Aphantasia
Intro
A couple years ago, I learned about Aphantasia, which according to the wikipedia article, is “the inability to voluntarily visualize mental images”. From the moment that I heard about it, I was pretty sure I had it. For one, I always just assumed that “visualizing” or “picturing” things was a metaphor.
Below is a representation on different people’s visualization ability. On this scale, I rate around a 5.
What’s interesting about Aphantasia is that it, generally speaking, only affects voluntary visualizations, like trying to visualize something. Most aphantasics, myself included, are able to dream, just not visualize, say, an apple.
No real downsides
While I’m pretty sure the vast majority of my (non-existent) readers can’t relate to the idea of not being able to visualize stuff, I personally find that it doesn’t really make a difference in day to day life. Researchers have found that aphantasics have less acurate autobiographical memories and less precise working memories, but apart from that, I don’t think it really matters.
Not even a good excuse
While I’d like to blame aphantasia for everything, as previously stated, it doesn’t really affect anything. In fact, lots of people with aphantasia have even gone on to do creative stuff, like game design and animation, meaning that my lack of prowess with art is solely my fault.