Do you like using your imagination?

[benaspiringwriter]

This is a very interesting thread. Proust once said about literature; 'it is more real than reality'. The perfect riposte to my nagging mum saying 'get your nose out of that book!'. What's more, there is a youtube documentary on William Golding where Golding argues that, pace the reason-worshipping tradition flowing back to the eighteenth century enlightenment, human consciousness is always conditioned by the imagination. Elsewhere, during the book Becoming Dickens: the invention of a novelist, Oscar Wilde is quoted as saying 'one's real life is the one one doesn't lead'. I will probably never achieve my dream of becoming a professional, published writer, however keeping the dream alive is often fun and fulfilling despite the frequent disappointment! Or, as Aristotle once said 'do things not for the applause to be gained by them, but for the worth of the things themselves' . Do some of you feel such pride and pleasure through acting with autistic naturalness in obscurity, I wonder?

Lastly, what do people think about Hans Asperger's idea that often in autism 'the language is nearly always unnatural' in so far as this has implications for how autistic people use their imaginations? Do we use language in a mechanical, un-subtle way, and therefore loose some of it's nuances? Therefore are autistic imaginations often mechanical, un-subtle, also? However, perhaps, the long list of great autistic science fiction writers suggests that the autistic imagination is perfectly capable of being both mechanical and subtle? i.e On the one hand, in her 1995 book Thinking in pictures Temple Grandin argues that Einstein--- although not a science fiction writer, certainly a scientist, and so germane to the former topic--- was attracted to science for the perhaps initially slightly counter intuitive reasons of it's seeming sensuous characteristics; (thus the subtle imagination of the autistic scientist Einstein); and on the other hand, other autism books such as 2015’s Neurotribes argue that some classical science fiction writers, also emerging in the 20th century, were sometimes ‘guilty’ of producing plots that were transparent and implausible, and were only really fashioned into existence so as to parade various scientific objects and concepts. (thus examples of the autistic and science-related imagination being 'mechanical’, also')

Again, what do people think?

 

[AprilR]

I love to daydream imaginary scenarios, reading and watching fictional stories. When i was younger i used to have an inner voice that narrated what is currently happening, but idk if i am imaginative. I am not much of a writer or artist.

That Said, i do have an original character i created, and there are certain scenes that pop in my brain, esp when i am listening to music. But as for, creating a story that has an actual plot and world-building? I suck at that

 

[Shevek]

This is a very interesting thread. Proust once said about literature; 'it is more real than reality'. The perfect riposte to my nagging mum saying 'get your nose out of that book!'. What's more, there is a youtube documentary on William Golding where Golding argues that, pace the reason-worshipping tradition flowing back to the eighteenth century enlightenment, human consciousness is always conditioned by the imagination. Elsewhere, during the book Becoming Dickens: the invention of a novelist, Oscar Wilde is quoted as saying 'one's real life is the one one doesn't lead'. I will probably never achieve my dream of becoming a professional, published writer, however keeping the dream alive is often fun and fulfilling despite the frequent disappointment! Or, as Aristotle once said 'do things not for the applause to be gained by them, but for the worth of the things themselves' . Do some of you feel such pride and pleasure through acting with autistic naturalness in obscurity, I wonder?

Lastly, what do people think about Hans Asperger's idea that often in autism 'the language is nearly always unnatural' in so far as this has implications for how autistic people use their imaginations? Do we use language in a mechanical, un-subtle way, and therefore loose some of it's nuances? Therefore are autistic imaginations often mechanical, un-subtle, also? However, perhaps, the long list of great autistic science fiction writers suggests that the autistic imagination is perfectly capable of being both mechanical and subtle? i.e On the one hand, in her 1995 book Thinking in pictures Temple Grandin argues that Einstein--- although not a science fiction writer, certainly a scientist, and so germane to the former topic--- was attracted to science for the perhaps initially slightly counter intuitive reasons of it's seeming sensuous characteristics; (thus the subtle imagination of the autistic scientist Einstein); and on the other hand, other autism books such as 2015’s Neurotribes argue that some classical science fiction writers, also emerging in the 20th century, were sometimes ‘guilty’ of producing plots that were transparent and implausible, and were only really fashioned into existence so as to parade various scientific objects and concepts. (thus examples of the autistic and science-related imagination being 'mechanical’, also')

Again, what do people think?

I spend more time writing than anything else, but get very little response to my best ideas, however well presented. I suspect that I should split my articles into a hundred parts to sneak up on the big ideas, but I don't know how to write characters to make the stories interesting.
I recently got six pages in a new book just describing something I made of mostly scraps from my career, to help me cope with travel. Most of the book is about grand adventures, while I'm struggling with short trips, but the editor thought I showed more imagination.
I get stressed by public recognition; I just want things to work more efficiently and to hide in the lab, with one link to the rest of the company.

I've never noticed much science in science fiction, apart from a broad introduction of things like Dick Tracy's two-way wrist radio, later upgraded to a TV. There sure is not any mention of the basic hazards of space for humans except the vacuum. One of my favourite authors, Zenna Henderson, wrote wonderful stories about caring, telepathic humanoids, but her science was total rubbish.

Even the greats make gross errors. In "From the Earth to the Moon" Jules Verne had his astronauts shot from a gun that would have made them into jelly. They then coasted to the point where the gravity of the Earth and Moon were equal, and stopped there, waiting to see which way they would fall. They noticed this milestone by becoming weightless there, and celebrated by pouring champagne into glasses.

 

[Judge]

Not really. Not when more often than not, I consider myself a "ruthless pragmatist".

For better or worse, I try to look at most everything as it is rather than how I wish it could be.

 

[Shevek]

Not really. Not when more often than not, I consider myself a "ruthless pragmatist".

For better or worse, I try to look at most everything as it is rather than how I wish it could be.

I find it takes a lot of imagination to see things as they actually are, and what is truly pragmatic. There are enormous investments in replacing gasoline cars with electric ones, but a car only needs to weigh as much as it carries to haul our bodies, yet it often it weighs ten times that much to carry our image and insecurities around. Advertising is quite insidious.

 

[benaspiringwriter]

Hi Shevek,
Thanks so much for your insightful comments. I did not know that about Jules Verne’s oeuvre, as well as those ideas that constitute your other impressively forensic, but not unaffecting, analysis of part of the science fiction world. I’ll be honest, I have not had much experience with reading science fiction because, well, I have never devoted myself to physical science as a multifaceted subject to understand both for its own sake and the ‘physical science’ parts of science fiction. (!) i.e when I was in secondary school between 1998 and 2005 **1**, I practically dropped out of all my subjects, including all the sciences, and only focused on music. In other words, I had a sort of ‘science fiction, autistic fan boy’ approach to obvious but immortal specific subculture bibles such as *Kerrang*.

Dreaming of getting a ‘5 K’ review in *Kerrang* was my teenage version of perhaps your teenage dream of winning the nobel prize for psychics, say. (?!) I’d like to reiterate that although I am a very ambitious, stubborn person, I am aware that most of what I write on this forum will appear like brain-farts to most people. I genuinely understand this reaction to my efforts. However, please know that in my own case, I am a mixture of high functioning and low functioning. And in my own manic depressive way, the excitement during the moment of composition, often quickly turns to the paranoia and depression of thinking that, yet again, I’ve made a fool of myself.

However, like many of us here, you grow to get used to familiar, distasteful pattern of subjective, reflex derived behaviour. Thus, to round things off, although some day I hope to attain the kind of physical science and science fiction knowledge Shevek seems to possess (I’m genuinely not being sardonic; if anything, as David Foster, Wallace— who killed himself tragically in 2008 after his follow up attempts to 1994’s *Infinite Jest* ended in well, disappointment— once said on youtube, “I would happily trade places with you!”.), nevertheless, in other words, be it primarily caused by the imagination leading the reason, or the other way around (sometimes, it is hard to distinguish!), my current position is of a follower and practitioner of science fiction, only in the sense that I eventually end up becoming some kind of hero in some kind of story (nice and loose definition, there you see!)

That’s why social science has sometimes seemed more appealing to me than the still-to-be-mastered physical science aspects of science fiction. In other words, play the game reasonably well—, what the French sociologist P. Borudieu called ‘a feel for the game’--- and you may end up becoming some kind of hero in a ‘story’ like the social science staple, *Outsiders; studies in the Sociology of deviance*, by Howard. S. Becker. However I am probably the kind of guy whose only claim to fame will ultimately be a sort of self-parodic version of the TV-fictional personage of ‘Howard Moon’ from *the Mighty Boosh*. And *he* once said during an episode that he wanted to be a walking incarnation of that always somewhat nebulous notion, ‘a jazz poet’; and look where that got him! (wink)

At any rate, obviously but importantly, this relates to the aforesaid also ‘autism-social science synthesising’ themes of Oliver Sacks great aforesaid book featuring Temple Grandin, *An Anthropologist on Mars*. Perhaps, then, even though we are all arguably part of a broadly similar autistic subculture, nevertheless, perhaps it is possible to be a *deviant* within such a community?! I hope I’ve not pissed anyone off with my efforts on here today. Again, please remember that I have an *intellectual disability* in that I am low functioning as well as high functioning. Perhaps I am just a weirdo, even in the autistic community?! Listening to Radiohead’s song *Creep* seems to offer a balm as well as confirmation of such undesired status. And yet, as the also asperger syndrome person S. P. Morrissey **2** once said; “but everybody’s got to live their lives; and god knows I’ve got to live mine”. Tomorrow, I’ll try again. (btw, I’m not saying that I think everyone hates me, its just that my rambling, (unintentionally) hairbrained prose style is probably quite annoying sometimes. And yet, proving the wry saying in our community “If you've met one person with autism then you've met one person with autism’ possesses verity claiming status, the sympathetic, patient reaction of Gerontius, Sacredheart, and Shevek, etc seems to hint that perhaps some of you think I’m a welcome member of the community, even though I probably won’t, even eventually, end up producing something of publishable use before I’m six feet under?! Anyway, it’s been a rollercoaster today, for me, the new kid. However, as The Beatles once said…. *Tomorrow never knows*.....or something like that, at any rate (wink)

Again, Warmest comradely greetings,

Ben



**1** The late, great neurologist Oliver Sacks, after all, says in his book *An anthropologist on mars*,vis-a-vs autistic people; “sometimes, only a full biography will do” (however, don’t worry, I may be socially awkward even amongst a community of autistics, however I will spare you a whole biography(!) in this comment on this thread. Indeed, as J. D. Slainger says during the start of his novel *The catcher in the rye*, “I’ll spare you all that David Copperfield crap”. Or, as the great social scientist Karl Marx once said (I paraphrase) “History repeats itself; the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce’ (wink)

**2** btw, like many of you I suspect, I categorically disagree with the far right trajectory that S. P. Morrissey’s political statements took on after he left The Smiths, however, when he was with The Smiths, all seemed to be well….

 

[Shevek]

Hi Shevek,
Thanks so much for your insightful comments. <snip>

Thanks for the kudos. I have not been reading SF for many years, missing many modern authors, and a large majority of your references. If I were to read a fiction book next year, it would probably be "Ishmael," which may not be classed as SF, but it does feature a talking gorilla, which is close enough for me. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40611328-ishmael

My first ambition was to participate in a successful movement to ban nuclear weapons. I only chose my specialized vocation after the group I was with stopped making progress. Richard Feynman was a lot more sociable than I, and he only accepted his Nobel because refusing it would have led to even more publicity. I share your difficulty in maintaining confidence in writing after the initial burst. I try to stay detached enough from my results to laugh at them, along with all the other wasted opportunities all around us. You may have the better approach. Peter Drucker observed that whenever he saw something new coming available, it was because of a megalomaniac with a vision.

 

[MildredHubble]

My imagination seems to be far better at audio than it is dreaming up visual things. I can conjure up memories but I can't modify them, at least not much. I can picture extant things and combine them. This is useful for modifying electronics or repairing things.

But if I'm asked to picture a pink rabbit my mind will flash up the Duracell Bunny commercial I saw yesterday (maybe the energiser bunny where you are, it's quite an interesting story if you Google it!). I can't, invent a new and unique pink bunny. It just won't happen and I've tried real hard to do this sort of thing but there's just blackness in my mind.

I can imagine systems, like a car engine in motion. But I don't quite know how to describe how I do that, it's not exactly visual, it's more like a weird form of proprioception.

When I listen to music though it's like a light show! It's like a 3D cloud that I can see and zoom in on things. But I'm not quite sure it's the same as imagination.

 

[Darkkin]

And there in the shadow
of the chalk face that fell
deep to the molten heart
of the moon dark abyss,
the Rexy, a Glass Rabbit
found him, still as stone
a knight with no purpose,
country, kinth, nor kind...

A warrior, hardened, hated
with a bounty on his head.
For the Grootslang sought
the treasure, the very horn
the Northern White Knight
wielded, his bladed crest,
a horn that spoke the truth,
bones cast from diamonds...

for...

Ivory left the plundered dead

but not...

that Knight of the Living Stone,
whose hide was a great shield
of dolerite plating in the stead
of oddly vulnerable rhino skin.

Lith, the Rhino of Living Stone

(Two minutes with a cell phone certainly make the probably of six impossible things before breakfast a very real possibility.)

 

[Jumpinbare]

I write science fiction, so I guess by definition I am using imagination. I don't try too hard to imagine what characters look like other than basic descriptions, and write mainly the ideas, not so much the gritty details. I definitely don't get much into interpersonal dynamics, or much into detailed imagery.

 

[lovely_darlingprettybaby]

I

As I get older and take time to figure out how my mind works, I'm learning that I just love using my mind to conjure up vivid sensory experiences in my imagination.

If I concentrate enough, I feel like I can visualize objects or people in HD. What goes on in my imagination is just as compelling and realistic as what's actually going on around me.

My favorite movies, music, books, etc. capture my imagination and give me a lot to think about. While living in isolation during the pandemic, I spent a lot of time lying in my bed and just entering an imaginary realm where I could spend time with my favorite people. It felt like they were really there.

Is this something you can relate to? If so, how do you manage your tendency/desire to get lost in your imagination? What's your favorite thing to think about? How vivid is your imagination in general?

I have synesthesia where I see images in my head etc
I can imagine a lot in mind like different worlds etc. I love my imagination.
It is a vivid and rich imagination

 

[lovely_darlingprettybaby]

How does this make you feel? Do you ever catch yourself wishing the real world could be as interesting as the one in your mind?

I always think God should have made the world more interesting.
More colours for art, like you some plants with little chocolates inside, little fairies inside of others or little fairies at the bottom of the garden or in an enchanted forest, real hidden treasure and pots of gold at the end of rainbows, gemstones in rivers and lakes, mermaids and worlds under the sea, flying cars, you could climb into the sky and live in a loft on your roof, find things in raindrops or it rain in different colors, you could talk to animals and ride kind wolves, change your face for a time or age, go back in the future or past, find places on earth with no gravity that flung you in space, that karma would involve your enemies sinking in a pit ot gravity disappearing and them being flung in space or falling down a long well and have to live there for years still alive etc

 

[Captain Jigglypuff]

I enjoy coming up with ideas for stuff. I enjoy being creative with my mind.