I was shocked to realize that when people said "imagine in your minds eye", they meant it literally. This seems to be a common experience for people with aphantasia [0].
Note that when I'm close to sleep or dreaming, then yes, my minds eye visualization is close to photographic parity. While awake, its almost completely non-existent.
[0] "I can’t picture things in my mind. I didn’t realize that was unusual" https://www.theguardian.com/wellness/2024/feb/26/what-is-aph...
Just now, what you wrote for example.
> my minds eye visualization is close to photographic parity.
What does this mean? Does this mean it's literally the exact same experience as if your eyes were open and you are looking at the picture? Or is it more like you imagine it and it's somewhere popping up in the back of your head?
When I read a book for example I can imagine what I read but it's not even close to "seeing" it. It's a completely different sensation and visual fidelity. It's just not "seeing".
Sometimes when I'm close to sleep or when I'm lucid dreaming, I can visualize things with good fidelity. While I'm awake, I'm almost completely unable to.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qvdVBzuGWr4
You can easily understand where the difference is because the data is different between the eyes. The difference appears 'ghostly'. In a similar way, data from the mind's eye is different from data from the physical eyes when those two 'streams of data' are blended.
It's similar to replaying music in your head (if you can do that), you can hear the tune but your ears "know" no music is actually playing.
