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Some people can't see mental images

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183 points petalmind | 11 comments | 30 Oct 25 17:45 UTC | HN request time: 0.514s | source | bottom
1. pfgallagher ◴[30 Oct 25 19:31 UTC] No.45764287[source]▶
I have aphantasia. Like many others, I am able to see images when I dream and very rarely in a hypnagogic state.

My partner is on the opposite side of the spectrum; she can conjure mental images with ease. Our differences in that respect have led to a lot of interesting conversations.

I think aphantasia is quite misunderstood by people able to visualize. I can remember how things look, have no issues identifying faces, have a strong spatial understanding of places I've been, etc. It's hard to describe precisely; we just remember things differently.

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2. anthk ◴[30 Oct 25 19:34 UTC] No.45764317[source]▶
Instead of the whole image, you just visualize the main aspects as vectors?
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3. pfgallagher ◴[30 Oct 25 19:39 UTC] No.45764382[source]▶
Your metaphor isn't bad, actually. I just don't visualize anything. It's more like a feeling of abstract relationships. It often feels like most of my brain is in RAM; I can usually recall things almost instantly. And if I can’t, I can do the trick where you think of something else and let your mind crunch in the background until it pops up.

I should clarify that I can still imagine what a room looks like and what’s in it. I just don’t see it. It’s more like I feel the layout or know where things are, almost like navigating a mental map without any visuals. Specific details like colors, patterns, etc. are much harder to recall unless I am intimately familiar with the object or whatever.

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4. FjordWarden ◴[30 Oct 25 19:43 UTC] No.45764424[source]▶
After coming down from the shock of learning there are people like you I was even more amazed that one of the founding engineers of Pixar, and a giant in computer graphics, also has this condition. He even did a survey that found his artists where more likely to be on the aphantasia spectrum than managers. Dunno, maybe some people are so driven to create what they cannot think or see.
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5. pfgallagher ◴[30 Oct 25 19:55 UTC] No.45764556[source]▶
I’ve heard about that! My partner and I have both been learning to draw this year. I’m pretty decent at drawing observationally / from reference, but I haven’t tried much from memory. I imagine she’d be much better at that side of things. I’ve also noticed I’m not great at coming up with initial ideas or visual concepts, but once I have a topic or direction, I can absolutely run with it.

I also think it makes sense why a lot of software engineers (myself included) have aphantasia. Being “rational” is arguably easier when you’re not influenced by the emotional weight of images. Maybe we’re even less predisposed to PTSD, since we can’t visually relive things in the same way. My mind still races at night like anyone else’s, but it’s all non-visual. Just endless inner monologue instead of a reel of images. Couldn't count sheep if I tried!

6. ◴[30 Oct 25 20:50 UTC] No.45765163[source]▶
7. cperciva ◴[30 Oct 25 21:59 UTC] No.45765896{3}[source]▶
a feeling of abstract relationships

This. If you ask me to imagine a triangle I'll start thinking about having three sides and three angles and the area is half of the base times the height and it's a rigid body and the angles add up to 180 degrees... but there's no visual aspect to it.

Sometimes I wonder if aphantasia gave me an advantage in mathematics, because I had no trouble whatsoever with the concept of "abstract symbols".

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8. Refreeze5224 ◴[31 Oct 25 00:02 UTC] No.45766908{3}[source]▶
Your description matches my experience exactly, and I find it oddly comforting to know someone else has the same thing going on in their head.
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9. saltcured ◴[31 Oct 25 00:05 UTC] No.45766927{4}[source]▶
I think you have some abstract symbol capability that is not the opposite of imagery.

I lack imagery but also am nonverbal and hit limits in math. I am terrible at rote memorization or application of formulae.

I did well in math up to a point, which may have hurt me. I simply felt answers to quite a bit of algebra and some calculus, but it doesn't scale. I also got accused of cheating a couple times in primary school, when I could not explain my work when arriving at an answer very quickly.

10. pfgallagher ◴[31 Oct 25 03:43 UTC] No.45768180{4}[source]▶
Yeah, people are definitely wired differently! It’s cool to see there’s a lot more research going into how minds like ours work.
11. theshrike79 ◴[31 Oct 25 10:15 UTC] No.45770312[source]▶
My brain is like a vector database, it stores the "feelings" of information, not the actual information - if that makes sense?

I can make lightning fast connections in my head when something happens, like when something breaks in production, I see the symptomps and the vectors just connect from effect to the cause.

Can I explain to others why and how I know where the problem is? Nope. ...Or yes, but it'll take a long time for me to follow the feeling-vectors and put them into words I can actually communicate to other people.

For actual people and characters in books I also retain the shape and ...something about them, but I couldn't explain how most people in my life look like to a sketch artist.

From a previous comment of mine[0] on this subject:

> When I read a book, I kinda retain the "feeling" of the characters and maybe one or two visual traits. I can read thousands of pages of a character's adventures and I can maybe tell you their general body type and clothing - if they have an "uniform" they tend to wear.

> I've read all 5 books (over 5000 pages) of The Stormlight Archive and I couldn't tell you what Kaladin (the main character) looks like. I have no visual recollection of his hair colour, eye colour, skin tone or body type.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45687441