Daniel Kish: Prometheus of the Blind

Daniel Kish is a visually challenged person, and he uses echolocation to navigate around the world.

This is how it started:

"I am 6 years old and it's my first day at school. The bell rings for recess and all my classmates run gleefully away. But unlike them I cannot see. At least, not with my eyes. Instead, I click my tongue, listening for echoes from the wall to my left. I walk with my hands slightly outstretched to keep me from running into chairs that may have been left askew. I hear kids laughing and shouting through the open door, and by clicking I also hear the presence of the sides of the doorway in front of me. I go through it to the playground for the first time.

"After a few steps, I stop to listen. I stand on a crack in the pavement that runs parallel to the building behind me. I click my tongue loudly and turn my head from side to side. The way is open, shot through with scurrying voices, balls bouncing and shoes scampering to and fro. What is around me? How do I get there? How do I get back?

Clicking my tongue quickly and scanning with my head, I move cautiously forward, catching fleeting images of bodies darting hither and thither. I follow spaces that are clear, avoiding clusters of bodies, keeping my distance from bouncing balls. I am not afraid - to me, this is a puzzle. I turn my head and click over my shoulder. I can still hear the wall of the building. As long as I can hear that, I can find my way back."

- New Scientist 

And what does he see?

"For example, I perceive a parked car as a large object that starts out low at one end, rises in the middle and drops off again. The difference in the height and slope pitch at either end helps me identify the front from the back end; typically, the front will be lower, with a more gradual slope up to the roof."

- New Scientist 

It seems miraculous to us, but he says this could be an inbuilt skill, and people are not trained enough to make use of it.

Dr Kish has now started World Access for the Blind ,  a non-profit organisation that teaches people to see the way he does- he calls his method FlashSonar.

You must read the New Scientist article. It is astonishing.

Here is a link to YouTube where Dr. Kish explains echolocation.

Dr Kish goes hiking, camping, mountain-biking and more- things we dare not do.

He says,

"The best piece of advice I would pass on is ...

Make a point of regularly challenging what you think you know. Most of it is based on assumptions that have been programmed into us by a society which doesn't necessarily have our best interests at heart. If we challenge what we think we know, there is a chance we can break out of that and begin to touch what is real.",

in a BBC interview.

If Braille opened the books for the blind, Dr.Kish's FlashSonar could open the whole wide world for them. He could be the Prometheus of the Blind.

Now, here is a man who can inspire us to believe that nothing is impossible- for the right person.