@mentallyalex@beige.party @helplessduck @UnFitz2 @TazPoltorak
The best way to explain it I've found is like this:
You know how apples are red, right?
Even though many particular apples aren't actually red, might be green or yellow or some kind of mix, the "apple" concept is (for most people) kind of associated with "redness" in our mental model.
It's that, but instead of the concept of "apple", it's the concept of "the number 3" or "the letter C" or whatever.
@mentallyalex@beige.party @helplessduck @UnFitz2 @TazPoltorak So it's not like you literally hallucinate the color red whenever you see or think about an apple, but "apples are red" is just a feature of that particular concept that kind of rides along with it.
Well, "3" is also red.
@mentallyalex@beige.party @helplessduck @UnFitz2 @TazPoltorak (This isn't the sort of synesthesia that I personally have, at least not in a very strong way, and everyone is different of course. I have the sensory-wires-crossing hallucinating trippy patterns whenever there's a sharp unexpected noise, which imo is different enough that it should really have a different name, but I've heard the neurological mechanisms are similar.)