What do blind people see?

[flint]

ok, this is an odd question to phrase, im aware the blind can't see as the non blind can, but do they "see" what non blind people see when they close their eyes or what?

[society]

if you close your eyes what do you see?
in blind people their other senses are more developed to compensate for their lack of eye sight.

[CheekyChops]

I suppose it depends if they have ever been able to see. If they have, then I suppose they can remember what things look like and so can 'see' them.

If they have always been blind, then I don't see how they can 'see' like a non-blind person, I know they can feel to gauge the shape of something but how would they know what it actually look like?

[saxy_jag]

It also depends on their condition. A friend has inoperable cataracts, growing since he was boy, with a later build-up calcium. All he saw most of the time were very blurred shapes, but enough to know whether anyone was moving around him or sitting in from days. However some days this would be accompanied by an influx of light. On others, he would get what he called his 'red mist' - they eyes clouded by redness and he would hardly be able to make anything out at all. In the end, they did operate - not to help him recover his sight but to stabilise the condition so that he could at least plan his daily routine.

'Blind' people rarely see blackness, but have very much degenerated vision.

When it came to using his other senses, my friend always said that it wasn't so much a case as them developing more, but of his becoming more aware of them. He hears much more acutely than I do because he unconsciously works harder at hearing, that being the only way, sometimes, that he can glean information. It's why you should never creep up behind a blind person and say boo.

[saxy_jag]

Does this help?:

http://www.rnib.org.uk/xpedio/groups/public/do cuments/PublicWebsite/public_eyelist.hcsp

[chitchat]

My dad is blind and he cant anything. If you were to close your eyes and look towards the sun we can see the brightness of it through our eyelids - he cant. Everything is black to him.

[4getmenot]

they would see what they see things as in their imagination

[AniaSM]

I'm told that people who are blind from birth have no concept of vision. Like we have no concept of having wings or whiskers. Of all my senses sight is the one I'd least like to lose.

[flint]

thanks a lot people thats a real help, and i agree aniaSM id hate to lose my sight.

[AniaSM]

I'd hate for you to lose your sight Flint XXxx