Do you think in pictures?

[Loomis]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

Sounds like thankless filthy & hazardous work. I'd never even heard of it before now. I'd bet that exposure to such conditions cause long term health problems for many on the crew.

You are right I am glad I only did it for less than a year. I was in the Oil, Chemical, and Atomic Workers Union and the pay back then was very good. People who do that kind of work should be paid very well. One man died on the job when I was there when he fell off one of the huge vats where they brewed the evil stuff. Another time a truck driver was delivering some product and he started a fire. I went outside and saw people running in two directions. Half were running toward the fire to help extinguish it and the other half were running away in fear because if the fire had gotten out of control it would have been catastrophic. There was a huge tower that contained Xylene. Xylene is highly volatile and akin to gasoline in flammability. The company had their own little fire engine and they put the fire out before it spread too far.

 

[Margaretha]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

This is an interesting question, so I have been thinking about how I think. I know I think by making connections. for instance, if you say the word "table", I could make connections to pictures of tables, memories of gatherings at tables, ideas and concepts about tables, such as shape and what they are used for, and pictures of everything associated with tables.

It's a patterned network of pictures, memories, concepts, and ideas all connected to the word "table" and connected to each other and everything else. So although I don't actually think in words, everything is connected to words, or I wouldn't be able to understand language at all. What I can't figure out is exactly what is guiding my brain to choose the different neural pathways to connect to, to form a unique thought or idea or to understand something.

Maybe I'm overthinking this.

 

[Soup]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

Sounds like a job someone would get sentenced to rather than hired to do. I bet the pay sucked too!

 

[Margaretha]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

written words are pictures and spoken words are memories of sounds and we make sense out of language by connecting it in a logical way to all our memories, feelings, senses, and experiences So whether we think in pictures, words,or patterns, it's all connected in an intricate way.

 

[Deno]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

Ah I see what you meant Soup. You incorporate senses into your thoughts essentially?

Also Loomis just mentioned that he made a post about this same thing before. Here is the link

 

[Margaretha]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

Deno, you left pattern thinking out of the poll. I think I'm mostly a pattern thinker. Although my memories are pictures and sounds, my thoughts come together in patterns. I'm good with math, I hear the patterns in music, I love patterns.

 

[Deno]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

Deno, you left pattern thinking out of the poll. I think I'm mostly a pattern thinker. Although my memories are pictures and sounds, my thoughts come together in patterns. I'm good with math, I hear the patterns in music, I love patterns.

In my mind patterns are not a way of thinking, but a result of the way you think. People can either visualize things in their minds eye, in which case they think in pictures. OR they cannot visualize things, in which case they think in words. Other categorizations fit under these two main categories.


Just a side note: Please choose a option on the poll if you read this, There have been 5+ (including me) people to post replies but only 4 poll points. Thanks!

 

[Geordie]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

I always think in images.

Currently, I think about this:



Lots of light, from lots of places, from one single source.

 

[Margaretha]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

In my mind patterns are not a way of thinking, but a result of the way you think. People can either visualize things in their minds eye, in which case they think in pictures. OR they cannot visualize things, in which case they think in words. Other categorizations fit under these two main categories.


Just a side note: Please choose a option on the poll if you read this, There have been 5+ (including me) people to post replies but only 4 poll points. Thanks!

I don't agree with that. This is what Temple Grandin had to say about it:
9. AUTISTIC THINKING IS SPECIALIZED
When I wrote Thinking in Pictures (Grandin 1995), I thought everybody on the autism/Asperger spectrum was a visual thinker. People with autism and Asperger's are specialist thinkers. They are good at one thing and bad at other things. From both books and interviews, I have concluded that there are three principal types of specialist thinking.

Photo-realistic visual thinkers--such as I. All my thoughts are in photo-realistic pictures (Grandin & Johnson 2005). My area of weakness is in algebra because there is no way to visualize it. Visual thinkers can do geometry and trigonometry, but not algebra. For my work, visual thinking is very important. I can see everything in my head and then draw it on paper. Figures 1 and 2 show two of my drawings, done by hand, of livestock handling facilities. They date from the mid-1980s when I did much of my best work.

Pattern thinking--music and math mind. This is a more abstract form of visual thinking. Thoughts are in patterns instead of photo-realistic pictures. Pattern thinkers see patterns and relationships between numbers. Some of the best descriptions are in Daniel Tammet's book Born on a Blue Day (Tammet 2006) and in Jerry Newport's book Mozart and the Whale (Newport et al. 2007) The weak area in pattern thinkers is usually reading and writing composition.

Word-fact thinkers. These individuals have a huge memory for verbal facts on all kinds of things such as film stars and sporting events. They are often poor at drawing and other visual thinking skills.

 

[Deno]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

The brilliant thing about people is that we can agree to disagree, and so you are free to create a thread, if desired, about the three types of thought. My belief is that there are those two main ways in which peoples brains are able to think. With images, and without. I think of everything else as subcategory's. Not to say what I post is absolute and true, it is merely what I believe.

'Temple Grandin said..' to me is much like 'the bible says..' I don't take anything as fact unless I can touch it, with my hand, or my minds eye. The bible is believed to be true by many. Why? because it is one of the oldest and best known books of all time? Is that to say people did not lie in that era? Lying is not something that came about in the last 2000 years. I am not saying that Grandin is lying, but that what he says is his point of view, and this is mine.

 

[Margaretha]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

Of course she is not lying and neither are you. I didn't mean to argue about your beliefs. I'm sorry. I guess you can say that pattern thinking is a sub-category of picture thinking, if you prefer thinking about it that way.

 

[Christian T]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

Good on you Deno - it's always gratifying for me to hear someone advocating subjectivity. All perspectives really are equal.

As for the question at hand, I'm definitely a linguistic thinker - actually. Language is one of my biggest obsessions, and I'm fascinated by the way it's used. My mental images are typically very vague - I'm much more of a conceptual thinker, as words are very good for concepts.

Also, I find that if I overthink visualising something, the iamge just vanishes.

 

[Soup]

The more I look at all the different art forms Aspies have excelled in, I think that we Aspies are indeed extremely creative & imaginative BUT that we approach & express this differently than NTs do. We sometimes have a verbal disconnect when it comes to explaining our creative/imaginative drive in NT style. This is where digging up Aspie history is vital to deepening our & the NT world's understanding of us & the way we do things. So many great artists, musical genii & scientific pioneers have been & are Aspies. We seem to not separate out intimacy with patterns, systems & detail orientation with creativity & use our intellect to imagine. NTs rely heavily on intuition to accomplish creative/imaginative expression.

As to precisely how this works, fMRI scans & other brain imaging technologies performed on Apies & NTs (when engaged in creativity & imagining) for comparison's sake may provide some answers. If not, it'll at least point scientists in the correct direction re further research. I would bet that, while engaged in creative tasks, the verbal/language areas of the Aspie brain will be comparatively inactive.

Perhaps our relative disinterest in imaginative peer play (role-type play) as children has misled researchers to conclude that we lack imagination. I don't believe this to be true because, from experience, I know how creative (artistically) I was as a child & continue to be. We differ from NT kids in how we interpret complex social cues & read intentions. I can create entire worlds in my mind with complex legal systems, cultures & ethical foundations BUT I can't do so orally with some other person meddling & wanting to toss in parts my pattern-oriented mind can clearly see do not fit.

 

[rolo]

"NTs rely heavily on intuition to accomplish creative/imaginative expression". Please explain this statement-are you implying that Aspergers are not intuitive. If so, I would have to disagree-I am extremely intuitive but its what I do with that information that may be different from NTs

 

[rolo]

I do the random word or comment thing as well, usually after a mental roam-around while someone is talking. It makes sense in the context of where my mind went, but that is usually after two or three related subject changes in my mind. I can always piece together the route my mind has taken, though, for my bewildered conversation companion. "Well, you said ___ , which made me think of an article I read last week about ____ , which discussed the same theme as that movie we talked about last night where the main character looked like the neighbor, which reminded me that he came over this morning and borrowed the rake which I really need back because the leaves are a mess and I'd better water the garden." All of this takes a split second.

YEP! You are definately a woman!

 

[Soup]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

I find Grandin fascinating in the way she adapted her thinking in pictures to verbal language proficiency enabling her to excel in communicating with NTs. She has become an Aspie translator of sorts BUT the mistake many Aspies as well as the NT world are making is in over-generalizing & applying what she says about herself as someone on the Spectrum to others.

This same thing happens when an interviewer singles out some member of an ethnic or cultural group. This person speaks about what he as a _______ thinks & believes. He becomes the default spokesperson for an entire group, many of whose members disagree with him & see things differently. Imagine an Amish person chosen to represent how Americans think, believe & live. Now, have a foreign interviewer speak to 50 different Amish men. Any conclusions he would draw about Americans in general would be inaccurate. Our problem as Aspies is that there are so few spokespeople on the Spectrum who are sociable enough (when it comes to interacting with NTs) to speak out & provide a more well-wounded & diverse image of who we are.

For instance, can anyone name a religious Christian Aspie who has spoken about faith? When it comes to sexuality & relationships, Grandin has nothing substantial to say as she has never been in one & has no desire for one! Concluding that Aspies & Auties don't enter into relationships based upon Grandin as an individual would be absurd: many of us are married with kids. Many single Aspies are deeply lonely & long for a meaningful partnership & a sex life (involving someone else). They are solitary more out of feeling excluded & rejected. THere is even the type of Aspie who has hyper-sociability as a trait!

Aspie/NT cultural interaction is in its nascent stages. THe internet is enabling us to interact with each other for the 1st time in history & we're seeing images slowly emerge reflecting who & what we are. Since Asperger's was defined by a white Austrian European using a handful of middle class white Austrian boys as his subjects, the 'text' for what an Aspies are is inherently flawed, prejudicial & biased. Asperger is akin to someone who has glimpsed an unfamiliar creature through dense fog or a narrow tube & proceeded to describe what he saw.

Imagine the Aspie in an African tribal context living his traditional culture: many things considered deficits in 1940s Austria or the modern West would be advantages in the other context where pattern detection, detailed thinking & being less of a social chatterbox would render hunting & gathering, tracking animal migrational/fertility cycles etc. would be vital to tribal survival. Being a blabbermouth unable to be alone while out hunting or gathering would alert prey & reduce the food supply. Context is very important in understanding any behaviours.

 

[Soup]

@ Rolo & Bay: my mother does that too. While I can go off on a tangent, I can't go off on 6 of them in a string in a split second. When she does this, I have no clue what she's talking about.

@ Rolo, the few people who've known me also say I'm very intuitive: some have told me I'm prescient, have 'second sight' & am psychic! I don't see myself that way. I know I'm detecting patterns in what I'm seeing, comparing them very rapidly to other patterns I've encountered & making predictions based on probability.

As for intuition, how I would describe it in the context above is that social cues NTs intuitively understand & know how to react to are often alien to us unless explained. THen, too, how we react to (or as you said "... its what I do with that information that may be different from NTs." ) this info is different. This indicates that our intuitive ability to understand & interpret cues we intuit from the NT world is very different (flawed from an NT perspective). I see social intuitive understanding as having 3 parts.

1. The cues themselves from body language to facial expressions, words & gestures.
2. The meanings ascribed to the above.
3. THe correct (in social terms) reaction to be displayed (returned gestures, words, facial expressions & body language)

We Aspies see the cues individually BUT our interpretation software isn't the same as that of the avg NT who seems to be seeing an entire picture of the totality of the cues. From that, he can interpret them with little to no intellectual processing AND react in a way the avg. other NT in his society will correctly comprehend. He does all this in a flash. These intuitive leaps are difficult to impossible for many Aspies: we tend to have to think about the cues & work out stuff like, 'Is this person flirting with me or just being friendly?' 'As I being asked out on a date or does this person just want to know if I like jazz?' 'Is this person angry? Did I cause it or are they passionate about _____?' Aspies tend not to know this stuff intuitively.

I don't now if that made more sense to you or if it clarifies what I meant. If not, let me know & I'll try again.

 

[Cerulean]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

Even if I think about a word it's not just a word- all the letters have personalities and feelings to me, so different combinations of letters make me think and feel differently.

 

[Deno]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

Even if I think about a word it's not just a word- all the letters have personalities and feelings to me, so different combinations of letters make me think and feel differently.

So you are unable to picture things in your head? (minds eye) If you think apple, does an image, even if vague, appear? (not the same as seeing something physically with ones eyes)

Of course she is not lying and neither are you. I didn't mean to argue about your beliefs. I'm sorry. I guess you can say that pattern thinking is a sub-category of picture thinking, if you prefer thinking about it that way.

Yes, I believe 'pattern thinking' the way Grandin explains it, is merely a subcategory of Picture thinking. Also no need for apologies, I was merely trying to press that this is my view of how it is, and that is Grandins.

 

[Cerulean]

Re: Do you think in pictures or words?

I do picture things in my head as opposed to words, I just mean that if I picture letters in my head (for this example I'm counting letters as an object, like an apple), I still get the same kinds of thoughts and feelings about it as I would if I was thinking about an apple. Unfortunately I'm not awesome with words, I know this explanation is probably only serving to further confuse people haha!