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As a person who can see, this is my best way to explain to a blind person what sight is like (feel free to critique this ) (self.Blind)
submitted by FloopingtonsGhost
I've been thinking about this for a long time and I think this explanation, while not perfect, comes very close to successfully explaining what it's like to see. Being able to see is incredibly similar to feeling objects with your hands. Your eyes can feel objects without actually touching them. How is this possible? Well maybe it's sort of similar to how you can feel wind even though you can't reach out and grab wind. Wind simply comes through the air and you can feel it. To see things, when you point your eyes at an object, the object's shape very quickly moves through the air and into your eyes. When you point your eyes at a lamp, the lamp's shape quickly moves through the air into your eyes, your eyes feel the shape and tells your brain, okay this is a lamp, and if you approach the lamp with your hand out, you can feel it with your hand instead. But the major catch here is that your eyes can feel lots of shapes at the same time. Take out a pen. Put the pen in your hand and feel the pen. Now point your eyes at the pen. Imagine that your eyes are feeling the pen. Literally imagine that you are feeling the pen with your eyeball and you can feel the shape right inside your eyeball. Now imagine you can feel the shape of your hand with your eyes. Think about your eyeball feeling the shape of your hand. Now imagine you can feel the shape of the pen and your hand at the same time with your eyes. Take your time. Your eye is feeling and sending both shapes to your brain at the same time. Now imagine you're standing in your bedroom with your eyes pointed towards some of the furniture and things that you own. Your eye can feel the shape of lots of objects at the same time. All the objects' shapes are moving through the air and into your eyes. You feel them all at the same time and the shape of everything in your room is sent to your brain, and the longer you stand there with your eyes pointed in that direction, the more times you feel all those shapes, over and over, like two times per second. The longer you look at them, the longer you feel all the shapes with your eyes, the more information is sent to your brain about all the shapes. The shapes keep getting sent to your brain repeatedly, so fast, and so much that you can walk around without using your hands because you always know where all the shape are at. You feel like you're barely doing any work because all the shapes continue to float towards your eyes like wind through the air and your eyes can keep feeling all the shapes over and over without getting very tired. Except when you read. There are just so many tiny little words to feel with your eyes, your eyes might get tired and sore after a while.
Well that's my best explanation. It might sound silly to other sighted people, to break down the process so much, but I think this explanation comes mighty close to how seeing works.
Well that's my best explanation. It might sound silly to other sighted people, to break down the process so much, but I think this explanation comes mighty close to how seeing works.
fastfinge 8 points 7y ago
I think it's just a little oversimplified. In fact, this was exactly how I used to think about sight when I was a child. Unfortunately, that system was too simple to be useful. It doesn't really take into account some of the most important things to remember about sight, and thus isn't useful when interacting with sighted people.
First of all, it doesn't take into account light level, or the type of light. Objects viewed in sunlight look quite different from the same object viewed in moonlight, or harsh hospital light. This is important for a few reasons. Most obviously, it's important to remember to think about lighting when asking a sighted person to look at something. Even to this day, I will sometimes ask a sighted person to, for example, identify the inputs on the back of my stereo, when I don't have a flashlight anywhere near at hand, and there is just no way the room lights are going to light up the wires back there in the corner. Then I have to waste someone else's time while I spend 15 minutes scrambling to find a flashlight or some other light source. Less obviously, where you're going and what you're doing can effect what colours of clothes you might want to wear. If you're traveling at night, for example, you want to make sure to dress in bright colours, and have something reflective on you, so cars will see you coming. But if you're traveling to a TV station to be interviewed on camera, this is probably exactly what you don't want to do. Teaching blind children about sight using your explaination wouldn't allow them to get to grips with just how important brightness and type of light can be.
Second of all, you really don't talk about colour at all. And that's a huge oversight. Knowing the primary colours, how to match colours, what colours are associated with what moods, etc, are hugely important if you can't see. While a lot of that stuff would just come naturally to sighted people, for those born blind, they're just a set of rules that we have to memorize. And we *do* have to know them, if we ever want to make our own fassion decisions, decide what colour of sofa we want to buy, or paint the bedroom walls a reasonable colour. If we want to live an indipendant life, and make a decent impression on the sighted folks around us, we must do all of those things.
Thirdly, you've missed out on perspective entirely. It still strikes me as odd that far away objects look small. But never the less, it's a thing I need to know. When asking a sighted person to guess at the size of something, it's useful to know how they make that judgement (by using other objects for scale, etc).
Fourthly, you've left out a lot of other important information about sight. Obviously, people can't see behind them, unless they turn their head to look. But when you're 3 or 4 years old, and can't actually see people turning their heads to look behind them, that isn't so obvious at all. It's important for someone born blind to have at least a passing understanding of things like peripheral vision, blind spots, what degree of vision most people have, how far away they can see objects, and how the details they can make out change for far away objects.
If I had to explain sight to a child born blind, and keep in mind I was born blind myself so this probably isn't something I should ever do (but it's the Internet, and everyone on the internet is always wrong all the time anyway), I'd probably make a comparison with sound. Colours are sort of like notes. Just like notes, some colours have names, but those names are just markers on a continuous scale of colour, that goes from black at the bottom, to white at the top. And just like cords of notes, particular colours go together and harmonize well, while others do not. Also like cords, different combinations of colour evoke different moods in viewers. When we hear far away sounds, they sound quieter; never the less, we can usually tell the difference between a sound that's far away, and a close sound that's just quiet. Similarly, far away objects look small, but other clues can help people tell the difference between a far away object, and a small object that's close. Also, far away sounds are much less detailed than close ones, in the same way far away objects can seem less detailed than close ones. Although people can see much farther than they can hear...I'm not sure exactly how much farther, but people can see airplanes even when the sound of the airplane doesn't reach the ground. But the main differences between hearing and seeing are: light is required to see objects, an object doesn't have to be making sound to be seen, and it's possible to look away from things. You can't just not hear something by turning your ears away from it in the same way you can just not look at something. Similarly, we can hear things going on behind us almost as well as we can hear things going on in front of us, but to see something behind them, a sighted person must happen to be looking that way. The fact that eyes must focus on what they're looking at in a way that ears don't is also the thing that makes almost all stage magic possible. I'm not sure it would be possible to perform an audible magic trick, or a trick that relied entirely on any other sense like touch.
IMHO that would get the basics across much better than an explaination that relies on the sense of touch. And as the child grows up in an entirely sighted world, that would quickly get refined into a more nuanced understanding.
Edit: and now I'm wondering about an almost unrelated question. Assuming there was air between the earth and the moon to carry sound vibrations, and that the moon was putting out as much audible energy as the energy currently contained in the light it reflects, could we hear the moon? What about other planets? Stars? I'm pretty sure we could hear the sun; we can feel the energy it's putting out. This may have been the most useless nonsense I've ever wondered.
First of all, it doesn't take into account light level, or the type of light. Objects viewed in sunlight look quite different from the same object viewed in moonlight, or harsh hospital light. This is important for a few reasons. Most obviously, it's important to remember to think about lighting when asking a sighted person to look at something. Even to this day, I will sometimes ask a sighted person to, for example, identify the inputs on the back of my stereo, when I don't have a flashlight anywhere near at hand, and there is just no way the room lights are going to light up the wires back there in the corner. Then I have to waste someone else's time while I spend 15 minutes scrambling to find a flashlight or some other light source. Less obviously, where you're going and what you're doing can effect what colours of clothes you might want to wear. If you're traveling at night, for example, you want to make sure to dress in bright colours, and have something reflective on you, so cars will see you coming. But if you're traveling to a TV station to be interviewed on camera, this is probably exactly what you don't want to do. Teaching blind children about sight using your explaination wouldn't allow them to get to grips with just how important brightness and type of light can be.
Second of all, you really don't talk about colour at all. And that's a huge oversight. Knowing the primary colours, how to match colours, what colours are associated with what moods, etc, are hugely important if you can't see. While a lot of that stuff would just come naturally to sighted people, for those born blind, they're just a set of rules that we have to memorize. And we *do* have to know them, if we ever want to make our own fassion decisions, decide what colour of sofa we want to buy, or paint the bedroom walls a reasonable colour. If we want to live an indipendant life, and make a decent impression on the sighted folks around us, we must do all of those things.
Thirdly, you've missed out on perspective entirely. It still strikes me as odd that far away objects look small. But never the less, it's a thing I need to know. When asking a sighted person to guess at the size of something, it's useful to know how they make that judgement (by using other objects for scale, etc).
Fourthly, you've left out a lot of other important information about sight. Obviously, people can't see behind them, unless they turn their head to look. But when you're 3 or 4 years old, and can't actually see people turning their heads to look behind them, that isn't so obvious at all. It's important for someone born blind to have at least a passing understanding of things like peripheral vision, blind spots, what degree of vision most people have, how far away they can see objects, and how the details they can make out change for far away objects.
If I had to explain sight to a child born blind, and keep in mind I was born blind myself so this probably isn't something I should ever do (but it's the Internet, and everyone on the internet is always wrong all the time anyway), I'd probably make a comparison with sound. Colours are sort of like notes. Just like notes, some colours have names, but those names are just markers on a continuous scale of colour, that goes from black at the bottom, to white at the top. And just like cords of notes, particular colours go together and harmonize well, while others do not. Also like cords, different combinations of colour evoke different moods in viewers. When we hear far away sounds, they sound quieter; never the less, we can usually tell the difference between a sound that's far away, and a close sound that's just quiet. Similarly, far away objects look small, but other clues can help people tell the difference between a far away object, and a small object that's close. Also, far away sounds are much less detailed than close ones, in the same way far away objects can seem less detailed than close ones. Although people can see much farther than they can hear...I'm not sure exactly how much farther, but people can see airplanes even when the sound of the airplane doesn't reach the ground. But the main differences between hearing and seeing are: light is required to see objects, an object doesn't have to be making sound to be seen, and it's possible to look away from things. You can't just not hear something by turning your ears away from it in the same way you can just not look at something. Similarly, we can hear things going on behind us almost as well as we can hear things going on in front of us, but to see something behind them, a sighted person must happen to be looking that way. The fact that eyes must focus on what they're looking at in a way that ears don't is also the thing that makes almost all stage magic possible. I'm not sure it would be possible to perform an audible magic trick, or a trick that relied entirely on any other sense like touch.
IMHO that would get the basics across much better than an explaination that relies on the sense of touch. And as the child grows up in an entirely sighted world, that would quickly get refined into a more nuanced understanding.
Edit: and now I'm wondering about an almost unrelated question. Assuming there was air between the earth and the moon to carry sound vibrations, and that the moon was putting out as much audible energy as the energy currently contained in the light it reflects, could we hear the moon? What about other planets? Stars? I'm pretty sure we could hear the sun; we can feel the energy it's putting out. This may have been the most useless nonsense I've ever wondered.
wadss 3 points 7y ago
> This may have been the most useless nonsense I've ever wondered.
sound is simply the air molecules getting knocked around in an organized fashion by something. if nothing knocks around the air, then there is no sound.
the thing is, the moon or any other celestial object doesn't vibrate like the surface of a drum would. a drum surface is elastic, so if you hit it it vibrates back and forth, the moon isnt. so even if there was air, it wouldn't vibrate, and we certainly wouldn't be able to hear it. if you held up a candle, you can feel the heat, but you can't really hear it, just because something radiates energy of some form doesn't mean it can be translated to be explained via sound.
an interesting note though, even though there isn't much of it, the universe is filled with gasses, mostly hydrogen. and under certain conditions, those gasses flow, condense, and form shockwaves just like air does on earth like wind, fog, or a sonic boom. a great deal of astronomy is trying to understand how these gasses behave in bulk. so while *technically* you can have sound in space, it isn't something audible unless you manipulate it with a computer at which point it isn't really genuine anymore.
sound is simply the air molecules getting knocked around in an organized fashion by something. if nothing knocks around the air, then there is no sound.
the thing is, the moon or any other celestial object doesn't vibrate like the surface of a drum would. a drum surface is elastic, so if you hit it it vibrates back and forth, the moon isnt. so even if there was air, it wouldn't vibrate, and we certainly wouldn't be able to hear it. if you held up a candle, you can feel the heat, but you can't really hear it, just because something radiates energy of some form doesn't mean it can be translated to be explained via sound.
an interesting note though, even though there isn't much of it, the universe is filled with gasses, mostly hydrogen. and under certain conditions, those gasses flow, condense, and form shockwaves just like air does on earth like wind, fog, or a sonic boom. a great deal of astronomy is trying to understand how these gasses behave in bulk. so while *technically* you can have sound in space, it isn't something audible unless you manipulate it with a computer at which point it isn't really genuine anymore.
fastfinge 2 points 7y ago
You *can* hear a candle, if you get your ear close enough to the flame. It makes a kind of quiet hissing sound. But speaking from personal experience, if your ear is close enough to hear that, your ear is too close, and it's time to rethink your short-term life choices. Fires, matches, and almost anything else that creates heat do make sounds of some kind. But it could be that those sounds are just caused by the air movement around the flame.
Yes, I do know how sound works, and that it's quite different from the way light works. When I was writing the question, I knew it was poorly worded nonsense, and not actually getting at the thing I was wondering. So, with a fresh cup of coffee, I'll take another shot. I guess the real question is: is the ear more sensitive to sound than the eye is to light? Based on my understanding, I feel like people can see farther than they can hear just because there's more light around, and because it can carry through a vacuum, when sound cannot. However, if I replaced all of the 100 watt light bulbs in my house with 100 watt speakers, and turned them up full blast, my house would be so loud I could hardly think! Yet sighted people don't find my house overly bright, even if I turn on all the lights. A second, related question would be, can the light from a 100 watt light bulb be seen at a larger distance than the sound from a 100 watt speaker can be heard? But even that doesn't quite work; sound waves lose energy far quicker than light does. But that's how I got to my silly question about the moon and stars. I was wondering if the same amount of energy that hits your eye when you look at the moon or a star, if it hit your ear as sound, could be heard. According to Wikipedia, when the sun is shining, 1050 watts per square metre hit the surface of the earth. Thinking about 1050 watts of sound is really quite a lot! But I suspect that light bulb wattage and speaker wattage can't quite be interchanged the way I'm doing.
Yes, I do know how sound works, and that it's quite different from the way light works. When I was writing the question, I knew it was poorly worded nonsense, and not actually getting at the thing I was wondering. So, with a fresh cup of coffee, I'll take another shot. I guess the real question is: is the ear more sensitive to sound than the eye is to light? Based on my understanding, I feel like people can see farther than they can hear just because there's more light around, and because it can carry through a vacuum, when sound cannot. However, if I replaced all of the 100 watt light bulbs in my house with 100 watt speakers, and turned them up full blast, my house would be so loud I could hardly think! Yet sighted people don't find my house overly bright, even if I turn on all the lights. A second, related question would be, can the light from a 100 watt light bulb be seen at a larger distance than the sound from a 100 watt speaker can be heard? But even that doesn't quite work; sound waves lose energy far quicker than light does. But that's how I got to my silly question about the moon and stars. I was wondering if the same amount of energy that hits your eye when you look at the moon or a star, if it hit your ear as sound, could be heard. According to Wikipedia, when the sun is shining, 1050 watts per square metre hit the surface of the earth. Thinking about 1050 watts of sound is really quite a lot! But I suspect that light bulb wattage and speaker wattage can't quite be interchanged the way I'm doing.
wadss 3 points 7y ago
>I guess the real question is: is the ear more sensitive to sound than the eye is to light?
this is an interesting question, but i'm no biologist so i'm not equipped to answer it, maybe you can ask it in /r/askscience
> But I suspect that light bulb wattage and speaker wattage can't quite be interchanged the way I'm doing.
although wattage means the same in both cases, you are correct that they have very different outcomes. this is due to the fact that their method of energy transmission is different. for example a person with a sledgehammer can thoroughly destroy a wooden shed in a couple of hours, this person might only be outputting a few hundred watts. however a high power radio tower outputting tens of thousands of watts couldn't even move a wooden crate even if you directed all of the radio waves towards it.
this happens because of the kind of energy you're transmitting is different. a person doing work converts chemical energy to kinetic energy, while a radio tower converts electrical energy to photons, which are massless and carry very little momentum. the energy is stored within the photons themselves since they are pure energy.
the comparison is similar if you replace the person hammering with a speaker.
this is an interesting question, but i'm no biologist so i'm not equipped to answer it, maybe you can ask it in /r/askscience
> But I suspect that light bulb wattage and speaker wattage can't quite be interchanged the way I'm doing.
although wattage means the same in both cases, you are correct that they have very different outcomes. this is due to the fact that their method of energy transmission is different. for example a person with a sledgehammer can thoroughly destroy a wooden shed in a couple of hours, this person might only be outputting a few hundred watts. however a high power radio tower outputting tens of thousands of watts couldn't even move a wooden crate even if you directed all of the radio waves towards it.
this happens because of the kind of energy you're transmitting is different. a person doing work converts chemical energy to kinetic energy, while a radio tower converts electrical energy to photons, which are massless and carry very little momentum. the energy is stored within the photons themselves since they are pure energy.
the comparison is similar if you replace the person hammering with a speaker.
fastfinge 1 points 7y ago
> this is an interesting question, but i'm no biologist so i'm not equipped to answer it, maybe you can ask it in/r/askscience
I may just do that. Thanks for an interesting discussion though!
I may just do that. Thanks for an interesting discussion though!
claudettemonet 3 points 7y ago
Fastfinge!!! I love this! For the most part you are dead on. The difference between the distance of sound and sight is truly staggering though. The horizon is the edge of what a sighted person can see during the day time. The horizon is merely the line past which the earth is curving away from you and the land beyond the horizon is in fact below that horizon line. How far out to the horizon you can see depends on how high up you are. If, for example, you were swimming in a perfectly calm ocean, the horizon line you would see would only be about a mile away from you, base on the fact that your eye level is only several inches above the water, or the surface of the earth. If, however, you were standing next to the ocean and looking out across it, you would be able to see about 3 miles out. The higher you get the greater the diameter of the area of the earth that you can see.
This is why many sighted people enjoy high places, because it allows them to see a much larger swath of the earth. Some people find this experience beautiful, but it is also strategically advantageous and part of the reason high ground is sought in battle situations. It is also easier to fight downhill,with gravity, than against gravity, but the sight advantage can not be discounted.
If you were to go even higher, to the point where you are not so much high above the earth, but far away from it, you would be able to see one entire half of the earth. You wouldn't see the other half for the same reason you can not see beyond the horizon line normally. The curve of the Earth obscures it. In the same way that if you were sprayed with a hose by a pesky sibling in the summertime, your body would obscure part of the spray and you clothes would only be wet on the spray side. The farthest away thing we see during the day is actually the sun.. as the sun is 93 million miles away.
However, at night, with the absence of the sun and the reassuring blue haze of our nitrogen atmosphere, we can see much much farther. We can see through the atmosphere to the great, cold dark void of space. Light and invisible energy is traveling through that space, but until the light hits something we don't see it. For example the moon is only bright because it is reflecting the light of the sun. Without a moon, there would be no reflected light at night. However, even without the moon there are still stars. Which we see because their light is hitting the back of our retinas. The closest star, beside the sun, is a little over 25 billion miles away. Most stars are much farther. The distance is actually so far that some of the light we see from those distant stars actually left that star hundreds of thousands of years ago. In fact, many of those stars may have already ceased to exist, but we wouldn't even know for another several hundred years.
Yet as I mentioned before, light is not the only energy travelling through the void. With the correct equipment you can actually hear the other energu waves. So you don't need to fill space with air to hear the cosmos. There are lots of observatories you could go to right now to listen to the stars.
Though if you could hear the sun it would be 100 decibels. So as loud as a motorcycle, if you were riding it, except it would be everywhere on the day side of the earth, all day, every day.
This is why many sighted people enjoy high places, because it allows them to see a much larger swath of the earth. Some people find this experience beautiful, but it is also strategically advantageous and part of the reason high ground is sought in battle situations. It is also easier to fight downhill,with gravity, than against gravity, but the sight advantage can not be discounted.
If you were to go even higher, to the point where you are not so much high above the earth, but far away from it, you would be able to see one entire half of the earth. You wouldn't see the other half for the same reason you can not see beyond the horizon line normally. The curve of the Earth obscures it. In the same way that if you were sprayed with a hose by a pesky sibling in the summertime, your body would obscure part of the spray and you clothes would only be wet on the spray side. The farthest away thing we see during the day is actually the sun.. as the sun is 93 million miles away.
However, at night, with the absence of the sun and the reassuring blue haze of our nitrogen atmosphere, we can see much much farther. We can see through the atmosphere to the great, cold dark void of space. Light and invisible energy is traveling through that space, but until the light hits something we don't see it. For example the moon is only bright because it is reflecting the light of the sun. Without a moon, there would be no reflected light at night. However, even without the moon there are still stars. Which we see because their light is hitting the back of our retinas. The closest star, beside the sun, is a little over 25 billion miles away. Most stars are much farther. The distance is actually so far that some of the light we see from those distant stars actually left that star hundreds of thousands of years ago. In fact, many of those stars may have already ceased to exist, but we wouldn't even know for another several hundred years.
Yet as I mentioned before, light is not the only energy travelling through the void. With the correct equipment you can actually hear the other energu waves. So you don't need to fill space with air to hear the cosmos. There are lots of observatories you could go to right now to listen to the stars.
Though if you could hear the sun it would be 100 decibels. So as loud as a motorcycle, if you were riding it, except it would be everywhere on the day side of the earth, all day, every day.
fastfinge 1 points 7y ago
Thanks for the kind words! :-) Even to this day, the horizon isn't something I usually think much about, because there just isn't a similar effect with any other sense. When I think about high ground, I tend to think in terms of seeing over other tall objects in the area, so people can't take cover behind them. Battles tend to happen at close enough range that the horizon wouldn't be much of a factor, would it?
I'm curious about how you came up with that 100 decibels number. I looked it up on Wikipedia, and apparently 1050 watts per square metre of sunlight hits the surface of the earth. That strikes me as a lot louder than 100 decibels! There are speakers that will generate 105db of sound with just 1 watt of power.
I've always been vaguely aware of radio astronomy, and meant to look into it more deeply. Unfortunately, I've just never managed to take the time.
I'm curious about how you came up with that 100 decibels number. I looked it up on Wikipedia, and apparently 1050 watts per square metre of sunlight hits the surface of the earth. That strikes me as a lot louder than 100 decibels! There are speakers that will generate 105db of sound with just 1 watt of power.
I've always been vaguely aware of radio astronomy, and meant to look into it more deeply. Unfortunately, I've just never managed to take the time.
claudettemonet 2 points 7y ago
The horizon would still be a factor in attaining the high ground. Height allows you to see over other objects, but it also allows you to see miles and miles farther out to the horizon, which is especially significant back in the day when sight was pretty much the only way you knew the enemy was approaching, and the majority of them were approaching on foot, so seeing them a few miles sooner gave you significantly more time to prepare. That's why castles will often have a couple really high towers even though the castle itself is already on the highest hill in the area.
This is also why old ships have crows nests, those look out towers at the top of the highest mast. The look out towers allow them to see significantly farther out on the horizon, which was super helpful in locating land or spotting other ships that may or may not be friendly.
As to the decibels. . Sorry my husband looked it up while I was looking up distances to the horizon, so I didn't link it. Here is the link. Its also a reddit thread. Lol.
https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/33xuxu/if_sound_could_travel_through_space_how_loud/
How to calculate distance to the horizon:
http://www.ringbell.co.uk/info/hdist.htm
There is an illlustation of the geometry and how it works, but the text does a pretty good job explaining the geometry without it.
This is also why old ships have crows nests, those look out towers at the top of the highest mast. The look out towers allow them to see significantly farther out on the horizon, which was super helpful in locating land or spotting other ships that may or may not be friendly.
As to the decibels. . Sorry my husband looked it up while I was looking up distances to the horizon, so I didn't link it. Here is the link. Its also a reddit thread. Lol.
https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/33xuxu/if_sound_could_travel_through_space_how_loud/
How to calculate distance to the horizon:
http://www.ringbell.co.uk/info/hdist.htm
There is an illlustation of the geometry and how it works, but the text does a pretty good job explaining the geometry without it.
fastfinge 1 points 7y ago
Thanks for that Reddit link! Interesting thread! Why is it all the interesting things on the Internet these days are all on Reddit? :-)
FloopingtonsGhost [OP] 2 points 7y ago
Wow, thank you, this is a fantastic reply. You've clearly done more thinking about this subject than I have. I did indeed ignore a lot of things I thought were subtleties, such as light and color, but you're right, to a blind person it's very important to understand lighting and color, both to communicate with people and to accomplish all kinds of tasks and make important decisions, even fashion. Also that is quite true how far away objects lose visual detail just like far away sounds lose audible detail. I'm a guitarist and the comparison you made in regards to colors harmonizing and clashing much like musical chords do, thus creating certain moods, is spot on and fun to think about. That is exactly what happens with color. I now see how important it is to include all the senses, well I'm not sure about smell, when attempting to explain sightedness. I must be a good example of what it's like to take sightedness for granted, in a way, because I thought I could explain it in such a rudimentary way, when in reality sight is such a nuanced sense it would take a very long time both to explain it and to learn about it. Thanks for that perspective. Your thoughts about planets and stars making sound that people could hear, hypothetically, aren't nonsense at all, it's an interesting question. My gut instinct tells me if there was air between us and the sun, the audible sound would be delivered to our ears, at the speed of sound, but of course I'm not a scientist and have no idea what would really happen. Perhaps the sun's sound would scatter in all directions and be too quiet for us to hear once the tiny portion of sound traveling towards the earth arrived here. Interesting question. Thanks again for answering, I think I'll spend time reading this forum and try to get a better understanding about what it's like to be blind and all the things blind people know about seeing! haha
Unuhi 1 points 7y ago
Brilliant points.
I think of colors being like flavors (taste... I sort of have synesthesia with taste and color perception).
Some tastes are light, fresh, bubbly, others spicy and exotic. Colors kind of can be something like that, but they are also very personal. Everyone seeing colors probably sees them different, just like our tastebuds differ, then just learns that what sky looks like is called blue, what grass looks like is green, even if you are colorblind/color deficient.
Also some colors go together in some cultures, not in others.
Color psychology is very culture dependent too. Some cultures love xome colors and see them positive, others don't.
And a lot depends on the amount and type of light. In the dark there's less color perception (or none, depends probably on light).
Color blindness is also surprisely common, 1/12 of sighted guys and 1/200 of ladies have some form of it. So what is blue, red, green etc depends also on your cones.
Having been able to see at some point can make it difficult too.
What does a normal field of vision look like? Did i ever have that?
I remember my surprise being able to see the ground when i got my first glasses. No more having to stay on the middle of the path (blur, color) because on the edge there would be often something that would make you fall or stumble.
Also how close or far do normals see? No clue.
I hear a plane, then use an app to figure what kind of plane flies over me... Otherwise not a chance i'd randomly look at the sky and just happen to see something I don't hear.
Facial expressions and body language... Are probably natural for most sighted folks. I learned to interpret and use those from books as a kid. I'm always amazed with described movies that the feelings etc are described, as even if i had the biggest screen ever I don't think i'd ever have been able to interpret from someone's face their inner cues. (I know still what a smile looks like, but have to rely only on voice in interpreting a smile's genuinety). So it's like magic having that now available for voice.
I think of colors being like flavors (taste... I sort of have synesthesia with taste and color perception).
Some tastes are light, fresh, bubbly, others spicy and exotic. Colors kind of can be something like that, but they are also very personal. Everyone seeing colors probably sees them different, just like our tastebuds differ, then just learns that what sky looks like is called blue, what grass looks like is green, even if you are colorblind/color deficient.
Also some colors go together in some cultures, not in others.
Color psychology is very culture dependent too. Some cultures love xome colors and see them positive, others don't.
And a lot depends on the amount and type of light. In the dark there's less color perception (or none, depends probably on light).
Color blindness is also surprisely common, 1/12 of sighted guys and 1/200 of ladies have some form of it. So what is blue, red, green etc depends also on your cones.
Having been able to see at some point can make it difficult too.
What does a normal field of vision look like? Did i ever have that?
I remember my surprise being able to see the ground when i got my first glasses. No more having to stay on the middle of the path (blur, color) because on the edge there would be often something that would make you fall or stumble.
Also how close or far do normals see? No clue.
I hear a plane, then use an app to figure what kind of plane flies over me... Otherwise not a chance i'd randomly look at the sky and just happen to see something I don't hear.
Facial expressions and body language... Are probably natural for most sighted folks. I learned to interpret and use those from books as a kid. I'm always amazed with described movies that the feelings etc are described, as even if i had the biggest screen ever I don't think i'd ever have been able to interpret from someone's face their inner cues. (I know still what a smile looks like, but have to rely only on voice in interpreting a smile's genuinety). So it's like magic having that now available for voice.
AlliTurna 4 points 7y ago
My friend who walked in when I was reading this probably thought I was reading something about inserting pen and other stuff in to your eyes. Oh well!
gelema5 2 points 7y ago
Disclaimer: I'm just adding my comments as a sighted person since you said you were open to them. Keep in mind that whatever I say is influenced by the fact that I've also been sighted my whole life! Haha.
Comparing two senses is a great place to start when you're thinking about this topic, and science has a lot to say on the matter, too. I recommend looking at scientific literature and Reddit's various science related subs, you can find interesting stuff with keywords like "totally blind" with "space" and "sound".
If you're really interested in knowing what sight *is* to blind people, it might be even more helpful to ask questions and learn from peoples' different opinions. You can learn a ton from what blind people think about sight. Again, I would look to science for a better understanding of the importance of senses in the brain, what brain development is like for blind children. You might even stumble on an influential way of thinking about the differences between various senses that would help clarify your description further.
On the other hand, if blindness interests you but you don't care much for the science behind it, you could look into philosophy and literature on blindness, which is more of an artistic interpretation. There's also the option of getting involved in the community! Spending time lurking on this sub will teach you a lot about accessibility and what blindness is like in general.
Edit: disclaimer
Comparing two senses is a great place to start when you're thinking about this topic, and science has a lot to say on the matter, too. I recommend looking at scientific literature and Reddit's various science related subs, you can find interesting stuff with keywords like "totally blind" with "space" and "sound".
If you're really interested in knowing what sight *is* to blind people, it might be even more helpful to ask questions and learn from peoples' different opinions. You can learn a ton from what blind people think about sight. Again, I would look to science for a better understanding of the importance of senses in the brain, what brain development is like for blind children. You might even stumble on an influential way of thinking about the differences between various senses that would help clarify your description further.
On the other hand, if blindness interests you but you don't care much for the science behind it, you could look into philosophy and literature on blindness, which is more of an artistic interpretation. There's also the option of getting involved in the community! Spending time lurking on this sub will teach you a lot about accessibility and what blindness is like in general.
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