Journal $$$$$exyGal's Journal: Can the blind see? 30
For instance, I suffer from a moderately rare eye condition. I will go blind for 3+ hours if I'm exposed to bright light for more than a few minutes. It's like a goths wet dream. When it first happened I was probably 12 or so, and the whole time I sepnt trying to think what blind people saw suddenly made sense.
They don't see anything. Not black, nothing.
This particular topic in regards to what a blind person "sees" is a fascinating one. If you ask the average person on the street what blind people "see", they will probably say "nothing but blackness". Those were my thoughts as well until I realized many years ago that truly blind people do not see any "color" whatsoever. They do not see anything. The absence of sight is not the color black.
Just to be clear, there are many different variations of being "blind". I, myself, am "legally" blind without any contacts or glasses, but can see 20-20 otherwise. I see plenty of blurry colors even without my glasses. For the purposes of this discussion, "blind" refers to those people who do not receive any input whatsoever through their eyes (or optic nerves, etc).
My hypothesis is that blind people do not have a curtain of blackness preceding their paths. There is absolutely nothing at all. You might think that blind people do have a black curtain eternally draped in front of them, but they just cannot relate that experience to others, because they have no color-point-of-reference. That thinking would be wrong.
Imagine a new race of alien, called the Mucola, who have a seventh sense (I'll skip six for fun
The Mucola call the "there is no gravy around" tick "fubar", and call the "there is gravy within my reach" tick "yumyum". From "fubar" to "yumyum" are dozens or maybe hundreds of other degrees of ticks: "dork", "nerd", "geek", etc.
Nearly all the Mucola share this spectrum of tick words, with the exception of the Mucola who lost their GravyTicker in gravy-raiding battles. Those Mucola can remember what it was like to tick "fubar" or "yumyum", but now the ticking has completely stopped, and they tick nothing. Many of these Mucola quickly die, but some learn to find gravy using nothing but their senses of sight, hearing, smell, feeling, and taste.
What do you tick?
illegal et sy (Score:2, Funny)
I, me, myself, and I, am, is, and are "illegally" blind because we snuck across the border.
Also of interest, in a recent (within the past year) NOVA special on synesthesia* they interviewed a person who has been blind (no sight, only some 4% I beleive are of this level of blindness and can not apreciate any levels of light) for most of their life yet experiences colors and lights in responce to synesthesia.
* - I'm not quite certian whi
"legally blind" (Score:2)
People with vision worse than 20/200 vision are considered legally blind.
More Info [yahoo.com].
Re:"legally blind" (Score:1)
Re:"legally blind" (Score:1)
I talk to a lot of people who say that they're "blind" without their glasses, and not many can compete with me. I can't see anything, no matter how close it is, without my glasses. Once I was told by my optomitrist that "we don't have a wall big enough to project an 'E' for you to see clearly." Upon asking, he guessed that my eyesight was in the range of 20/1200 to 20/1400.
Lots of fun when my glasses break, let me tell ya.
Re:"legally blind" (Score:1)
I had Lasik about t
Re:"legally blind" (Score:1)
Re:"legally blind" (Score:1)
So in programming speak.. (Score:2)
Re:So in programming speak.. (Score:2)
public class BlindPerson
implements Person
extends PersonBase
{
public void see()
{
throw new RuntimeException();
}
}
hmmm (Score:3, Interesting)
Although I never really probed in detail about the lack of sight, I did really get confused a few times, for example, when my friend Mike, who was born with no connection from the eyes to the optic nerve one day says "Jesus Christ, what was that flash of light?!" in response to a police car's spotlight being aimed directly into my passenger side mirror, and catching him in the eyes. Apparently extremely bright, direct sources of light would cause the electrical impulse to actually jump across the gap in the optic nerve.
Another, who was born sighted, but gradually lost his vision due to some condition, said that occasionaly he would see swirling color patterns, kind of like when you closed your eyes really tightly.
I can't think of anyone else in that group that was completely non-sighted, though we had several friends who's vision was completely useless for navigation or recognition of anything, and a lot more than could only recognize things that were within a foot or two of their eyeballs.
All in all, an interesting time growing up amongst a group that was about 50% in the "legally blind" category, and 50% normally sighted. I think I learned that I could easily live blind, but I'd have a really difficult time dealing with life if I were deaf.. at least, if I were to become deaf at this point..
An interesting experiment (Score:1)
Let me know if anyone tries it and it works.
-Francis
Re:An interesting experiment (Score:1)
Don't do it! While IANAL I believe that this might be going illegally blind!
I have no idea what the penalty is for a crime like this but I wouldn't risk it!
-Francis
(I also forgot to mention that your sight will return to you after a second or two after you remove the ping pong balls.)
Re:An interesting experiment (Score:2, Interesting)
see everything stare into the sun (Score:1)
Re:see everything stare into the sun (Score:2)
Oh no problem just drill a hole in your head and all is good. And keep your hands off me, I don't want my circles turning into swirlies.
blindness depends (Score:1)
Re:blindness depends (Score:2)
Re:blindness depends (Score:1)
The age old statement... (Score:1)
Some people would say... (Score:2)
...that I am legally insane. But that's simply not true. ;P
Your facination with the question, "what DO blind people see" reminds me of a discussion my wife and I were having recently. It was the concept of perception and reality. I was suggesting that it could be entirely possible that nothing is what it really seems to be.
A mild example:
Perhaps what appears to be red to you is what I would call green if I saw what you saw. Take a ball for example. Let's say that this
Re:Some people would say... (Score:2)
I have also thought this. It seems possible to me that this theory could also explain why some people like red while some people like blue or green. Of course there is really no way of knowing.
Well, anyway, it is very interesting to think about.
Actually, we DO know (Score:2)
Some languages don't actually have words for "red" or "green", and nor do they need them. Think about it. If something is about to fall on you, do you really need to know what colour it is?
On the other hand, there are people who work in colour-related areas (e.g. fashion, design) who care about the difference between teal and chartreuse.
What this suggests is that colours are actually linguistic concepts, not physiological or psychological. So what you and I agree to call "red" is whatever our local res
Re:Actually, we DO know (Score:2)
How you can relate (Score:2)
Now imagine your field of vision being shrunk to half its size. Now smaller. Now really teeny. Now gone.
That's what it's like.
Re:How you can relate (Score:2)
Uh...lady? (Score:2)
I'm not sure. I must ask though; WHAT were you smoking when you wrote that stuff about the aliens, and WHERE can I get some??
But seriously...
The obvious answer (IMHO) is:
There is no answer. Speculate freely. Ponder the unanswerable all you wish, if only to exercise your brains/intellect.
Re:Uh...lady? (Score:2)
It was "Mucola" - which is similar to coke with a special dairy ingredient.
There is no answer.
Every question has an answer, unless the answer is "spoon."
Something you should see (Score:2)
Since the "Why men masturbate" thread has been archived, this was the next best place (seeing as we're talking about blindness and whatnot...) to tell you about this [slashdot.org] story [slashdot.org]. That is, if you hadn't heard already.
I want to see the $$$$exy spin on this latest info!!