,960 --> 00:39:08,400
Speaker 1: of people's experiences online. Some of them say, one of

711
00:39:08,440 --> 00:39:11,239
Speaker 1: my parents has this. Yeah, so this leads us to

712
00:39:11,480 --> 00:39:14,799
Speaker 1: believe it might be hereditary. And then ten of the

713
00:39:14,800 --> 00:39:19,000
Speaker 1: twenty one said, uh, said that all all versions of

714
00:39:19,040 --> 00:39:23,320
Speaker 1: the imagery were affected. Now, now, like I alluded to earlier,

715
00:39:23,440 --> 00:39:25,600
Speaker 1: this does seem to me, based on what I've read

716
00:39:25,640 --> 00:39:28,399
Speaker 1: so far, to be sort of a um it's not

717
00:39:28,520 --> 00:39:32,719
Speaker 1: necessarily an all or nothing. It's sort of a spectrum condition.

718
00:39:32,840 --> 00:39:36,560
Speaker 1: Because one of the things that these people reported is

719
00:39:36,600 --> 00:39:39,760
Speaker 1: that it's not like they've never ever in their entire

720
00:39:39,920 --> 00:39:43,799
Speaker 1: live seni mental image. They just generally don't see them,

721
00:39:44,560 --> 00:39:46,920
Speaker 1: like some of them sometimes reported that they might have

722
00:39:47,000 --> 00:39:54,120
Speaker 1: had very brief involuntary mental images, like they they might involuntarily, quote,

723
00:39:54,120 --> 00:39:57,880
Speaker 1: flash an image of somebody's face, but it's just that

724
00:39:57,960 --> 00:40:00,680
Speaker 1: this is rare and they can't do it on man, Right,

725
00:40:00,719 --> 00:40:03,520
Speaker 1: it's something that just might occur during while they're awake.

726
00:40:03,560 --> 00:40:06,000
Speaker 1: It might occur during dreams some of them. This is

727
00:40:06,040 --> 00:40:10,280
Speaker 1: another thing, the interesting variation on dream experience. Some report

728
00:40:10,360 --> 00:40:13,600
Speaker 1: that they don't have dreams at all or don't remember

729
00:40:13,640 --> 00:40:16,120
Speaker 1: having them if they do have them, and some report

730
00:40:16,200 --> 00:40:19,440
Speaker 1: that they do have dreams and can experience visual content

731
00:40:19,520 --> 00:40:21,760
Speaker 1: and dreams, but just can't do it while they're awake

732
00:40:21,880 --> 00:40:25,160
Speaker 1: or on command. Yeah. Zeman is a big believer that

733
00:40:25,200 --> 00:40:29,560
Speaker 1: this is essentially a variant of neuropsychological functioning and kind

734
00:40:29,560 --> 00:40:32,120
Speaker 1: of like synesthesia in a sense, and again kind of

735
00:40:32,160 --> 00:40:35,719
Speaker 1: on on a spectrum as well. So so again, don't

736
00:40:35,760 --> 00:40:38,440
Speaker 1: think of it as a you know, as a as

737
00:40:38,480 --> 00:40:40,839
Speaker 1: a as a brain injury, don't think of it as

738
00:40:40,880 --> 00:40:45,080
Speaker 1: a as as an ailment. It is just a different,

739
00:40:45,880 --> 00:40:48,799
Speaker 1: uh a different way that the mental chorus is coming

740
00:40:48,800 --> 00:40:51,879
Speaker 1: together to receive reality. Yeah. Another thing that I thought

741
00:40:51,920 --> 00:40:54,920
Speaker 1: was interesting is, uh so we've been talking about images

742
00:40:55,040 --> 00:40:58,960
Speaker 1: being visual as in like what you know, light, photons,

743
00:40:59,000 --> 00:41:02,400
Speaker 1: and the eyes, but this does seem to extend to

744
00:41:02,760 --> 00:41:06,040
Speaker 1: varying degrees to other senses as well. Right, Some of

745
00:41:06,080 --> 00:41:08,719
Speaker 1: the people who report that they have a fantasia for

746
00:41:09,320 --> 00:41:14,040
Speaker 1: visual images. Also can't imagine the feelings of other senses,

747
00:41:14,440 --> 00:41:16,240
Speaker 1: if you know what I mean. And then some report

748
00:41:16,280 --> 00:41:19,040
Speaker 1: that they sort of can, again, making it seem like

749
00:41:19,040 --> 00:41:22,239
Speaker 1: a kind of spectrum issue, like can you hear a

750
00:41:22,280 --> 00:41:26,680
Speaker 1: piece of music that you're not currently listening to? Yeah? Yeah,

751
00:41:26,719 --> 00:41:29,960
Speaker 1: that's that's That's another good one. I certainly can. Like

752
00:41:30,120 --> 00:41:31,880
Speaker 1: one of the ones I wanted to think was the

753
00:41:31,920 --> 00:41:34,719
Speaker 1: Star Wars theme. I can just play the whole Star

754
00:41:34,760 --> 00:41:37,839
Speaker 1: Wars theme in my mind from beginning to end. Yeah,

755
00:41:37,840 --> 00:41:40,360
Speaker 1: And certainly we've all experienced earworms, so that's kind of

756
00:41:40,400 --> 00:41:43,560
Speaker 1: a variant of that now. Um. Also in this UH

757
00:41:43,600 --> 00:41:47,239
Speaker 1: the Zaman paper, they said of the individuals, a number

758
00:41:47,280 --> 00:41:50,600
Speaker 1: of them reported modest effects on their relationships, which I

759
00:41:50,600 --> 00:41:53,160
Speaker 1: guess one can imagine if you and your um, your

760
00:41:53,200 --> 00:41:58,560
Speaker 1: significant other are ultimately engaging with mental imagery and drastically

761
00:41:58,560 --> 00:42:01,680
Speaker 1: different ways. And also, fourteen of the twenty one participants

762
00:42:01,719 --> 00:42:05,320
Speaker 1: reported difficulties with autobiographical memory. So here's a quick quote

763
00:42:05,360 --> 00:42:10,000
Speaker 1: from the paper. The same number identified UH compensatory strengths

764
00:42:10,000 --> 00:42:14,400
Speaker 1: in verbal, mathematical, and logical domains. They their successful performance

765
00:42:14,440 --> 00:42:18,279
Speaker 1: in a task that would normally elicit imagery count how

766
00:42:18,320 --> 00:42:20,960
Speaker 1: many windows there are in your house or apartment, etcetera

767
00:42:21,160 --> 00:42:25,200
Speaker 1: was achieved by drawing on what participants described as knowledge, memory,

768
00:42:25,400 --> 00:42:28,560
Speaker 1: and subvisual models. Yeah, this is interesting. So this again

769
00:42:28,600 --> 00:42:30,080
Speaker 1: gets back into the idea that you end up just

770
00:42:30,200 --> 00:42:33,759
Speaker 1: utilizing different modes of memory the workforce of the brain. Yeah, right,

771
00:42:33,800 --> 00:42:36,120
Speaker 1: because I can't imagine. So if somebody said how many

772
00:42:36,120 --> 00:42:38,200
Speaker 1: windows are there in your house? I would do that

773
00:42:38,239 --> 00:42:40,799
Speaker 1: with a picture. I would picture my house and sort

774
00:42:40,840 --> 00:42:43,560
Speaker 1: of picture walking around the sides of my house and

775
00:42:43,600 --> 00:42:46,960
Speaker 1: seeing how many windows are there. But they can do

776
00:42:47,040 --> 00:42:49,719
Speaker 1: this without the picture. It's not like they're unable to

777
00:42:49,800 --> 00:42:52,640
Speaker 1: do it. So there's something else kicking in. Must be

778
00:42:52,680 --> 00:42:56,640
Speaker 1: conceptual facts logged about the house. Okay, so we need

779
00:42:56,680 --> 00:42:58,520
Speaker 1: to take one more quick break and then we'll be

780
00:42:58,680 --> 00:43:08,000
Speaker 1: right back with more a fan tasia. Now that BBC

781
00:43:08,120 --> 00:43:11,240
Speaker 1: paper that we mentioned earlier by James Gallagher. In that paper,

782
00:43:11,280 --> 00:43:16,359
Speaker 1: Gallagher spoke with one Neil kin Mure of Lancaster. Uh,

783
00:43:17,000 --> 00:43:19,440
Speaker 1: this is a self reporting individual with blindness of the

784
00:43:19,480 --> 00:43:22,400
Speaker 1: mind's eye, and he provided some interesting insight on the condition.

785
00:43:22,960 --> 00:43:24,520
Speaker 1: So I have just a couple of quotes here from

786
00:43:24,520 --> 00:43:26,720
Speaker 1: that that piece that I found were interesting, he said. Quote,

787
00:43:26,719 --> 00:43:30,160
Speaker 1: my stepfather, when I couldn't sleep, told me to count sheep,

788
00:43:30,600 --> 00:43:33,440
Speaker 1: and he explained what he meant. I tried to do it,

789
00:43:33,719 --> 00:43:36,919
Speaker 1: and I couldn't see any sheep jumping over fences. There

790
00:43:37,040 --> 00:43:40,880
Speaker 1: was nothing to count. No, that's a that's that's an

791
00:43:40,920 --> 00:43:42,719
Speaker 1: interesting because I guess that might be one of the

792
00:43:42,719 --> 00:43:47,640
Speaker 1: earliest examples of of here mentally mentally imagined this. Like

793
00:43:48,000 --> 00:43:51,759
Speaker 1: with my own uh son, I had a similar situation.

794
00:43:51,960 --> 00:43:54,520
Speaker 1: Like I distinctly remember the first time I told him

795
00:43:54,560 --> 00:43:58,000
Speaker 1: to close his eyes and encouraged him to imagine an

796
00:43:58,040 --> 00:44:00,520
Speaker 1: elephant because he was really obsessed with the elephants at

797
00:44:00,560 --> 00:44:03,239
Speaker 1: the time. And Um, I saw the delight on his

798
00:44:03,320 --> 00:44:07,040
Speaker 1: face as he imagined the elephant. Um. But you know,

799
00:44:07,080 --> 00:44:09,799
Speaker 1: after doing this research, I realized, well, there's equally a

800
00:44:09,800 --> 00:44:12,080
Speaker 1: possibility that he wouldn't be able to see the elephant.

801
00:44:12,400 --> 00:44:14,960
Speaker 1: And you know, there wouldn't be anything go wrong with

802
00:44:15,040 --> 00:44:17,760
Speaker 1: him if he couldn't see it. In the BBC piece,

803
00:44:17,880 --> 00:44:21,480
Speaker 1: um the the the interviewed individual, Neil kim Miller also

804
00:44:21,600 --> 00:44:23,719
Speaker 1: said that he had a terrible memory, but he was

805
00:44:23,760 --> 00:44:27,040
Speaker 1: good with facts and and then there's an additional quote

806
00:44:27,880 --> 00:44:30,040
Speaker 1: This is the hardest thing to describe what happens in

807
00:44:30,080 --> 00:44:32,239
Speaker 1: my head when I think about things. When I think

808
00:44:32,280 --> 00:44:35,080
Speaker 1: about my fiancee, there is no image, but I am

809
00:44:35,120 --> 00:44:38,080
Speaker 1: definitely thinking about her. I know today she has her

810
00:44:38,120 --> 00:44:40,920
Speaker 1: hair up at the back, she's brunette. But I'm not

811
00:44:40,960 --> 00:44:44,320
Speaker 1: describing an image I am looking at I'm remembering features

812
00:44:44,360 --> 00:44:47,040
Speaker 1: about her. That's the strangest thing, And maybe that is

813
00:44:47,080 --> 00:44:49,400
Speaker 1: a source of some regret. Yeah, I mean, this is

814
00:44:49,440 --> 00:44:52,239
Speaker 1: the thing because typically these people report that they it's

815
00:44:52,280 --> 00:44:54,640
Speaker 1: not like they can't they don't know what somebody looks like. Right,

816
00:44:54,680 --> 00:44:57,960
Speaker 1: It's not like that scene in like Hannibal where they

817
00:44:58,000 --> 00:45:00,440
Speaker 1: show face blindness as just seeing p but with like

818
00:45:00,480 --> 00:45:03,520
Speaker 1: smooth skin over their face. Yeah. What's that condition called

819
00:45:03,560 --> 00:45:07,200
Speaker 1: a congenital prosopagnosia? Is that a where you you have

820
00:45:07,239 --> 00:45:10,200
Speaker 1: a born condition where you just can't recognize faces people

821
00:45:10,280 --> 00:45:12,640
Speaker 1: You see people who are familiar to you, but you

822
00:45:12,719 --> 00:45:16,080
Speaker 1: just they just don't look like anybody, uh you know,

823
00:45:16,120 --> 00:45:19,120
Speaker 1: whoever that is. And and it's not like that you

824
00:45:19,239 --> 00:45:21,200
Speaker 1: or at least not for everybody. Like we said, there

825
00:45:21,200 --> 00:45:23,920
Speaker 1: seems to be a wide variation in how this applies

826
00:45:23,920 --> 00:45:26,640
Speaker 1: to people's lives, but I haven't read that it's like that.

827
00:45:26,680 --> 00:45:28,600
Speaker 1: For most people, it seems like they report, yeah, they

828
00:45:28,719 --> 00:45:32,160
Speaker 1: recognize people. Once they see a picture of of a

829
00:45:32,239 --> 00:45:35,480
Speaker 1: close family member or of the president or whoever it is,

830
00:45:35,560 --> 00:45:37,759
Speaker 1: they know who it is. They just can't make the

831
00:45:37,840 --> 00:45:40,839
Speaker 1: picture without looking at it. It's almost kind of like

832
00:45:41,080 --> 00:45:44,080
Speaker 1: we talked about in the P versus NP episode, like

833
00:45:44,120 --> 00:45:47,280
Speaker 1: the kinds of problems that once a solution is presented,

834
00:45:47,360 --> 00:45:50,000
Speaker 1: you can easily check to see if it's correct, but

835
00:45:50,120 --> 00:45:52,600
Speaker 1: you can't come up with a solution and a reasonable

836
00:45:52,640 --> 00:45:55,800
Speaker 1: amount of time by yourself. It sounds like a version

837
00:45:55,800 --> 00:45:58,280
Speaker 1: of that. You can't make the picture, but when somebody

838
00:45:58,280 --> 00:46:01,480
Speaker 1: shows you the picture, you can say, oh, yeah, that's it. Yeah, definitely.

839
00:46:01,640 --> 00:46:05,280
Speaker 1: But anyway, I I just find this condition really fascinating.

840
00:46:05,360 --> 00:46:09,400
Speaker 1: And so if you yourself are somebody who thinks you

841
00:46:09,440 --> 00:46:13,239
Speaker 1: may be experiencing a fantasia, or if you just want

842
00:46:13,239 --> 00:46:15,759
Speaker 1: to learn more about it, one interesting resource I think

843
00:46:15,800 --> 00:46:18,440
Speaker 1: would be to go and look at some of the

844
00:46:18,560 --> 00:46:22,520
Speaker 1: message boards online that have recently been created by people

845
00:46:23,040 --> 00:46:27,239
Speaker 1: who claimed to have this experience. Because there's one I

846
00:46:27,280 --> 00:46:32,239
Speaker 1: found that was a fant dot asia. Nice. Yeah, but

847
00:46:32,320 --> 00:46:35,000
Speaker 1: it's a it's just like a forum online, people talking

848
00:46:35,000 --> 00:46:38,000
Speaker 1: about their experiences. Uh, and it seems to be a

849
00:46:38,040 --> 00:46:42,120
Speaker 1: lot of people having this kind of, uh, this awakening

850
00:46:42,280 --> 00:46:44,680
Speaker 1: kind of experience. They're like, oh, man, I didn't even

851
00:46:44,719 --> 00:46:48,000
Speaker 1: realize that this was what was causing all this confusion

852
00:46:48,080 --> 00:46:50,759
Speaker 1: between me and other people all these years, or I

853
00:46:51,080 --> 00:46:53,799
Speaker 1: didn't realize I was the I wasn't the only one

854
00:46:53,800 --> 00:46:56,839
Speaker 1: who was like this, or you know, people really seem

855
00:46:56,920 --> 00:46:59,279
Speaker 1: to be having a lot of fun coming together with

856
00:46:59,320 --> 00:47:02,359
Speaker 1: a community of other people who have the same issue. Well,

857
00:47:02,440 --> 00:47:04,319
Speaker 1: like it reminds one of the whole you know, the

858
00:47:04,360 --> 00:47:07,000
Speaker 1: old example of hey, what if when I think of

859
00:47:07,040 --> 00:47:09,400
Speaker 1: purple and you think of purple? What if we what

860
00:47:09,440 --> 00:47:12,719
Speaker 1: if we're each seeing different colors? But there's never a

861
00:47:12,760 --> 00:47:14,799
Speaker 1: way to prove that out. But but this is kind

862
00:47:14,800 --> 00:47:17,160
Speaker 1: of like a case where what it's kind of like

863
00:47:17,200 --> 00:47:19,000
Speaker 1: if you were one day able to say, oh, yeah,

864
00:47:19,080 --> 00:47:21,879
Speaker 1: the purple I see is different from the purple these

865
00:47:21,880 --> 00:47:24,960
Speaker 1: people see. I'm gonna I'm gonna go hang out now

866
00:47:25,360 --> 00:47:28,000
Speaker 1: with individuals who see purple the way I see people.

867
00:47:28,320 --> 00:47:30,600
Speaker 1: I've never understood what the deal with Barney was, but

868
00:47:30,680 --> 00:47:33,680
Speaker 1: now I get it. Uh No, but so I have

869
00:47:33,840 --> 00:47:37,440
Speaker 1: all these questions about a fantasia, like what it means.

870
00:47:37,480 --> 00:47:40,480
Speaker 1: And again, just to emphasize, it does seem like we

871
00:47:40,560 --> 00:47:44,680
Speaker 1: haven't nailed down that there's a specific cause and a

872
00:47:44,800 --> 00:47:47,279
Speaker 1: very specific effect yet, because there seemed to be a

873
00:47:47,719 --> 00:47:51,200
Speaker 1: range of different ways this manifests in people's minds. It's

874
00:47:51,200 --> 00:47:54,120
Speaker 1: associated with different things. Some people dream, some people don't,

875
00:47:54,120 --> 00:47:57,279
Speaker 1: some people have memory problems, some people don't um. But

876
00:47:57,400 --> 00:47:59,719
Speaker 1: one of the things I was wondering about was can

877
00:47:59,760 --> 00:48:04,600
Speaker 1: a fantasiacs hallucinate? Yeah? So what if an a fantasiac

878
00:48:04,680 --> 00:48:09,600
Speaker 1: takes a drug that often causes visual hallucinations? Do they

879
00:48:09,640 --> 00:48:12,560
Speaker 1: see anything different? Yeah? Are they just going to get

880
00:48:12,560 --> 00:48:17,560
Speaker 1: the non visual hallucinatory effects, uh? Or is it going

881
00:48:17,600 --> 00:48:21,000
Speaker 1: to sort of ignite a type of visual imagery that

882
00:48:21,160 --> 00:48:23,759
Speaker 1: isn't normally there sort of heighten the flashes that some

883
00:48:23,800 --> 00:48:25,960
Speaker 1: of the you know, the the the occasional flashes that

884
00:48:26,040 --> 00:48:29,240
Speaker 1: some of these individuals experience. Yeah. And so I looked

885
00:48:29,280 --> 00:48:31,640
Speaker 1: this up actually on the on the forum boards, and

886
00:48:31,719 --> 00:48:34,600
Speaker 1: they had actually addressed it. So one member of a

887
00:48:34,640 --> 00:48:37,920
Speaker 1: message board said they typed a question that struck me

888
00:48:37,960 --> 00:48:42,279
Speaker 1: as intriguing. This person said they were confused Essentially, they said,

889
00:48:42,320 --> 00:48:47,200
Speaker 1: how is hallucinating different from seeing things in your mind? Again,

890
00:48:47,239 --> 00:48:50,440
Speaker 1: that question is hard to answer, but to somebody who has, uh,

891
00:48:50,680 --> 00:48:54,360
Speaker 1: you know, a mind's eye, it's very clearly different. I

892
00:48:54,719 --> 00:48:57,400
Speaker 1: don't feel like I'm hallucinating when I imagine something, But

893
00:48:57,440 --> 00:49:00,640
Speaker 1: try to describe the difference. Well, you're seeing being something

894
00:49:00,680 --> 00:49:04,799
Speaker 1: in your mind that's not there. Okay, that sounds like hallucination,

895
00:49:06,280 --> 00:49:08,480
Speaker 1: I think, but then it's also been It's also just

896
00:49:08,560 --> 00:49:11,759
Speaker 1: like seeing it. So, yeah, we come back again to

897
00:49:11,960 --> 00:49:17,640
Speaker 1: the cave. We're all still lined up staring at the

898
00:49:17,840 --> 00:49:21,000
Speaker 1: play of shadows on the wall. Yeah, some of us

899
00:49:21,000 --> 00:49:23,960
Speaker 1: maybe just have a slightly different view of the shadows

900
00:49:23,960 --> 00:49:26,759
Speaker 1: and others. Okay, Robert, I've got a question for you. Okay,

901
00:49:26,800 --> 00:49:32,040
Speaker 1: hit me. Do you think you could try to simulate

902
00:49:32,400 --> 00:49:36,080
Speaker 1: this in your in your own mind? Like? Could you try?

903
00:49:36,120 --> 00:49:38,200
Speaker 1: I know you it would be impossible for us to

904
00:49:38,280 --> 00:49:40,680
Speaker 1: really fully be able to do it, But can you

905
00:49:40,760 --> 00:49:44,960
Speaker 1: try to go through a standard day to day process,

906
00:49:44,960 --> 00:49:47,520
Speaker 1: something you would do all the time without using any

907
00:49:47,560 --> 00:49:50,840
Speaker 1: mental pictures. I was trying this morning, and I couldn't

908
00:49:50,920 --> 00:49:54,759
Speaker 1: do it. Just trying, yeah, trying not to think of

909
00:49:54,800 --> 00:49:58,040
Speaker 1: mental images immediately calls to mind mental images. It's like,

910
00:49:58,400 --> 00:50:01,959
Speaker 1: you know, telling somebody like, don't think of a rhinoceros

911
00:50:02,000 --> 00:50:05,200
Speaker 1: wearing a jet pack. Yeah, you just did it. Uh.

912
00:50:05,320 --> 00:50:07,799
Speaker 1: And even it works in the in the general sinse

913
00:50:07,920 --> 00:50:10,440
Speaker 1: just saying, try not to think of mental images, and

914
00:50:10,480 --> 00:50:14,359
Speaker 1: immediately my mind is filled with rhinoceroses and jet packs. Yeah.

915
00:50:14,360 --> 00:50:16,200
Speaker 1: I mean, if anything, I have to try and keep

916
00:50:16,440 --> 00:50:19,400
Speaker 1: from daydreaming and keep from or keep from you know,

917
00:50:19,440 --> 00:50:22,840
Speaker 1: pummeling myself with with different mental images. Uh, and and

918
00:50:22,880 --> 00:50:25,719
Speaker 1: actually focus in on a task, you know. Yeah. I

919
00:50:25,719 --> 00:50:28,480
Speaker 1: mean the way this really seems like it would come

920
00:50:28,520 --> 00:50:31,480
Speaker 1: through is like, how does if you can't have mental images,

921
00:50:31,800 --> 00:50:34,520
Speaker 1: how do you have fantasies about things you would like

922
00:50:34,640 --> 00:50:37,200
Speaker 1: to do? So you imagine, you know, your boss makes

923
00:50:37,200 --> 00:50:38,960
Speaker 1: you furious and you wish you could punch him in

924
00:50:39,000 --> 00:50:41,160
Speaker 1: the nose. You wouldn't actually do it, but you at

925
00:50:41,200 --> 00:50:44,440
Speaker 1: least have that image for a moment, right. Uh. I

926
00:50:44,480 --> 00:50:49,439
Speaker 1: think that's probably a nearly universal experience for people. Thought

927
00:50:49,520 --> 00:50:51,759
Speaker 1: of it. But what happens if you can't have that

928
00:50:51,840 --> 00:50:55,799
Speaker 1: image in your mind? Do you do? You think about it? Conceptually?

929
00:50:56,280 --> 00:50:58,839
Speaker 1: It's like I I just thinking about the concept of

930
00:50:58,840 --> 00:51:01,759
Speaker 1: punching my boss in the well. And then also even if,

931
00:51:01,880 --> 00:51:04,000
Speaker 1: like I was just thinking to myself, like, what are

932
00:51:04,000 --> 00:51:07,000
Speaker 1: some of the times when I'm actually able to to not,

933
00:51:08,280 --> 00:51:12,120
Speaker 1: you know, mentally imagine anything and have these mental visualizations

934
00:51:12,120 --> 00:51:13,960
Speaker 1: in my mind? I think, well, okay, maybe when I'm

935
00:51:13,960 --> 00:51:15,839
Speaker 1: doing yoga, because I'm able to sort of shut out

936
00:51:16,080 --> 00:51:18,080
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff, I'm able to shut off the

937
00:51:18,160 --> 00:51:21,160
Speaker 1: default mode network to a large extent. But even then,

938
00:51:22,120 --> 00:51:26,279
Speaker 1: if I'm focusing on a pose, I am also focusing

939
00:51:26,400 --> 00:51:29,879
Speaker 1: on a mental image of what I must look like

940
00:51:29,960 --> 00:51:32,640
Speaker 1: in that pose, which may or may not have a

941
00:51:32,960 --> 00:51:37,080
Speaker 1: match up to how I'm actually doing the pose. So

942
00:51:37,200 --> 00:51:39,880
Speaker 1: what is it like then to engage in a in

943
00:51:39,960 --> 00:51:44,839
Speaker 1: a physical activity like that with a fantasia? I mean,

944
00:51:45,160 --> 00:51:47,799
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously you can do it, but it just

945
00:51:47,880 --> 00:51:53,800
Speaker 1: kind of drives home just how much mental visualizations, um,

946
00:51:54,040 --> 00:51:57,359
Speaker 1: how big a role they play and just everything we do. Okay,

947
00:51:57,400 --> 00:52:01,160
Speaker 1: another question, ok, fiction writing. This is something again from

948
00:52:01,160 --> 00:52:03,759
Speaker 1: the from the Blake cross piece. So he's he is,

949
00:52:04,080 --> 00:52:07,200
Speaker 1: he's done some screenwriting, and he describes his process for

950
00:52:07,239 --> 00:52:10,680
Speaker 1: fiction writing without having mental images, which he described in

951
00:52:10,800 --> 00:52:13,839
Speaker 1: terms of words and parts of speech. I thought this

952
00:52:13,920 --> 00:52:16,520
Speaker 1: was interesting. So he said, like, when I'm imagining something,

953
00:52:17,160 --> 00:52:20,920
Speaker 1: I imagine a noun, the word, and then I imagine

954
00:52:21,000 --> 00:52:24,879
Speaker 1: a verb that follows it, the word um. And so

955
00:52:24,920 --> 00:52:28,239
Speaker 1: there's something very different about his process for writing than

956
00:52:28,280 --> 00:52:31,320
Speaker 1: I would have. So when I'm imagining a scene, there's

957
00:52:31,800 --> 00:52:34,839
Speaker 1: there's translation going on. I think of a picture, and

958
00:52:34,880 --> 00:52:37,719
Speaker 1: then I have to put the picture into words. But

959
00:52:38,160 --> 00:52:40,840
Speaker 1: could it be possible that this allows people to do

960
00:52:40,960 --> 00:52:46,399
Speaker 1: creative writing without any translation the original creative thing that's

961
00:52:46,440 --> 00:52:50,000
Speaker 1: happening these words. That's interesting. Yeah, Like they're not having

962
00:52:50,120 --> 00:52:53,760
Speaker 1: They're not in that situation that I mentioned earlier, where

963
00:52:54,120 --> 00:52:56,600
Speaker 1: as an artist or a creator of any kind, you

964
00:52:56,640 --> 00:53:00,480
Speaker 1: are stuck trying to translate the mental image into something

965
00:53:00,640 --> 00:53:03,600
Speaker 1: another person can share in. Like you said, there's no

966
00:53:03,640 --> 00:53:06,360
Speaker 1: translation going there. Well, it makes me wonder if the

967
00:53:06,800 --> 00:53:12,520
Speaker 1: maybe the ultimate form of direct written communication with almost

968
00:53:12,600 --> 00:53:16,520
Speaker 1: nothing lost in between, would be an a fantasiac writing

969
00:53:16,520 --> 00:53:21,360
Speaker 1: to another a fantasiac somebody, because there you're not translating

970
00:53:21,400 --> 00:53:25,280
Speaker 1: it into pictures on both sides or on either side.

971
00:53:25,960 --> 00:53:28,319
Speaker 1: I will say that something that does remind me of

972
00:53:28,440 --> 00:53:31,520
Speaker 1: is like in my own writing process. There there's definitely

973
00:53:31,560 --> 00:53:33,560
Speaker 1: the point where I have an image in my mind

974
00:53:33,719 --> 00:53:35,840
Speaker 1: or seen in my mind, characters in my mind, and

975
00:53:35,880 --> 00:53:38,239
Speaker 1: I'm trying to bring that to life on the page.

976
00:53:38,280 --> 00:53:41,720
Speaker 1: But then if I'll get into these situations where I'm writing,

977
00:53:42,480 --> 00:53:45,840
Speaker 1: and in a way what I'm writing is coming before

978
00:53:46,160 --> 00:53:48,800
Speaker 1: the mental image, so I kind of create the point.

979
00:53:49,280 --> 00:53:52,319
Speaker 1: Not to say it's it's a fantasia at all, but

980
00:53:52,800 --> 00:53:56,239
Speaker 1: I'm kind of writing before the mental visualization. I'm kind

981
00:53:56,280 --> 00:53:59,960
Speaker 1: of reading what I've writen I've written and and experiencing

982
00:54:00,080 --> 00:54:02,080
Speaker 1: it more or less in real time as a reader would.

983
00:54:02,239 --> 00:54:04,319
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, well, I bet you've had the experience I

984
00:54:04,360 --> 00:54:07,520
Speaker 1: know I have of writing something before you get the picture,

985
00:54:07,880 --> 00:54:10,120
Speaker 1: and then getting the picture, and then going back and

986
00:54:10,160 --> 00:54:13,959
Speaker 1: revising what you've written based on the picture. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

987
00:54:14,000 --> 00:54:17,560
Speaker 1: for sure. So this is Yeah, the writing is definitely

988
00:54:17,600 --> 00:54:20,000
Speaker 1: a fascinating area to think about this because it is

989
00:54:20,040 --> 00:54:22,680
Speaker 1: this sort of it's the mental image, but then this

990
00:54:22,800 --> 00:54:25,520
Speaker 1: stripping down of the mental image, the translating it into

991
00:54:25,760 --> 00:54:31,120
Speaker 1: into another form. Uh yeah, yeah, Well, it's fascinating to

992
00:54:31,160 --> 00:54:34,080
Speaker 1: be coming into this topic and it's such an interesting

993
00:54:34,120 --> 00:54:36,720
Speaker 1: time for it, you know, when when it seems we're

994
00:54:36,760 --> 00:54:38,760
Speaker 1: on the cusp of a lot of new learning about

995
00:54:38,800 --> 00:54:41,319
Speaker 1: what this condition is, how many people have it, what

996
00:54:41,440 --> 00:54:44,520
Speaker 1: it's like for them, And Hey, if you out there

997
00:54:45,200 --> 00:54:48,880
Speaker 1: actually experience this, if you have some level of a

998
00:54:48,960 --> 00:54:52,200
Speaker 1: fantasia or you're toward that end of the mental image

999
00:54:52,239 --> 00:54:54,440
Speaker 1: re spectrum, I think it would be great to hear

1000
00:54:54,480 --> 00:54:56,279
Speaker 1: about your experience. If you want to write in and

1001
00:54:56,280 --> 00:54:58,360
Speaker 1: tell us what it's like. Yeah, and if you're on

1002
00:54:58,400 --> 00:55:01,680
Speaker 1: the other end of the spectrum, if your hyper visualizer, uh,

1003
00:55:01,840 --> 00:55:04,280
Speaker 1: let us know about that as well. Uh. In the meantime,

1004
00:55:04,320 --> 00:55:06,040
Speaker 1: head on over to stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.

1005
00:55:06,040 --> 00:55:08,000
Speaker 1: That is the mothership. That's where you will find all

1006
00:55:08,040 --> 00:55:11,000
Speaker 1: the podcast episodes. You'll find videos, blog post links up

1007
00:55:11,040 --> 00:55:13,640
Speaker 1: to social media accounts such as Facebook and Twitter. We

1008
00:55:13,719 --> 00:55:16,000
Speaker 1: are blow the Mind on both of those. We also

1009
00:55:16,040 --> 00:55:19,239
Speaker 1: have accounts on Tumbler and Instagram. And if you want

1010
00:55:19,239 --> 00:55:21,640
Speaker 1: to get in touch with us with your experience of

1011
00:55:21,719 --> 00:55:24,520
Speaker 1: mental imagery or with feedback on this episode or any other,

1012
00:55:24,560 --> 00:55:26,600
Speaker 1: you can email us at blow the Mind at how

1013
00:55:26,640 --> 00:55:38,640
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. Well more on this and thousands

1014
00:55:38,680 --> 00:56:00,000
Speaker 1: of other topics. Is it how stuff works dot com.

1015
00:56:00,040 --> 00:56:01,200
Speaker 1: Star to start back by