Info for Noory caller who sees small red dots

On the October 1 Coast To Coast program, a caller told George Noory
he's been seeing small red dots in front of his eyes since childhood.
He wanted to know if anyone had the same experience. I think I know
exactly what he means and I asked the same question on Usenet years
ago.

Below is a repost from 1998 which yielded no answers. The dots have
always seemed benign to me and I think they're a function of
electrical activity in the retina, but most people aren't attuned to
it. I first noticed the dots when I was about 12. They can only be
seen when you focus in your mind or behind your eyelids, so to speak.
They are so small that several hundred thousand could fit in your
field of view. I rarely notice them except when deliberately trying,
so the Noory caller may have a more pronounced sensitivity. Seeing the
dots is partially like trying to resolve those Magic Eye 3-D pictures,
but they are best seen with eyes closed at night. -Al-

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Newsgroups: sci.med.vision
From: (Al) [non-working email address]
Date: 1998/12/16
Subject: Tiny red dots seen with eyes closed

When I close my eyes, especially in darkness, and mentally focus
on a certain plane inside the eyelids I see a field of very small
bright red dots which seem to have black centers. They are razor
sharp at the edges and so small that hundreds or thousands fill the
entire field of vision. The spacing of the dots is like a dense,
starry sky, but a lot more uniform. Each one seems to be the same
size, but they are in a constant state of flux like snow on a TV
screen, so I can't lock onto one and study it.

I noticed this the first time maybe 25 years ago (aged 35 now). It's
not an obvious phenomenon if you don't seek it out. My vision has
always been 20/20. I can't be "seeing" these dots with my lenses
since nothing could be that sharply focused behind the eyelids.

Can anyone else duplicate this? Might these be electrical impulses
being picked up by the retina?

Al

 

This was also reposted for sci.med.vision, which may be an equal waste
of time. It was just interesting to hear that someone else had seen
these specks of red light. It's a very real phenomenon, not Art Bell
fringe guest material.

Al