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A comment on People Who Can't Picture Anything Are Rewriting the Science of Imagination. Parent comment

Re:People Who Can't Picture Anything Are Rewriting the Scien... by Gamemaster1379 on Tuesday September 15, 2026 @02:35AM (#49708557)
When you express you have aphantasia to someone, one of the most common questions is whether you can dream. As someone with it: Yes I can dream. They're so real they are lifelike. And not just visually. In my dreams, reality and history itself can be different and to me, history didn't change. It just is.

I rememeber in one dream I was some sort of captain and I saw one of my closest friends. We'd been crewmates for the past 40 years and I remember all my memories with him and why I trusted him with my life. I was 22 when I had the dream.

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Re:People Who Can't Picture Anything Are Rewriting the Scien... by iinnPP on Tuesday September 15, 2026 @04:11AM (#49709308)
That's fascinating. Do you gain access to facts or knowledge that are verifiable afterwards? Have you ever become fluent in a foreign language for a dream?
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Re:People Who Can't Picture Anything Are Rewriting the Scien... by t-3 on Tuesday September 15, 2026 @07:28AM (#49710904)
In my experience, it feels real but the feelings doesn't really hold up to scrutiny. It's more like the set of a play than a real world, where a thin facade evokes all the right cues in the audience but couldn't actually be used to trick someone into thinking it's real.
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Re:People Who Can't Picture Anything Are Rewriting the Scien... by Gamemaster1379 on Tuesday September 15, 2026 @12:08PM (#49714684)
Within the confines of the dream? Yes? Outside of the dream? Once I'm awake it feels real for a moment but quickly snaps back that it was all fictitious
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Re:People Who Can't Picture Anything Are Rewriting the Scien... by throwaway91033 on Tuesday September 15, 2026 @04:34AM (#49709486)
I don't have aphantasia but I sometimes also have dreams that are so realistic that when I wake up I feel as if it was some type of alternative reality. In some cases it is also as if I am watching a "movie" where the life I am experiencing is not my own, but I will still know each person.
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