This'll sound ridiculous, but it's been bothering me.

How do people who are both blind and deaf believe with confidence that they exist? I mean, obviously they can still feel, smell, and taste, but with the combined lack of sight AND sound, how can one be sure he/she is REALLY feeling something, REALLY smelling something, REALLY tasting something.

Also, what if they got a flu? They wouldn't be able to smell either, then they'd start freaking out.

 

How can you be sure you're REALLY seeing something when you see it, or REALLY hearing something?

 

True, but you can have more confidence of it, because you've got 4 other senses backing it up.

 

I had the same exact discussion with my gf about Helen Keller! Its amazing how she went on to right books isn't it?

 

I don't know much about Helen Keller, all i know is she was a mute or something similar.

 

She was stricken with either scarlet fever or meningitis when she was about 2years old and because of that she became Deaf/blind/mute.

 

I knew of all that, just not the cause.
Honestly i couldn't really care less, doesn't interest me.

 

What I have always asked myself is what do blind people dream? Do they see things in there dreams? (im talking about people who are blind since birth)

 

Non-blind people see nothing in their dreams.
I think feel is the most reassuring sense (in terms of: are we here?)
So I think blind and deaf people wouldn't have any problems believing that they exist.

 

But we know how things look like and if I dream I see for example my brother. But blind people never seen how someone or something looks like.

 

Blind people who were able to see at a younger age still see things when they dream. I watched a documentary about that one time.

It's amazing how they taught Helen Keller to write even though she was blind and deaf, must have been hard.

 

We generally define existance by our senses and our ability to think. Obviously they go hand in hand, one does not work without the other. This subject is really getting into symantics and what defines someone as "alive". Close your eyes and put earplugs in, how do you know you exist? Because you saw and heard once?

 

That's a good question.
My answer to that would be the knowledge of surrounding humans by using their 'feeling senses'.

 

I always wondered this. It must suck big time to not be able to see or hear anything. I wish there was something I could do :'(

 

I think it would be possible to conduct surgery which could restore vision/hearing.

 

The fact that you exist is utterly subjective, but objective in its existence, examples include people who remain in vegetative states for the whole of their life, are able to communicate when a method is found, showing they are to terms with their existence, and are living organisms.

The five senses are minuscule in comparison with being in terms with your existence, thought processes, and life.

 

Its Hard This one Im just sure they adapt and overcome to get on with there life .

 

I would assume a deaf and blind person would be convinced they exist.

 

I think this has something to do with the heightened aptitude in the senses these people do have available to them. I was just watching something on the History Channel about this guy that was blind, but through using sonar only could navigate through anywhere. I think that these peoples sense of touch is so greatly inclined that they know exactly what and what doesn't exist.

 

I also saw something about a blind person who would make a clicking sound as he walked along, and by doing so be able to work out his surroundings and know in advance if he was walking towards a solid object. Really quite amazing. I heard somewhere that bats use a similar method to navigate.