the brain is just an intensely /neat/ place.

[phinnia]

new type of synesthesia discovered. Visual flashes or movements trigger perception of sound. How freaking rad is that?

Synesthesia fascinates me. I have a little bit - smells/colors, which makes BPAL really fun - and I love that there's so many different kinds. <3

Comments

[purridot.livejournal.com]

How cool! I read that Leonardo da Vinci also had synesthesia.

[lauramcewan.livejournal.com]

too cool! I do colors with names and/or people, although often I think there's some other visual cue that solidifies it in my head. Still, when I think of my first and middle names together, it's written out in scrolly flowy letters and in rose and lavender. Very elegant and formal-like.

[krasota.livejournal.com]

It helps makes things like BPAL unbearable for me. Sensory overload.

[gizmometer.livejournal.com]

i'm visual enough that images and colours are mixed up into pretty much everywhere in my brain.

but i feel music. :)
i haven't ever read of a categorisation for this specifically, but some sounds/chords/songs are like being touched. usually it's a good thing - i love live acoustic music for this reason - but sometimes? AAH. if i'm overstimmed or if it's not a good sound. there's a particular fingering of a particular chord on guitar that'll make me climb the walls.

[littlemissgg.livejournal.com]

Yay - Synesthesia dudes together! I see sounds. Always fun. Who needs drugs when you can have mildly deformed brain waves?!
Anyway, yay for synesthesia and by the way yay for gender!fuck House which I have just read and am deeply amused by! :D

[ka-crow.livejournal.com]

Sounds have colors for me. It's not overwhelming, but, for example, the timbre of Jerry Garcia's guitar is visibly metallic gold. Sometimes it's tinged with another color -- rosy or green or blue -- but it is still metallic gold, and if you touched it, you would feel the same thing as gold metal. Eric Clapton's guitar, by comparison, is a rich burnt orange, and very slightly textured like a painted interior wall. Jimi Hendrix's is very saturated green, which is confusing when he's playing "Purple Haze"!

[hithah.livejournal.com]

Oh, I LOVE synesthesia! I don't have it at all myself, but it's just incredibly fascinating, isn't it? I wonder what it must be like. :)

[phinnia.livejournal.com]

Have you read 'A Natural History of the Senses' by Diane Ackerman? She does a chapter on synesthesia (and it's an amazing book just to begin with). Very worth reading. <3

[hithah.livejournal.com]

No, I haven't. A book about the senses would definitely make for interesting reading! I have almost no sense of smell, so THAT would definitely be an interesting chapter. :) I've also inherited my father's and grandfather's inability to smell skunk. (Thank goodness!) To me, skunk smells sort of like rubber gloves or rubber party balloons. Very subtle and not offensive in the least.

Thanks for suggesting that book.

[phinnia.livejournal.com]

You're very welcome! I think she /may/ also talk about faceblindness, too. It's been a while since I've read it. All of her books are marvelous - she does some great writing about endangered animals, and one on the history of love, a good one I finished recently on the brain - she's one of my favorite authors. <3

[purplewaxhand.livejournal.com]

I wish I had synesthesia. I wanted it ever since I found out about it