I read a fascinating news article this week on two human conditions I had never heard of, aphantasia and hyperphantasia. Aphantasia is a phenomenon where a person is unable to form an image in their mind. It is estimated that about 1% of the populations has this. These people can’t see anything in their “mind’s eye”. They can’t form a picture in their mind of what an apple looks like. Some can’t remember what past events looked like, even their own wedding, .
The opposite of aphantasia is hyperphantasia, in which people see images so vividly in their heads they cannot tell if they are real or imagined. An estimated 3% of people see the world this way. From the linked article above, one person with hyperphantasia said she had an “enormous imagination” as a child, building entire villages in her mind.
I wonder how many “prophets” and visionary people have hyperphantasia. From what we know of Joseph Smith, he seems like a likely candidate for having it. Lucy Smith, his mother, in her biography of Joseph Smith, wrote the following
During our evening conversations, Joseph would occasionally give us some of the most amusing recitals that could be imagined. He would describe the ancient inhabitants of this continent, their dress, mode of traveling, and the animals upon which they rode; their cities, their buildings, with every particular; their mode of warfare; and also their religious worship. This he would do with as much ease, seemingly, as if he had spent his whole life among them.
Biographical sketches of Joseph Smith the prophet and his progenitors for many generations, Lucy Smith. Page 85
This was done before he translated the Book of Mormon. Compare the above with what the woman said about her imagination, “building entire villages in her mind”. What other things might Joseph have not been able to tell if they were “real of imagined”? Plates of Gold? Heavenly visitors?
Taking the apologetic side, maybe God purposely selects men with hyperphantasia to be prophets? It would be easy to influence them, and to put visions in their minds. Maybe all the great prophets through the ages have had hyperphantasia. Or maybe men acquire hyperphantasia by the act of being called to be a prophet? Moses, Lehi, Nephie, Alma, did they are have a physiological predisposition to be visionary? Do modern prophets still have it, it is having visions a thing of the past? When was the last time you heard in General Conference a Prophet say he had a vision?
Wheat & Tares 
As someone with aphantasia, I can tell you it is very real. I have always wondered how people can visualize something and have it be clear. When I close my eyes and try to imagine something, it is basically darkness. I actually can imagine objects or shapes better with my eyes open. I can recognize faces, but cannot see my family when I close my eyes. I need photographs to remind me how people look.
It makes sense that there would be the opposite as well. I can see God using such people. The struggle would be how to determine what is from God and what is not. For me, since I can’t visualize, when I do have a dream that I can remember, I pay attention to what it might mean for me in my life.
Gilgamesh, how is it reading books? Does it make fiction less enjoyable?
I’m guessing many people in the arts, especially motion pictures with conceptual artists, lean toward the hyperphantasia side. I remember getting off my mission, reading the first two Harry Potter books, watching the first movie at home and the second in theatres, and thinking “My imagination is crappy.” I certainly don’t have aphantasia, but if there is a scale, I definitely lean that way. Nearly everyone in my immediate and extended family seem to have much more vivid imaginations that I do. My dreams lean that way too. Although I never consciously think it in my mind, I always know deep down when I’m dreaming because it’s not nearly as clear as reality.
I have no problem with Heavenly Father using or gifting certain people with hyperphantasia to accomplish his purposes. Some of the greatest moments of revelation for me, simply came as words. For those who do have hyperphantasia, I’m curious as to how consistent these “visions” are with each other. Can they consistently visualize the same thing, or does it have no relation to memory strength and yield different results every time?
I’m sure RMN will be praised later as a visionary prophet when in reality all he did was “unleash” the findings and suggestions of focus groups and research projects conducted at 50 E North Temple.
Since I consider Moses, Lehi, Nephi, and Alma to all be fictional characters created for religious texts, I suppose we can endow them with any physiological traits we desire.
I think it would make sense that part of why Joseph Smith was so charismatic was because once he had imagined something, it became real to him.
I suppose that God could choose someone like that to be a prophet, but I could just as easily see such a person choosing themselves to be a spokesman for God. So it very much seems a two-edged sword and makes trusting such a person challenging.
I suppose another question I have is whether Donald Trump has hyperphantasia. Is there any simple tests that can be applied to test for this?
People like to use the quote from Lucy Smith to suggest that Joseph Smith had a great imagination and that he just made up the stories in the Book of Mormon. But they forget that he is meeting with Moroni every year. What did they talk about? I am sure that Moroni would give Joseph information about the Nephites and Lamanites. In fact I am sure that he knew their history before he ever translated any of the Nephite record.
I have had visions that seem to come from outside myself because of the information they contain. But I hate to even identify myself because some of y’all gonna think I am crazy. I think claiming visions as straight from God has gone out of style. But these visions from elsewhere are very different than my imagination. They are poured into my brain rather than my brain creating them. More like watching a movie running at warp speed, only comprehending it completely. And who/whatever was talking to me didn’t identify themselves, but spoke in first person in very clear words. It was also very different than dreaming. And no, I don’t have hyperphantasia.
And I would worry about God picking a prophet with hyperphantasia because just like our current leaders can’t seem to tell their own thoughts from inspiration, I would worry that a leader with hyperphantasia could not tell their own wild imagination from inspiration. Now, I could believe that Joseph had hyperphantasia *instead* of being a prophet. In fact it makes sense
I can totally see prophets of old having hyperphantasia – makes a lot of sense to me. That said (and being cynical) does that actually make them a prophet or just someone with a vivid mind who is vocal and believes/shares what they see? Considering that they wrote their own story, or someone who followed them did, we get one side of the picture. We’ve gone from everything in the Bible is a literal story to these stories are symbolic or just teach a principle. When I review the church history I was taught, the B of M was translated from brass plates which had a physical aspect. Now the narrative is that JS put his head in a hat with a rock and dictated the book. Given what his mother has shared, it would surprise me if he wasn’t hyperphantasia. I do not recall a prophet *ever *sharing a vision in my lifetime. I’m unclear if any other early prophets shared visions, but curious if any who did was a descendant of JS? While not proven, it is thought that hyperphantasia might be genetic.
Today, the leaders of the church are selected through a careful vetting process of loyalty to the institution, professional success, connections, and obedience to the ever changing rules. They are not prophets by nature (called of God) but by a title given by their soon-to-be peers. If God is the same today, yesterday, and tomorrow – then there is no reason he wouldn’t continue giving his servants visions and prophecies to share with His people. Perhaps God does speak to his servants, but they are not in a position of power. Instead the current leadership guilt and shame the membership to wear their garments more, spend less time with their living families and more time in the temple serving the dead, and to make sure they continue to keep the membership fees up to date despite an enormous hoard of wealth by the church. For me, it’s hard to see “prophet” anywhere in that.
“all he did was “unleash” the findings and suggestions of focus groups and research projects conducted at 50 E North Temple.”
Mortality is as much a test for prophets as it is the rest of us, and I’m guessing that’s just one of many ways they “study it out in their minds” when it comes to seeking revelation. I totally get the cynical POV, I do, but the revelation to regular members would probably benefit from them conducting more of their own informal research projects and focus groups before waiting for further Heavenly guidance.
Eli – not quite sure what your response means and I don’t really want to engage in back-and-forth BUT I would offer up Come Follow Me and the 1995 Family Proclamation as examples with less than visionary origins, contrary to what I always hear at Church meetings.
Eli, I’m another one with aphantasia, and I can tell you that for me, fiction that is heavy on world building, Iike fantasy, is a big turn off. I read The Lord of the Rings when I was an adult and thought it was super boring and my husband couldn’t believe it. But he can actually picture in his mind the setting and what is happening, almost inserting himself into the action. His dreams are like being inside a movie where he is the main character, whereas my dreams are just ideas. No images.
So, if I were to actually have a vision, I would tell everyone because that just can’t happen. But despite being “non-visionary” I am a fairly spiritual, intuitive person.
As for prophets, or specifically Joseph Smith having hyperphantasia, I think it’s possible, and something I have never considered. But I wouldn’t think it is necessary to prophecy.
As to whether visions are a thing of the past, my husband served a mission in Guatemala and he said that they would tell people about the first vision and not infrequently someone would respond, yeah, I’ve seen Jesus, too. Totally not surprised by the story (nor mocking the missionaries). I had an investigator from Iran who shared a visionary/supernatural experience. I think people have them.
Julian of Norwich described visions.
If a vision is a communication from God with a visual component, I don’t see why not. If God can communicate with us at all, why not visually?
Brains are interesting things. I wouldn’t say I have hyperphantasia, but I have a vivid imagination and can picture things easily. I write stories frequently, sometimes with an idea or picture I need to commit to words, and sometimes with just a feeling (or ‘vibe’ as the young’uns say nowadays) that I want to get into words on the page. For a long time, I thought much of that was inspired. Now, I just say I’m a writer and jokingly refer to my muse.
I’ve had experiences with “pure intelligence” flowing into my mind. I’ve also had spiritual experiences that I can’t believe came from my own mind — love and support in situations of total despair, and the like. There’s SOMETHING out there beyond humanity. And while I’ve not found the idea of a monotheistic patriarchal god to be very convincing, I can’t be an atheist either. Is there something in my brain that lets me connect with something Out There? Maybe. It took some effort and therapy to stop believing that every powerful experience was God’s attempt to communicate with me. Some stuff just happens because my brain works a certain way. I’ve learned to tell the difference. Church teachings about how to recognize the spirit really messed me up; I really wish I’d gotten a full psychological workup a few decades earlier than I did.
Some (many) of those experiences were deeply meaningful. I’ve had to rethink what the meanings were, but I know they happened. I also don’t think my mind came up with them; I believe it was a connection with a source of hope and healing.
Fortunately I’m a woman, and no one would ever accept that my experiences were some sort of revelation that should be taken seriously and applied to everyone. My father, on the other hand, didn’t have his gender holding him in check, and has had no reason or motivation to accept that his powerful experiences really aren’t God. That’s messed him up severely, and caused untold havoc.
3% with hyperphantasia is a lot—9 million Americans. But you don’t see 9 million would-be prophets running around—not even 9 thousand. So I suspect that credible prophets arise when powerful religious ideas intersect with conditions like hyperphantasia. It seems to me that visions incorporating powerful ideas would resonate with both those experiencing them and potential converts more than just the ideas themselves. On the other hand, visions without powerful ideas embedded in them would just seem crazy.
I am wondering if, like so many other things, there is a spectrum here. I wouldn’t say I have severe aphantasia; if you say “apple,” I can picture one—sort of—in my head. But not well. How to describe it? Like hearing music from two rooms over behind closed doors? My dreams are a combination of those blurry images and ideas. I am an avid reader, including of fantasy, but I can only build the world visually in my head in very limited ways. Since even my own most cherished memories are similarly hazy, it’s the just the water I swim in.
My husband, on the other hand, thinks in photo-real detail, but he’s not in any way prone to visions or confusing what is in his head with what is real. He finds reading novels, especially fantasy novels, absolutely intolerable. It may be the overwhelming need for his brain to create everything in rich detail. But he could probably happily spend 12+ hours a day watching classic films. “They write in images. It’s the language I understand.”
I think it is very possible that Joseph Smith, Margery Kempe, William Blake, any number of visionaries had extreme hyperphantasia. I don’t know if it follows (for me) that their experiences do not therefore have some kind of universal value. Insisting on the literal view they took of them is probably not a good idea, though.
And no, I don’t imagine many of Q15 are having hyperphantastic visions. I did hear Pat Holland share one once, with the qualifier that it happened “entirely in my mind.” She apparently could tell the difference.
Eli – I do okay with fiction. Even though I can’t “see” things in my mind, I do remember places I have been and could describe certain characteristics I remember. For example, I served my mission in Italy. If you asked me to close my eyes and envision the Leaning Tower of Pisa, I would not see it. But, if you asked me to describe it to you, I could do that based off my memory of the characteristics and setting.
So, when I read, I just remember the characteristics and piece them together to allow the story to continue. I definitely do better if I have seen the movie before I read the book.
While I believe that Joseph Smith certainly had a great mind — one that would grow to be as wide as eternity — we have to consider the testimony of witnesses to his claims. There are those who testify of having handled the plates and of having beheld visions and angels in company with Joseph Smith. IMO, that element of the historical record is a huge complicating factor to the idea that it was all a product of his imagination.
Hyperphantasia is a fun idea to explain Joseph Smith’s visions. I recently listened to a podcast that posed the idea of psychedelics as the catalyst for Joseph’s visions, which was also a fun and fascinating idea.
I honestly don’t know what was going on with Joseph and his visions, but I really think there was something going on. To me, some of his ideas about light, truth, time, matter, and eternity go beyond him “just making stuff up”. I believe that somehow he did tap into the “source of eternal truth”, and that many eternal truths are found in Mormonism, particularly in the teachings of Joseph Smith. (That doesn’t mean I believe that everything he taught is eternal truth). I can’t think of recent examples of modern prophets “tapping into the source of eternal truth” and revealing that truth to us. To me, they seem to use their brains and do what they think is best.
But I, myself, have some crazy ideas and believe some wacky things. So I wouldn’t put too much stock into what I say.
Joseph Smith with hyperphantasia? It’s plausible. I think in many ways, though, Joseph was really a product of his time in that regard. There was no television, movies, internet or radio. There were books, but they were expensive and often hard to come by, especially in a society where adult literacy was not universal. For entertainment, the big cities had live theater, but out in the sticks where the Smiths lived they may have occasionally had minstrel shows or other traveling entertainments. And of course, charismatic traveling ministers and circuit riders, who were as much a source of entertainment as spiritual awakening to the people of the frontier. Often, families had no other options for entertainment but to get creative and entertain themselves and each other. So when one child emerges as a natural storyteller who can keep the family enraptured for hours spinning fanciful tales, his mother will certainly take note. And over time, the characters he creates take on a life of their own, especially when the narrative intersects with his religious curiosity, and even moreso when it apparently becomes a path to wealth and power.
Also keep in mind that young Joseph was just one of many of his time and place that were claiming to have literal visions/encounters with the divine. But we have no way of knowing whether those purported experiences were vivid real-time “encounters” happening in his mind but indistinguishable from reality, or perhaps just abstract products of his well-trained imagination, or if he was completely making them up to go along with (and eventually outshine) the myriad other self-declared prophets of the early 19th century.
There is a bloggernacle writer (Stephen Fleming) over at Juvenile Instructor and Times and Seasons who holds a PhD in religion and was recently released after serving as an LDS Bishop. He proposes that the environment of Joseph Smith was a key factor in the Restorations, that many, if not all of the religious concepts that we think were unique elements of Joseph Smith’s thinking or revelatory experience were part of that environment. I hope I am not oversimplifying his thoughts, but this historical evidence no longer bothers him. He believes that “studying it out” is the process Joseph went through. Given that every human has an assortment of gifts or abilities, genetic or otherwise it would not surprise me that major religious figures possessed abilities that allowed them to approach the Divine in unique ways.
Sleeper, Gilgamesh,
Thanks for your responses.
I think the last time someone spoke of having visions over the general conference pulpit was likely Joseph F. Smith’s vision that is now D&C 138. Visions and the like are generally just not spoken of anymore, except the occasional colorful speaker in testimony meeting. This could be chalked up to present day leadership not being particularly visionary (which is true), but I also think there are probably cultural factors at play here as well. If you speak of having had a vision, people are more likely to think you’re crazy than they would have 100 years ago, even if you’re the leader of a religion. So now the standard protocol is to just say your spiritual experiences are “too sacred” to share. Behind all that ambiguity, a few things could be going on. Maybe people really are having crazy visions that they don’t want to talk about, which is fine, but I suspect most of the time it’s just a means of creating a mystique about spiritual experiences that aren’t that different from everyone else’s.
David B. Haight spoke of having a vision over the pulpit in 1989. After reading it, I think you can classify it as a vision and not just a dream.
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/1989/10/the-sacrament-and-the-sacrifice?lang=eng
When I worked for a remodeling company awhile back, I had a co-worker who could literally see a completed project in front of him before we began. He described it as kind of a life size blue print sitting in front of him. I was jealous because I can never visualize anything technical (much less actually see it). The difference was, he new this was in his mind (in a much more straightforward sense than to say that all reality is really in our minds), and there were no religious implications attached to these “visions.” Just practical applications – at least for now, anyway. If you see a “Church of Bob the Builder” pop up, you heard it here first.
Joseph Smith no doubt has an extraordinary mind and imagination. He was a person who comes around only once in a generation. He was far beyond being just a product of his culture and time. Joseph Smith brought us a long list of unique religious aspects including revelations via scribes, the idea of an ancient Christian text written in reformed Egyptian, the idea that there was actually a papyrus still in existence that contained the words of Abraham, the idea of a holy land (Jackson County) in the Americas, the idea of baptisms for the dead, the idea of a living prophet (as opposed to a guy with just different Bible interpretations), the idea of plural marriage, etc. Of course he plagiarized extensively from the KJV and Masonry and other sources to construct Mormonism. But the religion has its own distinct footprint. I had never heard of hyperphantasia but it makes sense in the case of Joseph Smith.
In my view, Joseph Smith was a fraud. He was making stuff up left and right. His main claims about historical truth can’t stand up under scrutiny, the most obvious evidence of fraud being the Book of Abraham. But he was an extremely successful fraud. I also think he has an extraordinarily high libido and invoked his “restoration” and role as a prophet as an excuse to get with lots of women. That Abraham and other OT figures married other women while already married gave him the perfect pretext.
Apologist explanations that God needed someone with with hyperphantasia, or some other extraordinary psychological condition, to carry out his work seems to undercut God and the concept of God’s divine omnipotence. Why couldn’t God just reveal things through more regular people? Why couldn’t revelations be backed up with clear evidence? The apologist god is an extremely tricky god. Someone who uses people who seem like obvious fabricators to bring about truth and test our faith. For it is not immediately apparent exactly what Joseph Smith revealed that is so amazingly true.
Upthread a few people noted that it’s now uncouth to have visionaries in your midst. I think from a US mindset that may be true. But on my mission there was a large Philippina population and many of their conversion stories involved visions and dreams. My point being that many cultures would not look down on a visionary prophet.
Thanks to the clever artists of The Book of Mormon musical, now whenever I think of Joseph Smith I sing in my head “You’re making things up again, Arnold…”
@Unidentified regular poster
Actually, very seldom do they claim a formal distinction. The two things are usually one in the same. In fact, Joseph Smith admitted that revelation consisted of “sudden strokes of ideas”. I do wish, however, that more LDS members realized this rather than think everything that came from 50 East North Temple arrived on stone tablets. And to the credit of many church leaders, they don’t want you to treat messages that way. They want you to study it out and develop your own understanding. It’s my experience, however, that with mindful practice and dedication, one can recognize those ideas that, although they did occur to us, weren’t entirely fabricated from our own imagination.
It was only about 5 years ago that I discovered I had aphantasia. For many years people would be describing what they see in their mind’s eye, or while taking yoga, the instructor asking us to imagine a string running through our core. And all the time I thought it was just a figure of speech, no one could really see things with their eyes closed. So when my wife of 35 years (who, as it turns out has a very vivid mind’s eye) discovered I didn’t, she couldn’t believe it. She asked what did I see when I closed my eyes and imagined something like a tree? I said “black”.
So if my mind’s eye is blind, then why couldn’t JS have the mind’s eye of an eagle?