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The Wisdom of Psychopaths
In this engrossing journey into the lives of psychopaths and their infamously crafty behaviors, the renowned psychologist Kevin Dutton reveals that there is a...
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In the peculiar neurological condition known as synesthesia, a person’s senses meld together, so that a synesthete might “hear” colors or “taste” shapes. Now scientists have stumbled on a previously unknown form of synesthesia in which visual flashes or movements trigger perceptions of sound.
California Institute of Technology neuroscientists Melissa Saenz and Christof Koch confirmed the existence of hearing-motion synesthesia, as they dubbed it, by creating a task at which the synesthetes would have an advantage. The researchers presented four self-professed synesthetes and 10 nonsynesthetes with 100 pairs of Morse code–like rhythmic sequences, each composed of either auditory beeps or flashes of white on a black background. The participants judged whether the two sequences in each pair were the same or different.
Both groups judged auditory patterns accurately about 85 percent of the time, the researchers report in the August 5 issue of Current Biology. On the visual trials, nonsynesthetes’ judgments fell to nearly chance levels, a result that corroborates other research showing that most people are better at judging auditory patterns than assessing visual patterns. In contrast, synesthetes—who reported hearing sounds such as beeps or taps in time with the visual signals—distinguished matching from nonmatching rhythms 75 percent of the time.
“I think of these people as having an enhanced soundtrack in life,” Saenz says. Her team is conducting brain-imaging studies to try to tease out the roots of that soundtrack as well as how a typical brain combines visual and auditory signals to improve perception.
Editor’s Note: This story was originally printed with the title “The Sound of Sight”
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Add Commenti used to listen to the toaster shine!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"bitter belly button"
Does the hyperlink in "brain-imaging studies" to the article titled "Brain Images Make Inaccurate Science News Trustworthy" imply that this story is not trustworthy?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDoes the hyperlink in "brain-imaging studies" to the article titled "Brain Images Make Inaccurate Science News Trustworthy" imply that this article is not trustworthy?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTo hear sight would be cool. maybe everything does put off a small viberation who knows . But you could buy a supershammys.com go to that web sight now that is something cool to watch. troy
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thislook go to suppershammys.com that is truth
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAfter reading this Article I was so very much relieved that finally there is in the real world physical evidence that has showed me other people besides myself have this enhanced sub-conscious auditory sensory system. However, this like so many other unusual senses I have seemingly melted together has caused me a lot of hardship in trying to explain it to other people how it is that I am affected by events in the world that may take place thousands of miles away. The vibrations I "hear & feel" up to 3 days before if severe enough can literally blow-out my normal auditory system as it did again this time. Thank God Science is prepared to acknowledge the presense or Gifts that some people have that reach far beyond human comprehension for many average people. it helps people like me understand what is happening to them and allows for better health management responses with regard to preventative health care. Keep on writing and show the world not everything has to be seen to be believed and exists on the physical plane.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisi must say that i never knew this was possible either. but i know now after seeing this stuff that hearing motion is not a normal thing, i just thought everyone did..but now they all think im a hypochondriac because i claim to be a synesthete...how do i explain what i am without people thinking im crazy? how do i prove i really am one? i feel kinda like i am a hypochondriac since i cant really prove what i hear...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHello everyone! You should check this: www.tukan.extra.hu !! There is a great online synesthesia survey - you can vote what color is 'A' and each letter and number and see the statistics. Really interesting!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor me, i see the colours in the days of the week, for example:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSunday is yellow, Monday is blue, Tuesday is green, wednesday is red, Thursday is purple, Friday is black and saturday is white.
Now I have some rational explanations for this:
Sunday is yellow because I imagine sundays to be lazing around in fields of yellow daffadils.
monday is blue because I feel crap to have to go to work.
tuesday is green for some reason, I think i associate it with St Patricks day.
wednesday is Red because it stands out in the middle of the week, like Red does.
Thursday is purple because if you combine red and black you get purple, just like thursday lumped between wednesday and friday.
Friday is black because of the religious term black friday.
Saturday is white because it follows friday which was black, and also because there aren't many colours left.
And yes I know that white isn't a colour and if you combine all the colours optically you get white.
Although its not really synesthesia, it is still a different way of perceiving things that don't usually have those qualities.
I thought I was going crazy,lol these new young people next door keep mummbling stuff all night and all day, I tryed to focus to hear what they were saying and a bird flew past my window and scared me and my eyes followed it out of fear and as it left the veiw of the window the wall turned transparent an oringe colour like the matrix, I've been drinking heaps of water lately and not even ear plugs can help, my ears are so soft my ear drums still resinate and so does my chest, its like extra sencorie perseption it was weird. thanks for this article its helped alot of people come back down to earth,lol.
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