• @[email protected]OP
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    3911 days ago

    I can repressurize my ears without yawning, just by flexing a muscle. Even less useful, I can focus my eyes to different distances without using the finger trick, which comes in handy never.

      • zout
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        1311 days ago

        Ear rumbling was gonna be my superpower. And I can indeed also use this to some extent to repressurize my ears.

        • ℕ𝕖𝕞𝕠
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          111 days ago

          I can rumble, but have never needed to repressurize my ears - they’re “leaky”.

        • @[email protected]
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          310 days ago

          Not everyone!

          Check out the Function->Voluntary Control section here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tensor_tympani_muscle

          I tried to find stats on what proportion of people could do it, with claims of “a small number” through to “over half the population”.

          This study says 55% in the general population. It’s also interesting as it’s exploring the ability to use this voluntary rumble as a control method for assistive technology.

    • @[email protected]
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      11 days ago

      I can focus my eyes to different distances

      That’s not common? Tbh I never asked around if others can do it I just assumed it’s normal.

    • @[email protected]
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      Íslenska
      511 days ago

      I thought everyone could do this and always wondered why people complained about having to pop their ears

    • @[email protected]
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      210 days ago

      I can focus my eyes to different distances without using the finger trick, which comes in handy never.

      I’m assuming you’re talking about convergence. When your eyes are physically turning inward to align on a nearby object, that’s called convergence. Focusing is what your lenses do, although the technical term is “accommodation”.

      I’m excellent at controlling convergence, too. I can be looking at my phone screen (like right now) and diverge my eyes just enough to make neighboring letters overlap. Or diverge them so much I see two phone screens entirely. Or anything in between. Same with converging and going cross-eyed.

      I can even diverge my eyes slightly further than parallel, making individual stars in the night sky look like two stars. But not by a lot. Looking at me, you’d probably just think was looking in the distance. I can’t make my eyes look in different directions like a chameleon.

      This does have one handy use: I can see those Magic Eye posters at will, in a split second, even across the room!

    • @[email protected]
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      211 days ago

      It’d probably come in handy if you started sports shooting. I do Olympic-style air pistol shooting, and part of what I’m currently training on is focusing my eye on the forward sight, not the target.

    • baduhai
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      11 days ago

      I can do both of those things too, but my ear repressurising abilities aren’t that strong, I usually have to either yawn or blow my closed nose.