REALITY: What do the blind see, what do the deaf hear?

I have always thought about this, ever since I was aware of people being born blind and/or deaf.

When you say something like "red", "leaf", "flowers", "dog", what would a blind person (born blind, never saw anything, EVER) see? We can all "see", even with our eyes closed.

How about people born deaf? What do they hear? You know how sometimes there's a "song in our head"? We don't actually hear a song. But still, we "hear" a song. When a deaf person sees a firetruck running towards an emergency, with all of its lights, what does he "hear"? What does he think when somebody signals "Voice", "Music", etc? When he sees a dog barking?

What did Beethoven hear, when he pressed the keys on the piano?...

Has anybody worked with these lovely people to ever ask them? I am very curious about how they see reality. So curious that if I can live my life all over again I might just choose to be one of them.

Blindness can just mean you are visually impaired. Very few blind people receive no visual impressions. Most actually CAN see, just not very well.

Beethoven wasn't born deaf. Around age 44 was he almost totally unable to hear. You don't have to hear music to know what it will sound like if you already know what notes sound like what. Even I can compose a piece without ever hearing it.

There is one NDE account I read where a blind woman was able to visually see things (she was born blind)...I don't remember what the content was specifically. There is also a blind man who claimed that the psychoactive drug Dimethyltryptamine made him see things again.

What did Beethoven hear, when he pressed the keys on the piano?...

He heard the notes in his head because he wasn't born deaf - His deafness happened slowly, over a long period of time. Music is a language, much like mathematics - Beethoven could speak that language long before his complete loss of hearing.

Oh I see... :O What about those born deaf then? What do they "hear"?

If you're referring to their 'inner voice,' the following article might be of some interest to you,

Those who were born completely deaf and only learned sign language will, not surprisingly, think in sign language. What is surprising is those who were born completely deaf but learn to speak through vocal training will occasionally think not only in the particular sign language that they know, but also will sometimes think in the vocal language they learned, with their brains coming up with how the vocal language sounds. Primarily though, most completely deaf people think in sign language. Similar to how an “inner voice” of a hearing person is experienced in one’s own voice, a completely deaf person sees or, more aptly, feels themselves signing in their head as they “talk” in their heads.

How Deaf People Think

The human body is very adaptable - Aside from the memory of musical notes, Beethoven could 'hear' his music through the vibrations it produced.

As for those who were born blind,

Many people who are born blind claim to "see" images in their dreams, but what they're actually referring to is an experience, rather than a picture. In the Hartford study, a congenitally blind 46-year-old man reported a dream in which he went to the hospital to see his first grandchild. Upon questioning, it came to light that what he referred to as "seeing the baby for the first time" actually meant the experience of meeting him, hearing him cry and holding him. Similar experiences were reported by other study participants, who also referred to "seeing" when describing scenes from their dreams, even though the scenes were based completely on tactile and auditory memories.

Do people who've been blind since birth dream?

[Xan]

Those who have out of body experiences discover there are senses in the astral body that see and hear in the physical world while in that 'between' dimension.

I realized this when I was sound asleep in bed and found myself in front of the clock looking at the time, to see if I should get up.


There are also non-physical sounds we may listen to as a deeply transforming meditation. Here's an article about that:

The Inner Sound Current - http://www.spiritualforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=3703


Xan

[psychoslice]

I suppose if you were born totally deaf or blind, then you wouldn't have any idea what it was to hear or see, the concept would mean nothing to you because you would have nothing to measure anything with.

Ohh... I see... Hmmmmm I guess to fully understand this I must really experience it...

Psychoslice --- that is exactly what I had in mind too...

Lulu --- That is a good study indeed! :)) But I was wondering... What would you know, if... There was no one else to "influence" you? If there was no one telling you a story about "what the world out there is like", when the only world you have... Is the one within?

It's probably too Theoretical isn't it... Sigh :(

[psychoslice]

Originally Posted by Sybilline

Ohh... I see... Hmmmmm I guess to fully understand this I must really experience it...

Yes and even if you did experienced it, because you know what sound and seeing is like, it still wouldn't teach you anything, because you would remember what it was like.