How Do You Think?

[UFO]

TL;DR:

I want to change my testimony. After testing myself, I realized that I solve puzzles etc. with visual images after all, they are just quick snapshots of situations, not actual visualization of movements or processes. "Unsymbolized thinking" is merely for intermediate steps between visualized images. If I think without visualization, then I work with gut feeling, that is hardly thinking, more like guessing and intuition without confirmation. I still keep internal dialogue and verbal thinking at minimum, though.

Full story:

As this topic really began to bother me, I made several actual tests, instead just trying to remember what I remember been going inside my head when I was thinking about things... I ended up with these results:

I can play Tetris with my stuffed refrigator without visualizing how I can fit items inside. It is good enough to use gut feeling based on size and shape of objects, so I didn't visualize what I was doing. I just fitted stuff inside without consciously imagining what the refrigator would look like after putting in some individual item.

When I saw an equation "16x=4" on the computer screen, I saw a mental image of "x=4/16". That happened even before I decided to solve "x" so the image came without a warning. However, thought process itself wasn't visual, I just saw the end result. I didn't saw 16 moving to under 4, it was there already when I got that mental image.

I chose a programming problem that I haven't memorized line-by-line how it should be made: I know in principle how a binary search works, but have no memorized step-by-step algorithm at practical pseudo-code level. When I recalled the binary search from my memory, I got a "feeling" of the algorithm, but not a visual image of it, nor a literal phrasing like "split sequence to smaller sequences, choose which sequence contains the searched unit, and keep splitting until only one unit is left". But when I began to write the code, I got a visual of every line of code before I wrote it. Damn, I even got a visual of two or three lines of code when they had to work together and produce a result I knew was needed at that phase of the algorithm.

I recalled a puzzle about two gates with gatekeepers, one always lying while other always telling truth. By the puzzle's rules, I can ask only one question from one of the gatekeepers to find out which gate I should choose to walk thru. First, I got a vague memory image of the movie Labyrinth which had this scene. Because I remember the right question to ask (

Spoiler: right answer hidden if you want to solve it by yourself

"Would the other guy say that this gate is the right one?"

), I naturally thought of that in a spoken form, which was expected. Then what I really tested, was how I would rationalize the explanation. I couldn't formulate the answer without me entering into an internal dialogue mode, thinking different options:

Spoiler: logic hidden to avoid spoilers

"If this guy says yes and he lies, then the other one says no and he don't lie, thus other door is correct one. If this guy says yes and he tells truth, then the other one says yes and he lies, thus other door is correct one. And so on..."

I simply couldn't get the gut feeling of the logic without dressing it to the words, and writing it down to help my memory to keep up with listing all the logic combinations. I tried if I could visualize it as some kind of logic tree, but I didn't manage to do that, the verbal dissection of the logic was the only way to go.

Tower of Hanoi was the most interesting case:
- It is a good test as I have never thought a strategy for the game before, just tested it once or twice years ago. I wanted to avoid visualizing moves beforehand, so I went with a gut feeling like I do with programming.
- Three and four pieces version of the game went perfectly with minimum amount of moves. I repeated the test twice for both versions with about a ten minute pause in-between to make sure that I forget any sequences that I haven't tried to remember on purpose. This, of course, does not mean that I didn't solve three piece version of the puzzle at first attempt with luck, and then subconsciously remembered the sequence how to get an individual piece at its place.
- I actually got a proof of subconscious remembering as with a five piece version of the puzzle I managed to move whole tower in minimum amount of moves... to the middle. I got also plenty of move wasting mistakes, but mostly I managed to solve the puzzle to the wrong position with minimum amount of moves. I didn't play it enough many times to see if I can get it right, as about dozen attempts were enough to me.
- I didn't had visualizations of moving sequences, only quick flashes of images me dropping the piece to the place where I was moving it, and occasional images of the second move following it (which couple of times made me change my mind about the initial move). I tried to not think consciously moves ahead as that would have certainly produced visualization of moves.
- Because I have programmed computers since I was about eight years old, the two's powers (2^x, where x=0..16) are burnt permanently to my mind. For this reason, when I saw game's prediction about minimum amount of moves following sequence 1, 3, 7, 15 etc. depending on the amount of pieces, I didn't need to visualize moves to notice, that lowest piece needs to move only once, second lowest pieces moves twice, third lowest pieces moves four times and so on.

I think all this means, that I have an eye to the patterns, but my brains also accept a very vague and abstract level thinking instead getting obsessed with details. I personally feel bad about not having a full understanding of what I am doing, but it is not paralyzing. I know that "autistic people have an impairments at abstract level thinking" is a debunked conclusion from tests where autistic people excel with detail oriented thinking, but I think my kind of thinking show less focus on detail processing... I don't know... I'm still confused about how I fit on the spectrum

 

[Grondhammar]

It's hard to draw conclusions, but those were some really interesting experiments and observations. Thank you for writing them up and sharing them with us!

The Tower of Hanoi experiment was interesting for me. After reading about your experience, I tried solving mentally and went straight to active visualisation where I could see the disks moving. When I got about five steps out from solving (in my head), my internal visualisation sped up like a video on 3x or 5x speed.

With simple algebra, my brain seems to work with the relationships between numbers. My brain sees the 16 and the 4, then builds a logical bridge between 1) the unstated 4 in the relationship between the two numbers, and 2) the fact that 16 needs to get smaller. And then I'm presented with the version of 4 that makes things smaller (i.e. 1/4).

It was really tough to break that last down, though, because it happens so quickly. I had to present my brain with quite a few of these to notice the steps I was taking.

Thanks for the fun thought experiments!

 

[are]

I get images of code i forgot about that. it's when i'm actually coding though like if i'm calling another function i can see what it is. or what i might write. in working memory.

that doesn't happen much though.

 

[the_tortoise]

I watched about half of the first movie and was so sad about how frantic the Shire -> Rivendell sequence was that I got up and left the theatre. I've never walked out of a movie before or since. The dissonance between Peter Jackson's idea of what Middle Earth feels like, and the feel of the very high detail internal world I used as a refuge as a pre-teen/teenager, was just too much to bear.

I still haven't seen the rest of the first, or any of the others. It was a memorably unpleasant experience.

I relate to this...I have found in later years my own imagery of people, places, and things cannot be fully overwritten but for a time in youth I had the exact same fear ...ultimately it's usually for me that the new imagery would always be remembered alongside mine, and I have never liked that either but it less bad than if I lost all my old mental fantasy worlds. It is still very disorienting, can be distressing, and detracts from the story in my head unless I can separate them (as below)...

I resist going to movies of any of my favorite books, [...] because the story itself ALWAYS gets rewritten in unnecessary ways.

For me this makes it actually it easier if the story is substantially rewritten because then I can sort of treat it like an entirely different story in my mind.

 

[BloodyKun108]

My internal monologue is almost constantly on all the time, especially in contrast to how quiet I can typically be either by myself or with others, and I wonder if it’s developed in part at least due to having to think about what I will or would say far in advance or to keep myself company, in a way. It can be very hard to actively quiet it when I know I need to get to sleep or even just to focus on something. At least I think it can also help to quell what seems to be tinnitus, but I also do need white noise for that as well.

Also think a lot in images, or rather video? Odd word to use to describe thought but images to me implies something still. I can do both but mostly picture stuff that’s moving, able to rotate things in my mind, etc. though thinking in still images is very helpful for keeping a clear idea if what I may want to draw or paint in mind. I’ve started good practice in actually using more reference material instead of relying entirely on my mental imagery of the past several decades of my life, but it’s a bit tougher now when things like google are plagued by AI images unfortunately.

Both these are pretty much always working in conjunction with each other in some way or another, whether it’s my art or thinking of stories or designing game ideas, planning or organization, etc. Mostly my internal monologue is me just talking to myself but can also hold theoretical conversations with others or between any people, real or fictional, and helps to figure out scenes for things. Even to some extent I think it helps keep me from getting lost or to remember how some places are laid out, in video games or real life, I guess one caveat being that I can never seem to attach arbitrary names to streets except those I live on or memorized for work and whatnot.

Can definitely relate to the discussions on books and movies and such. I did enjoy the film adaptation of The Giver, for example, but it turned out to be quite different from what I had in my head for many years. To add to this, I understand people’s need for voice acting in games these days, but I was very against it in particular for the Zelda series. With Breath of the Wild, I could not stand it and couldn’t help but think at least they should have gone a direction more closely resembling Fromsoft’s games than the saturday morning cartoon vibes the cast and direction chosen gave. Tears of the Kingdom was somehow even worse, people praising Ganondorf I feel only because of the specific actor rather than him actually fitting the role. At least the option to pick other languages is there and for me Japanese was close enough to the usual grunts the series has had up to that point. Maybe a me specific sort of thing but I feel kind of fits this topic when you get used to seeing or hearing things a certain way in your head. Have similar feelings for the original and newer dubs of Sailor Moon, or sticking to Japanese in series like Yakuza or Jojo.

Lastly wanted to bring up stuff related to trying to get to sleep and dreams, just because I think it can be interesting in relation to how people usually think vs. their subconscious. It seems many who might not think as much in visuals do claim their dreams still can be very much so, though I don’t have any concrete statistics or anything. For me, it’s always visual, and think I even hold onto my internal monologue even if in retrospect my line of reasoning always follows the abstract dream logic. Few of my dreams have been mundane, most all I remember being super fantastical in some way, and I guess it’s part of the logic to just follow along to try to make sense of them. I’ve been interested in trying to achieve lucid dreaming but have only ever realized I was in a dream once, and almost as soon as I said it out loud in my dream I woke up. Maybe one day.

EDIT: I forgot to add, and it is very minor and more of a conscious effort kind of thing that doesn’t just happen by itself necessarily, but also can imagine up textures and tastes. I think smells are a bit tougher for me because my sense if smell already doesn’t seem to be very strong at all, but can still sometimes do it, and remember very specific ones like glue or crayons in kindergarten or my grandparents’ carpeting in their home. The sense of taste I imagine has been helping me with my diet but then I think mostly it just makes me crave more junk food lol

 

[UFO]

It seems many who might not think as much in visuals do claim their dreams still can be very much so

There is a condition called aphantasia, where a person is unable to visualize voluntarily (and yes, it is more common among autistic individuals than in the general population). However, involuntary visualization, like dreaming, is still possible.

I assume that dreams are separate from the conscious thinking process. I try to think a lot of in my dreams and I try to control the situations I see in dreams, but I have no control over the imagery and events in my dreams. But I can visualize how my dream should go, but the dream just don't obey that visualization. Only thing I can do, is to wake myself up before the dream turns to a nightmare, if I start to notice such a change in the mood of the dream.

Btw. I don't have aphantasia myself as I can visualize things voluntarily just fine, I just don't resort to visualization in thinking process that often, unless I want to be thorough at scientific levels. It appears that I am not hyperphantasic either: creating a movie in my mind is an effort compared to imagining still images. But I can imagine those Hanoi Tower pieces moving around...

Btw 2. My dreams are usually rather mundane, but especially at autumns and springs they turn to a real high fantasy stuff. But no flying or (at least reliably working) magical powers. I haven't flown without an airplane since I was a kid

 

[are]

I have episodic dreams with voices like half the time. The other half is like weird ideas and stuff uncomfortably fighting with each other. Or like a recent dream i was like observing myself calculating the odds i was dreaming. But there was no real imagery or voice.
These are all interesting posts. There's so much variety in the autistic community on how everyone thinks.

 

[Jumpinbare]

Or like a recent dream i was like observing myself calculating the odds i was dreaming.

When I was 5, I went in my bedroom to see if I was dreaming. I saw myself asleep in bed, decided I was dreaming, and decided I could do the otherwise prohibited thing I wanted to do.

 

[are]

When I was 5, I went in my bedroom to see if I was dreaming. I saw myself asleep in bed, decided I was dreaming, and decided I could do the otherwise prohibited thing I wanted to do.

Did it work did you get away with it?

 

[are]

My internal monologue is almost constantly on all the time, especially in contrast to how quiet I can typically be either by myself or with others, and I wonder if it’s developed in part at least due to having to think about what I will or would say far in advance or to keep myself company, in a way. It can be very hard to actively quiet it when I know I need to get to sleep or even just to focus on something. At least I think it can also help to quell what seems to be tinnitus, but I also do need white noise for that as well.

Also think a lot in images, or rather video? Odd word to use to describe thought but images to me implies something still. I can do both but mostly picture stuff that’s moving, able to rotate things in my mind, etc. though thinking in still images is very helpful for keeping a clear idea if what I may want to draw or paint in mind. I’ve started good practice in actually using more reference material instead of relying entirely on my mental imagery of the past several decades of my life, but it’s a bit tougher now when things like google are plagued by AI images unfortunately.

Both these are pretty much always working in conjunction with each other in some way or another, whether it’s my art or thinking of stories or designing game ideas, planning or organization, etc. Mostly my internal monologue is me just talking to myself but can also hold theoretical conversations with others or between any people, real or fictional, and helps to figure out scenes for things. Even to some extent I think it helps keep me from getting lost or to remember how some places are laid out, in video games or real life, I guess one caveat being that I can never seem to attach arbitrary names to streets except those I live on or memorized for work and whatnot.

Can definitely relate to the discussions on books and movies and such. I did enjoy the film adaptation of The Giver, for example, but it turned out to be quite different from what I had in my head for many years. To add to this, I understand people’s need for voice acting in games these days, but I was very against it in particular for the Zelda series. With Breath of the Wild, I could not stand it and couldn’t help but think at least they should have gone a direction more closely resembling Fromsoft’s games than the saturday morning cartoon vibes the cast and direction chosen gave. Tears of the Kingdom was somehow even worse, people praising Ganondorf I feel only because of the specific actor rather than him actually fitting the role. At least the option to pick other languages is there and for me Japanese was close enough to the usual grunts the series has had up to that point. Maybe a me specific sort of thing but I feel kind of fits this topic when you get used to seeing or hearing things a certain way in your head. Have similar feelings for the original and newer dubs of Sailor Moon, or sticking to Japanese in series like Yakuza or Jojo.

Lastly wanted to bring up stuff related to trying to get to sleep and dreams, just because I think it can be interesting in relation to how people usually think vs. their subconscious. It seems many who might not think as much in visuals do claim their dreams still can be very much so, though I don’t have any concrete statistics or anything. For me, it’s always visual, and think I even hold onto my internal monologue even if in retrospect my line of reasoning always follows the abstract dream logic. Few of my dreams have been mundane, most all I remember being super fantastical in some way, and I guess it’s part of the logic to just follow along to try to make sense of them. I’ve been interested in trying to achieve lucid dreaming but have only ever realized I was in a dream once, and almost as soon as I said it out loud in my dream I woke up. Maybe one day.

EDIT: I forgot to add, and it is very minor and more of a conscious effort kind of thing that doesn’t just happen by itself necessarily, but also can imagine up textures and tastes. I think smells are a bit tougher for me because my sense if smell already doesn’t seem to be very strong at all, but can still sometimes do it, and remember very specific ones like glue or crayons in kindergarten or my grandparents’ carpeting in their home. The sense of taste I imagine has been helping me with my diet but then I think mostly it just makes me crave more junk food lol

I relate a lot to planning on what to say. I've had to start scripting like on paper. and then i stop thinking about what i'll say so much. but yeah that's the only time i can use verbal reasoning is planning what i'll say or talking.
idk that it's bad though.

It sounds like you have strong dialogic reasoning -- where you think using another in your head or in person.