blindness

Etymology

From Middle English blyndnes, blyndnesse, from Old English blindnes (“blindness”), equivalent to blind + -ness.

noun

1. The condition of being blind; unable to see.
2. (figurative) Want of intellectual or moral discernment; mental darkness; ignorance, heedlessness.
   A tormenting hunger shuddered through her and she wished she could put aside the power. Oh, to be as others were — blind in that safest of all blindnesses, living only the hypnoidal half-life into which birth-shock precipitated most humans. 1976, Frank Herbert, Children of Dune
3. (obsolete) concealment