#visual imagination

In Memoriam: Stephen Payne, editor and publisher

Publisher and editor Stephen Payne in 2017. Photo © and courtesy Kevin Jon Davies I am incredibly sad to learn of the death of Stephen Payne, a founder of the Doctor Who Appreciation Society (DWAS), former editor of Starburst magazine and co-founder of Visual Imagination, whose raft of publications predominantly catered for the growing interest in television fantasy and science…

Blind in the Mind: Why Some People Can't See Pictures in their Imagination

This is something I've thought about since that one day in sixth grade when we were told to close our eyes and picture this calming scenario our teacher was verbally instructing. And I closed my eyes and sat through a blank nothing. Then when we were sharing what we imagined, there was a boy who talked about how he pictured the square getting smaller and smaller until he, as a rabbit, could no longer fit into it and jumped out (the instructions were to imagine a big dark square and imagine it decreasing in size until you can't see it anymore. then imagine you are a rabbit. Something along those lines. I don't quite remember everything; this was like eight years ago). I wondered if he'd actually saw those things in his head or was just making it up. 

Then, last year, my psych professor was lecturing on something where he told us to close our eyes and imagine a triangle. Or something having to do with visualizing an object. And I turned to my friend next to me, expecting her to agree, and said that I don't actually see a triangle when I am trying to imagine a triangle. She said, "Really? What do you see?" "Black?" "That's weird."

I just had a conversation with my roommate who is a synesthetic, wherein she sees colors associated with letters and numbers and anything you can name or think of. And we talked about visualizing a car. Who's in the front seat? She had a descriptive answer. I said I don't know; I don't see anything but I could probably make up an answer for you.