Blind Man Navigates Maze

Scientists have discovered that a blind person can navigate through a maze of obstacles unaided using the power of sense alone. The man, left blind by a stroke, was able to intuitively walk around chairs and boxes without bumping into them using hidden pathways in the brain. The study suggests we all use subconscious brain resources and can do things we think we are unable to do.

BBC News

Lead researcher Dr Beatrice de Gelder of Tilburg University stated:

"You can experience a total loss of your cortical vision but still retain some capacity to move around inside and out without damage to yourself," she told the BBC. "It shows us the importance of these evolutionary ancient visual paths. They contribute more than we think they do for us to function in the real world."

Interesting stuff! It seems that science is starting to demonstrate what many of us have known all along - that there's more to our abilities than we currently believe.

I'm very much looking forward to the further research

[Edit to remove duplicated title]

[edit on 22/12/08 by lizziejayne]

was he using sound? i know humans who have lost sight for long and train enough can use echo location...nothing as advanced as bats etc but still...

reply to post by Solomons


His eyes function and they send the sight information to his brain - but his sight centres in his brain have been scrambled by the strokes - so they are not processing the information... At least not on a level his conscious brain can figure out and understand - he is blind, but it seems that on some instinctive level he has some sight - they called it blind sight in the article.

reply to post by Solomons


Sound is a possibility I hadn't considered.

It wasn't mentioned what controls were utilised in the study (e.g. with and without hearing etc) - it would be interesting to establish if this result could indicate an overall mitigation of sight loss using a combination of other senses.

As the researcher seems convinced the results indicate some "hidden" subconscious pathways, I'm assuming they've eliminated other possibilities.

That said, I'm going on the prowl now to find out some more details

reply to post by Now_Then


Many thanks for clarifying Now Then. It seems that in my haste and excitement, I somewhat misconstrued the article.

That said, it's still very interesting stuff - makes you realise what complex creatures we are

If you pay close enough attention to what's in your aura field, I can definitely see how that would be possible.

Originally posted by lizziejayne
That said, it's still very interesting stuff - makes you realise what complex creatures we are

Oh yhea defiantly - when I used to go to the doctors to try and figure out why I hear all the tinnitus I do we pretty much concluded that we all hear more than our brain actually lets us know - and where most peoples brains are content to ignore it in the same way people tune out normal sounds like a busy road - noise irritates me - in order for me to sleep well I can't have so much as a mobile phone on charge in the room - and even then...

Same must go for sight, and touch - like some one said about their aura... that could be considered an extension of senses.

Crazy stuff - give you a head ache thinking about it.