Hearing Soundless Voices

Reports of hearing soundless voices are perplexing and yet not uncommon in psychiatric contexts. In this paper, I try first to understand why we talk about experiential modalities at all, and in the way that we do, and then apply this to these reports. This sheds light on what the experience might be like and why it is reported in the way that it is. I end by suggesting how this might help us to understand the differences between the phenomena that are reported as soundless voices and those that are reported as inserted thoughts.