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#aphantasia — Public Fediverse posts

Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #aphantasia, aggregated by home.social.

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  1. looking for recommendations to replace Xfce / Fedora 43. something simple and stable.

    I'm running a L-470 ThinkPad and Fedora has started to become unreliable and seems to be bloated and slow.

    I love Xfce but open to suggestions.

    Have been using Linux exclusively for over 25 years but no longer look forward to using the command line. I work with pictures, wood, metal, dirt, and rocks and things and never really learned to code beyond basic install, update and package manager stuff. I struggle with the abstract and always have.

    No high demands but would like something like what was promised with Gnome 2 - MATE 1.10.

    #Linux #XFCE #ThinkPad #aphantasia

  2. Except for Oliver Sacks, I have never read a single author who understands that there are people without a mind's eye. They just assume everyone is like them and can visualize things. More of us cannot than they realize. #aphantasia

  3. So that article about #Aphantasia
    I do have visual images encoded because I could see them during EMDR. The therapy is designed to help one relive blocked/hidden memories and some were very raw and vivid.
    But processed images? No.

    I have no other conconsious control. If I try to visualise something I may get a faint image running across my mind but it disappears quickly and can't be 'seen' again when I try.

    This is usually included in the range of aphantasia even if the authors don't.

    Without listening to us researchers are misunderstanding the spectrum of experiences.
    Maybe EMDR would be a better tool to use?

    sciencedirect.com/science/arti

  4. I spent months fixing my prompts. The problem wasn't prompting.
    The LLM kept pulling my original framework back into what it already knew. I named it: 𝗣𝗿𝗶𝗼𝗿-𝗗𝗮𝘁𝗮 𝗚𝗿𝗮𝘃𝗶𝘁𝘆.
    The result: 𝗙𝗿𝗮𝗺𝗲𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸 𝗥𝗲𝗮𝗯𝘀𝗼𝗿𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻.
    #AIResearch #LLM #PromptEngineering #ArtificialIntelligence #Aphantasia #Anendophasia #MentalImageryhttps://www.linkedin.com/pulse/cautionary-tale-researchers-when-llm-reabsorbs-your-cristina-gherghel-zy5gf

  5. I have folders full of published manuscripts, folders containing books ready to publish, and folders containing drafts that need editing—these will remain dead for eternity. Picture this: “The book you submitted for review is in illusion, you aphantasic moppet.”
    Just kidding. A Fantastic Theory of Mind is (a)live and kicking.
    Hip, Hip. Hurray!
    Have a look: https://link.amazon/B0chThTz9
    #SimulationTheory #PhilosophyOfMind #Aphantasia #MentalImagery #Ethics

    cristinagherghel.substack.com/

  6. 🚀✨ Welcome, #Imaginary #Visionaries, to the #Aphantasia #Guide for the Confused! This manual is so riveting, it'll make your lack of mental images seem like a thrilling episode of... nothing. 🤯 Dive in and discover the exhilarating world of not being able to picture anything—it's like trying to watch TV on a blank screen! 📺🔍
    aphantasia.com/guide #MentalHealth #Creativity #Innovation #HackerNews #ngated

  7. Here’s a really interesting thing about having #aphantasia: I legitimately don’t know / remember what I look like.

    I can’t recall what my parents look like, my wife, my dog, my cat. It doesn’t mean I don’t recognize them (I’m also rather face blind), but it means I can’t make an image of them (or me) in my head. I can’t make any images in my head at all. Not even a faint outline.

    Apparently this is unfathomable to many people.. but it also means, I think, that I don’t get any visual intrusive thoughts. I don’t know what that’s like. So the idea of triggering thoughts that are primarily visual is.. a totally intellectual concept to me, not a visual one.

    Brains are so weird.

  8. Tiny bath tableau by Emma Terry, artist who was recently diagnosed with #aphantasia
    newcityarts.org/exhibitions/em
    "Clay becomes my way of thinking in three dimensions, building forms I cannot visualize, but can come to know through making."

  9. CW: 🦄🪞🪄 (long)

    Sometimes I get this eerie feeling that the long forgotten versions of me that were only ever a question of what it could be like, are coming into my life.

    One new friend is an amazing artist, and she creates so much art with items she finds in the world around her. Feathers dropped from birds, sticks, crystals, a plastic dinosaur. She picks up items she feels compelled to create with, and it's wonderful!

    I remember many times, imagining what I could create with found items, if I had the inner artistic calling. I always thought I could be good at it if I tried, but I hadn't felt that moment of freedom where my inner artistic feelings bubbled up so that I was aware the feelings and drive were there.

    Now I feel my pull. I have so many objects that I will be using soon, to express ideas inside of me. I've gathered them for years. Dolores the headless mannequin has been hauled to Chicago and back, and I feel the inner call to create with her. I will know when it is time, for now I feel the feelings, but have no visual knowledge of how this will manifest - because aphantasia, no visual imagery in my mind.

    I have come to view this lack of visual imagery as a blessing. That would be more words than I want to use now, to tell. Let's just say, I really love surprises!

    And I have had a handful of visuals in recent months. Some in days after psychedelic use, even microdose levels. At least one having no apparent psychedelic connection. Some when awake with my eyes close, some during sleep. And now, both static and moving images.

    All of this is a new experience. I possibly had visuals when I was a toddler/young kid, but nothing I've ever remembered. I am certain I've had none since I was 8-10, at least. And this year, as I allow myself the certainty that I can reconnect with this piece of my imagination, despite having zero evidence it was possible when I started, I have begun to Understand the magic in the world around me, even when I cannot directly see it.

    My inner ability to reconnect to my mind's eye - despite 40 years of dormancy and a cyst on my pineal glad - supports my Knowledge and Understanding that all I have to do is become Aligned with myself, and I can accomplish anything I want to.

    Imagine how powerful we could all be if those of us who are Aligned with Love and who desire Peace were to join together on just this as our guiding beach - allowing a massive Alignment of Love to propel us onward.

    I have observed on myself a recent inner call to write raw words again. Unfiltered, exploratory and yet grounded words, like I write to myself. Only I feel the pull to write here. These flows always seem to last weeks, months, years before fading.

    So here I am, Allowing the flow, looking for how to open the tap inside of myself even wider. My world feels so aligned, and I am so happy to be in this moment, Now, aware of what's coming, with no details of how it will manifest. Just a Knowing that it will be as divine as I allow it to be.

    And remembering that when I write in flow, I do not need to always add clarity after, unless the reason to do so is apparent. Most of this is just allowing me to see something about myself.

    🦄🪞🪄

    *it used to interrupt my energy flow, before awakening, I'm unsure how much more healing I get to do there or if it's already complete, but I feel my mind's eye opening even more than I see it opening

    #UnicornMirrorMagic
    #UnicornJournaling
    #Aphantasia

  10. Helpful description of a lesser-known condition that can co-occur with autism: aphantasia.

    Aphantasia is an inability to visualize mental images. When someone with aphantasia tries to visualize an apple, a loved one's face, or a childhood memory, they experience no mental pictures.

    Instead of mental pictures, their mind works with facts, concepts, and knowledge.

    aphantasia.com/what-is-aphanta

    #Neurodivergence
    #Aphantasia
    #Autism

  11. I don't think I've always had aphantasia. I'm pretty sure I could see things in my mind's eye until my 20s

    I suspect that being on high doses of propranolol for several years may have taken most of my visual memory away.

    That being said, I have visual dreams.

    Brains are weird.

    #aphantasia

  12. On this Thoughtful Thursday, I have written a blog post about my inner world and what it's like inside my mind. From my experiences with visual imagination to my internal monologue and the many friendly voices in my head.

    Link: introvertnudist.com/my-inner-w

    #aphantasia #plurality #pluralGang #plural #consciousness #mentalHealth

  13. 💁🏻‍♀️ TIL: Two aphantasic researchers asked whether aphantasics #dream like they imagine.

    Most showed consistency between waking and dream sensations, though some reported no link at all. Even non-aphantasics showed wide variation in dream #smells and touch.

    👉 theconversation.com/do-your-dr

    #aphantasia #dreams #imagination #neuroscience #science #psychology #luciddreaming

  14. Oh, that's right, having aphantasia means I will forget what stuff looks like and it's perfectly acceptable to enjoy these flowers while I can

    #aphantasia

  15. Do your dreams have smells? New study on 'blind minds' reveals vast differences in imagination medicalxpress.com/news/2026-07 #aphantasia

    Heterogeneous relationships between the multisensory content of aphantasics' dreams and their volitional waking imagined experiences nature.com/articles/s41598-026

  16. 💁🏻‍♀️ TIL: 🧠👁️ Around 10% of #students experience #aphantasia, a lack of mental imagery that can make #science harder to learn.

    A study across seven #Sydney private schools found load reduction instruction boosted test scores by about 20% for these students. The #research recommends physical models and concrete language over “imagine this” prompts.

    👉 phys.org/news/2026-07-assume-s

    #education #learning #teaching #neurodiversity #classroom #psychology

  17. Llevo toda la vida pensando que hay 3 tipos de personas, los que piensan en conceptos (o palabras), los que ven imágenes y los que como yo, tienen ambas.

    Sin embargo, haciendo el test (Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire) que viene en este artículo parece que las imágenes que yo veo son una porquería comparadas con lo que ve todo el mundo ¿Cuándo os imagináis algo lo veis tal cual veis con los ojos? 🙀

    nature.com/articles/d41586-026

    #aphantasia

  18. I'm reading She Has Her Mother's Laugh by Carl Zimmer. Like so often the writer casually asks the reader to picture something in their mind.

    My mind doesn't do this but usually I mindlessly work around it. This one though:

    "DIVIDE YOUR MIND’S EYE like a split screen. On the left, picture a single bacterium. On the right, a fertilized human egg.

    The bacterium grows, duplicates its DNA, and splits itself in two, then four, then eight..."

    Can you do this?

    #aphantasia #brain #diversity #book

  19. As a person with lifelong complete and total aphantasia, I am so thrilled by my new experiences. Since beginning to commune with the divine via psilocybin earlier this year, I've had at least half a dozen visual images in my mind when I'm sober.

    Tonight I had another, during lucid dreaming.

    For over 10 years, I've been hoping something might give me a connection to my mental imagery, since I first discovered this difference in my experience. And now I'm averaging once a month! 🤯

    #aphantasia

  20. (mini review) Missing images: autobiographical memory in Aphantasia and blindness frontiersin.org/journals/cogni Congenital #aphantasia and congenital #blindness; mental imagery

  21. Ya know, #adhd has never really felt like a disability but #aphantasia sure does. I really fucking hate it

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