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movies ,

Some inner voice talking to me all time sounds fucking awful haha

realitista OP ,

If it’s a different person than you, then you have a different issue ;-).

southsamurai ,
@southsamurai@sh.itjust.works avatar

Eh, it isn’t all the time for most people, and it isn’t hard to shut down for most people either.

The key is that it isn’t a separate entity, it’s just your own mind using words to ideate. Like, you can see the sky and just enjoy the blue, or you can think about the blue in words, if you have that inner voice. People without that voice still have a way of processing and thinking, it just isn’t in words, it’s more abstract.

The few people I’ve met that don’t think in words do seem to have difficulty in expressing the experience to others though.

tburkhol ,

As someone with an inner voice, I can’t even imagine how I’d think about abstract concepts without words. Like, how does “I love freedom” or “I wish all people could be free” happen without words? Maybe this is a learning disability of mine, and explains why interpretive dance doesn’t make any sense to me.

HubertManne ,

Yeah I can't imagine functioning without an inner voice. Mines constant. I can't really make any decisions without internal debate and I have to sorta constantly keep track of things I need to this. after work im going to do x this weekend I need to get y and z done. W needs to get done before the end of the month.

iamdisillusioned ,

I’m the same. My mind is always churning. I’m getting evaluated for ADHD next week.

MeThisGuy ,

which I always found weird about the brain. usually when diagnosed they give you some form of amphetamines to slow your brain down

partial_accumen ,

Mines constant. I can’t really make any decisions without internal debate and I have to sorta constantly keep track of things I need to this.

A new perspective from this article on the topic I haven’t heard before is that what you’re describing may not be the “inner voice” being referred to.

after work im going to do x this weekend I need to get y and z done. W needs to get done before the end of the month.

I’m going to assume your native language is English (forgive me, replace with your own native language). When you’re having this internal debate, are your points and counterpoints in actual English language with a sentence structure noun+verb+adjective? This is what I’m reading in the article they say “inner voice” is.

  • “I really need to do laundry this weekend or I won’t have any clean socks on Monday”
  • “I’m going to play football with my friends. I’m excited to work on my kicking form again.”
  • “Have I paid the electric bill? What day does that arrive? How much money do I have in my account?”

Or instead is it abstract concepts stacked on top and next to each other for comparison?

  • concept of obligation
  • playing out a scenario of the future where you wake up on Monday, open your sock drawer and find it empty
  • forecasting a sense of satisfaction from the completed task
  • calculation of consequences of not doing the task (again)
  • a slight self imposed discomfort to motivate you to complete the things to become comfortable again

According to my read of the article, the first would be the “inner voice”, the second would NOT be. I have the second, not the first. How about you?

HubertManne ,

no its totally words and sentences. I can't honestly don't know what my thoughts are outside of that except for visualizing things and like subconsicous things like hunches. Not sure if its related but im one of those people who if I say something its also whats going through my head and actually if im alone enough I just start verbalizing the internal dialogue. Like when I walk the dog I will talk with her. hmmm weather said no rain but those clouds look like they could rain so maybe I should have brought my rain hat but oh well we should finish up soon enough I don't think we will go far on this one want to be able to get home quick if I need to.........

partial_accumen ,

no its totally words and sentences.

That’s amazing to me! It would be so much extra effort for me to put things in words to think on them first. The only time I do that is when I’m testing how it will sound to someone else. Even then, I’ll build the sentences, and then simulate a person hearing them in concept with what I know of the audience to see how they would receive it, and what concepts they draw from what I say. Then I adjust the words as needed to get the thoughts across to the audience.

I can’t honestly don’t know what my thoughts are outside of that except for visualizing things and like subconsicous things like hunches.

The best metaphor I can think to describe it is assembling a jigsaw puzzle. You don’t need to describe the shape of the piece to be able to find a matching piece it fits into. The shape, size, edge, color, and pattern all inform you of where it will fit. That’s kind of a hunch. This conceptual thinking works similarly. There are “attachment points” to each concept that link them together with other mental abstracted concepts. There are places that don’t fit which let you know the pieces are unrelated.

Schmoo ,

For me it’s not that I can’t think without words, it’s just that the words are very useful tools for organizing my thoughts. I’ve been doing it all my life though so it doesn’t really require more effort than thinking in concepts. It’s like breathing, it happens automatically but I can stop or control it if I want to. When I stop my inner voice I would describe my thoughts as sort of fuzzy and ephemeral. I would easily forget them or have difficulty expressing them without first putting them into words.

partial_accumen ,

I’ve been doing it all my life though so it doesn’t really require more effort than thinking in concepts. It’s like breathing, it happens automatically but I can stop or control it if I want to.

I’ve found the opposite. The older I get, the “expensive” words are to use. The concept when in mind is so complex and nuanced, to use a word for it shaves off all that complexity and nuance and collapses the thought into the limits of the definition of that word. When it becomes a word, its…less, a mostly formed shadow of what it was. That’s the price of communicating it to others.

When I stop my inner voice I would describe my thoughts as sort of fuzzy and ephemeral. I would easily forget them or have difficulty expressing them without first putting them into words.

We operate oppositely in this, which is wonderful! For you it sounds like the thoughts don’t have meaning until you choose words and make them concrete. Like your thoughts are liquid and fluid, but you’re able to make them solid and meaningful by confining them in words. For me, I do the best I can with choosing a word, sometimes dusting off old antiques, to try to match as close as possible to the concept. Sometimes I have found words in other languages sometimes fit better because of a closer match of concepts or properties. That too has its drawbacks, as using that would lose your audience when you’re trying to communicate an idea.

Schmoo ,

If a word does not adequately describe what I’m thinking I just use more words, or I get creative with them and use them in new ways. I guess that’s what makes me prone to getting lost in thought for long periods of time or being very long winded when I’m talking to people. When I’m talking about something I’ve recently been very interested in people often have to cut me off because I’ll essentially start verbalizing my thought process to them and forget they’re there.

partial_accumen ,

I try the same and have the same result!

HubertManne ,

yeah to find the matching piece I might visualize it but like I could not look for a piece without talking to myself about sifting through the pieces and how this ones not quite right and such.

Today ,

I still think of all the things i need to do, it just sorta comes in chunks, not words or auditory.

HubertManne ,

things like this I can't even imagine thinking about without words. Maybe there are non word things in them but my internal monologue drowns them out.

snooggums ,
@snooggums@midwest.social avatar

Interpretive dance is about expressing feelings without words. Mimes convey a ton of meaning without words. Both use motion and body language in ways that not everyone is familiar with, kind of like speaking a language. Other things people do physically, like shaking hands, bowing, and hand gestures have regional meanings like verbal language does.

Non-verbal communication can be hard, but then again speaking different verbal languages is a barrier too.

Kecessa ,

Image of someone running in a field, naked

(I don’t know, I’ve got words in my head)

partial_accumen ,

I didn’t think this “not using inner voice” thing applied to me, but the way I read the article maybe it does. If the inner voice is truly a voice using grammatical spoken language it sounds crazy limiting.

As someone with an inner voice, I can’t even imagine how I’d think about abstract concepts without words. Like, how does “I love freedom” or “I wish all people could be free” happen without words?

None of this is in words when I’m thinking about it. I’m putting words here to describe the concepts , thoughts and feelings, of each step but none of it is words when I’m thinking it.

Freedom

  • limitless choice
  • peace and comfort
  • patriotism (to the extreme, ironic terms freedom being used as a method of control)
  • anti-freedom = slavery or being controlled
  • personal experience with making free choices
  • historical learning about situations where they didn’t have freedom
  • personal luck in being born in a (mostly) free country
  • imagining being born and living in a place without freedom
  • fictional examples of lack of freedom, like sci-fi dystopia
  • empathy about those that don’t have the same things I do
  • sense of justice about equality
  • memory of muscles used to make my mouth and larynx say the word “freedom” FREEEEEE — DUUMMM

All of the above only takes a second or two of actual elapsed time.

Words that come out:

“I love freedom. I wish all people could be free”.

Phen ,

It’s like an instinct. You get the meaning behind the words without the words needing to be there.

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

I don't think cognitive processing without words is necessarily more abstract.

Arguably if you're processing concepts such as relative geographical location or how to cook a steak, spatial processing is at far less of a remove than converting it all over to words/symbols.

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

Ikr, it's wild. I don't think I could cope with something like that.

ricecake ,

It’s not “some voice” talking “to you”, it really just feels like your thoughts are words, if they’re “word adjacent thoughts”.
Like, thinking about how to phrase that first part, it felt like I was reciting the words I was thinking of typing, not like someone else was saying them to me.

Beardsley ,

Mine never turns off the fucking radio

Carrolade ,

It has its uses, helpful for remembering a short sequence of numbers for instance, or practicing a specific dialogue line that is going to be important, like for a job interview or something where you want a solid and confident delivery. But generally speaking I prefer it quiet, makes it infinitely easier to pay attention to my surroundings.

Meditation is basically the practice of learning how to turn it off at will. Can take awhile, it doesn’t always seem to like being quiet. It also turns off other times though, like when you’re suddenly startled for instance.

Quacksalber ,

Can take awhile, it doesn’t always seem to like being quiet

Reminds me of this video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=wfYbgdo8e-8

jballs ,
@jballs@sh.itjust.works avatar

This thumbnail makes me very uncomfortable

SpaceNoodle ,

Oh, that’s what meditation is supposed to be? Now I get why I never got it.

Cryophilia ,

Yeah it confused me for so long

Instructor: “what I want you to do is stop thinking”

Me, internally: okay, done

Instructor: “I know that may be the hardest thing to ask, but I want you to quiet your mind”

Me, internally: yep, already did it

Instructor: “once you learn how to stop the constant parade of thoughts in your head and just listen to the world around you, you will find great peace”

Me, internally: I do that all the time what

SpaceNoodle ,

Stopping the thoughts is distinct from stopping the voices.

Cryophilia ,

Yes, neither one is difficult for me but I gather it is for people with a monologue.

Today ,

I don’t have words in my head but i still have thoughts that keep me awake. I’ve been practicing turning off my thoughts to sleep better. I focus hard on relaxing each body part for 3 breaths starting with a foot.

Mr_Fish ,

Honestly I’d kind of like that in some ways. Language is actually pretty limiting, so not being stuck with it for thinking would make some thoughts easier to convey to yourself.

bstix ,

I don’t think it’s limited like that. While I usually think in sentences, it also happens that I get ideas that I either can’t express in words or it happens so fast that I don’t bother trying to think it through in sentences.

Try to think of a house and notice how you don’t need to describe it in any detail to instantly visualise how you think a house looks.

It’ll be interesting to hear what they find in the ongoing research, but it’s already clear that the brain is not just a large language model.

Today ,

I can’t see a house. If i have a specific description and try really hard i might get kind of a wire frame outline of something.

Gigan ,
@Gigan@lemmy.world avatar

I wonder what causes this? Genetics, random, maybe issues during speech development as a child?

snooggums ,
@snooggums@midwest.social avatar

I don’t think issues is a great word for something that doesn’t have an obvious negative outcome.

I have an inner monologue that is something like an auditory version of my thoughts. Reminds me of a movie narrator explaining what people arre thinking, but not a verbal exchange like the article describes. It is absolutely zero help in remembering things because it switches to my current thoughts, and doesn’t just run in the background. It doesn’t seem to be a negative at all, and it is hearing hearing what I’m thinking but not rrally hearing because it doesn’t sound like anyone in particular.

On the visual side, I can’t picture something I haven’t seen before and only have brief flashes of what I have seen before. Can’t picture anything in my mind except the vaguest of stereotypical ideas, like a tropical island is a tiny island with a palm tree or a lagoon. Maybe the rough outline of a mountain peak. Can’t draw anything like that from imagination, but can do a pretty solid sketch of something that I have a visual reference for. Also not really an issue, since most things don’t require picturing them without seeing them, but it did derail my interest in art and I can’t do any of the meditation exercises that involve picturing myself somewhere.

I assume any of these kinds of differences can be caused by a combination of genetics and environment since genes are expressed differently based on experience and environments can also impact people in ways that don’t involve genes.

Today ,

I think we will eventually find that it’s connected to a lot of other areas. I was thinking of other senses. Someone mentioned taste - i can sort of taste things I’ve eaten before that sound good. I don’t think feeling tactile things that aren’t there is a thing, but maybe some people have that?

The lack of auditory thing doesn’t bother me at all. Visual part does bother me. I’m terrible with faces - I introduce myself to people repeatedly and I get confused in shows with too many characters. I lost my mom last year and i can’t see her face in my head. Everytime i see a photo of her it’s a little bit surprising. Sometimes i stare at my husband - I’m afraid I’ll lose my memory one day and won’t recognize him. I lost my cat once and brought in another cat that looked similar. My cat was just hiding and freaked out!

Sabre363 ,

Probably a combination of environment (nurture) and simple evolution. The brain is a complex computer that handles a metric-fuck-ton of information. Some minor variation in how that information is processed or accessed is bound to develope, especially when the sample size is in the billions.

Today ,

I recently learned that some people do hear a voice in their head. Some see pictures too.

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

For the longest time I assumed it was just a literary device, not an actual thing anyone really does.

laughterlaughter , (edited )

So, if I tell you “I’ll give you $10,000 for you to spend in 24 hours. Spend 20 seconds to think about it,” what goes through your head? Don’t you hear anything like “shit, that’s a lot of money?! Where to start, where to start…”?

Don’t you “have words” in your head to form thoughts?

calabast ,

Babies can think before they can talk 🤷‍♂️

laughterlaughter , (edited )

We don’t disagree with this one, but I don’t see how this is relevant. I wish I could ask a baby this question, but they can’t answer, can they? So I’m asking OP instead.

calabast ,

Ah sorry, I think I misread your previous comment as if you were saying you had to have words to think, maybe implying other people were not correct when they said they didn’t have words? And I was trying to say it was possible, but I see you weren’t actually trying to argue that now, so nvm!

I also don’t think I’m a words person. Sometimes I’ll talk out loud to myself while I’m doing something, and I definitely CAN think my thoughts as words in my head, but yeah usually I just do stuff without it. I mean to some degree everyone does things without brain words, right? If you’re getting ready for bed, so you think “now I need to stand up, now I move my left foot, now my right, now I move my right arm to pick up the toothbrush”. Like, you have to take some actions without narrating them, right? We’re just like that, but more so 😄

laughterlaughter ,

Yup, I wasn’t trying to argue. Don’t worry, friend - all good :)

Ok, in that case you’re like me, then. It’s not like I’m constantly chatting in my head. That sounds exhausting, actually. But my “word thoughts” closely resemble the words I’d say if someone told me “think aloud while you’re doing things - you don’t need to be as detailed.” In your example, if I’m getting ready to bed, I wouldn’t describe in my mind everything that I need to do. It would be more like “a’aight, time for bed” (do stuff, do more stuff), “where’s my phone charger? ah! here.” (do more stuff, then some more stuff) “…aaaaand done! Ooh, very nice!”

explodicle ,

But they can understand you before they can talk too.

Phen ,

No words here at all. I generally don’t use words for thinking unless I’m trying to think of a sentence or something like that.

laughterlaughter ,

I wish we could swap brains for five minutes. But what is “thinking” for you? Can you picture things in your mind? Moving objects? Suppose that you’re looking for a spoon and open your silverware drawer, and it’s unexpectedly filled with cotton candy. And you live alone! What goes through your head?! Because the first thing that goes through my head is surprise, followed by the phrase “what the fuck?!?!?!?!”

Phen ,

I also can’t picture anything in my mind either. It’s like a different language that is based on feelings instead of words. You know when you move next to a fire and you feel hot? You don’t need any words to feel hot, right? It’s kinda like that. I would open the drawer and feel a “this isn’t right” feeling.

laughterlaughter ,

Wild. Thanks! The feeling hot analogy is glorious.

Knitwear ,

It’s like I “know” all the options (pros and cons and obstacles and things to think about) all at once, any time I have is then spent on the emotional consequences of them. But more time doesn’t usually mean discovering more options.

CaptainEffort ,

So like… how do you think through ideas? Philosophize? You don’t bounce ideas around in your head and deeply weigh multiple options? It’s just… empty?

Cryophilia ,

Personally, when I’m working through a problem, I’ll usually force it into words (either out loud or to myself), but that’s a conscious action rather than a subconscious response. I choose to speak those things, and it’s me (not an amorphous voice) who speaks them.

But often after forcing the thoughts into words I’ll hit upon an interesting thread, and my mind will leap ahead faster than spoken language can catch up. It’s only when I hit a roadblock that I slow things down into language-speed.

CaptainEffort ,

I mean that’s the same as anyone. When people talk about their inner voice, the voice is still them. They’re in control of what it says. It can get a little out of hand sometimes (like getting a song stuck in your head) but ultimately it’s you doing it.

Same with being able to “leap ahead” faster than the spoken word. Like, if someone gets a knife pulled on them they don’t have to think “I will run now”, they simply run. The internal monologue is an addition, not a replacement, if that makes sense.

Cryophilia ,

From how people are describing it, it’s a necessary addition rather than an optional one

CaptainEffort ,

Like I pointed out in the mugging example, it’s entirely optional. It can just get out of hand sometimes lol.

I say that as someone with an extremely active internal monologue.

Cryophilia ,

Sounds like others’ are more active than yours. People in this thread talk as if theirs never stops.

CaptainEffort ,

Mine never does unless I actively focus on it, like through meditation. But it’s still me lol, the alternative is what’s called schizophrenia.

laughterlaughter ,

I can’t speak for everyone, but in my case, yes, I can control the voice just like I can control my physical voice. Sometimes they’ll be automatic, yes, but that’s no different from your way of thinking while doing some chore, like washing dishes.

Today ,

Just chunks of thoughts not in words or pictures.

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

@laughterlaughter

Don’t hear anything like “shit, that’s a lot of money?! Where to start, where to start…”

No and it's amazing to me that you'd even be able to think of it in 20 seconds with all that chatter in your brain.

As I was reading your comment I could sort of hear parts of that, because it's you "speaking" to me, but as soon as I saw it the $10,000 imediately became a sort of conceptual bundle located in front of me, the 24h was like a moving spatial cycle thing and my brain was plotting possibilities based on how far I would have to travel (the ones falling inside the cycle are the do-able ones) and locating a whole lot of stuff branching out from my computer with short action times.

Also my brain had immediately reached to the right hand middle distance which is where it "keeps" investment advice. It had a quick dart to the far away centre-left and I had a flash/photorealistic image of home furnishings out there but rejected instantly as the tangled sense of moving parts between me and it meant the process toward them is complex and would take up too much of the 20 second processing time to even see if they would fit in the 24h cycle.

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

@southsamurai did the above comment make sense?

It's hard because we have to translate it to get it across -for me it feels a bit like being asked how do you know where your arms are relative to your body.

MeThisGuy ,

about the arms. spacial awareness… and a surprising number of ppl don’t have that

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

I didn't express it very well - I meant basic proprioception, which most people have. We need it for things like walking or lifting a cup to our mouths.

laughterlaughter , (edited )

Fantastic! Thank you for answering, and I have a similar process going on in my brain as well - but it’s combined with “me talking” as well. For example, if I become aware of that “right hand side” investment section you described, I’d probably say’ “ooh investing, maybe?”

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

Thanks, that makes sense! But I don't understand how that could fit in temporally? Like, wouldn't you have already got halfway through the possible investment overview while you were still talking? Or is it more that you're doing both at once?

laughterlaughter ,

Correct, at once. Like a teacher who is writing on something on the whiteboard while speaking.

Or that scene in Minority Report in which Tom Cruise is going through videos/scenes/etc with his hands while saying things loud to himself.

thirteene ,

Not op, but I’m curious if anyone will help me understand my own reality. I immediately close my eyes to make the experience authentic.

“I have to spend 10 grand in 24 hours” as a imaginary verbal statement. (internal monologue?). Then I “lookup” spending money memories and create an object in my head without any attributes. I can tell it has emotional attachment from the memories, best described as a label. (I determine to go online shopping without much thought).

“most likely buy raw materials like gold”. [Pause]. But what’s unique about this situation that I can take advantage of? 24 hours [trail off]. Bonds would be easy and just postpone payment. Is laundering an option? Why is this person giving away 10k? What damage can it do?"

As the passenger, it feels like large derivitive stuff is silent. The inner dialogue is mostly probing. But here is a significant amount of silence betweens questions. I don’t have a visual canvas.

Are others answering these questions? Frequently, I have a silent mind but pondering takes probing.

laughterlaughter ,

Interesting! In my case, if I remember all of a sudden that I have to do laundry tomorrow, but there’s a conflict, then I’ll “speak” in my mind, with my own voice, saying “oh shit, tomorrow I have Bob’s party and I haven’t done laundry yet - all my clothes are dirty!!” Well, maybe with not that many words. Maybe more like “Oh shit, I forgot! How do I solve this…?”

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

It sort of sounds like yoi do it as a way of externalizing the questions, like it's a different part of your brain or your brain wants to make it clear to you that the question process is different from the answer process.

To me a question feels like knowing there's something behind my occipital bone and sensing it moving forward towards my eyes. So it's not verbalised but it's definitely a separate feeling.

laughterlaughter ,

So, if you study a map of a building, noticing that it has a kitchen at a certain place, then in go inside the building (without the map), and someone says “go to the kitchen,” how do you know where the kitchen is? How do you imagine the paths, rooms, hallways to follow?

If I told you “a pink and brown dog,” you can’t “see” that dog in your mind at all?

iamdisillusioned ,

The map would be tough. If someone showed me the map and said, go to the kitchen, I would try remember, turn left then right then its around to the left. I would remember it in words, not visually.

Brown and pink dog…in my mind I see a hazy face of a poodle with fluffy pink ears. I can’t see the full dog. I can’t walk around the image and explore it more. Its just a hazy partial visual that flashes in my mind for a moment.

realitista OP ,

I definitely have both. I can even visualize things with my eyes open. I switch back and forth between modes depending on the content I’m working on in my head.

Sir_Kevin ,
@Sir_Kevin@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Same. I thought it was that way for everyone. I can have a full conversation in my head while visually building something in a 3D mental image.

partial_accumen ,

I can even visualize things with my eyes open.

Are you able to build complex visualizations while maintaining eye contact with someone? Once the concept becomes complex enough, I have to break eye contact with them (usually staring at nothing above their heads) and unfocus my eyes. Once I do that, the sky’s the limit on how complex the mental visual can get and be abstracted, but something about staring at a face (reading realtime facial reactions?) consumes the part of my brain I need for the very complex visuals.

realitista OP ,

That sounds pretty similar to me. I have to really be focusing to do it, if I were looking at someone and trying to do it, there would be a lot of competing sensory information. I could do something but it would keep getting broken up by distraction. It definitely works best just in a nice quiet room.

PrimeMinisterKeyes ,

So kind of like Werner Herzog then, who once stated that he never, ever dreams. But he keeps having visions with his eyes wide open, in broad daylight, all the time. He describes them in his terrific book “Of Walking in Ice.”

realitista OP ,

His thing sounds different. I do dream (often prolifically), and when I visualize with my eyes open it tends to be something I’m trying to visualize such as a new paint color, furniture placement. I’m pretty good at it, my visions usually work out pretty well when taken to action. I’m imagining them more than really seeing them, but I’m able to do it well enough to accomplish the tasks I need to visualize.

Today ,

I’m so bad at furniture arranging and color matching. But I’m excellent at stacking boxes or other items in a small space.

cynar ,

Not op, but I have a very weak ability to visualise. The data is more abstracted. A map is a set of spacial connections that define an area. My brain has learnt to pull that from a map. What I can’t do is recall the map to figure out additional information. If my brain didn’t think it was relevant when I looked at it, the information is likely gone.

There are definitely pros and cons to it. I’m not limited to what I could visualise, when thinking. This lets me dig deeper into more complex ideas and patterns. It also makes other tasks a lot harder. I struggle a lot with faces and appearances.

As for the dogs, I have an abstracted “model” in my mind. The size and breed of the dogs is undefined. There are 2 dog entities in my mind. 1 brown, which is quite generic, the other has pink attached to it, that cross links it with poodles etc.

I can personally push it to a visualisation, but it takes significant mental effort, and the results are unstable.

folkrav ,

So you basically visualize maps as graphs? You’re the human equivalent of the A* algorithm!

cynar ,

It’s spacially based. It makes more sense in 3D. It’s just as compatible with echolocation as visual data. (The soundscape of a room tells you a LOT about your surroundings). I believe it’s based within my visual system, just stripped of the superfluous visualisations. Interestingly, I can actually map mathematics into the same structures.

I’m doing a piss poor job of explaining it. Language lacks the nuance to describe it well, and I lack the skill to bend it into shape.

MeThisGuy ,

next question: how many times would you have to walk a new space (like a house) to remember it?

cynar ,

I can remember it fairly quickly. My spacial sense is particularly good. I can easily get a sense of negative space (hidden rooms etc) as well as good predictive skills. My personal problem is when maps get large or don’t overlap. It’s either mapped well, or not. It can take me a while to join up multiple smaller sub maps in my mind. (Think office or stadium sized spaces).

Today ,

I can remember the layout and draw it, but can’t see it in my head. Building layout is very concrete and is easy to know things like ‘My office is at the end of the hall on the third floor.’ When asked to describe a person I’m limited to very basic descriptions - short/tall, heavy/thin, black/white. My coworkers were making fun of me recently because i described someone as tall, maybe white, possibly red hair.

Buelldozer ,
@Buelldozer@lemmy.today avatar

I’m not the OP either but my brain seems to work the same way that yours and theirs do. I’d say you did a good job of describing how it works for people like us.

One difference though is that you don’t seem to have the visual recall that I do. I don’t have a “photographic” memory but I could probably recall the hypothetical map as a visual object and examine it for additional information that I didn’t notice the first time.

I can personally push it to a visualisation, but it takes significant mental effort, and the results are unstable.

You may actually be better at this than I am. Describing my results as “unstable” would charitable. I also don’t get dog breeds, just amorphous and blurry blobs with rorsarch like colors slapped on them.

cynar ,

I also don’t get dog breeds, just amorphous and blurry blobs with rorsarch like colors slapped on them.

That’s akin to what I get. The core structure is there, but it’s almost a sense of what should be there. It’s akin to seeing things out of the corner of your eye, while overtired. Your brain tells you what it is, and you accept it, it doesn’t necessarily match what you are actually ‘seeing’.

I ‘know’ how dogs move, I ‘know’ their body structure. I can force that down to a single image, but it wants to be so much more. All the senses of ‘dogness’ compressed into a single entity.

CoggyMcFee ,

So, if you study a map of a building, noticing that it has a kitchen at a certain place, then in go inside the building (without the map), and someone says “go to the kitchen,” how do you know where the kitchen is? How do you imagine the paths, rooms, hallways to follow?

I know this isn’t true of everybody with alphantasia, but what I do in this situation is I get lost. I can’t visualize walking through the space while I study the map, and I can’t bring the map to mind when I’m actually there. Some people with aphantasia have no trouble finding their way around, so I think in my case it must be that I’m missing some innate sense of direction as well that visualization might have helped me to compensate for, if only I could.

If I told you “a pink and brown dog,” you can’t “see” that dog in your mind at all?

Correct. I’m not 100% on the aphantasia spectrum, so if I think about it then I might get the briefest flash of some dog, like an afterimage at best, and I can’t hold it in my mind, or manipulate it, or see any details or color. It’s not even really a complete outline or anything either that flashes for that quarter-second.

When I read a book, I don’t know what the characters or places look like. But I have always been able to draw really well. So it’s really a mystery how this all works.

lagomorphlecture ,

If I told you “a pink and brown dog,” you can’t “see” that dog in your mind at all?

Jim Pickens’s cat popped into my head. Sigh.

MeThisGuy ,

for me some reason a pitbull

Today ,

There’s a kitchen off the hallway just past the bathroom on the left. No magic path to follow. I hate those video games where you just wander around! I can’t see a dog - i don’t know what kind of dog, size/shape of its parts, what parts are brown, what parts are pink, … If you said poodle or German shepherd, and i focused hard i could get sort of a loose wire frame outline.

EmptySlime ,

For me it’s even weirder than that. Those pictures exist in my mind and I can “feel” them there but the conscious part of me that’s supposed to see them can’t see shit. I can describe to you the things that are in them or even draw them out as they exist in my mind, but I can’t see them. The part of me that’s giving directions? It can “see” the map of the building and my position in it just fine like it’s staring straight at a live minimap, but the conscious part of me that should be able to visualize that stuff? Nothing. I close my eyes and try to visualize that dog and I see nothing but black. But I can feel the presence of the image that the part of me that does the mental conjuring of images is making.

It’s like turning the monitor off on a computer. Everything is still running even though you can’t see it.

laughterlaughter ,

Very interesting. Thanks for sharing!

Fubarberry ,
@Fubarberry@sopuli.xyz avatar

Only 1-3% of people lack the ability to visualize images in their head.

Somewhat related, I recently realized I can’t really remember the taste of food at all. I can remember the texture of the food, and whether I liked it or not, but not how it actually tastes. For example, I know I like chocolate but I have no desire to eat it most of the time because I can’t remember anything about the taste except for the texture. But once I start eating chocolate and have the taste lingering in my mouth, I find myself craving more of it until the taste fades and I forget what it tasted like again.

Today ,

Oh man! That is a perfect example! I have not able to understand the voice or the picture… Like you actually hear a voice or you see an image??.. But I totally understand the taste - almost like the shadow of a taste in your mouth for something that sounds good. I guess that’s why what people say, “what do you have a taste for”?)

Today ,

When I first learned that other people see and hear, I started asking around. From My polling, about 30% of people either don’t hear or don’t see. I’ve only found a handful of people who don’t do either. I read some articles that say you can train the visual.

TexasDrunk ,

I have some very loud voices in my head. One is intentional, like when I read or write things out I hear my own voice in my head. At least one of them just talks shit to me all the time. It’s not like schizophrenia “I hear voices”, it’s just a thought that I’m not actively having. When my depression gets bad it’s gets really loud so I drown it out with music and books.

I can’t see pictures in my head.

On another note, I’m pretty sure religious nutjobs really hear their own inner monologue and think it’s a god talking to them. That’s why their god always agrees with them.

PopOfAfrica ,

The mind of an artist perhaps? I can see vivid film grade depictions of whatever I want in any style I can imagine.

Its quite frustrating when I know my hands could never produce what I see in my mind.

danekrae , (edited )

“Weirdos. I don’t have an inner voice”, most people thought, using their inner voice.

Ibaudia ,
@Ibaudia@lemmy.world avatar

I’m one of the 5-10%. I always sucked at verbal memory tasks. Didn’t know some people have an real, interpretable internal monologue until a few years ago. I thought thinking nonverbally was the default. I even specifically remember watching shows and movies where you listen to a character’s internal internal monologue and thinking “this is dumb, that’s not how thinking works”. Turns out it is, and I’m just in the minority! Now I make an effort to manually start an internal monologue when I’m doing anything that requires a lot of verbal processing, like listening to instructions at work. It helps, but I can still tell that I have a deficit compared to most people when it comes to those things.

Schmoo ,

Your anecdote seems to support that it’s a learned behavior/skill, which tracks for me. I have a very active internal dialogue that’s difficult to turn off. I say dialogue instead of monologue because I often make up “other voices” that bounce ideas off each other, and this generally happens without my conscious effort. I think I developed this because as I was growing up I was encouraged to pray regularly, and I was very fanatically religious as a kid so I did so as often as I could. I prayed silently so often in fact that my thoughts were basically a constant one-sided monologue directed to god. Whenever I would daydream or let my imagination wander I would imagine god responding, and eventually the constant monologue became a dialogue. I would work out problems or make decisions by having conversations with an imaginary god. When I stopped believing in god the second voice never went away, I just started recognizing it as my own.

Ibaudia ,
@Ibaudia@lemmy.world avatar

Okay, now I have to know if religious individuals are more likely to have an inner voice. That just makes sense!!!

Schmoo ,

Perhaps! I also think internal monologues can develop just from learning to read and write silently. Having an inner voice makes it easier to absorb the information in a book or to plan out your writing in advance.

Buelldozer ,
@Buelldozer@lemmy.today avatar

Having an inner voice makes it easier to absorb the information in a book

I think all of our brains are wired different and the different wiring leads to advantages in one thing but it’s probably a disadvantage for others. For instance I have no inner voice but my reading speed, with comprehension, is well faster than nearly anyone I’ve ever met. I can even sometimes recall precisely where on a page a given word or phrase was located, even years after reading the material. However I’m almost entirely unable to imagine a 3 dimensional object and rotate it in my “minds eye”.

Schmoo ,

That does make me wonder if maybe I use my inner voice as a bit of a crutch when I’m reading, but I think it helps me infer tone and get immersed in what I’m reading. Perhaps I am sacrificing some reading speed but I do believe it helps me with comprehension and memory.

Though I will add that it’s more the concepts that I remember than the words themselves. Give me a quote and I couldn’t tell you what page and where on the page it was, but I could tell you what was happening in that scene, what happened before and after, what the character was feeling and why they said it, who they said it to and so on.

Aceticon ,

I have an inner voice but I don’t use it when I’m reading, which is maybe why I am a very fast reader.

I tend to use it when pondering on things. That said I just noticed that when composing and cross-checking this text for posting, I also used it.

Curiously, nowadays my inner voice is not just in my own mothertongue but can be in just about any of the languages I know enough for basic conversation. It’s probably related to, because my foreign language skills are so advanced (I can speak about 7 languages) that I’ve long stopped translating to my native tongue in my mind and concepts just translate directly from those foreign languages. Also, I’ve lived in a couple of countries and as I would eventually end up mainly speaking the local language, my inner voice would also, eventually, end up also using that language.

MeThisGuy ,

very interesting because I moved back to my home country 5 yrs ago after living abroad for 24. still think in my secondary language after being alone with my thoughts long enough

Aceticon ,

Yeah, I have a similar experience of still thinking in a foreign language even though I’ve been back in my homeland for years after 2 decades abroad.

I suspect my thinking language still being generally English is probably because I keep getting exposed to English-language media. I’ve noticed that, for example, if I think about my time living in The Netherlands or are exposed to Dutch-language media, my thinking often switches to Dutch.

Today ,

Same on remembering exactly where i read something. I used to be a fast reader - out of practice. Maybe it’s being able to skim instead of hearing every word?

grrgyle ,

Whoaaaa that’s so interesting. I grew up silently praying in the daily as well, and also tend to have dialogues going on in my head. Also a stream of unsolicited advice, which is less pleasant… But I’d probably miss it if it went away.

Schmoo ,

Learning to get over religious shame and guilt took quite some time for me, and I still have to catch myself sometimes when an inner voice says things I no longer believe/agree with. Part of getting over that meant cultivating other voices. When one voice bites another bites back lol.

As a plus I’m very good in a debate.

MeThisGuy ,

like the devil and the angle on each shoulder type thing?

lagomorphlecture ,

There’s actually a theory that back in ye olden times when inner monologues first started, people thought it was God talking to them because it was a new phenomenon and that didn’t have any way to understand that it was some kind of evolution of consciousness, not a god.

afraid_of_zombies ,

Yeah Jensen’s work. It is mostly considered pseudoscience today but there some who think it has value.

Zetaphor ,
@Zetaphor@zemmy.cc avatar

I mean the NVIDIA stock price speaks for itself, I think Jensen is onto something

afraid_of_zombies ,

Ha! Good one.

On a serious note here are the issues

  • He can’t explain how the event impacted the rest of the world. Only a fraction of the human race was there. How does he explain China for example?
  • We already know that meta-cognition isn’t limited to humans. A rat that knows where food is vs ones that do not engage in different behaviors.
  • He can’t explain the almost superhuman reflex speeds some people have in modern times under his model.

I do agree some of it rings true. Just very hard to pin down what exactly.

mrcleanup ,

I am trying to wrap my head around this. So if you are just walking down the street alone, watching cars go by, not reading, there a voice? What would it even be saying?

Schmoo ,

Yes, multiple voices, probably debating what I’m going to cook for dinner later. At this point I might be going a bit too far anthropomorphizing the voices, it’s not like actual separate personalities, they’re all me. It’s more like perspective taking. I’m engaging in a conversation with myself and the different voices will take different stances. For example I might have a “lazy voice” that just wants to eat leftovers and a “craving voice” that wants to cook tacos. I decide what to do by having the voices hash it out.

As I’m describing this it all sounds very intentional and like I’m playing pretend, but it really is just automatic.

mrcleanup ,

I guess I have something similar, but it’s all just nonverbal feelings. I don’t argue with myself about getting up in the morning, I just feel comfortable, lazy, frustrated, determined, and rarely tell myself “get up” but that’s the only voice part.

Elextra ,

TIL. I’m one of the 5-10% as well!! I have not noticed a deficit in verbal memory… I’m more interested reading the comments and learning today that people have inner voices?!?

lagomorphlecture ,

Yes! You’ve seen TV shows where people are thinking words in their heads or whatever…based on reality!

Today ,

I think of cartoons - some people have word bubbles for ideas - some of us just have a lightbulb.

afraid_of_zombies ,

Basically if I know you well I hear your voice in my head argue for a pov I know you hold. If you are say a safety-first kinda guy I will hear you lecture me when I am not being safe. I got a committee arguing all the time and I admit it sometimes becomes hard to remember if I mentioned X to my mental version of someone or the real someone.

Yes I am aware that the voices I hear are not real. It is just the way my brain is presenting information to itself. Like writing down notes in different colored inks. It is all the same letters and words but with an added change.

lagomorphlecture ,

“It helps, but I can still tell that I have a deficit compared to most people when it comes to those things.”

I was totally gonna ask you about this until I got to the end! It seems like thinking without any kind of internal monologue would be incredibly abstract which might be good for some things but it would probably suck ass for trying to remember or understand extremely detailed instructions and things like that! I’m so curious what it’s like to think the way you do and I wish I could flip a switch for a little bit to experience it because it’s kind of hard to really imagine what I would be like.

Ibaudia ,
@Ibaudia@lemmy.world avatar

It’s strange because while we can use words to describe our thought processes, understanding how someone else thinks isn’t really possible since we only have one frame of reference (our own minds) and words can only go so far in describing cognition. We can only observe differences in task performance and speculate as to the underlying causes on a cognitive level, maybe make some correlations here and there in the process. So weird!

troglodytis ,

You get to think in ways that other people can’t. You actually have a super power. Don’t sleep on that! You rock

multifariace ,

I’m with you. Your movie reference really helped solidify it. I assumed I was one of the lonely minds, but this made it clear.

Some things that seem associated with this are my constant cravings for social interaction and intellectual conversation. I can’t give it to myself. I have never understood how people can just do nothing. I never had an invisible friend as a kid. There are many things people say and do that could be explained by having personal voices. There are many struggles with communicating to others that have already had a conversation with themselves before I can share a full thought.

Today ,

I drive my office mates crazy because the thoughts in my head just come out of my mouth, especially if I’m bored or nervous.

gravitas_deficiency ,

It’s a two-edged sword. Sometimes it can be really mean to you :(

Fubarberry ,
@Fubarberry@sopuli.xyz avatar

I’m not really sure if I count as having an inner voice thinker or not. I definitely use an inner voice when composing verbal/written thoughts, and when I’m trying to remember something specific. However trying to pay attention to my inner thought process makes it seem like my thoughts are mostly non-verbal with occasional sporadic words thrown in? It feels like the more relaxed I am the fewer words there are.

redcalcium ,

Those are probably the quick-thinker types. I wonder if people with inner voices take longer when making decision because they have to “listen” to the their inner voices.

cynar ,

I’ve got both pathways in my brain. Thinking without words is definitely faster. Verbal thought is better for communication and crystallisation of ideas. I.e. I think about something non-verbally, then internally verbalise the conclusions to help fix it in my memory and communicate it.

BruceTwarzen ,

I don't think i'm a quick thinker guy, but my reflexes are shockingly good. Like i i sometimes knock something over while cooking and i just see it in the corner of my eyes and somehow catch it midair. But in this fraction of a second my inner monologue still goes: i just knocked something over, but what, oh right, i put the soda stream bottle on the counter because i just emptied the dishwasher. Oh no it's also probably the glass one, because i have three glass bottles and only one that is plastic, so this could bet really messy when it breaks, they are also kinda expensive.
And then i somehow hold it in my hand before i fully caught up. Kinda like when you snooze for 10 minutes but have like 2 hours worth of dreams.

grrgyle ,

I believe that means you’re the kwizatz haderach

BeigeAgenda ,
@BeigeAgenda@lemmy.ca avatar

Stillgar: Lisan Al Gaib!

wide_eyed_stupid ,
@wide_eyed_stupid@lemmy.world avatar

Definitely those Atreides genes.

Knitwear ,

A friend asked me the same thing, they have a back and forth of voices, at significant speed, and then they reach a decision. Whereas I just “know” all the pros and cons (to the best of my ability) all at once if that makes sense?

grrgyle ,

I don’t know what it is I know, except that if I start flapping my gums the ol’ blackbox will fill in the details. I kind of realise it as I’m saying it lol

Today ,

It’s like chunks and patterns for me.

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

Have to admit the number of people in here with full internal voices has made me realize why podcasts and long videos of youtubers talking are so popular.

I hate them because it's like spending 10 minutes to be drip fed 1 minute's worth of information.

Today ,

I hate videos of talking and i don’t understand why tiktok is popular. I can skim an article without watching 10 minutes of crap.

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

Exactly, it's like not being able to fast travel in a game.

I like tiktok for non talky stuff like those 10 second videos of a fox walking along or something.

018118055 ,

I have a non-verbal inner voice which gives meta-commentary on my verbal inner voice. If I want to think about what I’m thinking, that’s what is going on.

BeigeAgenda ,
@BeigeAgenda@lemmy.ca avatar

It’s voices all the way down!

Evil_Shrubbery ,

Oh, the non-verbal one prob does that thing where they look directly into the camera all disappointed & defeated.

jordanlund , (edited )
@jordanlund@lemmy.world avatar

How do they read silently to themselves? 🤔

ScruffyDucky ,

Direct-to-video

Knitwear ,

It’s like I just “know” the text. It’s just in there with no intermediary.

partial_accumen ,

How fo they read silently to themselves? 🤔

The same way as listening to someone speak. There’s a thread of consciousness that takes in visual data and is translating the written word into a string of syntactical concepts that is then processed analytically.

Xanis ,

For those of you lacking caffeine today:

Translated: Yo’ brain be doing a figure out.

grrgyle ,

I wonder if it does the voices too

AnUnusualRelic ,
@AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world avatar

I was really surprised when I found out that people imagined voices when reading. Wouldn’t they be sped up voices? People read faster than speech. It’s so confusing…

decivex ,

I think the inner monologue is more there to “support” the processing of information rather than being filtered through it entirely.

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

How do you read silently to yourself? Seems like it would be harder and more noisy if you have to hear the whole thing.

jordanlund ,
@jordanlund@lemmy.world avatar

I mean, not really. It’s just words in my head.

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

What I'm getting from this thread is that almost everyone thinks their own cognitive process is easier and less annoying.

Which makes sense, because thinking is one of those things where people naturally just do it the most efficient way for their own neural structures.

Ghyste ,

I wish mine would shut up every once in awhile…

Knitwear ,

With my aphantasia it’s not that it’s all quiet in there, unfortunately you still get the carousel of regrets/self criticism etc, but it’s a carousel of emotions with no narrator if that makes sense

Ghyste ,

I think I’m picking up what you’re putting down.

kusivittula ,

i have two and they argue and bitch at each other. silly but i legit can’t stop them…

SpicyLizards ,

Wow l, i didnt know this was a thing. I’m the visual version of this - which i already know sucks less.

I wonder whether you don’t get songs stuck in your head… like as a consolation prize at least?

Palerider ,
@Palerider@feddit.uk avatar

I’m almost the opposite. I can recall a song I know and “listen” to it in my head. However my dreams tend to be like comics. A static image with accompanying sounds or, on a couple of occasions, my dream was like listening to an audio book… This was before audio books were a thing.

Today ,

I get songs stuck in my head almost every day! Drives me crazy and keeps me awake. There’s no music, just the urge to say/sing the words

delirious_owl ,
@delirious_owl@discuss.online avatar

Sometimes I wish I could silence the voices inside my head…

DudeImMacGyver ,

You can, but it takes work for some people. Various meditation can help, but require patience and diligence.

I’ve learned to turn it off and on mostly at will and frequently just play music in my mind when I want to listen but can’t use headphones or a speaker.

Evil_Shrubbery ,

As long as it’s not a monologue like op is describing, you are fine.

delirious_owl ,
@delirious_owl@discuss.online avatar

Usually its a song. But sometimes its more than one song playing at once. And sometimes there’s a narrator speaking over the music

Eccitaze ,
@Eccitaze@yiffit.net avatar

God, same. One of my little annoyances in life is that my internal voice is a goddamn motor mouth and I literally CANNOT stop it.

I can stare at a white wall and watch paint dry, and my monologue will start philosophizing about watching paint dry, where the phrase came from, why I’m doing it (to try and silence my internal voice), then go on a wiki walk about how trying not to think about something makes you think about it more and the classic example of telling someone “don’t think about a brown bear” makes them think about bears, then I’ll start thinking about bears and my monologue is suddenly halfway across the world.

Put me in a sensory deprivation tank, and my internal voice starts ruminating about how Daredevil uses these to sleep, then goes off about fight sequences, and then superhero comics, and whoops I’m halfway across the world.

Even when I’m paying attention and listening, my inner voice is still motoring away, it’s just that it’s mirroring what is being said to me instead of going on its own wiki walk halfway across the world (though sometimes someone will say something that makes my internal voice go “wait a second, that makes me think of…” and then I stop listening while I go on a wiki walk).

I have ADHD, in case it isn’t obvious yet.

SwingingKoala ,
@SwingingKoala@discuss.tchncs.de avatar

I’d try meditation…

WraithGear ,
@WraithGear@lemmy.world avatar

I am not sure about myself. I assume it is English, but now when i think about it my thoughts are much slower, and trip over them selves. It seems odd to consider thought in a means that is contrived for a much less efficient medium. So maybe i don’t think in a language at all and just attribute the meanings after the fact. I can visualize objects in my head though

MeThisGuy ,

yeh not everyone can visualize in their head. weirdly enough (or maybe not), I can taste in my head. like if you say tomato I can taste it. I should’ve been a chef maybe

realitista OP ,

Taste is an interesting one.

I can’t say I can truly taste at will but I can remember the experience of tasting something well enough to be able to “visualize” what taste I am craving, sometimes by imagining different tastes one by one until I find the right one. I’m not really tasting them but sort of replaying the experience of tasting them which is enough for me to understand the taste.

But it’s more like my brain describing it to me than actual taste. It’s weird.

livus ,
@livus@kbin.social avatar

I can taste in my head but there's a limited range of what I can smell in my head.

Like, the smell of chocolate or wet dog or chanel no 5, no problem. The smell of my mother's house or a meadow on a sunny day, very vague and uncertain.

MeThisGuy ,

yes now that I think of it, smell is def harder. I can only really tell you if something smelled good, like a gf’s sweater (prob pheromones) or bad, because those are easier to forget

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