台大心理系

Aphantasia is a condition in which subjects report the absence of any perception-like experiences associated with acts of mental imagery. Might some self-diagnosed aphantasics engage in mental imagery, but only unconsciously? A number of recent empirical results seem to suggest that the answer is yes, and researchers are beginning to take seriously the possibility of unconscious imagery in aphantasia. In this paper I aim to do two things. First, I will argue that the case for unconscious imagery in aphantasia is not as strong as it appears to be. Existing results can be equally well explained by appealing to the difficulties associated with leveraging introspective reports as a source of evidence. Second, I will outline how natural kind reasoning can help expedite progress on this question.