Synesthesia--anyone else have it?
- Thread starter Nerys Ghemor
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I think I have a mild form of it. All of my life I have had the association of certain numbers being "hot" and certain numbers being 'cold". 2,4,7,and 9 are cold. 3, 5, and 6 are hot. 0,1, and 8 are kind of medium. I only get a color association with 4 which is blue, 6 is red, and 7 is green. Certain numbers are colder than others like 4 is colder than 7 so 47 is a colder number than 74. 42 is an extremely cold number(which invites obvious Douglas Adams jokes). I have no idea where this comes from, but it is something I have thought all my life. I even rememberer as a kid trying to explain it to people and them not getting it.
I'll add that music is probably a form of synesthesia that all humans have inherited. Albert Einstein noted that Mozart was math. Why would math be rationally related to the perception of music except for some strange wiring in our brains? Almost all birds can sing, but they don't produce what we would call music. Mammalian vocal cords can also produce a vast range of sounds, but we wouldn't call any of their productions music, either. Yet we produce music with our voices, our hands (on a vast array of instruments), on our computers, and have used just about everything capable or producing sound. It's as if we're processing sequences of notes (again, another invention of ours related to our bizarre perception of music) on an emotional level, which really makes no sense at all unless we're all processing sensory inputs in illogical and irrational ways, like seeing colors associated with numbers and letters.
But since everyone has the same defect we mark it as normal and instead label those who don't possess it as deficient, tone deaf, autistic, and the like.
So let us just note that those with synesthesia live in a somewhat richer world which makes little or no sense to the rest of us, just like my cat and rabbits make no sense of all the emotionally uplifting music I play on my laptop.
They can't perceive how the mathematics of changing patterns of sound frequencies could be emotionally uplifting, and we don't understand it either. But since we all perceive that it is so, and since we all love the result, we don't question how our sensory wiring could be so screwed up to produce such an effect.
It's much like the way the crew of the Enterprise failed to appreciate Wesley's perception of space and time. He could hear and see and feel things in ways that made no logical sense to the minds that weren't similarly miswired, just as his character made no sense to minds that weren't attuned to the creative genius of having a whiney kid at the helm. Let's be honest. If we had inherited the same perceptual abilities as the writers, Wesley would've been the show's Anakin Skywalker.
ETA: Yes, I totally went there.
But since everyone has the same defect we mark it as normal and instead label those who don't possess it as deficient, tone deaf, autistic, and the like.
So let us just note that those with synesthesia live in a somewhat richer world which makes little or no sense to the rest of us, just like my cat and rabbits make no sense of all the emotionally uplifting music I play on my laptop.
They can't perceive how the mathematics of changing patterns of sound frequencies could be emotionally uplifting, and we don't understand it either. But since we all perceive that it is so, and since we all love the result, we don't question how our sensory wiring could be so screwed up to produce such an effect.
It's much like the way the crew of the Enterprise failed to appreciate Wesley's perception of space and time. He could hear and see and feel things in ways that made no logical sense to the minds that weren't similarly miswired, just as his character made no sense to minds that weren't attuned to the creative genius of having a whiney kid at the helm. Let's be honest. If we had inherited the same perceptual abilities as the writers, Wesley would've been the show's Anakin Skywalker.
ETA: Yes, I totally went there.
This is an interesting topic. I think I might have a mild form of synesthesia, but I've never been tested for it. Sometimes, when I hear sounds, I'll see colors. It only happens in the dark when I'm relaxed, though. (Like when I'm falling asleep and a noise startles me.) I sort of see the sound wave, like it would appear on an electronic tuner, and I see the color in the background. The most common colors are dark red or dark green. Occasionally I'll see blue.
I don't know if this is related, but I'm also colorblind in dim light. (I can see color normally in full light, though.)
I don't know if this is related, but I'm also colorblind in dim light. (I can see color normally in full light, though.)
I liked it.But potentially funny!
I like Voyager and Enterprise but used them for the joke because TOS, TNG, or DS-9 wouldn't make as much sense.
I would've gone subtler and just said "brown," though.
Interesting thread all around.
Interesting...the more "wave-form-like" shape sounds more like what I experience, though I can say I have compared my perceptions to waveforms and mine still diverge in certain ways. What would you say in your case?
That may be more of an issue with your night vision--not sure, though...you'd want to have a professional decide what that is and isn't, not some person on a message board.
I don't think I have any form or synesthesia, but I've found the phenomenon absolutely fascinating since I heard about it some years ago. I immediately recalled a childhood friend who always used to talk about the colors that letters were, and musical notes as well. At the time, no one really understood of course.
I wasn't aware, though, that there were so many different manifestations.
May I lurk and listen and learn some more?
I wasn't aware, though, that there were so many different manifestations.
May I lurk and listen and learn some more?
No problem! 
Sure. Listen and see what you hear.May I lurk and listen and learn some more?
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