# Synesthesia



## Zofia (Jan 24, 2019)

Hallo,

My Mother and I both have synesthesia as do three of my five siblings. It is the mixing of sensory feedback for example seeing colours when you hear or playing music. This is what happens to my family and I.

When my friend moved to our school from the UK I discovered that like me he "sees" time. He explained it to me and I was able to finish his explanation. We were in amazement because we thought it was only "me".

For example I see the months of the year in colour on the clock in my mind and it is very effective memory aid. I remember reading Snow White when I was two years old...

Johann has just sent me an article that says this is linked to synesthesia also. I feel much better having read it now. Wondering do you have a similar experience in anyway?


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## jenspen (Apr 25, 2015)

Zofia said:


> Hallo,
> 
> My Mother and I both have synesthesia as do three of my five siblings. It is the mixing of sensory feedback for example seeing colours when you hear or playing music. This is what happens to my family and I.
> 
> ...


Zofia, you are just what Professor Jamie Ward of the University of Sussex and the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics are looking for - synaethesthes and their *first degree relatives* - an extract:

_Synaesthesia often runs in families, yet little is known about its genetic origins. In collaboration with colleagues at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, we are aiming to conduct the first genome wide association study (GWAS) into synaesthesia, which will hopefully shed light on the genetic basis of synaesthesia and help us understand how synaesthesia develops.
_

Here is the University of Sussex Synaethesia Research website:

http://www.sussex.ac.uk/synaesthesia/index

I think you will find the tests and the interim results fascinating e.g. "Previous research has shown that synaesthesia is linked to better memory, better perception of detail, more creativity, and more vivid mental imagery. "


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

My daughter has this. She looked at the link jenspen posted and remarked:



> THis is so much like me.
> 
> Q.7 Can synaesthesia occur for touch and other bodily sensations?
> 
> Yes, it was once thought to be very rare but we now think it is one of the most common types of synaesthesia. We have recently documented people who experience touch just by looking at someone else being touched, and we call this 'mirror touch' synaesthesia. Most people assumed it was 'normal', i.e. they assumed that everyone else experienced things this way too, and hence it was undetected until very recently (Blakemore et al., 2005; Banissy & Ward, 2007). Feelings of pain or touch can sometimes trigger synaesthetic experiences of vision/colour (e.g. Whipple, 1990; Dudycha & Dudycha, 1935). There is one known in case in which words trigger feelings of bodily movement (e.g. Devereaux, 1966). ^


Yet I don't know of this being in my or my wife's family.

A few weeks ago she sent me this link and asked me if this is how I think:
https://www.jaandrews.com/aphantasia-writing-cant-see-story/

That is me. I have this exact problem they describe:



> If I'm ever the sole witness to a crime, people, we're in trouble. Unless the police are good at picking out criminals from descriptors like, "He was smallish, but fierce. His hair was…um…well, it looked a little angry. Also, he skulked."


So my daughter and I are at opposite extremes on this. I can imagine some scenes from the past but not vividly. My son has it too. They both say that after they watch a movie they can re-watch it in their heads pretty much as if it were on the screen. I have heard of people having photographic memory but perhaps it is not that so much as just they have Synesthesia.

I will tell my son so-and-so looks kind of like someone, and he will say well maybe a bit, but to me it is a lot because I will often focus on one feature (Jay Leno's chin for example ) and not have clarity on the rest of the features.


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## Pat Fairlea (Dec 9, 2015)

Hallo. My name's Pat and I'm synaesthesic. 

Only mildly so, compared to some, but many scents give me a sensation of colour. I was aware of this as a child, but just assumed that was normal. I was a young adult before I realised that not everyone gets the same cross-over. 

Some scents/smells give a very intense reaction: ammonia, for example, smells a particularly strong shade of blue.
Some shift as the scent develops: all roses have a soft grey smell, but some of the modern varieties develop a distinct yellowish border to the grey. Musk roses are a slightly pinky-grey.
Some colours give subtlety to the scent: the rank smell of foxes in the countryside is distinctly khaki, but with a yellow tinge if the scent is really fresh. Badgers, on the other hand, smell a rich purplish-brown, roughly the colour of raw liver. And dog urine, detected at street corners and on lamp-posts, is silvery.

So that's it. I'm short-sighted and my hearing is going (eh? speak up!), but my sense of smell seems to be weathering the years in good order.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Interesting. Includes some familiar names to classical music such as Leonard Bernstein:

Wikipedia's List of people with synesthesia


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## Zofia (Jan 24, 2019)

Fritz Kobus said:


> Interesting. Includes some familiar names to classical music such as Leonard Bernstein:
> 
> Wikipedia's List of people with synesthesia


I for sure think it helps boost musical ablitiy or at least affinity for music. I cannot write music very well if I think about it too much but I can be sit day dreaming or reading books playing games and poof it is all in my head easy as 1 2 3. I always linked it to the synesthesia might not be but I imagine it is.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Zofia said:


> I for sure think it helps boost musical ablitiy or at least affinity for music. I cannot write music very well if I think about it too much but I can be sit day dreaming or reading books playing games and poof it is all in my head easy as 1 2 3. I always linked it to the synesthesia might not be but I imagine it is.


My daughter is an author. She can see the whole story in her head before she writes it, move things around, etc.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Zofia said:


> Hallo,
> 
> My Mother and I both have synesthesia as do three of my five siblings. It is the mixing of sensory feedback for example seeing colours when you hear or playing music. This is what happens to my family and I.


How does that work? Do you literally see colors when you hear music? Is it like putting on glasses with a blue tint? Like if you're looking at something red, do your eyes put a blue tint on the red, making it purple?


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Scriabin reputedly experienced a variant of Synesthesia and was fascinated with the relationship of colors to certain keys. Also, Rimsky-Korsakov, and the two of them would sometimes debate the color of a particular key.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Manxfeeder said:


> How does that work? Do you literally see colors when you hear music? Is it like putting on glasses with a blue tint? Like if you're looking at something red, do your eyes put a blue tint on the red, making it purple?


Nobody has responded yet. I hope my comment didn't come off as disrespectful.

I'm genuinely curious how that works. I know Messaien wrote music based on the colors he saw, and it bothers me when I hear his music, like I'm missing something, because I have no frame of reference.


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## Zofia (Jan 24, 2019)

Manxfeeder said:


> Nobody has responded yet. I hope my comment didn't come off as disrespectful.
> 
> I'm genuinely curious how that works. I know Messaien wrote music based on the colors he saw, and it bothers me when I hear his music, like I'm missing something, because I have no frame of reference.


Sorry Manx I did not see. Different notes are different colours and for me also the month of the year is also linked to colour. You remember old style windows player with the colours in reaction to the music? It is sort of like this.

One of the tests I did when I was younger was they would played a certain note ask me what I thought then 1 year later repeat it. I gave the correct answers as before. Even if I just hear the music in my head colours appear in my mind and yes in my eyes to.

When I try to write music it is very hard but when I am just sitting reading etc a full piece can pop into my head finished. If I am editing work I will often think it is "too blue" or must be yellow-er? it is how I describe it.


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

It's a fascinating subject. Here is a link to a synesthetic artist who paints images she sees when she listens to particular songs.


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## Zofia (Jan 24, 2019)

Art Rock said:


> It's a fascinating subject. Here is a link to a synesthetic artist who paints images she sees when she listens to particular songs.


Thanks Art! Yes I could see similar things although not the same certain music is more asscioated with things like birds for me or people etc.

I have a copy of my test notes if someone cares to see them they are in German though.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Zofia said:


> Sorry Manx I did not see. Different notes are different colours and for me also the month of the year is also linked to colour. You remember old style windows player with the colours in reaction to the music? It is sort of like this.
> .


How interesting! Personally, the only thing close to synesthesia I have is, when I hear the Berlin Phil string section conducted by von Karajan, I my tongue feels melted chocolate. It's wonderful, and there's no carbs/calories that come with it.


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## eljr (Aug 8, 2015)

Zofia said:


> Hallo,
> 
> My Mother and I both have synesthesia as do three of my five siblings. It is the mixing of sensory feedback for example seeing colours when you hear or playing music. This is what happens to my family and I.
> 
> ...


i have tasted sound under the influence of LSD.


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## Zofia (Jan 24, 2019)

eljr said:


> i have tasted sound under the influence of LSD.


I am told by the Doctor who does the tests that they are similar experiences. I am not for using drugs but I do like to read about the brain. I am told synesthetes have more connections between parts of the brain that allow this "cross wiring". LSD apparently turns off the firewalls that keep areas compartmented allowing the signals to reach areas normally locked off.

I have often wonder if there could be away to increase intelligence via forced connection making in the brain. As only a small percentage of the brain lights up in fMRI scan but the whole brain will under high dose LSD etc.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

The question I have is with Synesthesia can you have the equivalent of a bad trip? You can with LSD. While there are similarities as described in Zofia's post, I suspect turning off firewalls is not going to be quite the same as having extra connections. Maybe the two don't exactly coincide in which connections are affected?


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## Zofia (Jan 24, 2019)

Fritz Kobus said:


> The question I have is with Synesthesia can you have the equivalent of a bad trip? You can with LSD. While there are similarities as described in Zofia's post, I suspect turning off firewalls is not going to be quite the same as having extra connections. Maybe the two don't exactly coincide in which connections are affected?


No drug experience is a different state of mind from what I know from books and talking to people. Depending on the drug your brain and the stat you are in before the start of the drug can change the experience.

Synesthesia is not a trip or altered state of mind it is just normal for us. The reason it is compared to trips of drugs as it is perhaps the only way to draw to experience people without Synesthesia can relate to. There is not change in our brain it is a constant connection between parts of the brain that is not normal.

I've never had bad experience it does not give pleasure much either except maybe ai enjoy music more than most other people because of the colour experience.


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