The second time I wrote about it was a year ago, when I was reading the NYT article — "The Cost of Being an ‘Interchangeable Asian’" — about "the phenomenon of casual Asian-face blindness," which made me go back to something Oliver Sacks had written in The New Yorker in 2010 — "Face-Blind/Why are some of us terrible at recognizing faces?" by Oliver Sacks. I said:
The suggestion that there's racism in the inability to recognize faces needs to be handled carefully, because there are 2 forms of discrimination in conflict. It may be discrimination to be bad at recognizing Asian-American coworkers, but vigilance about this human frailty may amount to a failure to accommodate the disabled — those with prosopagnosia. Quite aside from the specific disability, we're all on a spectrum when it comes to facial recognition. Many of us are bad at it, and some people are fantastic at it. Be careful about throwing accusations of racism around in this area of radically diverse ability.
Of course, the Oliver Sacks article was worth reading and rereading, and I'm ready to reread it again. Sacks himself had prosopagnosia:
I have had difficulty recognizing faces for as long as I can remember. I did not think too much about this as a child, but by the time I was a teen-ager, in a new school, it was often a cause of embarrassment. My frequent inability to recognize schoolmates would cause bewilderment, and sometimes offense—it did not occur to them (why should it?) that I had a perceptual problem. I usually recognized close friends without much difficulty, especially my two best friends, Eric Korn and Jonathan Miller. But this was partly because I identified particular features: Eric had heavy eyebrows and thick spectacles, and Jonathan was tall and gangly, with a mop of red hair. Jonathan was a keen observer of postures, gestures, and facial expressions, and seemingly never forgot a face. A decade later, when we were looking at old school photographs, he still recognized literally hundreds of our schoolmates, while I could not identify a single one....
At the age of seventy-seven, despite a lifetime of trying to compensate, I have no less trouble with faces and places. I am particularly thrown if I see people out of context, even if I have been with them five minutes before. This happened one morning just after an appointment with my psychiatrist. (I had been seeing him twice weekly for several years at this point.) A few minutes after I left his office, I encountered a soberly dressed man who greeted me in the lobby of the building. I was puzzled as to why this stranger seemed to know me, until the doorman greeted him by name—it was, of course, my analyst. (This failure to recognize him came up as a topic in our next session; I think that he did not entirely believe me when I maintained that it had a neurological basis rather than a psychiatric one.)...
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69 comments:
Remember! ANY problem that you face, is a medical problem; and Thus.. Not Your Fault!!
Either That, or it's Racist society's fault!
It's CERTAINLY NOT, that you're Rich and don't Have to remember people
I bet Angela was pissed when he called her Jennifer!
Fascinating and frightening. We are wired to read faces; to be face-blind is to be socially crippled, and deeply alone.
"many of us are just lazy about noticing and remembering people. We could make casual claims of prosopagnosia"
Yes, in addition to laziness there is...
"Quite aside from the specific disability, we're all on a spectrum when it comes to facial recognition."
Sometimes it just depends on the face. Sometimes you even can't forget the time or place.
I have this thing about recalling Proper Nouns, and it is also socially awkward. I’ve seen videos telling people how to recall names by association, but that’s the thing. While I’m mentally struggling to recall the Proper Noun (it is not always a name of a person), I can easily recall various other details such as when my first encounter, location, their role in my life. As go down that mental path, I try to recall other names, proper nouns, associated with the one I’m trying to recall, and those memories will get locked out as well. I do know it is stress induced, because if I relax for awhile, the name will come to me. I never sought a diagnosis, because the people who know me and care about me know that this happens.
In recent corporate DIE training, I noticed the desire to make such failure to quickly identify a person and call them by name some sort of racial issue. It wasn’t just limited to recall, but included poor pronunciation of a name. It seems a variation of the demand to use preferred pronouns. The demand to force compelled speech as Jordan Peterson might claim. I find the argument diverse, but far from inclusive or equitable. It is just another example that we must only identify differences by the color of skin or sexual organs (and use of them) rather than character.
My BFF workout buddy's brother has it. He is also severely color blind... nearly gray scale. He's a very successful venture capitalist and a former military intelligence officer.
I don’t think I have prosopagnosia, but I do have difficulty recognizing people whom I do not see regularly. This is one of the reasons why, despite my theological education, I would never consider being a pastor. Brad Pitt wants to meet someone who suffers from this condition. Since I don’t have a confirmed diagnosis, there goes my chance to hang out with him.
My understanding is that the condition is like a switch - you just don't recognize people's faces, but put things together by individual features and other context. If you're just bad at remembering faces, you don't have the condition.
I'm legendarily bad at recognizing people, I think not from the condition but because when I'm talking with someone I have 100 other things swirling in my brain (which is probably some other condition). This trait reached its peak when I was walking my dog in one of our regular parks, and saw a young woman walking a dog that looked just like my niece's dog. I watched very carefully as the dog approached mine in a friendly way. I chatted with the young woman for a full minute before realizing that she was, in fact, my niece. Very recently before this meeting, she had lived in my house for a couple of years.
While watching movies from the 1930s, I often find it hard to tell the characters apart. I am familiar with modern hair styles and clothes and how they differ--and perhaps I use that to help tell present-day characters apart. But the old hair styles and clothes kind of blend into a uniform "old-fashioned", which combined with a mild prosopagnosia makes them look the same.
In my late thirties I began noticing that there were an awful lot of people who looked like other people-- specific people, I mean. My dentist circa 1989 looked very much like the guy who serviced the boiler in my grammar school circa 1965, for instance. If I started paying attention to it, it was like living in a TV series like "Mannix," where you might have Ralph Meeker or Janice Rule turn up two or three times over the course of a season, playing totally different (but identical) characters. It's a good idea to remember many people look alike and yet are not the same people. A few years ago my local Stop n Shop had rearranged the cereal aisle so everything be up at THAT end was now down at THIS end, and vice versa. Someone down at that end said, "Christ! They switched everything around." It was my former co-worker, Nelson, who I hadn't seen in two or three years. '"Christ, they switched everything around,'" I said in a really good Nelson imitation. "What are you, RAIN MAN?" Nelson stared at me, dumbfounded, at which point I realized that it was, in fact, not Nelson.
I decided to look up my condition. If I were to dangerously self diagnose, I think anomic aphasia is the closest fit.
We know those we become familiar with. People of any color or race become familiar at a glance when we've had time to interact with them one on one. But, as you stated, our abilities to recognize are on a spectrum. I consider myself pretty good at recognizing people. But I did have a situation with an Asian man a few years ago. When I was living in Atlanta I had the same doctor for about 20 years. I knew him and he knew me- inside and out. Yet one day, standing in line at checkout at the local Publix grocery, a guy behind me spoke up and said, "Hello Mr. Temujin. Eating healthy, I see?" I turned around to see a smiling Asian man...who I knew, but could not quite place. I just stared at him for what had to be the longest silent moment of my life. He smiled and smiled and finally told me who he was.
I could not recognize him because I had never seen him out of a white lab coat in a doctor's office through all those years. It wasn't Asian blindness. It was doctor-out-of-place blindness. My point is we more easily recognize faces we know in places we attach to them. I guess I could have just written that and dropped the story.
I'm a face-recognizer. Frankly, it's embarrassing. Everyone looks at you like you're a stalker for remembering them from a slight encounter. I hide it now and don't mention anything.
I never forget a face and struggle renembering names. I just learned to just admit it and always ask again and again until it's hardwired.
If I see people out of the context I know them I often don't recognize them. I'd known and been running with my friend Chris for over a month. Keeping a similar pace and talking with him for at least half the run and hanging around the coffee shop for 30-60 minutes after. One night I'm at the store and this person I don't know comes up and starts talking to me like a buddy. It wasn't until his voice clicked that I recognized him. Same thing happened with my next door neighbor. I'd known him over a year, saw him every day, and we talked a few times a week. After a year of this I'm at Home Depot and this stranger comes up and starts chatting me up. Again I was at a loss until his voice clicked. Both were fellow blonde guys within 10 years of my age.
I know someone who has face blindness. She has to rely on other clues in the people she knows and interacts with to figure out who they are, (unique mannerisms, voice, distinctive hair, height, etc.).
I used to confuse a White guy with an Asian guy, and their faces looked nothing alike. However, they were the same height, same weight, and had the same physical build. They movements were similar too -- it was super easy to confuse them unless looking directly at the face.
Us humans are just dressed up apes. We aren't very good at a lot of things. Be kind, and be forgiving of minor mistakes.
I remember reading (which is ironic for reasons that will become clear) a long time ago that people who learn to read early and read a lot may tend to recognize faces less well than people who spend less time reading. It's as if the visual cortex gets "reprogrammed" to recognize words and loses some discrimination with regard to faces. I definitely have a harder time with faces I see infrequently than with words I see infrequently, and I am a fast and accurate proofreader (blog typos notwithstanding - that's a presbyopia thing!).
(Shrug) One data point.
Fayette county had a walking tour of Dutton's cave park (Literally the Coolest place in Fayette county). There were about 12 people there. After the walk, they had smores for us. I was standing there chatting to all these new people; when one of them said
"so, gilbar? how was your trip to wyoming?"
This confused me, because while i had said my name at the start of the walk i didn't think anyone would have listened.. AND how the HELL? Did she know i just got back from wyoming??
Finally, i realized that she was a waitress where i usually go for lunch.
I WISH i could blame it on her not wearing her uniform, but they don't wear uniforms*
don't wear uniforms* They wear street clothes.. Get your mind out of the gutter!
What Temujin said. My patients often don’t recognize me outside the office and I am not Asian.
ask anybody to remember/recognize who checked them out at grocery store! sold stamp at post office etc.
not bug but feature
Yes, I think I have that. So far, it only manifests when I watch Japanese or Chinese movies, but I hear it's progressive.
Could it be from Brad's incessant pot smoking? Maybe he's never not high.
gilbar said...Remember! ANY problem that you face, is a medical problem; and Thus.. Not Your Fault!!
I believe it was Patterico who once said, "Any problem I have is real. Any problem neither I nor my friends have is bupkis."
The last time this came up, I posted that I have a mild case of it. I haven't mistaken my wife for a hat rack, but I have walked past my own brother in an airport. People have complained that I don't wave when I see them on the street, my wife once freaked out that I was getting dementia because I didn't recognize our next-door neighbor at the dog park. When I see an actor I like in a new show, I often recognize them by their voice rather than by their face. If it's by their face, it's often because of something distinctive like Owen Wilson's broken nose.
It's not a big problem day to day. I recognize most people most of the time, I just rely more heavily than most on indicators other than the face. Why that should be the case--that I remember the voice better than the nose and chin and cheekbones is a mystery.
I am currently being evaluated for prosopagpronounsia. The analyst is torn between whether it’s a condition or that I just don’t give a shit.
- Krumhorn
Temujin said...We know those we become familiar with. People of any color or race become familiar at a glance when we've had time to interact with them one on one
The "they all look alike" phenomenon, which it is fashionable to dismiss as racism (and is, of a sort, I suppose) is the product of a simple categorization method our brains use. When we are unfamiliar with a class of something, we notice the similarities to other members of that class so that we can categorize them properly. As we become more familiar, we get better at noticing the differences that make each member of that class distinct.
For instance, Europeans have many different hair types and colors and so use hair-type and color as one of the distinguishing characteristics they use to tell people apart. Well, Africans and Asians have much less variation, so that particular characteristic will tend to make them look the same to Europeans. Other races do this as well. An African might use hairline as a distinguishing feature. Europeans, with their straight hair often hiding their hairline, will tend to look the same to Africans.
I know how he feels and it gets me into trouble too IRL sometimes, but mostly I notice it in movies. If there is a movie with two blondes, I can't tell them apart. Banditas, (which I highly recommend, guys) I couldn't tell Selma Hayek from Penelope Cruz until halfway through the movie. I can now. I watched some British crime movie and all of the actors seemed to have that same British buzz cut that was popular then, and I couldn't follow it. I have to ask my daughters for IDs on famous people I should know, a lot.
Was it here I read about the super face recognizers that London Police recruit and who can easily recognize wanted criminals in crowds?
Leland said...I decided to look up my condition. If I were to dangerously self diagnose, I think anomic aphasia is the closest fit.
Have you always had that, or did it start at a given, identifiable moment? Can you come up with words describing the thing/word you want or when trying to find a word can you not articulate anything around it? If you're writing instead of speaking do you notice any difference?
My own vocabulary seems to be shrinking and I have trouble "pulling" words lately, myself. I'm hoping it's just too much Twitter/neglecting real reading, but still a concern!
I worked for seven years in a semiconductor factory, where cleanroom gear from head to toe was worn. Heads were covered, faces were masked, eyes were safety goggled, hands, limbs, bodies all covered in uniform white cleanroom coveralls, booties, rubber gloves. I never met most of the workers outside the cleanroom, and knew those with whom I interacted from voice, body outline, and personal carriage. Faces didn't enter into the equation at all. After a while I could recognize my coworkers from 100 yards down the hall in their cleanroom burqas.
Of the 1500 or so employees working there, exactly two were attractively shaped while in their cleanroom garb. The rest of us looked like tall Oompa Loompas dressed in monochrome white. Those two, with whom I was privileged to work in the factory office as well, also looked spectacular outside the cleanroom, in normal clothes.
I had the strange experience a few times of hearing a familiar voice from the cleanroom, while in the office, and having no idea which person around me was the speaker.
I am not completely bind to faces, just need several exposures to a face, unless it's really striking, to be able to recognize one, even if I make an effort. Names, it's really just a matter of effort.
'...worries about appearing 'remote … aloof, inaccessible [and] self-absorbed' while struggling to recognize faces...'
That look otherwise known as 'Magnum' or 'Blue Steel.'
I just think he doesn't like to work that hard to remember names...
“I bet Angela was pissed when he called her Jennifer!”
I assumed that this was natural. I am, probably at least once a day, called by the name of one of my partner’s past husbands. If I am called by her divorced husband’s name, I probably did something wrong. But if I am called by her late husband’s name, it is probably good. More of the latter, than former, these days, which means that, as we near 1/4 century together, we are habituating to each other. On the flip side, when I call her by my ex wife’s name, it is mostly intentional.
The funny thing though is that she is phenomenally good at recognizing faces. Probably a day doesn’t go by when she doesn’t ask me who some character is, in a TV show or movie. Then she repeats “Think!”, somewhat like what was done by Sheldon on Big Bang Theory. She’s trying to keep my memory sharp, but I was never good at this sort of thing, so just think that her efforts are bothersome.
I've attended a couple of class reunions. One of my 8th grade class 50th in 2002 and my medical school 56th last spring. Try recognizing faces you haven't seen in 50 years.
Europeans rely on hair color as a primary categorization technique (blonde, brunette, ginger). We look at hair texture as well (straight, curly, frizzy). This simple categorization makes recognition much easier for casual acquaintances. I asked some Koreans about this years ago, since they came from a world where everyone had straight black hair. They said that face shape was important, and they had terms for different shapes. For most people in the US, for a long time categorizing someone as Asian was enough to narrow down the possibilities to a fairly small set. Now, because of immigration it is more challenging. Fortunately, in recent years Asians have chosen to have a variety of hair colors, both European and fanciful, so they fit better with our reliance on hair.
'While watching movies from the 1930s, I often find it hard to tell the characters apart.'
The '30s had an excuse; black and white film.
Pet peeve alert...
Modern-day movies/TV will have 3 women characters, all vaguely pretty, all the same age, and all with a similar, brunette hair style.
Here's a clue; brunette, blonde, redhead.
I have to work my ass off to figure out who is who by looking at ear shape, or freckles, etc.
It's especially bad with some British murder shows that have huge casts for some reason...
The Economist once had an interesting article about phonagnosia -- failure to recognize voices - and the astonishment of someone with the condition when he discovered that others could recognize voices. If I find, I will post link.
'I could not recognize him because I had never seen him out of a white lab coat in a doctor's office through all those years.'
Yes...context is everything.
I was at a wedding and a man two rows away in the church kept smiling and waving at me. At first I thought he was looking at someone behind me.
When the ceremony was over and we were leaving the church, he came over and shook my hand and said, 'Hey, how are you...doctor Jones here.'
Duh! It was my oral surgeon who I see once a year and who took my kid's wisdom teeth out...turns out he was related to the groom : )
I know someone who has this. No indication that it's been sad. Merely funny. Several characters in movies appear to be the same person. Some very comical misunderstandings of plots have come out of that.
I would recognize Bruce Hayden’s face anywhere. Not only by his tiny black narrow eyes that look like marmot nostrils but also by his distinctive cheeks that look just like Joe Biden’s aviator glasses.
I wonder if Brad Pitt has tried pointing at the person while rapidly snapping his fingers?
It can also help if you push your eyebrows down and bite your lower lip while you're doing it.
My one talent on facial recognition seems to be recognizing actors and athletes on the street. Far better than my husband, who’s the bigger sports fan. I finally figured out that I was the NYC anomaly…someone who looks directly at other people’s faces when walking down the street, riding the subway or sitting in a cafe. I may not recognize my dry cleaner out of context as my dry cleaner, but I’ll know the face from somewhere.
"The Departed? Oh, I hated it. It went too far."
"What do you mean?"
"It was one thing for the guy to imagine himself in a different life, but then to have him physically fight himself. That's too far."
"Physically fight himself?"
"Someone might be delusional, but he's not going to imagine that he's two people and that the two people he is are fighting each other. That's ridiculous!"
I looked up the story because I have problems with faces on occasion. Mine is mostly recognizing people when I see them someplace other than where I normally see them.
What I found interesting was a suggestion that this condition (that Brad Pitt thinks he has; not mine) may be related to Aspbergers.
Marmot Nostrils?
Marmot nostrils are always a dead sure clue for me. That’s why I always recognized Harry Reid no matter what he did to escape my notice.
- Krumhorn
Meade: "I would recognize Bruce Hayden’s face anywhere. Not only by his tiny black narrow eyes that look like marmot nostrils but also by his distinctive cheeks that look just like Joe Biden’s aviator glasses."
Not to mention his lean and hungry look.
Narayanan @ 8:24: good questions. I have recently made a practice (imperfect) to note the names of those who check me out at the grocery store. Result? This:
For Elizabeth Who Packed My Groceries
Her gaze crosses l
A little bit
Just so you know
She’s Down Syndrome
Here at checkout
Gauging the milk
Asparagus
And loaves of bread
She slips shapes snug
Instantly weighs
What mates with what
To fill the bag
Leaving no room
For anything
We need to live
Except her smile
tim maguire said...
The "they all look alike" phenomenon, which it is fashionable to dismiss as racism (and is, of a sort, I suppose) is the product of a simple categorization method our brains use.
Having known a few Black people who couldn't tell Whites apart, I think there is a racial or cultural element to it, but otherwise I agree that blaming it on racism is stupid.
I guess I'm lucky otherwise as I have never had a problem recognizing faces, although I will admit to being better with women's faces than men's.
'I could not recognize him because I had never seen him out of a white lab coat in a doctor's office through all those years.'
Also an old swimmers joke, people you only see at the pool: "Hey, look look really different with your clothes on!"
I actually had the reverse, my neighbor (few doors down), whom I have spoken with often, showed up at the pool and I only vaguely recognized her due to (lack of) clothing, and also her hair was wet and plastered down.
HoodlumDoodlum,
I read the Cleveland Clinic write up on the condition. It mentioned most instances of aphasia is related to a stroke or traumatic brain damage. It is one reason I added my caveat about self diagnosis, because I don’t recall such an event nor time a specific time when this became a problem. I can tell it is a condition, because when it happens I absolutely can’t obtain the memory of the name I’m seeking. I know stress, including excess caffeinating, will make it more prevalent. Other times, I can do what Tim in Vermont said he can’t regarding Selma Hayek and Penelope Cruz, including not only recalling their name but remembering stuff like Penelope Cruz having dated Tom Cruise.
Because I could do the latter, I often thought it might be a laziness. Except sometimes it occurs for names that I really don’t care to know these details of such as Selma Hayek, Penelope Cruz, or Tom Cruise. Sometimes it happens for more common things like to describe that stuff you spread on bread with jelly and kids like a lot with the simple words, peanut butter.
The problem presents less in writing than speaking, but I’m usually write casually especially in blog comments (as I’m sure many have noticed). When technically writing, it happens, but a web search on the description I can recall helps to hide the problem. One thing that might be related in writing, or could be something else, is thinking I wrote a word that a reread shows I clearly omitted. Worse, sometimes my reread will still not even pick up the omitted word, and I’ll read the sentence as if the word is there.
Back to the initiating event. My family has a history of stroke. I don’t. My mother is and her mom did suffer from dementia. So stuff like this worries me too. But this isn’t the same thing as a loss of memory. It is an inability to access the memory on demand. No amount of time at the instant it occurs relieves the situation, but time to relax and think of completely other things can recover the memory. As I said before, I can even recall the very first time I was exposed to the proper name, but then that is the oldest memory, but once I finally recall the name, I can remember more recent events too.
Speaking of recall, I remember now in my DIE training (they say DEI, but I agree with Jordan Peterson’s arrangement of the letters since it used to be D&I and Equity came later); they called not calling a person by their name a “micro-aggression”. I always disliked that word, because it always seems to presume intent as it does in this usage. Brad Pitt isn’t being aggressive at all. My struggle to recall a name is far from being aggressive. It actually feels quite vulnerable, particularly in the work environment. If there was ever a natural privilege, then it might just be the ability to easily recall a name to a face whenever you want. Perhaps not always a privilege either as Kate notes, but I know people with that capability tend to climb corporate ladders more easily.
freeman hunt I believe you described "Fight Club," not "The Departed."
NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...
tim maguire said...
" The "they all look alike" phenomenon, which it is fashionable to dismiss as racism (and is, of a sort, I suppose) is the product of a simple categorization method our brains use.
Having known a few Black people who couldn't tell Whites apart, I think there is a racial or cultural element to it, but otherwise I agree that blaming it on racism is stupid."
In areas with low minority populations, circumstances can result in an issue that is similar but less dependent on recognizing individuals. For example, there may be 2 or 3 Black men of similar age and body type that work at Lowe's. If you never see more than one of the Black employees at the same time, it's possible to just categorize those 3 individuals as the "black guy" at Lowe's. Even if that isn't necessarily racism, it isn't unreasonable for a minority to get damn sick and tired of being confused with someone else just because he's the "black guy" at work. In this case, the effort to facially recognize the individual was never even made.
I am great at recognizing faces, tying them to names, though, can be more challenging. If we have met before and chatted at a minimum, I will certainly know it when I see you again unless you have undergone tremendous physical changes, and I will likely know where and when we met, but I probably won't remember your name unless we met at least two distinct times.
I can't imagine what it would be like to be face blind- that has got to be some difficult things to deal with socially.
In January of 2018 I attended a get together that was honoring our high school basketball coach and dedicating the gymnasium in his honor. It was a lot of fun seeing teammates after nearly 50 years. I had been looking forward to seeing our starting center - Mark C. - after so many years and remarked as much to a fellow sitting at the next table.
Who turned out to be Mark C.
When I watched "You Only Live Twice" I had great difficulty distinguishing Aki from Kissy Suzuki. But that isn't necessarily racistbecause I had the same problem with Domino and Fiona Volpe in "Thunderball."
"Quite aside from the specific disability, we're all on a spectrum when it comes to facial recognition."
I'm really bad at faces, though not as bad as the some, apparently. And it certainly can cause awkward social encounters. I felt especially bad about not recognizing students in my class (and I had small classes; typically 20 students).
On the flip side, I'm great with voices. Time and again I would encounter a person I didn't recognize, and then they speak and their identity instantly registers. It's very strange; and also a pain in the ass. I wonder how many people I've insulted over the years.
@ Leland - How old are you? I never had a problem remembering Proper Nouns until some time around when I turned 60. Now it is more and more common that I can remember things about a person but not their name. Actually, it's also getting harder to remember improper nouns or verbs or ... I know the word exists and what it means but the word won't come, at least not right away. I've spoken with various people who say it's happening to them, too.
Leland said...One thing that might be related in writing, or could be something else, is thinking I wrote a word that a reread shows I clearly omitted. Worse, sometimes my reread will still not even pick up the omitted word, and I’ll read the sentence as if the word is there.
Thanks for the detailed answer! I run into the same problem w/proofreading where I'll "read" what I meant and not what's there. The alleged solution is to read everything out loud when reviewing but even then I have to go slow enough that I actually look at each word individually or I'll still skip.
Not Sure said...When I watched "You Only Live Twice" I had great difficulty distinguishing Aki from Kissy Suzuki. But that isn't necessarily racistbecause I had the same problem with Domino and Fiona Volpe in "Thunderball."
You can tell the difference between Domino in Thunderball and Domino in Never Say Never Again though, right?
Ah, Fiona Volpe. Imagine being able to say "hello" like Connery in that scene!
I wonder if he's really sure about this. Someone like Brad Pitt meets a gazillion different people day in, day out - and I would bet that nearly all of them are really eager to make a favorable impression in order to 'get in' to the inner circle of trust and develop a relationship. The old star-chaser syndrome. Poor guy is probably getting paranoid about it now, all these people he met 10-15 years ago pumping his hand and saying "Hey, buddy, remember me ~?"
In the last, say, sixty years, we've gotten used to seeing a lot of faces, up close, personal, synced with speech, great lighting on television. Lots and lots of faces not like passing in a crowd someone you never met.
Got to be a few cases where a person reminds you of another person, the another-person store being so full and rich. But, since the person we see or meet is in the real world, the television context does not kick in, just a vague feeling of familiarity.
But a recent phenomenon.
Roger Sweeney, I’ll hit 50 later this year.
HoodlumDoodlum, the Cleveland Clinic also commented that those with aphasia also tend to see and solve problems in a different way and in so doing are often misunderstood. I was surprised to see that bit, because it is a common feeling for me. I think this is an artifact of the problem solving methods that are developed to hide the condition from others. Now a days, I’ll a bit more open with the problem as it has been a problem for decades. I just thought it rare enough that few would have noted it for it to have a named condition (a bit ironic when you think about it).
tim maguire @ 8:54am,
Regarding recognition features and stereotypes: One time I was discussing a folk story we had transcribed with my South Sudanese language assistant. We came across a word I had never seen before, that was being used to describe a bird's beak.
"Oh", he said, "It means long and pointed--like a bird's beak, or a white person's nose."
I have a mild case. I have an extremely good visual memory and imagination, but if I have to visualize someone's face, it is indistinct unless I see them often. I would be a lousy eye-witness. I have very good luck recognizing people's voices, even people I haven't seen for a decade and who are somewhere I do not expect them. For instance, I knew a guy in high school but from another city and only met a few times. 20 yrs later in another state, I heard his voice in the college locker room and turned to see him. A guy walking his dog coming toward me but the sun was in my eyes--he spoke and I knew who it was before I could see him.
I think we should pause before making fun of anyone, even a star, because these problems are real.
"freeman hunt I believe you described "Fight Club," not "The Departed.""
Ha! No, but that would actually fit the description. No, this person spent the entire movie thinking Matt Damon, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Mark Wahlberg were all the same person.
What disease causes other people to think they recognize me? I must have a half dozen doppelgangers on the east coast and someone in my new hometown has mistaken me for an old friend already.
I don't know whether Pitt has this condition or not, or to what extent, but the ability to recognize faces -- especially after a brief exposure to them-- is clearly something some people have more or less ability to do. I do not believe in made-up, fabricated disabilities. But I have this problem -- not at the level Pitt claims to have, but at a level that definitely indicates I have some lower level of performance in this area.
Having said, I accept that it is up to me to compensate; I never used it to make excuses. I mean, come on, who are people like Gilbar going to attack next -- color blind people? people who can't carry a tune?
We just need to stop this constant monitoring of other people's pluses and minuses -- except when they claim legal rights or immunities as a result of conditions that may or may not be objective.
I've noticed a lot of hostility by commenters even on this, relatively intelligent, blog, towards the overweight (which the CDC has chosen to stigmatize as "obese", and then defined the term as including a surprisingly high percentage of Americans (especially males).
Can we simply accept we don't all look alike, we don't hear alike, we don't all recognize patterns and faces alike and -- who cares? who is hurt?
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