what does the picture of pi ( 3.14...) loooks lik?e

[dan020350]

http://video.google.com/url?docid=-3372301236664593143&esrc=sr6&ev=v&q=movie&vidurl=http://video.google.com/videoplay%3Fdocid%3D-3372301236664593143%26q%3Dmovie%26hl%3Den&usg=AL29H21LawbNOznEw8Q2tMl-Z7LiwncIHA

document of Daniel Tammet movie a savant.

HE tells us that the picture, of the circumference ( 3.14) is a beautiful picture. tell me what you think.

[kilted exile]

See this is the problem with philosophy - so much of it is complete nonsense.
What does pi look like? It's a bleedin' number it looks like 3.14........ same as 2 looks like 2 and 5 looks like 5. Complete balderdash.

[dan020350]

I do agree it is non-sense. But why do you participate in this non-sense thread?

[cuppajoe_9]

It's not nonsense or philosophy, it's a medical condition called synaesthesia, wherein the patient can appreciate information using two or more senses at the same time. Many children experience it when learning to read, designating certain letters 'red' or 'blue'. Some synaesthates experience sounds as colours; notable examples being the Russian artist Vasily Kandinsky, Vladimir Nabokov and myself :p.

The experience is entirely subjective, and what π looks like to Mr. Tammet may be completely different from what another number-as-colour synaesthate thinks it looks like, if, indeed, another one exists on the planet at the moment.

[cuppajoe_9]

Thanks for the link, by the way, Dan. That is the most beautiful documentary I've seen in quite a while.

[dan020350]

you say two senses at the same time. That is very interesting.

What happens if all senses combine working together? Would you consider him a freak or in touch with human originality?

[cuppajoe_9]

I would consider that fairly neurologically interesting, and probably impossible.

[papayahed]

I would consider that fairly neurologically interesting, and probably impossible.

I dunno, I love the smell of apple pie.

[cuppajoe_9]

I dunno, I love the smell of apple pie.But the smell of apple pie and the sight of apple pie are two seperate pieces of information. If you could interpret the sight of apple pie using four other senses at once, then I'd be impressed.

[papayahed]

But the smell of apple pie and the sight of apple pie are two seperate pieces of information. If you could interpret the sight of apple pie using four other senses at once, then I'd be impressed.

Well why would I want to do that when I can just use my other senses directly?

[cuppajoe_9]

Well why would I want to do that when I can just use my other senses directly?Because that won't get you into a psychology textbook.

[Adolescent09]

But the smell of apple pie and the sight of apple pie are two seperate pieces of information. If you could interpret the sight of apple pie using four other senses at once, then I'd be impressed.

This is an intriguing concept on the variation of perception in different bodily senses. I'm not sure if any of you may realize this, but in Roald Dahl's James and the Giant Peach the caterpillar alludes to a specific provision which is putrid and wholesomely foul on the outside, but succulent when tasted. This same allusion can be brought about by people in fictional instances ( Harper Lee's Boo Radley and Dickens' Magwitch) and in the real world where sometimes people of uncouth physical appearance are genuinely benevolent on the inside. Select foreign delicacies such as roasted frog legs, felines, canines, diverse insects and mollusks are abhorred in the States. Yet if people were oblivious of the seemingly horrid names from which these delicacies are derived, they would realize that their tastes do not vary greatly from beef/pork/venison/fruits/vegetables/ and exotic dishes that are customary in the States.

[Shalot]

When I was a child, I would hear words and I would get a mental image of what I thought that word looked like --- the image I got didn't look like anything I'd ever really seen in my waking life --- is this what you're talking about?

Also some colors have different attributes associated with them. Like red is angry (or it could be something else depending on where you are in your life), white is healing etc... if you heard a word and saw a shape of a certain color when you heard it --- is that sort of what you are referring to?

[cuppajoe_9]

When I was a child, I would hear words and I would get a mental image of what I thought that word looked like --- the image I got didn't look like anything I'd ever really seen in my waking life --- is this what you're talking about?Precisely, yes. Classic synaesthesia.


Also some colors have different attributes associated with them. Like red is angry (or it could be something else depending on where you are in your life), white is healing etc...This is not quite it. Red as implying anger and white as implying healing are culturally enforced; synaesthesia as a medical condition is caused by an accidental 'cross-firing' between two different areas of the brain. Many people think 'danger' when presented with the colour red, but this is more easily explained as a product of classical conditioning than of anything particularly neurologically interesting. Many dangerous situations are accompanied by that colour (the colour of blood, of the face of an angry person, of red lights and stop signs, &c).

It's an interesting parallel, though, as most synaesthetes are unaware that the way they experience sounds (or colours, or words, or numbers, or whatever) is any different from the way other people experience them, at least initially. Tammet, in the film, explains that when he was young, he assumed that everybody thought that a certain shape looked like the number 151. In my case, I thought that most people – or most musicians, anyway – thought that the colour red is related to the note A for the same reason they thought it was related to the emotion anger.

[dan020350]

when I punch, my mind is blown up, my feelings tighten up, my sight is focused, my smell is nothingness. MY taste is of a certain kind.

Is that it?

[Guzmán]

In my case, I thought that most people – or most musicians, anyway – thought that the colour red is related to the note A for the same reason they thought it was related to the emotion anger.

Do you have perfect pitch as well?
A funny thing is that in wikipedia it says that letter to colour synesthetes statistically associate red to the letter A. weird.

[cuppajoe_9]

Do you have perfect pitch as well?No, alas. I can, sometimes, 'see' the 'colours' of a song clearly enough to translate them into chords and notes, but it's complicated by the fact that different instruments and melodies also have their own individual 'colours'.

I have A440 memorized, and can tune instruments to my voice with reasonable accuracy, though.


A funny thing is that in wikipedia it says that letter to colour synesthetes statistically associate red to the letter A. weird.Also weird: the White Stripes, who use red as one of their emblematic colours, write most of their more well-known songs in A ("Seven Nation Army", "Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground", "Fell In Love With a Girl", "The Truth Doesn't Make a Noise", and others).

[Guzmán]

No, alas. I can, sometimes, 'see' the 'colours' of a song clearly enough to translate them into chords and notes, but it's complicated by the fact that different instruments and melodies also have their own individual 'colours'.

I have A440 memorized, and can tune instruments to my voice with reasonable accuracy, though.

Also weird: the White Stripes, who use red as one of their emblematic colours, write most of their more well-known songs in A ("Seven Nation Army", "Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground", "Fell In Love With a Girl", "The Truth Doesn't Make a Noise", and others).

Interesting that you can tune to A440 with your voice, yet no perfect pitch, still its a great ability.
The songs that i write that i like the most are also in A. There's something about the Amaj7 chord that, to my ears, sounds better than any other maj7 (maybe its because the root is played on an open string in the guitar or whatever. Another funny thing is that you said you thought people associated A with red and therefore with violence: I figure that in popular music the tonalities that are used the most (at least in rock) are C and G both of which have A as a minor chord. The weird thing is that one (at least I) doesn't generally associate an Am7 as something violent but as something sad. Yet again, i dont know if im conditioned by something you said because im most certainly not synaesthetic, but id rather associate A with red than with any other color. D i would see as green or C as green and B most certainly gray. The gray thing is probably because the minor fifth interval in C tonality.

In regards to that "amazing brain" guy what baffles me is people describing him as having great mathematical abilities; i dont consider inmense calculations as mathematical abilities: demonstrating theorems is a mathematical ability not performing 22/7. Nevertheless its an amazing feat.

[Whifflingpin]

Cuppajoe 9: "I thought that most people – or most musicians, anyway – thought that the colour red is related to the note A "

Perhaps they are related; concert A has wavelength 440Hz, what we perceive as red centres about 440THz. Meaningless coincidence, of course.

[cuppajoe_9]

Yet again, i dont know if im conditioned by something you said because im most certainly not synaesthetic, but id rather associate A with red than with any other color. D i would see as green or C as green and B most certainly gray. The gray thing is probably because the minor fifth interval in C tonality.Interesting. My keyboard looks something like this:

Ab - A: different shades of red
Bb- Db: different shades of blue, B the darkest and Db the lightest
D: brown
Db - E: no particular colour. I'm tempted to say black, but it's nothing so dramatic
F - G: varying greens, Gb the lightest and G the darkest

On a piano, I like to play in F min/Ab maj, as that gives me an excuse to go from a 'green' chord to a 'red' one (something that only I can appreciate, obviously, but fun none the less). On the guitar, it's more a matter of what's convenient to play.

[/ego trip]

[Guzmán]

Interesting. My keyboard looks something like this:

Ab - A: different shades of red
Bb- Db: different shades of blue, B the darkest and Db the lightest
D: brown
Db - E: no particular colour. I'm tempted to say black, but it's nothing so dramatic
F - G: varying greens, Gb the lightest and G the darkest

On a piano, I like to play in F min/Ab maj, as that gives me an excuse to go from a 'green' chord to a 'red' one (something that only I can appreciate, obviously, but fun none the less). On the guitar, it's more a matter of what's convenient to play.

[/ego trip]

What do you call a synesthetic with daltonism?

Tone deaf.

[dan020350]

interesting. That is what I call philosopher of Music.