Would you rather be deaf or blind?

Dremmer

Would you rather be deaf or blind? I'd rather be deaf. It would be extremely terrible not be able to see where I'm going. Though I'd hate to be deaf as well.

DaveC426913

If only given those two choices I'd pick deafness. I'm pretty sure most people would. We receive a very large portion of our input from the world visually.

Jimmy Snyder

They say the best marriage is between a deaf husband and a blind wife.

leroyjenkens

I'd rather lose my sense of hearing, taste, and smell than be blind.

That's how important I think vision is. So yes, I'd definitely rather be deaf than blind.

Hobin

I'm practically half-deaf, because my left ear doesn't work. It's annoying, and I suspect being completely deaf would even be much more annoying, but it'd beat being blind any day. I can't even begin to imagine how much I would miss out on if I were blind.

ThomasT

Deaf.

DaveC426913

Ya kill me!

Jack21222

Deaf. I'd likely commit suicide if I was blind.

Tosh5457

Sick question...

Hobin

Why?

Andre

Truly it is not the eyes that are blind ...

bpatrick

I'd have to choose deafness if I had such a choice.

It would suck quite a bit since I'm a musician, but there are some up sides to being a musician as well. I can sit down and read a conductors score of a symphony and have it play in my head so I still believe I would be able to experience new music (or at least music I haven't been exposed to) and still hear it ... at least in my head. Yay for decades of theory and ear training.

I think I would have to almost give up on my current career path if I were blind, but I'm not sure how much being deaf would really matter, especially since I'd still be able to talk as well as I do now. I don't have a car anyway since I live in a city, so not having a license wouldn't be that bad, and I still could drive in an emergency ... not like you forget how. I imagine the main issue would be having to learn to read lips and sign, which isn't much worse than simply learning a new language anyway.

Heck, even with modern cell phones / texting and all that, if Debra couldn't yell to me if she were in another room she could just text and it would vibrate and all that.

Going down that technology road even more: with all the developments in smart phones and even companies working on building smart phones into eye glasses with voice command, I wouldn't be surprised if within a decade, there would be a simple pair of smart eyeglasses that could take sounds around you and display text (assuming it's language) on the display for you to read ... even translating it into your native language. There could easily be an app for showing deaf people the direction sounds are coming from to alert them to their environment.

So yeah, overall I'd gladly choose losing my hearing over losing my sight if I were posed with such an awful choice.

arildno

I would choose blindness.
Not being able to talk to people, hear what they say??
Going around in complete isolation from warm, rude, courteous and impudent human voices??

THAT is a nightmare..

gravenewworld

Deaf, easily.

QuarkCharmer

Deaf. If you are blind you would lose much of your independence.

mathwonk

rather than what?

Gad

I'd say neither, but I think it's easier to be blind than being deaf, IMO.