Question came up during a conversation... any input??

[Kronos]

What does a blind person, one that was born blind and has never seen anything, dream of? Do they even dream?

My friends and I were talking and for some reason this thought came up from one of them...

Any input anyone?

 

[Robert01]

They may be able to dream. However, the images presented in dreams come from the brain. Obviously, if you haven't seen anything, images won't be stored. But perhaps they can visualize.

Why don't you ask someone who is blind?

 

[Kronos]

<< Why don't you ask someone who is blind? >>



Is there anyone on AT that is blind? LOL

No, really, I dont know anyone blind. Thats why I posted it on here. To get other peoples ideas and input.

 

[Czar]

Our dreams have sounds, but maybe their dreams are more about sounds than ours.

 

[MajesticMoose]

accorrding to Hume's (i think it was hume and don't feel like checking) theories on knowledge, they are unable to have a concept of what something would look like in a dream, because they don't have an idea of what anything looks like. So if they do, they would be very hard-pressed to describe it to you w/o a concept of color or the general appearance of objects.

i hoppe i put that correctly, but who really knows. I'm not necessarily ssaying its correct either.

m00se

 

[Albatros]

Hmm
a very interesting question. your friend must be a very insightful and smart, awsome, and all around cool person to think of that one. . .
I wonder who that person is. . . I would like to meet him someday.
>=]

 

[Juniper]

Maybe they dream of how things 'feel' like...

 

[royaldank]

Maybe they dream about being able to see.

I'd say they have images in their dreams...they have an idea of what things look like. That said, I wonder what they do for color? I mean, they've never seen color before...so it's not like things are off color or the wrong color, because they don't know what color is period. And if they did see color, they'd never be able to describe it because they don't know what green is...or any color for that matter.

I'd love to ask a blind person but I don't currently know any that have been blind from birth.

 

[yellowperil]

I don't know the answer to this, but blind people are not oblivious to the world, obviously. They still have the sense of hearing and touch, so while we usually associate dreaming with visualizing the world, maybe they hear and feel the world.

 

[Kronos]

<< a very interesting question. your friend must be a very insightful and smart, awsome, and all around cool person to think of that one. . . I wonder who that person is. . . I would like to meet him someday. >>



If you knew him I think you would think differently. You really wouldnt want to meet some of my friends and you definatly wouldnt ever want to talk to him. Hes a moron. Dumber than dirt. hehe

 

[royaldank]

<< I don't know the answer to this, but blind people are not oblivious to the world, obviously. They still have the sense of hearing and touch, so while we usually associate dreaming with visualizing the world, maybe they hear and feel the world. >>



That seems logical. I bet they dream just as we do, but they don't have a picture. It would be like they are living in their dream just as they live in real life. Meaning, they still touch things to feel them and sense things from hearing. But wouldn't you think while dreaming they might actually make up pictures or images to go along with it? I mean, its a dream...and I dream of stuff I've never seen or stuff that doesn't make sense.

 

[Albatros]

<<

<< a very interesting question. your friend must be a very insightful and smart, awsome, and all around cool person to think of that one. . . I wonder who that person is. . . I would like to meet him someday. >>



If you knew him I think you would think differently. You really wouldnt want to meet some of my friends and you definatly wouldnt ever want to talk to him. Hes a moron. Dumber than dirt. hehe >>



With friends like Kronos, who needs enemies. . . they are all sooo nice to me allll the time.
Now you know why I have the icon that I do.
lol

 

[Looney]

This is a good question... the first time i thought about this was actually when Oprah had a kid on her show that was blind from teh age of 6 or something (due to an accident), and she asked him what he dreams of... and he says he dreamt that he could see. She started to lose control there and started crying. Anyways, i was curious as to what somebody who has NEVER had a functional visual system would dream about... but i would imagine it would be things that they could experience, such as sounds that stir their emotion, smells that reminds them of something, tactile sensations that they liked, etc.

Sight is just another sensation, no different than hearing, tactile, etc. I may dream of a girl because i've been condition to like girls (i've come to link good looking girls with being something i want), so i visualize in my dreams a girl that stirred those feelings... a blind person would probably replace visualizations with tactile stimulation, perhaps they were once touched a certain way by a girl that turned them on, so in their dreams, they probably dream about reliving or wishing for that kind of sensation again. Sometimes when you close your eyes, you can dream about a certain music you've heard, and i'm sure blind people do the same thing as well... except just more often.

 

[DrMoreau]

Interesting question. Our dreams are made up of not only images but also events from our waking lives. The subconscious randomly takes the memories of these images and events stored in the brain and puts them into the "story-line" of the dream. Some believe that this re-sequencing of images and events is not just random, but is the subconscious mind's way of making the dreamer aware of some more inner need or desire. But not everyone subscribes to this theory. Either way, the subconscious creates the dream from the materials it has at hand: the images and events stored in the dreamer's memory.

Now consider the fact that these stored memories of images and events are not exact replicas of what actually took place or what was seen, but are in fact the perceptions formed by the viewer. Nobody perceives the same image or event the same way; classic examples being the "unreliable witness" theory or the varied responses to abstract art.

A blind person may not have any stored memories of visual perceptions, but they do have stored memories of events from their waking lives. And part of their daily lives is learning to perceive the world using their other senses like touch, taste, and smell. They form a perception of what something might look like visually based upon their other senses. So like everyone else, their dreams are formed from the stored memories of events and perceptions, the only difference is how these perceptions are formed.

This is just conjecturing of course, since I'm not blind. But based upon things I've studied in the past I'd say this is fairly accurate. Only a blind person could say for sure!

 

[GSOYF]

they definitely dream, and they dream of what their perceptions tell them things look like. We dream about stuff that we know looks a certain way, they just dream of things as they perceive them to look. I bet that if they could see that they could create some pretty damn cool crap that would bamboozle us who can see fine.

 

[royaldank]

There have obviously been many studies on this. One that I remember was where a blind person was asked to draw what a person running looks like. They got the general shape pretty close and even had one leg shorter than the other (as if they were running).

With that in mind, I bet they have images in their dreams, just not very accurate since they are only guessing by what they have felt.