When I solve an imaginary logic problem such as advancing the hands on a clock I can't see the before and after states but I can infer their positions by the directions they must point and then read the new time from that.
The best example of this, and why I’m absolutely certain it’s real and there’s not just a miscommunication, is the joke “don’t think of a pink elephant”. Until I learned of aphantasia I always thought it was super dumb because you say the words pink elephant so of course you’re thinking of a pink elephant. But seemingly for a lot of people “thinking of a pink elephant” means “conjuring an image of a pink elephant”. Or something awful that people don’t want to imagine. I’ve never understood “I wish I could unsee that”.
I just responded to you elsewhere assuming that you're operating from a baseline experience of depending on visualization, but this comment has made me think you might actually also lack it, and that your assertion that aphantasia must be debilitating is from an assumption that the lack we're describing is something beyond your experience. Since it's all a matter of your internal experience, though, it's impossible for me to know.
I don’t believe that people have a high res magical image. I believe there’s something that feels like visual stimulation which is used as a reference for information. I don’t have anything that seems remotely visual.
Some people do, hyperphantasia. I can do this, perfectly visualize the details of the Mona Lisa and examine it from any angle in my mind's eye. If I am in a semi-lucid state while nearing sleep, I can do it even more intensely, as the other day I was visualizing waves bouncing around in a maze and I could see every single bounce.
However, you're right that most people cannot do it so vividly, but it is not the case to say that it's simply memories and concepts, it actually is images and video inside their heads.
Have you tried drawing the Mona Lisa from various angles? To what level of detail can you comfortably reproduce it?
Can you describe the difference to me based on your experience? I don't quite understand what it would be, because in my mind's eye, I can literally see the entirety of the Mona Lisa. It does not feel like a "feeling," like happiness or angriness, those are what I'd classify as feelings.
> Have you tried drawing the Mona Lisa from various angles? To what level of detail can you comfortably reproduce it?
I don't draw so it would be limited by my drawing ability, but I can reproduce it pretty well if I tried hard enough, as I can visualize it completely in my mind.
If drawing is not your thing, consider whether you can count the number of creases in her sleeves, or what length the shadow under her nose is, and where the light source is coming from.
Note that I'm not interested in memory aspects here. If one can't differentiate minute details, yet still see them highly realistically, then what exactly is it one sees? Probably not the same as the real thing or a photographic image.
A follow-up question would be whether the envisioned details are stable enough to draw or reason from, or whether the image keeps changing in one's head. In the latter case, the process of phantasising may be more akin to what diffusion models do.
I see what you mean, yes, it's not eidetic or photographic memory when I see it in my mind, I can't see all the small details like that, but I can see it as if I took a picture, not an extremely high resolution one that shows every brush stroke, but more akin to something like this photo's level of detail (I can visualize the people in the crowd as well) [0]. I might even say that I cannot see the details because I actually have no knowledge of them (exactly how many folds or creases there are), than being unable to visualize them entirely. For example, I can see the Mona Lisa with 4, 5, 6, folds in her sleeves, all different images in my mind. Some people however can see every crease exactly as it is but that's much rarer, it's photographic memory, and it's not really what I'd call a normal person's (without aphantasia) experience. It is likely even trainable with more exposure to the actual underlying artifact such as observing the painting in-depth and remembering via visual snapshots what it looks like.
There are others with aphantasia, perhaps milder forms of it, who cannot "see" the Mona Lisa as a photograph, they just see a blur or something more akin to curves and lines that they must focus on, sometimes without color. These people would have less stable images in my mind, but generally my images are pretty stable. I'm curious to hear about what you can see in your mind's eye. Based on what you were saying, it seems to me like you're more on the belief or feeling side, or is it that you can completely see an image in your mind that's stable?
[0] https://static01.nyt.com/images/2018/05/02/arts/02reyburn3/m...
Is there a meaningful distinction?
In the latter case, one assumes to see details, but in fact one does not, and one cannot focus on details, nor reason with them.
I'm painting a black-and-white distinction here, but I suppose that in reality it is even more complex.
Does this make sense, or do you still insist that there is no meaningful difference between these two interpretations? In that case, could you point out where you think my reasoning goes wrong?
But my original point was more that the feeling of seeing something is all there is, whether you interpret those feelings as visual or otherwise. There isn’t a homunculus in your head with a little film projector.
I tend to agree, but I suppose that the level of lossiness varies from person to person, and depends on training and concentration.
> the feeling of seeing something is all there is, whether you interpret those feelings as visual or otherwise
Interesting! Would you say that the same mechanism applies to the feeling of hearing or tasting things? Or are those fundamentally different from visual experiences?
And what about observing the real world, is that the same experience as replaying something in one's head, but using a different input source?