People can learn click-based echolocation in ten weeks

[Still Waters]

For years, a small number of people who are blind have used echolocation, by making a clicking sound with their mouths and listening for the reflection of the sound to judge their surroundings. Now, research published in PLOS ONE shows that people can learn click-based echolocation regardless of their age or ability to see.

Researchers led by psychologist Lore Thaler at Durham University spent ten weeks teaching over two dozen people, some who were blind and some who were not, to observe and navigate their environments by echolocation. Participants attended two sessions per week for two to three hours each time.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/study-shows-people-can-learn-echolocation-ten-weeks-180977889/

https://www.sciencealert.com/blind-and-sighted-people-can-learn-to-echolocate-in-as-few-as-10-weeks

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/

[Buzz_Light_Year]

I learned about this from a story about a remarkable young man by the name of Ben Underwood who lost his eyes at age 3 to cancer. Unfortunately the cancer eventually killed him.

 

[+DanL]

It is amazing what people are actually capable of doing when circumstances force it onto them or situations make it important. I used to walk for hours at night. I'm a chronic insomniac. I eventually noticed that the darkness in no way seemed to be a problem. I started walking with my eyes closed trying to figure out what I was sensing that allowed me to walk for an hour with my eyes closed and never step off the street or road and usually walked the center of the streets. Finally I figured it out. A street offers you two very east to sense ways to know where you are. First the streets have a crown and with a little practice that is all you need to stay on the slight crown. The other is a form of the echo location. The edges of a road even a dirt road are softer than the road and offer a clear difference in the way that sound is sent to your ears. Even without clicks I had little trouble staying on path. 

I think that I have always done this sort of thing without realizing it. When I was little they didn't think that I was very smart because I struggled in school. I managed to pass but my grades sucked and it was a near miss. In the second half of the Second grade they sent us all to the nurses station to have our eyes checked. Remember the old chart with all of the different size Es on it. WEEEELLL I couldn't see the top and biggest one until the nurse moved me to within about 4 feet! Hell, I was blind and didn't know it!!!

It was off to the Ophthalmologist for a check and then glasses came in about a week later. OMG!!!! I had never seen a bird in flight! The trees actually had leaves that I could see and best of all the teacher wrote everything that I needed to know on the chalk board. Around the top of the class room you had the alphabet and the numbers. For me it was a whole new world. I wasn't dumb, I was just learning totally from what I heard and couldn't see much of anything that was on a chalk board. 

I bloomed!!! In the 4th grade they gave us all intelligence tests and I scored really high and ended up in special classes on an accelerated path. The poor dumb kid that was almost failing that was an embarrassment to his parents was like the ugly duckling. I have a Mensa tested 146 IQ, I missed making the cut by one point. That isn't genus really but I am fairly smart. You can bet that my kids eyes were checked out long before she went to school!!!

 

Edited June 5, 2021 by DanL

[fred_mc]

 I watched a documentary once about a blind boy who could ride a bike by using echolocation. He was making clicking sounds with his mouth that he used for echolocation.

[Nosy.Matters]

Interesting post, thanks. May be relevant,,

I didn't seem to see a

 book > fiction > 

((category)cat so,, will post it here:

Author: Kat Falls, 'Dark Life'

I picked it up on a whim and was pleasantly surprised. Although she has other's published, like most I don't see the extra time to get to them. Cleverly written, clean fun odysseys full of adventure swirling in action packed intrigue. About a family in a beta community living just offshore under the waves in the ocean.

Oh ,, and of course, some of the new children using a form of Echo Location.

Edited June 7, 2021 by Nosy.Matters
sea/ocean

[NCC1701]

You should have glasses that send out clicks. Ten you'll get a good idea of your surroundings based on the echos.