I’m not doubting your friend, but that kind of mental visualization ability (doing arithmetic on visualized paper) has to be extremely rare. That is savant level capability. I would say that ability depends much more on short term memory capacity than anything else. I think the visualization aspect is incidental.

> but that kind of mental visualization ability (doing arithmetic on visualized paper) has to be extremely rare. That is savant level capability

No way. I would say most of the math students I've taught at the university level could do it to some extent.

It's not all that helpful. The problem is that your visual scratch pad is quite limited. If you're forced to always rely on it you won't get far without having to unlearn bad habits.

This happens to people with amazing memories too. I can't name a single colleague at my top 10 university that has an eidetic memory. The people I've met with amazing memories have systematically had a lot of issues because of their memory. It's too easy to rely on remembering things and then you never build good heuristics and don't generalize well.

It is pretty handy in a related concept - rotating stereoisomers in organic chemistry

I can definitely see things in great detail in my mind, I don't feel like it's too hard, is it really that uncommon?

My wife always loses things, and when she is looking I just virtually walk around my house to figure out where it is. I'm not sure I see every detail, but I see most of the home. Same for if I am talking about where something is for driving, I just virtually drive there in my head and explain the major turns to them as I go. I can also picture math and programming in my head; the former usually as geometric shapes forming to solve a problem and the latter as flow charts.

I'm not the smartest person, so I'm pretty sure it's just practice that allows me to do this, as I've always been a sort of loner and had to picture books and worlds in my head to entertain myself.

I visualize mental math but anything more than 2 digits by 2 digits is hard to keep track of. Short term memory is very much the limiting factor.

Surely it isn't that rare? I can track about 8 digits total while doing mental mul/div, and I don't think of that as anything special.

I’m probably just an idiot, but I am absolutely terrible and anything that requires me to retain information in my head for a calculation.

So you could multiply or divide two four digit numbers by visualizing them?

To me that is pretty incredible!

How do you figure? Just the two inputs would take up all 8 digits, but you need to keep track of a bunch of intermediate results too.

Yeah 4x4 would be a bit much, 3x3 is doable, 3x2 is easy.

A few years back I couldn't visualize a point.

Recently I learned to read words backwards in my mind.

It's a skill.

Paramedic with aphantasia here. You're spot on that it's a huge blessing in that regard (I don't think there's any particular selection pressure for it in EMS though, I've yet to come across anyone else in the field)

What was the point at which it "clicked" for you? For me it was an AskReddit thread a few years back with a prompt of "When you hear a 'three X walk into a bar' joke, what does the bar look like?" It had just never occurred to me that people can actually visualize a bar when they hear that joke.

It clicked for me when I read Blake Ross's article on his own discovery of aphantasia:

https://m.facebook.com/nt/screen/?params=%7B%22note_id%22%3A...

I read that and went "huh. I guess I'm weirder than I thought."

Do you read fiction? I stopped when I realized I simply didn’t enjoy it, and I think that’s because I don’t see the scenes.

I do. I love reading fiction and got through thousands of fiction books in my teens.

My experience of it is quite different from most, as I have come to understand.

I never understood what people meant when they said "That character in the movie didn't look at all like I imagined him."

I always thought they just meant "I don't think the movie makers came up with a good version."

I did try my hand at writing fiction once, and I was boggled at how hard it was to do something like write a military skirmish. I was sketching maps and trying to work out topography and all kinds of details.

Now that I know people can visualize the scene then describe it, well... my difficulties make a lot more sense.

I listen to fiction audiobooks (I love reading physical non-fiction books, but can't do that for fiction).

I can certainly still enjoy the plot of a fiction story, but yeah, the fact that my experience of stories told through text/audio is apparently really limited is sad...

I'm similar. For me, I can get a "flash", but it immediately morphs into another shapeless shape.. constantly morphs, in fact.

Try this neat trick I just discovered: Try to visualize colors. Close your eyes, and just try to picture a red, then a green, then a blue. I never realized I could do this, and it actually requires a good bit of concentration. But it's super satisfying, especially given my aphantasia. I really can "see" the color like it's right there.

How's your "inner ear"? Can you hear music perfectly? I can.

I just tried your suggestion, but at least on a first attempt I can't get anything to appear.

Thanks for the idea, though!

My inner ear is nothing compared to a good composer's, but it's waaaaay better than my mind's eye, I think mostly due to years of heavy musical practice routines.

There was one memorable occasion when I was able to page through a set of flute/clarinet duets and actually hear in my head how they sounded based on sightreading the scores mentally.

I was playing a lot back then and doubt I could do it now. Two monophonic instruments also helped - I can recall individual voices or instruments fairly well, but whole arrangements much at all.

not whole arrangements, is what I meant to type.

This was one of the things that convinced me aphantasia is real (and that it's how my brain works).

I was concentrating very hard, trying to visualize _anything_ and suddenly managed to imagine a green blob. I can occasionally visualize purple as well. It's so incredibly vivid though... It makes me genuinely sad to realize most people can do that (and so much more) at will.

I don't "hear" any more than I "see" in my brain.

I definitely have aphantasia - it makes meditating both easier and more difficult. I don’t get to traverse beautifully intricate mandalas but I can very easily engage in focused metta without distraction. On occasion I will see a blue light that fades in and out.

Keep practising. Try imagining the blob turning into simple shapes. Try to imagine what the blob would look like from the other side.

I have, trust me. Most nights lying in bed I'll spend at least a little time doing exactly that, with little change (that's how I figured out I could make it purple though)

Don't do it when you're trying to fall asleep, do it when you're bored and have nothing else to do. I think I'm really good at visualizing because I spent most recesses by myself imagining I had friends.

> OTOH, an upside is that I've never had to wish for "brain bleach". I didn't understand that phrase at all until the past year or three. I occasionally think that aphantasiacs should be preferentially chosen for high-trauma-exposure jobs, like EMT - we simply can't retain those horrible moments.

I'm also an aphantasiac, as it were, and I've got some considerable trauma behind me that doesn't phase me the way that people who learn of it think that it ought to. I've never seen that expressed before but I understand what you mean. Thanks for sharing.

I've recently realized that the difference between facts I remember like some numbers and names, and things I don't remember, is that I recall them as an extremely rough image of text. Sometimes it's easy, sometimes it's hard. Sometimes I just can't. This stands out when putting in verification codes: sometimes I can hold the whole thing in my head as an image sort of like when you look at a bright object and it gets stuck in your vision where the receptors are overloaded. Sometimes I have to keep referring back every 1-3 characters.

Oddly, I can visualize things very well in specific circumstances. For example: if I spend a lot of time playing a new game, I can recall images from it and manipulate them with ease. There are times where I listen to podcasts while playing a game and images from the game pop up when I recall anything related to what was in the podcast.

> make the numbers dance in your head

That is the best description of mental arithmetic I’ve heard, I love it.

Thinking about it, I guess I solve problems by moving numbers into certain positions relative to each other based on the operations then watch them split apart/combine, grow/shrink, etc. I always assumed it was a weakness in my math skills but the dance metaphor is a profound reframing, thanks!

I still see my father in law and my step father dying (separately) very clearly, and wish I couldn't. I can see the life draining from my stepfathers half open eyes and his face as the nurse, thankfully, "made him more comfortable" [0] as he was taken off the ventilator. I can also see my father in law's blood drain from his swollen face as the heart-lung machine was disconnected. It's horrible.

[0]: I suspect that's just code for pumping him with an overdose of opiates so he would die quicker and with less spasms and no pain, but I can't be sure. I kind of think it's an open secret in medicine that they do this, though not sure, and I appreciate her service in helping us all be more comfortable in that room with her action that day.

Have you ever tried doing CAD work and if so, are you any good at it? What is that process like?

I've dabbled a bit with that kind of work and I find my mind's eye to be critical for it and I would have no idea how to undertake it if I couldn't visualize something.

I've never done CAD, but I did try 3D modeling and animation in my teens.

I was not any good at it.

I did slowly improve, but never got to where I could make anything genuinely visually compelling.

I got to be okay at working in traditional 2D media, as long as I was working from a reference photo.

Facebook needs to recruit aphantasics for moderators! I wonder if they could even find potentials with all of their data.

may I ask if you’re circumcised? I’ve read some literature on aphantasia and it may stem from early childhood trauma

I am.

I'd not heard of an early childhood trauma angle before. Thanks for mentioning it.