Man Sees, Hears Words in Color

iWon News ^ | 03/18/2002 | PAUL RECER

[bootless]

I wonder what curse words look like.

Blue!

[lsee]

I wonder if this condition is related to other perception alterations, such as dyslexia or dysgraphia? I also wonder how well his clothes match or if it is only print that alters in color....

[LarryLied]

See musical notes drift out of the speakers too?

[hole_n_one]

See musical notes drift out of the speakers too?

Forget the sound of music............Julie Andrews was doing a strip tease!

[Texas2step]

"Swallowing colors of the sounds I hear...am I such a crazy guy? You bet!"
Ozzy Osborn - Flying High Again

Man, Ozzy had this figured out decades ago!

[M. Thatcher]

My daughter, now 18, has this. When she was little she would talk about it, mentioning observations about words being this color or that color so matter-of-factly -- she really assumed everyone saw/perceived things the same way she did. She was floored when I told her at about 5 or 6 that not everyone saw words in color. Her synesthesia also causes her to "see" people as shapes; they are categorized somehow as "triangles" "ovals" "circles" etc. There are a lot of other areas where one sense blends into another (individual songs are seasons, for instance). It's really interesting. She is extremely bright and creative, and it doesn't seem to affect anything other than as a source of family joshing.

[Doctor Stochastic]

This is somewhat related to some forms of dyslexia (note the weasel words.) For some people, numbers exist in certain places, for example maybe linearly 23,1,27,14,444,33,2,0,17, etc. For others the numbers are in a two-dimensional array. (I don't know of people who see numbers laid out in three or more dimensions.) These people have trouble learning arithmetic because the operations on the numbers are not related to their idiosyncratic order. They must learn arithmetic algorithmically and ofter have no intuitive feel for magnitudes. Other people see days of the week or months in some patterns.

I see the year as a circle, Christmas on top and July 4 on the bottom. Week is the same, Wednesday on top and Sunday on the bottom. At least this doesn't contradict operations on dates. I see numbers in a great line stretching from negative numbers to positive (I don't know if from left to right or vice versa, just a line.) The line turns a corner somewhere arount 100 or so and shifts to a logarithmic scale. Integers are bumps on the line. So are rationals, and algebraic numbers (different types of bumps.) No colors though. Nor do I hear colors in musical keys. (Assignment of colors to keys is not consistent across people.)

[lsee]

Her synesthesia also causes her to "see" people as shapes; they are categorized somehow as "triangles" "ovals" "circles" etc.

Undoubtedly, she'd see my shape as "pear". LOL. Glad she has been able to value her unusual abilities.

[Libertina]

I'd heard of this before and I'd give my eye-teeth to experience it. Tell us any more interesting stories about your daughter - it is truly fascinating. I wonder in what shape she would see me? Do the people shapes she sees have anything to do with personality types? I wonder if any of the famous artist had synesthesia?

[d4now]

Very cool. Thanks for the bump.

In our local paper there was an article about a woman with this.
What I remember most is that there was a number which smelled like cabbage to her.

[Interesting Times]

You may find this MIT site interesting as well.

I did -- thanks for the link.

[M. Thatcher]

Do the people shapes she sees have anything to do with personality types?

I don't think so. They just "are." She sees people having shapes kind of like we see hair color. I remember when I was going to meet her first grade teacher my daughter told me, "She's a circle." I assumed she meant the woman was plump. After I'd met this slim, slight woman, I came home and had one of the conversations that over time I came to recognize:

"Honey, Ms. S isn't fat. I thought you told me she was round."

"No, she's not round. She's a circle. It's her shape."

"But she's thin."

"No, her SHAPE."

Pause.

"What shape am I?"

"Silly, you're a triangle, Mommy."

Eventually there were enough of these odd conversations that I was able to put it all together, and after doing some research discovered the phenomenon had a name. As I said, it hasn't really affected anything, although I do know my daughter finds it rather embarrassing now, and does NOT mention these things to people until she gets to know them really well.

[lsee]

I wonder if any of the famous artist had synesthesia?

Picasso, perhaps? He used some pretty interesting shapes in his portraits of people...

[StriperSniper]

In W.O.'s view, each numeral, except for zero and one, has a color even if printed in black and white.

So these stay black and white? Binary?

[andysandmikesmom]

This is a really interesting article...I have never heard of this before, and it only lends credence to the belief I have, that the brain is a miraculous thing, one about which we understand really very little...I think that the brain is capable of so much potentially, and that we have only begun to tap its resources...

Just seems to me, that people who experience this condition, have brains that are wired differently and are capable of different perceptions..

[andysandmikesmom]

I also am so glad that you posted about your daughter, and her experiences with this condition...puts to rest those sceptics, who think only people on drugs would experience this

Your daughter must have been fun to live with because of her observations...I bet it made her childhood interesting and challenging to you...

I am curious, did your daughter talk about this with her teachers and playmates, and what did they think of this...this whole thing to me is fascinating...

[RightWhale]

Just for thought:

Is this a newly evolved ability, or a remnant of an early ability from our proto-human ancestors?

[reformed_dem]

I'm not sure. A lot of languages use arabic numbers. Perhaps it's the shape that gives them a color? As for foreign words, perhaps it's the combination of letters that give off a certain hue. I don't remember reading about those instances. It would be interesting to read about that.