> As you say, blinking rarely makes its way into conscious thought, despite that the visual input was briefly suspended. (I suppose a similar thing happens with smell. How often do you notice that you don't smell much when you breathe out?) Neither do we notice that our various senses have different latencies, reporting the same event at different times.
Interesting anecdote: I've been through a fair amount of training in perception and conscious proprioception in the military. The end result of all of this training is that I am very often actively paying attention to my body, especially my vision, hearing, and touch. I've noticed that when I blink, I'm consciously aware of what has changed when I finish blinking. I'm aware of how my body moves during this time, if my sense of touch is telling me something is different than before my eyes closed. I can pick things up that I can't see without fumbling for them. It's really interesting how effectively we can mentally model the world around us, incorporate different types of senses to update this global model.
I imagine that professional athletes, race car drivers, Martial artists, etc... develop similar levels of proprioception and modeling.
Certainly to a lesser degree than it sounds like you’ve developed in the military, but just riding a motorcycle regularly gets you to a similar place. In order to survive on a bike, you need to stop assuming that other people see you. That leads to a much greater awareness of what’s happening on the road and what’s coming up in the near future, and the motion of your own body in space.
Interesting anecdote: I've been through a fair amount of training in perception and conscious proprioception in the military. The end result of all of this training is that I am very often actively paying attention to my body, especially my vision, hearing, and touch. I've noticed that when I blink, I'm consciously aware of what has changed when I finish blinking. I'm aware of how my body moves during this time, if my sense of touch is telling me something is different than before my eyes closed. I can pick things up that I can't see without fumbling for them. It's really interesting how effectively we can mentally model the world around us, incorporate different types of senses to update this global model.
I imagine that professional athletes, race car drivers, Martial artists, etc... develop similar levels of proprioception and modeling.