Face Blindness, Stereo Blindness, Aphantasia, and SDAM with Sadie Dingfelder Part 2

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People want texture.
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And again, like I'm sure like normal people apparently imagine these whole like fictional worlds in their brains, right?
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But I didn't know this was a thing, but I just knew that people like that.
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I don't really care about it.
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And so I always at every on the top of every notebook I write like sensory details.
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And then I write down.
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I literally record sensory details.
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I'm like, this carpet is the color of old beast erasers.
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Or you know, that like it smells like Christmas in here or whatever.
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Aphantasia is a condition characterized by an inability to visualize mental images in one's mind.
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If you have just discovered that you or someone you love has apantasia, or if you're just fascinated by the subject in general and love learning more about it, you are in the right place.
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The Discovering Your Mind podcast delves into all aspects of the mind's eye, including aphantasia, hyperfantasia, and everything in between.
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Enjoy part two of face blindness, stereo blindness, aphantasia, and s dam with Sadie Dingfelder.
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All right.
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Well, you know what it is.
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Yes, I do.
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I want to hear you explain it.
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Yeah.
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Oh, okay.
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So, like many people, I didn't really believe that other people could imagine things, um, could visualize things in their mind's eye.
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I thought it was a metaphor.
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Oh, like, so I'm a musician and I would play shows, and people would be like, oh, if you're anxious, like just imagine the audience naked.
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And for me, that just means imagine the audience could be naked.
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Like, you know what I mean?
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Like, it's like, imagine that these are just people that can, but I didn't realize that neurotypical people can literally like undress you with their eyes.
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They can imagine seeing like boobies or whatever, right?
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They can do that.
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And it's actually very alarming to me in retrospect.
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I'm like, oh my God, how many people have seen me naked just looking at me?
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And I just had no idea, you know.
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Another classic one is like um counting sheep.
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For me, that's exactly the same as just counting, right?
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I didn't understand, and I didn't maybe it's more like I didn't believe people when they said that they could.
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And my my best friend Miriam says that not only, I mean, she can, it's the specificity that really is convincing.
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I think she sees the sheep, and there are specific cartoon sheep jumping a specific cartoon fence on like a green hill, and there's fluffy sheep-like clouds in the sky.
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Probably she thinks it's probably from a children's book she saw at some point.
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Right.
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It's the specificity because, like, again, like if you see, so you imagine an apple.
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I can't, and you can't even do that.
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And we don't even know what it means.
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Like, we don't know how to follow the directions, even, you know.
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So for us, we're thinking just of the abstract concept of an apple.
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It's not red, it's not green, it's not Granny Smith, it's not a cartoon, it's not black and white, it's not, you know, like there's nothing specific about it.
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And that is actually our magic trick.
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That's that is like leads into, I think, our ability to generalize across experiences and to just deal with concepts because that's all we deal with.
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We are not thinking of a specific Apple.
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So we are already one level up on abstraction, and so that's just like gives you a little leg up if you're someone who is what you know thinks about ideas and wants to see how they connect to each other.
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Right.
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I'm a graphic designer, and most visual people, when they find out I have a fantasia, they're like, How in the world do you design if you can't visualize?
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It makes no sense to them.
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Yeah, but you do it on the page, right?
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Right.
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I do, I do it in real life in front of me.
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And uh, I think it helps me because of what you were talking about.
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I don't have a preconceived idea of what something should look like.
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Yeah, I get to create it and play with it in real life without trying to match some image that I've had in my head.
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Yeah, yeah.
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And actually, and I think that a lot of Afans who do art, who do visual art, enjoy the it's almost like a prosthetic imagination.
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The page or the screen allows you to see things that you can't see in your head.
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And so you enjoy messing around with it in in your vision.
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And you probably also know, but the um there's a Disney animator who has apantasia.
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Yeah, and he starts every drawing with a stroke, you know, like with the random line.
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And that is what gives him, and he had and he's famous for seeing for portraying things in perspectives that no one else would have thought of.
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So um it's so it gives him like a whole uh he gives them the whole different sort of set of tools for doing the same job.
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Right.
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And I've talked to artists where they're like they get excited about each and every little brushstroke because I don't know what it's gonna look like if I do this.
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Yeah, and actually, and that reminds me a lot of so a lot of people with aphantasia also have S dam, which is severely deficient autobiographical memory, because the relationship is that those people who can do this crazy thing where they can mentally time travel to moments from their past, and this is a very visual experience for them.
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But if you can't do that mental time travel backwards, you also can't do it forwards, right?
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And so I, you know, often have things coming up, and people ask me what I think I'm gonna feel or what it's gonna be like.
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We were supposed to move to India and it ended up falling through, but while it was still in process, uh people were like, What do you think life in India will be like?
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And I literally, I'm like, not only do I have no idea, like it seems this like a stupid question to ask to me, you know, like I'm just going in completely blind and I don't know how anyone could claim otherwise, frankly.
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Honestly, I mean, this is probably a problem for planning ahead to some extent, but it's also, I think it's a it's a very fresh way to like experience the world.
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Like it's more childlike.
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You're like, what's gonna happen?
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Who knows?
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I don't know.
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Right.
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Okay.
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Talk about kind of when and how you discovered a fantasia, you know, in relation to the face blindness, the stereo blindness, did it come before or after that?
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How did all that happen?
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It's funny.
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I mean, after so I originally just wrote an article for the Washington Post where I worked at the time on discovering I was face blind.
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And it became like a much better story than I thought it was going to be.
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Cause I, again, like I thought I was gonna go, I did all these tests, I did all this training, and I thought at the end of the day, they'd be like, Well, you're a little below average and you got a little better with all of our training.
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Instead, they were like, you were at the bottom of the heap, and you actually got almost to normal, like with all of our training, but it didn't really generalize to real life that well.
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So I wrote this article for the Washington Post magazine.
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It was really popular, and so people emailed, lots of people emailed me, and a science library emailed me about aphantasia.
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That's so basically, yeah, some people emailed me about aphantasia, and I was like, I've never heard of this.
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And then I did like a little dive into it because a lot like the story of discovering apantasia is the same actually as the story of the discovery of prosopagnosia, which is that it was originally known as a rare consequence of brain damage.
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They didn't realize that there were actually just people walking around with the developmental version of this, their brains are just not doing it.
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So basically, yeah, I started doing research and just and like quickly, I mean it's sort of obvious.
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Like, I feel like aphantasia is one of these things you don't even need to take a little online test.
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You just ask yourself, can I picture shit with my eyes closed or even with my eyes open?
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I don't even know what's easier for people.
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Uh, and if the answer is like no, then it's no, you know.
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Right.
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But the people who can picture things, I think there's actually a lot of unexplored heterogeneity there because some people can imagine objects in their world, like they could put an apple on my head, you know.
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Some people see things a very narrow field of view, and some people see a very broad field of view with their imagination.
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And I'm sure things change depending on your mood or how much you're focusing or anything.
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So it's so it's really interesting, really complicated.
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I can imagine, but it, oh my God.
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I mean, when you said like this makes a lot of sense, like, yes, like so.
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I mean, I can't follow choreography.
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I can't remember choreography, and that just seems like something that would be very like helpful if you could visualize something, you know.
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I think that that is part of my choreography problem.
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Like, my like, I can't even tell you how bad I'm so bad at choreography that people thought that I was doing it on purpose.
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Like people couldn't understand, like people just thought I was doing a little dance solo by myself on purpose.
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And I'm like, no, I'm trying to do it right.
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Like I'm trying my hardest, and I'm not, I'm trying.
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I mean, and of course, there's gonna be a fans out there who can do follow choreography, right?
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Sure.
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But they probably just do it in a way that's that uses a different toolbox.
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And that's what's kind of interesting about A Fantasia is that it's it's almost like too heterogeneous, I think, because there's some people who, even though they don't have a conscious experience of visualizing, I think that they're still doing it at a level that is a lot higher up than us.
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Or they're doing it and we're not, basically.
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Like my brother, for instance, he plays chess, he plays chess all the time.
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And I'm like, how do you play chess if you can't visualize at all?
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You know, and he's like, I think I'd be a lot better if I could.
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I play chess as well.
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Oh, yeah.
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And I talk to other people with aphantasia, one of them in particular that is very good at chess.
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And so that's why it goes back to this horses can't eat meat thing for me.
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Like the anytime we start getting into absolutes, yeah, they're not gonna hold up.
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And you're talking about, you know, people on the opposite end of the spectrum, hyper fantasia.
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It's the same thing.
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Like we have them in this group, but when you you start going through the individual questions, the differences are just amazing.
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They're just all over the place.
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And also, like sometimes people like you actually are probably a good example of someone who is drawn to the exact thing they suck the most at.
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No offense, but like maybe you were at some point you were like, I can't visualize, you know.
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Let's see what it looks like on the computer.
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Oh my God, I love this, you know.
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The most famous portrait artist that I know of, Chuck Close, was totally facelind.
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And he is famous for doing these gridded paintings that look like nothing close up.
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They look completely abstract if you're close, but if you walk farther away, right?
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They they yeah, they like become like a beautiful picture.
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And I feel like he actually, without realizing it, has given neurotypical people the experience of like being a face blind and like sort of, and if you could be cured of face blindness, it would probably feel like a resolution like that.
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Right.
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When I was in design school, I found out that about aphantasia, even though it didn't have a name back then, but I found out about the concept of it.
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Oh wow when I was in design school.
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But before, I think it was before I I figured it out, I was learning Photoshop for the first time.
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And it absolutely enthralled me.
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Like it was the most amazing thing I had ever experienced.
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I would go in on Saturdays when I didn't have to be at school, yeah, just to play with it.
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It was like just this endless world of playing with the visual things that I uh and I think that was really why, you know, I had never been able to do anything like that before, where you know, other people who are visual probably have been able to do those kind of things in their mind all along.
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And so, oh big whoop.
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But yeah, totally I was just enthralled with it.
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I could not get enough.
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That's really cool.
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Yeah, that's neat.
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Yeah, so you always end up with this little crew of people who are doing the exact opposite of what you would assume.
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In addition, like I think that that's a re like a chunk of outliers you're always gonna find.
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Yeah.
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All right.
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If you can describe what does it actually feel like to have little or no mind's eye?
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Well, of course, it feels completely normal to me, right?
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Like I've had no other experience of having a mind's eye.
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But if you are a person with a mind's eye and you could beam into my conscious experience, what would you notice?
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Like, what's the contrast?
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That's always the way I try to frame the questions like that.
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Because when people are like, what is it like to be a bat?
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Well, you'll never know what it's like for a bat to be a bat, you know, because they've been nothing but immersed in their own lives and it's completely normal for them.
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But what would it be like if you, Sadie Dinkfelder, could zoom or inhabit the conscious experience of a bat?
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What would it be like?
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You know, anyway.
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So if someone tried to zoom into my brain, given everything I've learned about myself, I mean, the first thing you would just be like is, oh my God, everything's really flat and I can't pick up cups without knocking them over.
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Like that would be the first thing you notice.
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And the second thing would be like everyone looks the same.
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Like it would probably literally, like, if you could, if you were trying to like in a cartoon portray what how I see people, like having everyone have basically the same face would be a good way to do it, probably.
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In terms of the A Fantasia and S dam, I think that you would never, I assume that people like my dad, when he's working on a carpentry project, he's like, you know, let me imagine how these things are gonna fit together.
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But it doesn't occur to me to do that, obviously, because I can't do it.
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And so I'm just all trial and error, right?
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Like I just go in and try things.
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And sometimes I try really stupid things because like I couldn't imagine it at all.
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So again, and because of my stereo blindness, for instance, like actually I remember someone asking me, a scientist asked me, like, if I was carrying a lot of boxes and then trying to get into my apartment, like how and I had to rejuggle the boxes without dropping them, like how would I figure it out?
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And so apparently he thinks about it visually, like in his mind, you know.
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And obviously, I just don't do that.
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So, in general, if someone like could beam into my conscious lived experience, I think most human beings would be like, wow, it's really quiet and peaceful.
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Right.
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It's like I'm not really, I don't have an inner monologue, I'm not thinking about a lot of things.
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All I have is actually like a vague, like I don't have a lot of sense of my own emotions either, which is totally related, like alexithymia.
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And so for me, actually, I don't even know how I'm feeling or what I think until I say it out loud or write it down.
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And I don't know if I'm sad until I'm like literally weeping.
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Like, I'm like, I'm fine, and then I'm like, oh, and I'm like, okay, I'm not fine.
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As like in the last few years, I've learned how to like sort of intuit that I have a problem about to happen, like a little bit better, but it's really just very physical.
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It's like I feel like my tear ducts like sort of burning a little bit or whatever.
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Also, the actually another way I would describe it is like I feel like this is true for all humans, but it's especially true for us, is that you are a big boat with a little rudder.
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Which is to say, like you have a lot of inertia, you have this whole machine, you're sort of like a CEO that is not real detail oriented.
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You're a big picture CEO, you don't really want to know all the details.
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And uh and and you're used, like that's your preferred uh way to deal with things.
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Do you like the analogy of it's a computer without the monitor?
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Oh, that's interesting.
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A computer without the monitor, you know what though, I do think I use real life to like try things, like you know.
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Right.
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But a computer without the monitor, sure.
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I mean, that seems very confusing because how would you interact with it?
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So I like it on some level and don't on some level too, but I like it because it helps me describe how undescribable it is, right?
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Because the only way you can tell what's going on in the computer is by what's on the screen, right?
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And my brain feels that way, like everything is happening behind the scenes.
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I cannot explain how it's doing what it's doing, right?
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It's but it's on and it's working.
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I just don't have the visuals attached to it.
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And so again, yeah, you go into real life to experience the visuals, but in the mind, the monitor is off, but all the ones and zeros are firing and going.
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Yeah, like that.
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I think it's interesting.
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It's an interesting metaphor.
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I'll have to think about it more.
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So, do you experience any of the other senses in your mind?
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Yes, I can hear, I have a great mind's ear, and that is the only reason why I even believe that real visualizers exist, honestly.
00:17:16.640 --> 00:17:21.039
Like I can extrapolate it from a mind's ear into the mind's eye.
00:17:21.200 --> 00:17:22.000
What about you?
00:17:22.400 --> 00:17:24.960
I'm a global complete aphant.
00:17:25.200 --> 00:17:26.640
I don't have any of the senses.
00:17:26.880 --> 00:17:29.839
My brother's like that too, which is kind of wild to me.
00:17:29.920 --> 00:17:32.640
But I'm a musician and I've always been obsessed with music.
00:17:32.799 --> 00:17:35.279
And so I have an excellent mind's ear.
00:17:35.359 --> 00:17:45.359
I can play pieces, I can transpose them, I can like listen to how parts might sound the same or different or how they might work together in my mind's ear, which is kind of wild.
00:17:45.839 --> 00:17:46.160
Okay.
00:17:46.559 --> 00:17:50.160
So if you have a mind's ear, why don't you have an inner monologue?
00:17:50.559 --> 00:17:52.960
Words are so different than music.
00:17:53.359 --> 00:18:00.880
In fact, they're so they're processed so differently that people who have completely lost the ability to speak can still sing in words.
00:18:01.039 --> 00:18:02.079
Isn't that crazy?
00:18:02.400 --> 00:18:02.799
Yeah.
00:18:03.279 --> 00:18:05.599
I mean, that's that's the neurological answer.
00:18:05.759 --> 00:18:17.200
And the thing about inner monologue, so I'm not gonna say I never have an inner monologue because if I'm really stressed out, especially if I'm trying to go to sleep at night and I'm really stressed out, that's when I experience an inner monologue a little bit.
00:18:17.359 --> 00:18:18.799
Like it's more like fragments.
00:18:18.880 --> 00:18:22.880
I can almost feel them breaking above the surface of consciousness, you know.
00:18:23.039 --> 00:18:24.720
And it's not a pleasant experience.
00:18:24.799 --> 00:18:29.839
It just means I'm like really stressed out and I need to like exercise or chill out or meditate or something.
00:18:30.160 --> 00:18:31.920
But does it feel audible?
00:18:32.240 --> 00:18:33.759
So, no, not really.
00:18:33.920 --> 00:18:39.039
It's just it's just like word, but it is words though, like it's worded but not audible.
00:18:39.359 --> 00:18:39.680
Right.
00:18:39.920 --> 00:18:42.240
That's how I describe my thoughts.
00:18:42.480 --> 00:18:47.599
It's a mixture of concepts and words, but words do appear in my mind, but I don't hear them.
00:18:47.759 --> 00:18:48.480
I just think them.
00:18:48.799 --> 00:18:51.759
Words never appear in my mind unless I'm really stressed out.
00:18:51.920 --> 00:19:00.000
So for me, it actually is really exciting to talk to other human beings or to write just to myself because that is how I discover what I'm thinking.
00:19:00.079 --> 00:19:04.240
I have no idea what I'm thinking until it is expressed in the physical world.
00:19:04.559 --> 00:19:09.200
Yeah, I've interviewed a few uh people with A Fantasia that it describe it that way.
00:19:09.440 --> 00:19:11.680
Like, I have no forethought at all.
00:19:11.920 --> 00:19:17.039
Yeah, I think by speaking, and then people are like, Can you think before you speak?
00:19:17.200 --> 00:19:20.480
And you're like, I don't really know conceptually how to do that.
00:19:21.599 --> 00:19:25.200
Yeah, and and also people are like, What were you thinking?
00:19:25.279 --> 00:19:39.039
Like, so one time I stuck my finger in an immersion blender and I got it cut, and it was because there was cookie dough in the immersion blender, and luckily it wasn't plugged in or anything, but you know, a lot of people were like, What were you thinking would happen when you stuck your finger in the immersion blender?
00:19:39.119 --> 00:19:40.160
And I'm like, literally nothing.
00:19:40.240 --> 00:19:49.440
So I maybe a neurotypical person would have like previewed that cut finger and not have gone for the cookie dough that looked so delicious, you know.
00:19:49.920 --> 00:19:50.240
Right.
00:19:50.400 --> 00:19:55.440
I remember when I was a kid, I carved my name into our piano.
00:19:56.319 --> 00:20:10.240
Like and and one of the things my dad always used to say to me when I was a kid is Shane, think right, because it's I just was like on autopilot.
00:20:10.319 --> 00:20:12.000
I didn't think things through, you know.
00:20:12.240 --> 00:20:25.599
And I feel like the version where I have learned, like obviously, I'm not just saying everything I'm thinking to people all the time, that would be a disaster, but the version of like sort of self-censorship just has to happen, I think, at a non-conscious level.
00:20:25.680 --> 00:20:27.759
Like, and I think I can almost feel it in my gut.
00:20:27.839 --> 00:20:34.720
Like, I'm like, that seems wrong, you know, or something like that, or like, don't say that, Sadie, or this could be a problem.
00:20:34.880 --> 00:20:36.160
Rethink this plan.
00:20:36.799 --> 00:20:37.200
Right.
00:20:37.519 --> 00:20:51.680
But in my case, I learned those things through again, trial and error, instead of thinking them through and saying, Oh, like you learn just learn through 50 years of being alive that you probably shouldn't do and say certain things, right?
00:20:51.920 --> 00:20:52.640
Totally, totally.
00:20:52.720 --> 00:21:03.759
And it is again, like I think for me anyway, like what I've learned specifically is that occasionally I'll have sort of almost a word of thought, but really just a feeling that goes, it'll be fine.
00:21:04.079 --> 00:21:13.039
And uh I've learned that when I think that, that means I really need to think about what's gonna be fine or not, you know, and like I should probably not do whatever I'm about to do.
00:21:13.359 --> 00:21:14.400
All right, very good.
00:21:14.640 --> 00:21:19.359
Still with a fantasia, but let's shift a little bit to the school system.
00:21:19.839 --> 00:21:26.640
So one of the quotes I pulled from your book is the US school system privileges the visualizers.
00:21:27.039 --> 00:21:28.799
Yeah, and the memorizers.
00:21:29.039 --> 00:21:40.640
Because visualizers are often the memorizers because they can like look at a page and sometimes really not only remember the fact, but remember where it was on the page, which is wild to me.
00:21:40.799 --> 00:21:46.079
So if you're a really great visualizer, every book is an open book test for you.
00:21:46.319 --> 00:21:59.279
Whereas if you are just a conceptual thinker and you can't visualize, then you actually have to really, really understand a concept and have it integrated into all of your other knowledge in order for it to be.
00:22:00.240 --> 00:22:02.240
Re like testable, right?
00:22:02.640 --> 00:22:10.240
But the school school systems, especially like modern, I mean, it's gotten worse since I was a kid, where they don't care if you understand anything.
00:22:10.480 --> 00:22:12.559
They just want you to be able to solve the math problem.
00:22:12.720 --> 00:22:20.480
You know, and so there's a lot of kids who just get through life by like sort of intuiting what algorithm to apply, but they don't really understand the math.
00:22:20.640 --> 00:22:28.000
And so this is kind of actually like a benefit of aphantasia in that you're not gonna be able to fake it.
00:22:28.160 --> 00:22:30.079
You know, you really have to understand things.
00:22:30.160 --> 00:22:31.200
There's no shortcuts.
00:22:31.359 --> 00:22:41.200
And I interviewed Craig Venter, who uh for my book, which and I love talking to him because he's clearly a genius and he really saw something that no one else was able to see at the time.
00:22:41.359 --> 00:22:50.160
He's the guy who, for anyone who doesn't know, he's the guy who basically beat the NIH in the race to sequence the genome.
00:22:50.400 --> 00:22:54.319
So, like in the 90s, you know, we're like, let's sequence the human genome.
00:22:54.480 --> 00:23:06.640
And uh Craig worked at NIH, and he was like, okay, the way we need to do this is to buy these machines that shatter the DNA and then use computers basically to piece them together and do the sequencing automatically.
00:23:06.799 --> 00:23:15.279
And NIH was like, no, no, the only way to do this is painstakingly with scientists doing it like one little strand at a time, you know, one and so it.
00:23:15.359 --> 00:23:22.480
I mean, I can see why conceptually you might think Craig's crazy, but he's like, no, I think this is really this is the way to do it.
00:23:22.640 --> 00:23:26.559
And so he quit NIH and just beat them at their own game, basically.
00:23:26.880 --> 00:23:32.079
At the end, they officially called it a tie because NIH like just started stealing his machines, basically.
00:23:32.160 --> 00:23:36.079
Like they went to the supplier and bought all these machines that he helped them design.
00:23:36.319 --> 00:23:39.759
And so they did start catching up when they realized he was right, you know.
00:23:40.000 --> 00:23:43.279
But anyway, so I interviewed this amazing guy, Craig Venter, who I love.
00:23:43.440 --> 00:23:45.359
He was called the bad boy of biotech.
00:23:45.519 --> 00:23:46.960
He pissed off so many scientists.
00:23:47.039 --> 00:23:53.680
If he hadn't pissed off like every scientist at NIH, he probably like would have like gotten a Nobel Prize or something, you know.
00:23:53.920 --> 00:24:04.160
But anyway, he has aphantasia and S DAM, and he also wrote a memoir, which is a funny thing for someone with severely deficient autobiographical memory to do.
00:24:04.400 --> 00:24:12.000
He often was like asked to speak at like a big honors graduation event, maybe it was in California or New York for high school.
00:24:12.160 --> 00:24:16.319
And he would ask people to raise their hands if they could visualize.
00:24:16.640 --> 00:24:26.240
And people with like near photographic memories, like very disproportionately were inhabiting this group of salutatorians and valedictorians of high schools.
00:24:26.400 --> 00:24:28.400
And then he'd be like, Can anyone not visualize?
00:24:28.480 --> 00:24:34.160
And there'd be like a couple kids, you know, who couldn't visualize at all, but still managed to do very well in school.
00:24:34.400 --> 00:24:48.799
But he's, you know, that I think that that's really good evidence that the school system is good for people who can do that rote memorization without having to integrate it into everything else you know to really understand something before you can pull it back.
00:24:48.960 --> 00:24:55.440
And honestly, I'm really bad at even the stuff that I really do understand, I can't pull it back out of context.
00:24:55.680 --> 00:24:56.960
And my husband's like this too.
00:24:57.039 --> 00:25:00.240
And we are like the worst people you want on your team for Jeopardy, right?
00:25:00.400 --> 00:25:04.160
Like I just wrote a story for National Geographic about moose migrations.
00:25:04.400 --> 00:25:08.319
So you should think that I know everything there is to know about moose migration right now.
00:25:08.480 --> 00:25:17.119
But if I went to like a trivia and like I just can't out of context pull that information back up, I have to tell you the whole story of the moose migration and how it fits into everything.
00:25:18.480 --> 00:25:20.480
Yeah, I resonate with that as well.
00:25:20.720 --> 00:25:23.680
Like I said, I was in college when I discovered this.
00:25:23.839 --> 00:25:26.240
So I started asking my wife about it.
00:25:26.319 --> 00:25:34.319
And we we were newlyweds at the time, and she's all yeah, I uh during a test, I can just pull my notes up in my mind and reading.
00:25:34.480 --> 00:25:35.359
Wow, that's cool.
00:25:35.519 --> 00:25:37.200
I'm like, that is cheating.
00:25:37.440 --> 00:25:49.680
It is cheating, you know, and I'm like, if I wrote it on my hand, I'd be caught for cheating, but you're doing the exact same thing, you're just doing it in your head, and you know that's an advantage.
00:25:50.000 --> 00:25:53.200
People who can spell really well are definitely visualizers.
00:25:53.279 --> 00:25:55.599
Like you see them spelling in the air in the national spell.
00:25:56.000 --> 00:25:56.160
Right.
00:25:56.240 --> 00:25:57.680
You see them look up and yeah.
00:25:58.319 --> 00:26:00.559
I feel like I mean, how do we learn how to spell?
00:26:00.720 --> 00:26:02.640
I don't know how to spell I just I don't know how to spell.
00:26:02.720 --> 00:26:08.319
I'm a professional writer and I am very grateful to spell check because like I literally would not be able to be a writer.
00:26:08.400 --> 00:26:09.359
I can't spell shit.
00:26:09.440 --> 00:26:13.599
I can't yeah, and for me, it's certain words, you know.
00:26:13.680 --> 00:26:16.480
There are certain words, I've spelled them a million times in my life.
00:26:16.640 --> 00:26:18.079
I still misspell them every time.
00:26:18.319 --> 00:26:19.119
Yeah, English.
00:26:19.200 --> 00:26:30.240
I feel like if you were if you're a person with aphantasia who lives in a culture where the spellings are like highly standardized and make any sense, then you would be closer to okay.
00:26:30.400 --> 00:26:34.079
But English really doesn't even try to make sense with its spelling.
00:26:34.160 --> 00:26:36.079
Like our letters are most arbitrary.
00:26:36.319 --> 00:26:37.920
Yeah, it's a mess.
00:26:38.079 --> 00:26:39.039
I agree.
00:26:40.400 --> 00:26:44.720
How has learning about your own mind changed the way you think about other people?
00:26:44.960 --> 00:26:49.039
Uh, it's really changed so much about how I deal with other people.
00:26:49.279 --> 00:27:00.480
Honestly, and it's embarrassing because again, like if people were falling short on something that I found to be really easy, then you know, it's natural, I think, to assume they're not trying, right?
00:27:00.559 --> 00:27:04.240
You don't assume that actually like their brains are working very differently than yours.
00:27:04.400 --> 00:27:06.960
And that's exactly the assumption people made about me.
00:27:07.039 --> 00:27:10.079
You know, they're like, well, it's very easy for me to recognize faces.
00:27:10.160 --> 00:27:12.960
So if you're not able to, you're clearly just not trying.
00:27:13.200 --> 00:27:16.240
And the other doing well in school, it just means you're lazy.
00:27:16.480 --> 00:27:17.359
Yes, lazy.
00:27:17.440 --> 00:27:17.680
Yeah.
00:27:17.759 --> 00:27:21.359
And I love the book title that like there's no such thing as lazy, right?
00:27:21.440 --> 00:27:23.440
Like every kid wants to succeed.
00:27:23.519 --> 00:27:24.240
They want to.
00:27:24.319 --> 00:27:26.480
It's like it's clearly what they want.
00:27:26.720 --> 00:27:28.720
I mean, I'm sure that's not true for every kid.
00:27:28.799 --> 00:27:34.319
As you point out, there's always exceptions, but most kids do they do want to succeed and they're doing their best.
00:27:34.480 --> 00:27:38.880
So, like, but also, yeah, so another version of this is like my best friend Miriam.
00:27:39.119 --> 00:27:42.240
She takes forever to get over breakups, right?
00:27:42.319 --> 00:27:44.400
Like, she there was this one guy she was obsessed with.
00:27:44.480 --> 00:27:46.319
She dated him for like a really short period of time.
00:27:46.400 --> 00:27:52.079
I feel like it was just a few months, but she was obsessing over this relationship for like another year.
00:27:52.400 --> 00:27:56.160
And I always thought that this was a choice.
00:27:56.319 --> 00:28:08.640
I thought it was she she just like is choosing to ruminate, is choosing to like visualize this guy and like replay all their moments of their relationship and think about where it went wrong or whatever.
00:28:08.880 --> 00:28:12.640
I don't even have this cognitive machinery to do that.
00:28:12.880 --> 00:28:15.759
And that's why I have this really weird.
00:28:16.160 --> 00:28:23.519
I now I know I'm the weirdo here because I get over, I mean, I've gotten over like years-long relationships, like in a matter of weeks.
00:28:23.599 --> 00:28:28.799
And I and it's interesting because I always have told people you just have to hide their photos from yourself.
00:28:28.960 --> 00:28:32.960
And then your brain loses it, it loses its visual representation.
00:28:33.119 --> 00:28:35.279
That was in my case already very shaky.
00:28:35.440 --> 00:28:47.920
And that that is the node that you use to remember all of the biographical information about your former love, and so that goes away, and then you're fine, you feel fine, and you run into them in the street, and you're totally fine, and they have a panic attack.
00:28:48.000 --> 00:28:51.440
And so that's what I thought everyone was just like choosing not to do.
00:28:51.599 --> 00:28:57.599
And I now I realize it's just my weird coping brain that allows me to do this.
00:28:57.920 --> 00:28:58.559
All right.
00:28:58.960 --> 00:29:03.680
Can you identify some upsides and downsides to having a fantasia?
00:29:04.079 --> 00:29:07.359
I think that again, like the conceptual like thinking is really helpful.
00:29:07.440 --> 00:29:14.000
I I'm I love words, and and I think it's because the only way for me to remember anything is through words.
00:29:14.240 --> 00:29:25.759
And I was always really good at analogies, you know, because it's and they're so obvious to me because I don't have any concrete, I'm not I'm dealing with, I'm always dealing with abstractions.
00:29:25.920 --> 00:29:29.759
And so that just gives you like a little bit of a head up.
00:29:29.920 --> 00:29:30.160
Yeah.
00:29:30.240 --> 00:29:36.319
So obviously for me as a writer, like I don't think I'd be a writer if I wasn't didn't have aphantasia and S Dam.
00:29:36.880 --> 00:29:40.559
And then the downside is is something that I've actually always been working.
00:29:40.960 --> 00:29:42.559
Like, I know that I'm not good at it.
00:29:42.640 --> 00:29:44.400
I didn't realize it was a thing.
00:29:44.720 --> 00:29:57.279
But um, I don't, when I'm reporting, as a reporter, you know, your main job is to go and witness something and then bring that in words to, I mean, if you're a written reporter, bring that in words to the audience, right?
00:29:57.599 --> 00:30:05.680
And so, and I'm, you know, a lot of times like I'll do that and I know that I'm only gonna remember the storyline, which is actually very helpful, right?
00:30:06.079 --> 00:30:07.839
But people want texture.
00:30:08.000 --> 00:30:14.480
And again, like I'm sure like normal people apparently imagine these whole like fictional worlds in their brains, right?
00:30:14.799 --> 00:30:17.920
But I didn't know this was a thing, but I just knew that people like that.
00:30:18.000 --> 00:30:28.160
I don't really care about it, and so I always at every on the top of every notebook I write like sensory details, and then I write down, I literally record sensory details.
00:30:28.240 --> 00:30:36.000
I'm like, this carpet is the color of old used erasers, or you know, that like it smells like Christmas in here or whatever.
00:30:38.880 --> 00:30:46.160
Share the gift of laughter with your children and grandchildren with books full of funny poetry and silly stories by Shane D.
00:30:46.319 --> 00:30:50.079
Williams, available on Shane'sBraindomain.com.
00:30:52.640 --> 00:30:55.839
So you've already told us what SDEM is.
00:30:56.319 --> 00:31:01.359
Do you think there's a link between aphantasia and SDAM and what is it?
00:31:01.599 --> 00:31:10.960
Yeah, I mean, it's I think that if you can't visualize something and if you don't have a good visual memory, we're such visual animals.
00:31:11.200 --> 00:31:12.640
So, like, I guess it's possible.
00:31:12.720 --> 00:31:19.680
I can imagine maybe a blind person reliving moments from their past through sound or touch or something like that.
00:31:19.920 --> 00:31:30.480
It might be just as vivid, but for most humans, we are, you know, our brain, I forget the percentage, but like it's like 80% of your brain is involved with sight in some way.
00:31:30.799 --> 00:31:38.400
And so if you can't visualize your past, you are not recording that past in an episodic way, I feel like.
00:31:38.640 --> 00:31:58.559
So, so again, like there are people who have, if you have aphantasia, if you really can't visualize at all, but you do have like a good or even excellent episodic memory, to me, that means that you're definitely visualizing and you're just not conscious of it, you know, and which is totally plausible and probably describes a large chunk of people with aphantasia.
00:31:58.720 --> 00:32:18.319
But if you truly, really can't visualize at all, you're it's not happening on any level of your consciousness, then you probably have SDAM, which means that you cannot do this mental time travel, which is so important to so many people because you know, people feel that their whole identity is built on autobiographical memory.
00:32:18.400 --> 00:32:21.200
And that you know that movie, um, what was it called?
00:32:21.359 --> 00:32:23.759
Uh Inside Out with the cartoons.
00:32:24.079 --> 00:32:24.400
Right.
00:32:24.640 --> 00:32:30.240
Yeah, like they that was all they represented this little girl's memories as bubbles, they're very precious.
00:32:30.319 --> 00:32:35.920
You have core memories, they're on a particular shelf, and she can relive them, she can like visit them again.
00:32:36.160 --> 00:32:39.920
And that is so wild to me because that is nothing, I can't do that.
00:32:40.079 --> 00:32:41.759
And I'm a little jealous, honestly.
00:32:41.839 --> 00:32:46.079
Like, I think it would be cool to be able to relive really cool moments from my past.
00:32:46.400 --> 00:32:49.680
And I and there's clear disadvantages here too, right?
00:32:49.839 --> 00:32:56.640
Like, I think if you don't have that visceral memory, you can fail to learn lessons of mistakes you've made.
00:32:56.799 --> 00:33:05.920
Like, there was this girl in college who like borrowed my phone card and then would like rack up like hundreds of dollars talking to her boyfriend in Canada.
00:33:06.079 --> 00:33:18.960
This was when long distance cost money, and um, and on my like phone card, and she did it like several times, and and then I would like get mad, and then people are like, Why do you keep giving it to her?
00:33:20.640 --> 00:33:22.720
And I'm like, Yeah, that's a great question.
00:33:22.880 --> 00:33:33.200
Like, so yeah, I do think that it I like sometimes I don't learn from mistakes because I do get over the stress and emotion too fast, and I don't wallow a little bit.
00:33:33.359 --> 00:33:38.000
Maybe I should wallow sometimes, like my friend Miriam does without even trying.
00:33:38.319 --> 00:33:57.359
So I get so the relationship, I think I think it's like almost I honestly think that S Dam is a better, more specific version of aphantasia that would like sort of cut out a lot of the heterogeneity if you want to do that, and then you would find a big subset of people who can't spell, who can't, you know, do math in their head.
00:33:57.519 --> 00:33:58.799
Like that's this is my guess.
00:33:58.880 --> 00:34:01.039
And I'm of course, there's always outliers.
00:34:02.160 --> 00:34:12.719
Yeah, I've I've always found SDAM to to be confusing in relation to apantasia because on some level they sound like the exact same thing.
00:34:12.960 --> 00:34:19.760
There are certain definitions I've read of STEM where like, well, that just sounds like aphantasia, right?
00:34:20.239 --> 00:34:29.280
But as someone with apantasia, I've never really identified with SDAM because I've always felt like my memory's pretty darn good.
00:34:29.599 --> 00:34:35.119
So if you took a test, okay, so I took this test and it's the autobiographical memory interview.
00:34:35.280 --> 00:34:38.719
And it's again, like, as you can tell, there's a fine distinction.
00:34:38.800 --> 00:34:46.800
Like, how do you know when I'm telling you a rich, beautiful, detailed story from my past that I'm not able to like re-experience it?
00:34:47.039 --> 00:34:50.480
And the and the way, I mean, there's ways to tell.
00:34:50.639 --> 00:34:51.519
There's ways to tell.
00:34:51.599 --> 00:35:02.320
And and um, they're they're built into this autobiographical memory test that is like it's a it's an interview-based test, and it's really kind of like you have to kind of be trained to code it.
00:35:02.559 --> 00:35:07.760
But it's again those irrelevant details that they're looking for, the weather, the day of the week.
00:35:07.920 --> 00:35:21.519
And so that's how you can tell if someone really is not doing um episodic memory, even though we all probably a uh people with S DAM on average love telling stories about our lives because that's the only way we remember things.
00:35:21.840 --> 00:35:33.039
So, another interesting thing about it is aphantasia and SDAM were being studied at the same time without each other knowing about the other.
00:35:33.360 --> 00:35:40.960
So, in a lot of ways, I think they were studying the same thing, but focused on different aspects of it.
00:35:41.360 --> 00:35:45.920
The SDM researchers are memory researchers, and we know how memory works.
00:35:46.000 --> 00:36:02.960
And so they can actually see like how our brains are not consolidating memory in the normal typical way, and they can see actually the structural differences and predict what kinds of structural differences you would have in like certain small parts of your hippocampus.
00:36:03.119 --> 00:36:20.159
And then another really another finding that I think was fairly robust is that most people, your hippocampus, which is like your memory consolidation mini organ, basically, it tags your episodic memories, it tags like all the elements of it and then replays it for you, right?
00:36:20.400 --> 00:36:28.639
And so people who can do that are most human beings, and they're you know, in your right hemisphere is your vision hemisphere.
00:36:28.880 --> 00:36:35.920
And so that area, your hippocampus on your right side, it's going to be bigger.
00:36:36.079 --> 00:36:43.360
Like so, most people have an asymmetry with a bigger right side hippocampus because memory is visual for most people, very visual.
00:36:43.599 --> 00:36:47.599
But that they find the opposite asymmetry for people with S DAM.
00:36:47.920 --> 00:36:58.800
So I think it's a better, it's a better theory, it's a better concept just because it allows you to make predictions about humans because it's more narrow and it's less heterogeneous as a group.
00:36:58.960 --> 00:37:09.440
Whereas like with just asking people like if they can visualize or whatever, like that you would get just a way too many different versions of that, I feel like.
00:37:10.079 --> 00:37:10.400
Okay.
00:37:11.360 --> 00:37:15.519
Do you think someone who can visualize can have S Dam?
00:37:16.880 --> 00:37:17.679
Yeah, definitely.
00:37:17.840 --> 00:37:19.119
You do definitely do it.
00:37:19.360 --> 00:37:21.760
I don't think it would be likely though, you know.
00:37:22.159 --> 00:37:25.119
I got a comment on one of my YouTube videos.
00:37:25.360 --> 00:37:27.760
I want to read it to you because I think it's fascinating.
00:37:29.039 --> 00:37:33.599
He says, I can imagine images in my mind, so I don't have a fantasia.
00:37:33.840 --> 00:37:36.000
But my memory has always been very bad.
00:37:36.079 --> 00:37:40.079
And since learning about this, I think it's because I have S Dam.
00:37:40.719 --> 00:37:44.639
I can remember some facts about my life, but I cannot relive them.
00:37:44.880 --> 00:37:48.239
I can't remember things from a first-person perspective.
00:37:48.559 --> 00:38:02.320
And if I try to remember a scene that happened to me visually, I think I must reconstruct the details into an imaginary scene because it's from a different perspective in the room, and I see myself in the image.
00:38:02.480 --> 00:38:02.960
Oh wow.
00:38:03.280 --> 00:38:07.599
Like seeing a movie of myself from another perspective.
00:38:07.840 --> 00:38:08.400
Yeah.
00:38:08.719 --> 00:38:09.760
That's so interesting.
00:38:09.920 --> 00:38:12.320
Yeah, I think that I think he's probably right.
00:38:12.480 --> 00:38:18.639
Like he he's someone who can visualize, but didn't his brain doesn't use it for episodic memory for whatever reason.
00:38:19.280 --> 00:38:25.679
So one of the questions I ask people all the time is, are your memories in first person or third person?
00:38:25.920 --> 00:38:26.400
Yeah.
00:38:26.719 --> 00:38:34.400
And I've had several people answer that they mostly happen in third person, which is always seems weird to me, right?
00:38:34.559 --> 00:38:38.400
And then later on I ask them, Do you feel like your memories are accurate?
00:38:38.719 --> 00:38:53.199
I need to go back and look and see if those people are who are seeing their memories in third person feel like their memories are accurate or if they have good memories in general, because again, I just ask the questions and see what they say.
00:38:53.599 --> 00:38:59.599
But this comment has really helped me think about STEM in a different way than I have before.
00:38:59.760 --> 00:39:04.719
I I wasn't sure that it could happen without aphantasia.
00:39:04.880 --> 00:39:18.000
But what he describes is I can visualize, but my memories, I'm reconstructing them into third-person things, and therefore they're not that reliable and they're probably not that detailed either.
00:39:18.239 --> 00:39:18.480
Yeah.
00:39:18.639 --> 00:39:18.960
Right?
00:39:19.199 --> 00:39:19.760
Yeah.
00:39:20.079 --> 00:39:24.639
But you know, the thing about reliability and memory, I mean, there's this paper.
00:39:24.719 --> 00:39:28.800
I always I want to do like a TikTok on this paper because I'm obsessed with it.
00:39:29.039 --> 00:39:38.960
They discovered that people, normal, neurotypical people, like have a extremely good memory for recent, relatively actually, I don't know, they even tested it a year later.
00:39:39.119 --> 00:39:39.840
They could remember.
00:39:40.000 --> 00:39:51.519
So I did this test and I just was so bad at it, where they made me do like a tour of the art of this building that I was in, like uh the Rotman Research Institute in in Toronto.
00:39:51.760 --> 00:39:58.639
And so it was like a it was, you know, a guided audio tour, and you went to point one and they pointed out a couple things about the art.
00:39:58.719 --> 00:40:01.360
And you went to point two and they pointed out some stuff about the art.
00:40:01.519 --> 00:40:06.400
And then they, and then later they were like, Did you do this thing first or this thing first?
00:40:06.480 --> 00:40:07.840
Or what did you do after this thing?
00:40:07.920 --> 00:40:10.239
And I'm like, I have no idea, you know, no idea.
00:40:10.400 --> 00:40:13.440
And they'll be like, Do you remember the color of the plate?
00:40:13.679 --> 00:40:15.199
Was this an image of a woman?
00:40:15.599 --> 00:40:18.480
That kind of thing, you know, and I'm just like, I have no idea, no idea.
00:40:18.639 --> 00:40:26.960
But the people, the neurotypical people who have this visual ability to replay their memories visually, like are actually really doing it.
00:40:27.039 --> 00:40:29.119
And it's actually like really good.
00:40:29.519 --> 00:40:30.639
It's weirdly good.
00:40:30.880 --> 00:40:35.679
Because like a lot of there's a ton of research on memory failure, you know, as we all know.
00:40:35.840 --> 00:40:41.519
And and it seems like it shouldn't work because every time you replay a memory, you do overwrite it, right?
00:40:41.920 --> 00:40:52.559
But we evolved to be able to do this, and the people who can do it, which is most people, are like surprisingly good at it, unless they're in a psychology experiment where people are trying to trick them.
00:40:52.719 --> 00:40:57.199
And then you can, there's like definitely a lot of examples of memory failures.
00:40:57.360 --> 00:41:01.440
But if you look at it on a whole, people are astonishingly good.
00:41:01.599 --> 00:41:04.960
Most people are astonishingly good at episodic memory.
00:41:05.360 --> 00:41:08.960
In this experiment, did you know you were gonna be tested afterwards?
00:41:09.280 --> 00:41:10.079
I totally knew.
00:41:10.159 --> 00:41:16.079
I mean, I did, yeah, and I and I did I try, yeah, I knew, but I feel like that makes a big difference to me.
00:41:16.320 --> 00:41:21.039
If I know somebody's gonna be asking me about stuff, I pay more attention.
00:41:21.280 --> 00:41:25.119
If I don't know, I don't, I just I don't pay attention.
00:41:25.360 --> 00:41:29.440
Yeah, but even trying my best, like I failed, like failed, failed.
00:41:30.880 --> 00:41:31.199
Okay.
00:41:31.920 --> 00:41:44.559
In your book, you talked about how some people have a more difficult time accepting S Dam than they do A Fantasia when they discover that they have these things.
00:41:44.880 --> 00:41:46.239
Uh, can you talk about that?
00:41:46.559 --> 00:41:49.360
Yeah, I mean, uh for the problem is the name, right?
00:41:49.519 --> 00:41:51.119
A Fantasia sounds kind of cool.
00:41:51.280 --> 00:41:54.400
It sounds like Fantasia, like the great Disney movie.
00:41:54.559 --> 00:41:59.519
And whereas S Dam, I mean, it says it has the word damn in it, so it sounds like you're damned.
00:42:00.159 --> 00:42:06.880
And it it really makes you sound like a non-player character because people believe their memories make up their whole identity.
00:42:07.199 --> 00:42:12.559
And it's episodic memories that are the ones that are really important to people personally, you know.
00:42:12.719 --> 00:42:20.559
Like you see, a lot of people when they figure out they have aphantasia, there's a lot of mourning happens where people are like, What other people can do this?
00:42:20.719 --> 00:42:21.599
I wish I could do that.
00:42:21.679 --> 00:42:23.039
I feel like I'm I've been cheated.
00:42:23.119 --> 00:42:28.480
You know, and I'm always a little surprised by that because it's like other people can have a lot of things you don't have.
00:42:28.800 --> 00:42:29.840
Right, right.
00:42:30.400 --> 00:42:34.559
Like, I mean, other people have yachts, and I don't feel cheated that I don't have one.
00:42:34.639 --> 00:42:46.559
But anyway, but with S Dam, I feel like it's actually almost everyone is mourning the fact that they don't have this ability to replay memories, and it feels like a real shortfalling.
00:42:46.639 --> 00:43:00.719
But Brian Levine and everyone who studies it uh is like, no, it's just the it's just an extreme, just like there's on the other extreme is HSAM, which is why it's called S Dam, because HSAM is highly superior autobiographical memory.
00:43:00.880 --> 00:43:07.920
And again, we are a culture that that worships at the altar of memory, you know, and autobiographical memory in particular.
00:43:08.000 --> 00:43:12.800
Like we think Alzheimer's is the is the worst thing that can befall someone, you know.
00:43:13.039 --> 00:43:21.519
I think there's a lot of people who are on the S DAM side of the spectrum, and every person like who's older than 70 basically ends up on the S DAM side.
00:43:21.840 --> 00:43:25.119
I want to talk about HSAM real quick since you mentioned it.
00:43:25.199 --> 00:43:31.440
I've read a few people's experience with that, and it is mind-boggling what they experience.
00:43:31.679 --> 00:43:36.480
And when you were describing super recognizers, it kind of reminded me of that.
00:43:36.639 --> 00:43:40.639
Do you do you think there's any tie there or just two separate things?
00:43:41.280 --> 00:43:41.840
You know what?
00:43:41.920 --> 00:43:58.239
I mean, I wouldn't be surprised if there's like a relationship, a correlation, but I don't think I mean again, like your face recognition system is so special that it's really possible that someone could just have a super souped up face recognition system and not be good at remembering any other kind of thing.
00:43:58.400 --> 00:43:59.760
And in fact, about half of people.
00:44:00.320 --> 00:44:04.559
Who are face blind have no other problems with object recognition.
00:44:04.639 --> 00:44:09.440
They can tell cars apart, they can tell houses apart, but half of us do.
00:44:09.840 --> 00:44:10.960
And I'm in that half.
00:44:11.119 --> 00:44:16.960
And I try to get into like anyone else's car, like any red sedan style car I'll try to get into.
00:44:17.199 --> 00:44:20.000
I've literally broken into people's cars by accident.
00:44:20.159 --> 00:44:21.679
I've let out a dog one time.
00:44:21.760 --> 00:44:25.360
I had to chase it around the parking lot and stuff it back into someone's car.
00:44:26.719 --> 00:44:27.679
Oh wow.
00:44:28.079 --> 00:44:28.400
Okay.
00:44:29.199 --> 00:44:36.639
Uh now that we've talked about each one of those in depth, uh, let's talk about kind of how they interact.
00:44:36.880 --> 00:44:42.480
How does face-blindness, memory differences, and imagination differences overlap?
00:44:43.039 --> 00:44:44.880
And how are they distinct?
00:44:45.199 --> 00:44:45.920
Oh, you know what?
00:44:46.239 --> 00:44:57.920
It's interesting because like people do say you see a lot of face-blind people who can visualize will say that the faces are fuzzy and in a way that the other things they're visualizing do not feel fuzzy to them.
00:44:58.159 --> 00:44:59.840
I think that's really interesting.
00:45:00.079 --> 00:45:03.760
Because obviously, I'm yeah, I'm not really visualizing anything.
00:45:03.840 --> 00:45:05.679
So I'm I would never notice a fuzzy face.
00:45:06.000 --> 00:45:08.079
I would be excited if I saw a fuzzy face.
00:45:08.480 --> 00:45:11.679
But yeah, so that I think that's an interesting interaction.
00:45:11.920 --> 00:45:16.159
It makes it harder for people to reconstruct faces in their visual imagination.
00:45:17.039 --> 00:45:18.000
Very interesting.
00:45:18.239 --> 00:45:18.880
Yeah.
00:45:19.679 --> 00:45:23.440
Why do these differences matter beyond just curiosity?
00:45:23.599 --> 00:45:27.119
What can they teach us about human diversity more broadly?
00:45:27.440 --> 00:45:37.119
The main thing for me, like the big life lesson, is like we no one is having the same inner experience as me, and almost no one is having the same outer experience as me.
00:45:37.360 --> 00:45:50.719
That's not the same like lesson you would get if you were fairly neurotypical, but still knowing that there are some people who are really not living in the same world you live in, is I think a really profound thing to think about.
00:45:50.960 --> 00:45:53.840
And and also I think it's something people don't even do with animals.
00:45:53.920 --> 00:46:00.960
Like you should really think about like people use it, it's so human to like anthropomorphize dogs, for instance, right?
00:46:01.199 --> 00:46:01.840
Or cats.
00:46:02.000 --> 00:46:11.360
Especially, I think cats are especially alien, like to our understanding, because they're not originally very social creatures and humans are extraordinarily social.
00:46:11.840 --> 00:46:16.159
Cats don't have the emotions, these sort of social emotions that we have.
00:46:16.320 --> 00:46:18.159
And this is what allows me to that.
00:46:18.480 --> 00:46:22.960
I feel so bad, but my one of my cats is very skinny and he really wants treats.
00:46:23.039 --> 00:46:26.800
And I would love to give him treats, but when I do, he barfs and it makes him skinnier.
00:46:27.039 --> 00:46:35.280
So I give my kitten, who is not allergic to treats, like an infinite amount of treats directly in front of Fuzz, like directly in front of him.
00:46:35.440 --> 00:46:37.840
And he never takes it personally.
00:46:39.599 --> 00:46:46.159
And I feel like a dog would, like a dog would, and like a human certainly would, a monkey would, you know.
00:46:46.400 --> 00:46:52.559
So like if you try to imagine what is it like to live in a brain that really doesn't have jealousy as an option.
00:46:52.800 --> 00:47:00.800
Like they also, there's also one, it's just one study, but it really seemed accurate to me that cats do not have a sense of causality.
00:47:01.199 --> 00:47:09.119
So they they had strings that if the cats pulled them, that it would cause, you know, the other part of the string to move and they could get like the treats.
00:47:09.280 --> 00:47:11.599
And as long as it was, they were like that, the cats got it.
00:47:11.679 --> 00:47:14.719
But if those strings were sort of crossed and occluded, they didn't get it.
00:47:14.880 --> 00:47:17.119
Whereas dogs got it, no problem.
00:47:17.360 --> 00:47:25.519
So I, you know how cats are always knocking things off counters, and people see their cats doing that and they think it's intentional because it looks intentional.
00:47:25.679 --> 00:47:28.880
The cat looks at the thing, you say don't do that, and they do it anyway, right?
00:47:28.960 --> 00:47:36.000
And it look, it feels like defiance, but it's actually because they have to keep checking gravity because they don't have a sense of causality.
00:47:36.079 --> 00:47:39.920
So they're like, what happens today if I knock this thing off the counter?
00:47:40.159 --> 00:47:47.039
I think this is like one of the ways in which people misinterpret things because they're attributing human cognitive abilities.
00:47:47.199 --> 00:47:55.360
I mean, humans are very unusual in the animal kingdom for a lot of our cognitive abilities and um a lot of our social emotions and things like that.
00:47:55.519 --> 00:47:57.920
And it's just not happening with your cats, guys.
00:47:58.000 --> 00:48:00.960
Like your cat is not retaliating against you.
00:48:01.039 --> 00:48:04.800
If your cat pooped on your pillow because and while you were gone, like he probably missed you.
00:48:04.880 --> 00:48:07.440
I don't know why he did it, but it wasn't a retaliation.
00:48:10.079 --> 00:48:10.559
All right.
00:48:10.719 --> 00:48:12.880
I know more about cats than I used to.
00:48:13.360 --> 00:48:24.880
And yeah, so this is like a big deal to me because I do think that it's fun to imagine other minds being that are so different from yours, and the realization that this includes other humans, it's not just other animals.
00:48:25.039 --> 00:48:27.280
Oh my god, can I tell you something about horses?
00:48:27.599 --> 00:48:29.440
Horses do not have language.
00:48:29.519 --> 00:48:38.639
I mean, obviously, all other animals don't really seem to have language, but they don't categorize and generalize things like humans, but they have an incredible visual memory.
00:48:38.800 --> 00:48:45.679
So if you have like a pile of farm equipment and one little thing moves in that pile, it you would not notice, probably.
00:48:45.760 --> 00:48:51.760
Like a human wouldn't notice if like the rake got like fell over or like moved like a quarter foot or something like that.
00:48:52.000 --> 00:48:58.000
Your horse will 100% notice and it will startle at that thing, like it's a new thing they've never seen before.
00:48:58.159 --> 00:49:08.639
And like similarly, if you have like a hose, like that's always coiled up in the barn, but like someone like leaves it on the floor, the horse doesn't think, oh, that's a hose and it's safe and I'm used to it.
00:49:08.880 --> 00:49:13.840
It's like that's a completely new object I've never seen before in my life, and I it could be dangerous.
00:49:14.159 --> 00:49:15.840
Wow, that's interesting.
00:49:16.159 --> 00:49:24.480
Can you imagine going through the world without language lumping things together, you know, and and having language for things changes how you see them.
00:49:24.800 --> 00:49:31.199
Knowledge literally changes how you see the world, and it what you're paying attention to changes how you see the world.
00:49:31.519 --> 00:49:31.760
Right.
00:49:31.840 --> 00:49:45.920
And I've said a lot of times that uh aphantasia, just knowing that it exists, has opened my mind to possibilities, and I find myself so much less judgmental of other people.
00:49:46.480 --> 00:49:46.960
Yeah, totally.
00:49:47.280 --> 00:49:51.840
Again, like I have no idea at all what it's like to be you, no idea.
00:49:52.079 --> 00:49:57.039
Yeah, so you do you, and I'm not gonna judge you for it no matter what.
00:49:57.280 --> 00:50:02.639
So I I just think that's a positive that can come from all of this.
00:50:02.880 --> 00:50:03.519
Yeah.
00:50:03.920 --> 00:50:04.719
And you know what?
00:50:04.800 --> 00:50:10.639
I feel like the agnosia part of like prosupagnosia, the not knowing is really important.
00:50:10.960 --> 00:50:14.159
Like, like you just said, I don't know what it's like to be you.
00:50:14.400 --> 00:50:23.039
And that, and sort of like embracing not knowing something is something that I think could like really improve everyone's life in so many different areas.
00:50:23.280 --> 00:50:27.519
Because I politically, everyone has an opinion on this or that, you know.
00:50:27.760 --> 00:50:34.239
Everything is really complicated, and there's people who have written theses about the thing that you're interested in.
00:50:34.400 --> 00:50:34.960
You don't know.
00:50:35.119 --> 00:50:43.039
I guess what my point is is that like there's a few things that I feel like I've studied in great depth, and even then I'm like, I know that I don't know a lot.
00:50:43.679 --> 00:50:48.320
Yeah, yeah, I have totally embraced I know that I don't know.
00:50:48.639 --> 00:50:55.760
I'm a science journalist, and so I'm actually always trying to get scientists to tell me facts, and they're they like won't admit, they won't.
00:50:55.920 --> 00:51:00.480
I one point I was like arguing with this vision research, and he's like, nothing's settled, science.
00:51:00.559 --> 00:51:04.880
And I'm like, okay, but like it's more settled than not, and he's like, nothing's settled.
00:51:05.679 --> 00:51:06.320
Yeah.
00:51:06.800 --> 00:51:07.119
Okay.
00:51:07.679 --> 00:51:16.320
One of the things that you talked about in your book that I liked is you said that you felt like an observer rather than really being in the world.
00:51:16.480 --> 00:51:17.519
Can you talk about that?
00:51:17.840 --> 00:51:20.320
Uh, it's such it's like a level of comfort too.
00:51:20.400 --> 00:51:27.199
It's so much more, I'm way more comfortable being an observer and versus being a participant in the world.
00:51:27.360 --> 00:51:31.920
And I've actually really been trying to like break the fourth wall that I've always lived behind.
00:51:32.079 --> 00:51:35.440
But I think in part, I think it's literally just because I'm stereo blind.
00:51:35.519 --> 00:51:41.440
And so I'm never truly immersed in the world visually and the way that most other people are.
00:51:41.760 --> 00:51:51.440
But also, I think if you're kind of an outsider and you have a brain that's not working the same as everyone else, you have that perspective that other people don't have.
00:51:51.599 --> 00:51:56.880
And that is kind of a gift because it allows you to see things that other people can't see.
00:51:57.760 --> 00:51:58.480
Isn't it funny?
00:51:58.559 --> 00:52:03.199
There's so many visual metaphors, but obviously I'm not seeing nearly as much as most people.
00:52:04.239 --> 00:52:09.440
But but in the conceptual sense, I I have like a completely different angle on the world.
00:52:09.599 --> 00:52:15.199
But it's also like if you're a little bit aloof and detached, like that is kind of a safety margin.
00:52:15.519 --> 00:52:23.280
And so I've been trying, actually, like through improv to like force myself to be a participant and not just be an observer, you know.
00:52:24.079 --> 00:52:30.000
Another phrase that you said in your book that I really liked was hidden neurodiversity.
00:52:31.039 --> 00:52:39.440
So how does the fact that these differences are hidden, how does that affect the study of them and the acceptance of them?
00:52:40.159 --> 00:52:41.840
I mean, I think it's really interesting.
00:52:42.000 --> 00:53:03.119
I don't, I feel like in the past, people would not have been as accepting of the concept of apantasia, the idea that there are people who can't do like a mental thing that other people do effortlessly, because there's just a skepticism of that for some reason, a real belief, a core belief that everyone is basically the same.
00:53:03.360 --> 00:53:26.480
And like the thing is, like, from an equality standpoint, that's actually a good way to feel, you know, and and like if you have the sense that everyone's worth the same amount, then you can continue on and be like, okay, but but also people are working with a completely different toolbox, like some people are, you know, and some people are like really impaired in a lot of areas of their lives.
00:53:26.719 --> 00:53:40.719
And actually, I really feel like this is like my proselytizing, and is that like the neurodivergents out there who are doing great, like I feel like I'm doing great because I've been lucky to have a life that I can build around my strengths.
00:53:40.880 --> 00:53:45.039
Like my whole career and everything about my life is built around my strengths.
00:53:45.199 --> 00:53:48.320
Even like things like, you know, I can't remember where I put my keys.
00:53:48.400 --> 00:53:52.239
So I put my keys like in the same spot, you know, and it's fine, it works great.
00:53:52.480 --> 00:53:58.000
But if I was like forced to go back to middle school, like it would be a fucking disaster, like it was when I was in middle school.
00:53:58.079 --> 00:54:06.320
Like I can't find my locker twice in a row, I can't like to get the lock to work, I can't get, you know, the right books out.
00:54:06.559 --> 00:54:15.440
You know, it's like there's just so many things that in the context of a rigid system, you can't like make work, you know.
00:54:15.679 --> 00:54:24.559
So, and I think those of us who are thriving, it's our job to like try to advocate for like especially the kids or the people who are just not able to thrive as well.
00:54:24.639 --> 00:54:33.840
And so that's why I love neurodiversity because it's like it's an idea that's separate from ability or disability, you know, and it's all context dependent.
00:54:33.920 --> 00:54:39.519
So like you can be disabled in one context, but not in a different in a context, you could be super abled, you know.
00:54:39.840 --> 00:54:57.280
So I think that I'm really excited about like the increasing acceptance of differences in your brains that is independent of worth, you know, because I think in the past that's how we sort of policed equality is we're like, no, you're the same, we're all the same.
00:54:57.440 --> 00:55:01.119
But having it's like a more nuanced, better version of equality.
00:55:01.440 --> 00:55:07.679
But that said, though, I'm honestly like constantly thinking about the our emphasis on intelligence.
00:55:07.760 --> 00:55:09.679
Like humans are obsessed with intelligence.
00:55:09.840 --> 00:55:13.360
We love to know what other animals are really smart, octopuses, crows.
00:55:13.519 --> 00:55:16.400
And we also like really care about what humans are really smart.
00:55:16.480 --> 00:55:24.079
And we have theory of multiple intelligences to be like more inclusive, even though that theory itself like kind of falls apart fast in the empirical literature.
00:55:24.320 --> 00:55:34.559
But the point here is that I would like for us to like let up on the intelligence thing a little bit, you know, like okay, fine, humans are the most intelligent, but cats like have better balance.
00:55:34.719 --> 00:55:36.400
So, like, I don't know.
00:55:38.000 --> 00:55:39.360
I get it, I get it.
00:55:39.760 --> 00:55:53.760
Part of me is always a little bit amazed about we're this far into humanity and we're just barely getting to the point where we understand that our internal experience is different than others.
00:55:53.920 --> 00:56:02.800
And I feel like one of the things that has really helped it kind of become more, at least a little more known than it has been in the past is the internet.
00:56:03.360 --> 00:56:04.480
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:56:04.800 --> 00:56:10.559
And I know that you talked a little bit in your book too about how the internet influenced the facelind world.
00:56:10.719 --> 00:56:18.239
So just talk a little bit about the internet and how you think it's influenced all four of these um things that we've talked about.
00:56:18.559 --> 00:56:24.880
Yeah, I mean, honestly, the internet super the earliest internet superusers were people with rare diseases and disorders.
00:56:25.039 --> 00:56:29.679
They found each other on usenet groups immediately and then they connected themselves with researchers.
00:56:29.760 --> 00:56:35.840
And it's great when that happens because it advances research and it gives like a more human angle to the thing.
00:56:35.920 --> 00:56:39.840
Like it could help you figure out your research priorities, for instance.
00:56:40.079 --> 00:56:46.000
And so this is also true for people with like brain quirks, like things that I wouldn't necessarily call disorders.
00:56:46.159 --> 00:56:52.800
Well, prosapagnosia is probably fairly disorder, it's it kind of fits in the disorder category pretty well.
00:56:53.039 --> 00:56:58.239
And the people who couldn't, you know, who couldn't recognize people found each other.
00:56:58.480 --> 00:57:02.880
And they went and because of they actually they couldn't do the research online yet.
00:57:02.960 --> 00:57:07.440
They literally went to a university library and found the word prosopagnosia.
00:57:07.599 --> 00:57:17.280
And then they connected with a scientist who a vision scientist who was studying prosepagnosia the only way it was known at that time, which was through brain damage.
00:57:17.440 --> 00:57:25.679
And he was like, Oh my god, like congenital or like developmental prosopagnosia is a whole different thing that could teach us a lot about how brain works.
00:57:25.920 --> 00:57:28.320
Anyway, so that's I do love it.
00:57:28.400 --> 00:57:34.639
It allows the internet allows little weird groups of people that would not otherwise be able to find each other to find each other.
00:57:34.800 --> 00:57:36.800
And I and this works in like trivial ways too.
00:57:36.880 --> 00:57:49.519
Like, so for instance, you know, as a Gin Xer, it never would have occurred to me, like I know that I would like to, I like to put on a fake mermaid tail and pretend to be a mermaid in the water at the age of 40, whatever.
00:57:49.840 --> 00:57:52.800
It would never occur to me to try to find those other people.
00:57:53.119 --> 00:57:57.840
But when I met some younger people, it absolutely did occur to them to try to find those other people online.
00:57:57.920 --> 00:58:06.239
And so now there's this whole mermaiding community, and we're basically just like free divers in costumes, but it's a thing, and we've all found each other, and it's great.
00:58:06.400 --> 00:58:08.960
So that's one thing the internet is so good at, I feel like.
00:58:09.119 --> 00:58:23.119
And with algorithms these days, I do feel like people are able to find diagnoses like or near diagnoses or you know, little groups that they belong to that they otherwise would have no idea that they belong to.
00:58:23.519 --> 00:58:24.159
Right.
00:58:25.519 --> 00:58:25.840
Okay.
00:58:26.400 --> 00:58:30.800
Um, the other thing I really liked in your book was when you talked about labels.
00:58:31.199 --> 00:58:35.519
Uh, can you talk about some of the pluses of having these labels and some minuses?
00:58:36.000 --> 00:58:36.320
Yeah.
00:58:36.480 --> 00:58:42.559
I mean, obviously the problem with all labels is that it they flatten texture.
00:58:42.800 --> 00:58:50.079
And so, like you say, face blind, and that you know, collects a group of people together who can't recognize faces, and that's helpful to know.
00:58:50.239 --> 00:58:55.840
And we all have a lot of common experiences, but there's a lot of different ways to be bad at faces.
00:58:56.000 --> 00:58:59.039
And so the label flattens those differences.
00:58:59.280 --> 00:59:00.800
Same with aphantasia, right?
00:59:00.880 --> 00:59:05.039
Like aphantasia people generally use it to mean like visual, right?
00:59:05.199 --> 00:59:20.800
And I've seen new words floating around for the other kinds, but again, it flattens, it flattens out people and it includes the people who can like pass these rotation tests, you know, or like, and and those of us who can't and can't even understand how the other people are passing it.
00:59:20.960 --> 00:59:21.119
Yeah.
00:59:21.199 --> 00:59:22.719
So here's what I think about labels.
00:59:22.880 --> 00:59:26.159
All labels are imperfect descriptions of reality.
00:59:26.320 --> 00:59:37.440
And what they give you is like a little group, like they give you a shared identity and they help you sort of come up with workarounds and like share experiences because you're usually the odd person out.
00:59:37.840 --> 00:59:40.639
And having a label and finding your group is really helpful.
00:59:40.880 --> 00:59:47.519
The negative side is that when they take on a life of their own, like you don't want to make it your whole identity, right?
00:59:48.800 --> 00:59:55.199
And I guess like my general feeling about all labels is is like how useful are they and who are they helping out?
00:59:55.360 --> 01:00:00.559
And if they're helping out the people you want to be helped out, then they should, we should keep using them.
01:00:00.639 --> 01:00:03.840
And and if they're not helpful, then drop them.
01:00:04.159 --> 01:00:04.639
Amen.
01:00:06.400 --> 01:00:06.880
All right.
01:00:07.119 --> 01:00:08.239
Last couple questions.
01:00:08.400 --> 01:00:10.239
I want to ask this in two different ways.
01:00:10.639 --> 01:00:17.119
So the the first way is if you could wave a magic wand and get rid of your neurodiversity, would you do it?
01:00:17.519 --> 01:00:20.559
No, because like that's like literally just erasing me, right?
01:00:20.719 --> 01:00:27.519
And that's the thing about neurodevelopmental disorders, is all these things get woven into every part of you, you know.
01:00:27.679 --> 01:00:32.960
And this is why people who are autistic don't like the people first language, like person with autism.
01:00:33.039 --> 01:00:34.800
It's like, actually, that's who I am.
01:00:34.960 --> 01:00:36.719
So so obviously, no.
01:00:36.880 --> 01:00:39.119
Now, would I like to have these experiences?
01:00:39.280 --> 01:00:42.400
Like, I would love to have the experience to visualize.
01:00:42.559 --> 01:00:45.760
I don't think that it would be a great new addition to my life, though.
01:00:45.920 --> 01:00:51.760
You know, like I think it would probably be distracting and annoying because I know how to do all the things already.
01:00:52.000 --> 01:00:53.920
Anyway, yeah, being able to recognize people.
01:00:54.000 --> 01:01:02.239
So I've often thought like it would be fun to like have Google Glass that tells me everyone's name and like who they are, but I probably wouldn't wear them all the time, you know.
01:01:02.400 --> 01:01:06.159
And anyway, we're not gonna get them because they would creep people out, probably.
01:01:06.800 --> 01:01:07.119
Okay.
01:01:07.679 --> 01:01:14.719
If you could wave a magic wand and get rid of one of your stereo stereo blindness, yeah.
01:01:14.800 --> 01:01:16.159
I would love to see in 3D.
01:01:16.239 --> 01:01:19.039
I hear it sounds beautiful, it sounds amazing.
01:01:19.280 --> 01:01:29.119
Being able to like really literally see it would be like being suddenly being able to see color or something, you know, like it would be a total transformation of the visual world.
01:01:29.280 --> 01:01:30.719
And I think that'd be really fun.
01:01:30.880 --> 01:01:40.960
It's also really overwhelming to people who have done it and you like want to take a week off work or something because your whole world is crazy and you have to take naps a lot to deal with it.
01:01:41.519 --> 01:01:42.400
Okay, Sadie.
01:01:42.480 --> 01:01:43.360
That is pretty much it.
01:01:43.519 --> 01:01:45.920
Thank you for sticking with me for so long.
01:01:46.159 --> 01:01:50.800
Is there anything else you would like to say or talk about before we sign off?
01:01:51.119 --> 01:01:52.239
No, it's been so fun.
01:01:52.400 --> 01:01:53.199
Thank you so much.
01:01:53.519 --> 01:01:54.320
You are welcome.
01:01:54.480 --> 01:01:56.639
This one was really interesting and really fun.
01:01:56.719 --> 01:02:02.159
I learned a lot, and I appreciate your book and your insights and your work that you do.
01:02:02.239 --> 01:02:06.639
And I appreciate you as a unique person that I'm glad I met.
01:02:06.800 --> 01:02:07.440
So thank you.
01:02:07.760 --> 01:02:08.239
Thank you.
01:02:08.400 --> 01:02:10.320
You've got such a good mission.
01:02:12.239 --> 01:02:20.480
If you like what you hear, please subscribe, follow, and engage with us, and share it with your friends and family as we continue to explore this fascinating subject.
01:02:20.719 --> 01:02:25.519
For additional information about this episode or Shane's brain, check out the show notes.
01:02:25.679 --> 01:02:28.719
Thanks for listening to the Discovering Your Mind podcast.
01:02:28.880 --> 01:02:30.719
You are beautifully unique.