ACCORDING to Richard Cytowic and David Eagleman, Wednesday is indigo blue. Well, not to me it isn鈥檛: it鈥檚 green.
I am one of millions of people worldwide who see days as colours, which is the most common form of synaesthesia: the term which describes such fascinating cross-sensory experiences. We 鈥渟ee鈥� letters, words or numbers as colours; other synaesthetes 鈥渢aste鈥� shapes, 鈥渉ear鈥� colours and so on. In fact, the best estimate is that 1 in 23 people experience some form of synaesthesia, with 1 in 90 having the letters/numbers-to-colours variety.
For two decades, has been a pioneer in recognising the importance of synaesthesia (which is blood red with gold and green embossing to me, since you ask), while Eagleman is a and . Their latest volume is brimming with well-explained facts and cogently argued theories.
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Synaesthesia, as it turns out, may be up to seven times as common among artists, novelists and composers as it is among other people. What鈥檚 more, it seems to run in families. For example, the Russian novelist Vladimir Nabokov (see 鈥淔rom father to son鈥�) saw letters in colours, as did his mother 鈥� who also heard in colours 鈥� and as does his son Dmitri. This obviously lends support to the idea that synaesthesia has a genetic underpinning.
If it is genetic 鈥� and common 鈥� why would evolution have selected for such a condition? According to Cytowic and Eagleman, it is all 鈥渢o do with creativity 鈥� especially an ease for making metaphoric cross-connections鈥�. Neuroscientist at the University of California, San Diego, has had a book on metaphor and synaesthesia in the wings for a couple of years, so we may be at the start of a rich theory of synaesthesia, one that could illuminate profound issues in consciousness studies and cognitive science.
For now, Cytowic and Eagleman predict a major upset for those who believe that the brain comes genetically specified as a series of specialised modules. Instead, they say, we ought to think in terms of distributed . After all, they write, the normal human brain displays crosstalk between specialised areas: 鈥淭he difference between synaesthetic and non-synaesthetic brains is not whether crosstalk exists, but rather its degree.鈥� And the fact that neurons specialising in visual tasks can act as auditory neurons when needed undermines the modular model of the brain.
This is a clear, clever book that will appeal to synaesthetes in search of explanations, and to all with a passion for neurology鈥檚 wild territory.
From father to son
鈥淭he long 鈥榓鈥� of the English alphabet has for me the tint of weathered wood, but a French 鈥榓鈥� evokes polished ebony. This black group also includes hard 鈥榞鈥� (vulcanised rubber) and 鈥榬鈥� (a sooty rag being ripped).鈥�
Vladimir Nabokov in his autobiography, Speak, Memory
鈥淥ne character may see another tinged with the aura corresponding to a particular emotion, or perhaps encircled by spikes suggesting antipathy鈥� As for the intensity of an orgasm, it may give birth not only to geometric aberrations in the mind, but鈥� to a seemingly unending tunnel of pleasure through which one races in a crescendo of sensation toward the ultimate release. And a new kind of cinema, perhaps, thanks to an enlightened perception of synaesthesia.鈥�
Dmitri Nabokov on how a potential film version of his father鈥檚 novel Ada could draw on synaesthesia (from Dmitri Nabokov鈥檚 afterword to Wednesday is Indigo Blue)
Wednesday is Indigo Blue: Discovering the brain of synaesthesia
MIT Press
