Your brain gives the illusion that you can, because it can switch quite quickly.
If my brain can switch that rapidly, why am I worried about it impacting my driving? And how is it that I can visualize (and hallucinate) objects interacting with the environment?
There you might be a little different—I’m always either looking in or out—there isn’t any fusion between the two. Although I have to say I’ve never tried pushing a fictional thing into the external view—if I try it now I find myself looking at an internal view of what I’ve just been looking at externally, which is not the same thing. Perhaps in your case the barrier can be persuaded to be less absolute.
One thing that’s interesting about the two fingers test is that it can be easy to persuade yourself that you can pass it, but a friend will quickly tell you the truth. When you switch to internal imagery, you don’t just lose awareness of the visual scene, you also lose awareness of the fact that your visual finger switching missed a beat. It’s easier for someone else to see it.
I’m also usually functioning in a state where visual information is dramatically impaired—my boss just came to talk to me and I can’t remember anything about his appearance today. I’ll happily concede the experimental results to you, because they actually do line up with my experiences.
However, “tracking small fingers over the course of split seconds” is very different from “this large object that I am VERY interested in because it can kill me, just suddenly exhibited a major non-rhythmic change in behavior” (i.e. the car in front of me just hit the brakes hard)
I’m also usually functioning in a state where visual information is dramatically impaired—my boss just came to talk to me and I can’t remember anything about his appearance today.
I’m also “naturally” like that, but in the last few years I’ve made a point of consciously noticing what I see whenever I remember to.
If my brain can switch that rapidly, why am I worried about it impacting my driving? And how is it that I can visualize (and hallucinate) objects interacting with the environment?
There you might be a little different—I’m always either looking in or out—there isn’t any fusion between the two. Although I have to say I’ve never tried pushing a fictional thing into the external view—if I try it now I find myself looking at an internal view of what I’ve just been looking at externally, which is not the same thing. Perhaps in your case the barrier can be persuaded to be less absolute.
One thing that’s interesting about the two fingers test is that it can be easy to persuade yourself that you can pass it, but a friend will quickly tell you the truth. When you switch to internal imagery, you don’t just lose awareness of the visual scene, you also lose awareness of the fact that your visual finger switching missed a beat. It’s easier for someone else to see it.
I’m also usually functioning in a state where visual information is dramatically impaired—my boss just came to talk to me and I can’t remember anything about his appearance today. I’ll happily concede the experimental results to you, because they actually do line up with my experiences.
However, “tracking small fingers over the course of split seconds” is very different from “this large object that I am VERY interested in because it can kill me, just suddenly exhibited a major non-rhythmic change in behavior” (i.e. the car in front of me just hit the brakes hard)
I’m also “naturally” like that, but in the last few years I’ve made a point of consciously noticing what I see whenever I remember to.