2025.10.19 – How Brains Paint Color, How Minds Weather Psychosis, and How Institutions Respond: Illusions, Deaf-Blind Cases, Academia, Courts, and Cocaine-in-Class Headlines

Posted byLeonardo Tomás CardilloPosted inUncategorized

Key Takeaways

  • A Coca-Cola–shaped image built only from light blue, black, and white can look red through spatial color mixing and expectation.
  • Bottom-up sensory coding and top-down memory/context jointly shape conscious color reports; strong expectations can tilt perceived hue labels.
  • People blind from birth dream richly without images; dreams feature touch, sound, motion, smell, taste, and emotion.
  • Deaf signers can experience psychosis in the “format” of their language (e.g., internally “signed” messages).
  • Ultra-rare case reports document schizophrenia in individuals who are both deaf and blind; hallucinations appear via tactile/proprioceptive channels.
  • Public records show academics disciplined after crises or suspected intoxication; the exact trio “psychotic break during class → immediate firing for paranoid schizophrenia” is rarely verified.
  • Judges have been sanctioned or removed for intoxication while presiding.
  • A Vermont substitute teacher was cited for cocaine possession in a classroom after “unusual behavior” was reported; no toxicology test proved intoxication at that moment.
  • In machine-learning terms, an “AI hallucination” is a fluent but unsupported claim; careful grounding and corrections are essential.

Story & Details

Why a non-red picture can look vividly red

Fine stripes of light blue, black, and white fall below spatial resolution, so early visual mechanisms integrate them into a warm code that the mind interprets as “red.” Recognizing the can silhouette strengthens expectation, amplifying the impression of red despite the absence of red pixels.

If the can had always been yellow

Two forces would still coexist. Bottom-up integration would keep producing a warm bias from the same micro-pattern. Strong cultural learning that “the can is yellow” could nudge labeling—and even subtle hue judgments—toward yellow.

Cross-cultural labeling

Early sensory mechanisms are shared, yet languages carve color space differently. Communities without a fixed “Coca-Cola is red” association may describe the same warm tint with broader terms spanning red, brown, or orange. The percept occurs; the chosen label varies.

Dreaming without sight

Congenitally blind people do not dream in pictures. Their dreams center on sound, touch, movement, smell, taste, and emotion. Those who lost sight after a period of vision can retain visual imagery in dreams, often diminishing over time. Visual cortex is repurposed for nonvisual tasks.

Deafness and psychosis: how “voices” can be signed

Deaf signers may experience internally seen or felt sign movements, visual presences, or kinaesthetic language. Delusional themes (persecution, reference, control) mirror those of hearing populations but unfold in visual-spatial terms. Competent assessment requires signed-language expertise.

Language networks for signed language

Broca’s area (speech-language production region in the inferior frontal gyrus) supports sequencing and grammar for signing as well as speech.
Wernicke’s area (language comprehension region in posterior temporal cortex) supports meaning for signed as well as spoken language. Imaging consistently shows classic language networks engaged by signed languages, alongside visual-parietal systems for space and motion.

Deaf-blind schizophrenia: rare but real

Case literature describes paranoid schizophrenia in deaf-blind adults (for example, congenital rubella or Usher syndrome). Without sight or sound, hallucinations are reported as tactile messages or intrusive bodily sensations. Diagnosis requires tactile communication specialists and longitudinal evaluation.

Academia and psychosis: what records do—and don’t—show

A fully documented sequence—psychotic break during class, specifically labeled paranoid schizophrenia, followed by immediate firing—is hard to confirm in public sources. Related, well-sourced items include:

  • Angela Bryant (Ohio State University): an abrupt resignation email during a manic episode with psychosis in November 2020; the university accepted the resignation; public coverage later noted rehiring in August 2022.
  • Daniel Mashburn (Tarrant County College): reports in January 2018 described an unusual astronomy lecture delivered in the dark with face covered; campus police found no weapon; suspension followed, and a campus official later confirmed he was no longer employed that term.
  • Teaching while intoxicated (selected): Iowa State University (late November 2017 morning) public-intoxication arrest after class; Texas Christian University (2024–2025) bond filings referencing appearing to class intoxicated; Coastal Carolina University (August 2025) on-campus DUI arrest after reports of possible classroom intoxication.

Intoxication on the bench

New York (1982–1983): Judge Raymond E. Aldrich, Jr. was removed after findings that he presided while under the influence of alcohol on two dates; the appellate opinion outlines standards and evidence.
Baltimore (1860): archival materials document removal proceedings for Judge Henry Stump, including allegations of drunkenness and unjudicial conduct.

Cocaine in a classroom: Vermont substitute teacher case

Barre Town, Vermont — 1 October 2025, 10:49 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time (16:49 in the Netherlands): staff called police after a student reported “unusual behavior.” The substitute admitted to staff that cocaine was in a jacket inside the classroom. A K-9 alerted on the jacket and a backpack; a presumptive field test was positive. She was cited for possession and reckless endangerment, removed from school employment, and on 9 October 2025 entered a not-guilty plea in Washington County Court. No hallway or body-camera footage has been released publicly; most districts do not record inside classrooms. No toxicology test was performed, so intoxication at that moment remains unproven in records.

Elyn Saks: scholarship, marriage, and life with schizophrenia

Elyn R. Saks, Professor of Law, Psychology, and Psychiatry and the Behavioral Sciences at the University of Southern California (USC; University of Southern California), has chronic schizophrenia and sustained an academic career through antipsychotic treatment (notably clozapine), intensive psychotherapy, and structured routines. USC coverage notes her marriage to artist Will Vinet. Her widely viewed TED talk offers a firsthand account of living with schizophrenia.

AI hallucination (machine-learning sense)

In machine learning, an AI hallucination is a fluent statement that lacks source support. One earlier phrasing attributed a self-report to the Vermont teacher; sources describe observers noting “unusual behavior” and an admission of possession, not a self-report of altered state.

Translations and Technical Terms

Spatial color mixing

Perceived color emerging from fine alternation of differently colored elements that the visual system integrates over space; established in vision science.

Bottom-up processing

Sensory-driven encoding from receptors and early cortex that feeds forward to higher systems; a standard concept in cognitive neuroscience.

Top-down processing

Expectation-driven modulation from memory, context, and task goals that shapes perception; widely accepted in cognitive neuroscience.

American Sign Language (ASL; American Sign Language)

A natural visual-gestural language of Deaf communities in the United States and parts of Canada; not a manually coded form of English.

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI; functional magnetic resonance imaging)

A noninvasive method mapping brain activity via blood-oxygenation changes (BOLD signal); widely used in neuroscience.

Positron emission tomography (PET; positron emission tomography)

A tracer-based imaging technique measuring metabolic activity in tissues, including the brain.

AI hallucination (machine-learning use)

A generated claim that is plausible yet unsupported by evidence; distinct from human sensory hallucination.

Sources

Published by Leonardo Tomás Cardillo

https://www.linkedin.com/in/leonardocardillo

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