Exactly. There’s no need to add more details unless that’s part of the requirements. Otherwise it makes it harder to keep track of things. Keep it simple first, then add complexity as needed.

That’s how I did it too. There is a sphere on a plane. A force is applied to the sphere, parallel to the plane. Neither the sphere nor the plane have a defined color, size, material, etc. Nothing specific pushed the sphere.

My job is often to mathematically model the things people say to me, and in those circumstances thinking like this is correct.

I don’t think this way when I daydream, although the visual components of my daydreams are more like the feelings I get when I look at something than like concrete mental pictures.

I have aphantasia, and people really struggle to comprehend what it means or what it’s like. Now to be fair, I don’t really comprehend how people without aphantasia think or process things either.

1. Were your front forks resting on the ground, or up in the air?

No idea, all I could think was that the front tire was missing, it didn’t occur to me to think how that affected the bikes position.

2. Was there any other damage done to your bike or to the lock?

I didn’t think about there being any damage.

3. Are there any other bikes nearby? People nearby? Security cameras that might have caught the crime?

I had just thought of a bike rack with only my bike, no people or other bikes nearby. Looking for security cameras seems obvious now that you mention it, but I didn’t think of that. If you had said “what advice would you give if your friend walked out and found their bike had been stolen/vandalized” I probably would have thought of that, but trying to think of an abstract situation is much more difficult for me.

Interesting point and I’m glad you made it, with a thought (?) experiment to check.

I think I am somewhat aphantastic, but not officially diagnosed.

My mental image of the bicycle changed as each detail was added, but sometimes the detail changed the image (the handlebars were straight until you said they were dropped) and sometimes the detail didn’t exist; the dropped handlebars were wrapped in handlebar tape, but that tape didn’t have a colour (not sure how to explain that better) until you mentioned it was black. Most of the details “added” something to the scene rather than “changing” an assumed detail.

The “front forks on the ground” question was particularly interesting to me.

The bicycle started with two wheels, and front wheel just sorta disappeared from my image when you mentioned it was stolen, but the front fork remained floating in the air as if there was a wheel still supporting it. But asking the question about the forks on the ground made gravity exist, and then there had to be a reason it was floating, which became it was being held up by the U-Lock.

I seem to imagine scenes with few superfluous details that mostly includes only what is mentioned or implied by the narrative. But it’s super interesting to me what details we’re in fact implied.

The ball on the table was similar. The table was at waist height to the person, and the ball had a specific size of roughly the size of a racket ball because it had to be something that could be easily pushed. But the person pushing it was just a silhouette of a person, it had no gender, the only thing I pictured clearly was the hand that pushed the ball. It was pushed in an intentional way that made the ball roll across the table away from the “person” (as opposed to bouncing, or pushed sideways)

The table was just an elevated plane it had no texture, or even legs supporting it, (probably because there was no ground for those legs to be on,) it didn’t go on forever, you could see the end of the table, but it also didn’t have a size.

Also conjuring up unnecessary details is a hyperphantasia thing, not doing it doesn’t mean you have aphantasia.

My brother in Christ you have described almost the exact same specs I visualized. The only difference is in the level of resolution of my “scene.” And by that, I mean essentially I did a few more render passes in my head to anchor everything you’ve written within a sort of Impressionistic, highly softened, out-of-focus backdrop. I saw hints of shadowy cabinets, the concept of a darkened kitchen out of sight. The shape and finger placement of my slightly more textured, clothed yet featureless male. The gray-brown feeling of a floor below, a dark white ceiling above, and the faded glow of sunlight through an unseen dining room window grazing one end of that oaken table.

But the basics … They’re the same, and before being asked to recall them. Damn.

More or less but person didn’t have gender because that wasn’t relevant to the subject which was the rolling ball. Ball also bounced a few times when hitting the floor.

Hmm have you been on LSD? I’m curious if your experience with it is different from someone who doesn’t have aphantasia?

Yeah I had a similar struggle. I don’t think I’ve been so caught off guard by a visualization.

This is a good point… I strongly prefer nonfiction over fiction, but it could just be Autism. I really only read fiction if it is really, really good… but I read them in the same way as I would read a nonfiction book as well, I’d be more interested in the themes of the book

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Just as an exploration with you on this. Use your same instructions for the placing and actions with one difference.

The room is pitch black, and you can’t see a thing.

What do you hear?

You imagined a lot more details than I did. For me it was just the concept of a ball. And then the idea of it moving. The person and the table were left our as irrelevant.

The thought experiment I use when explaining to people about aphantasia is a much simplified version of yours: “imagine a circle”, “ok”, “what color is it?”

That’s it. People give an answer, sometimes including more details, like texture. Then I tell them that for me the question doesn’t make sense, I just imagined the idea of a circle and didn’t actually “see” anything, so there’s no additional detail to it.

This sounds similar to how it works for me too. I closed my eyes to try this.

I saw a very rough version of the table that’s in the room with me. The table is a low rectangular coffee table with a coarsely threaded grey throw over it going lengthways, but I saw it as a rectangular shape with a vague grey top. The ball was featureless with no colour, and was about the size of my fist, so an adult man’s fist.

I saw a low quality arm push the ball, but I really struggled to picture it, and while I knew what would happen in real life, I couldn’t picture it happening in my head.

It’s strange, as sometimes I can picture things fairly well, but other times I can’t do it at all. I have very vivid dreams on the occasions that I remember dreaming, but I can’t close my eyes and picture my family. I know what they should look like, in the same way that I know what a rotating cow should look like, but I very rarely get any sort of mental image of them.

Ironically, I was in a coma a bit over a decade ago, and while I was in it, the dreams that I had were so realistic that it took me months to get things straight in my head.