The Worcester spy. [volume] (Worcester, Mass.) 1898-1904, 1899-07-20
sENsATIoN-PERcEPTIoN.
Rapid Survey of These Two Subjects b,
Or. LindIey.

DR.. Lindley spoke on Sensation and
perception" and said in part: 1 shall
give only a rapid survey of sensation
or perception. 1t is perhaps true that
the adult mind never has a pure per
ception. 1t is continually filed with
side associations so that pure concep-
ton cannot exist alone. Sensation
comes to advancing minds, as signs If
other sensations.
1t is necessary in certain professions
to get back the purest sensation, The
school of the impressionist in art is a
good example of this. Sensations be-
come so fused that it becomes almost
impossible to analyze them. At first we
have synthetic perception, says Helm
holtz, but with experience there are
lines of cleavage run through these sen.
sations and we begin to perceive an
alytically.
There are many of the dermal senses;
pressure, heat and cold the sensat.ol
of tickle, which stands all out of FRO
portion to it's stimulus. Then there is
| pain There is much bitter discussion
as to what pain is. Three theories have
been offered. First, that pain is the
| excessive stimulation of sensations,
some have said. One other theory is
that pain is a special sense and has its
own mechanism. The third theory is
that pain is bound up with the sympa-
thetic nervous system, and one does not
| feel pain as soon as he feels the touch.
There should be a separate distinc-
| ton of active sense, some think. There
| is a group of sensation that is called
muscle sense, but muscle sensation is
made up of many other kinds of SEN
sation. There is sinew sensation as
well as muscle sensation, and they
have been mistaken for each other.
Then there was what was called the
ennervation sense. When we lift a
| weight, there seems to be a sense of
the amount of energy we use. Recent
observation has shown that this en-
nervation sensation does not exist, and
that the feeling of effort we have is
| due to flooding back to the brain of
| the muscle sensation.
| Vision is the intellectual sense par
excellence. 1t was once thought there
was no difference between color sensa-
| ton and brightness sensation; but we
know that color-blind people have sem
sibility to light and darkness, but not
to color. Another evidence is that we
are all color blind on part of the sur
face of the retina.
| All the elements of the eye were
once only sensitive to gray, but being
constantly exposed to colors, the sense
of color developed. From 100000 to $4,000
color sensations have been computed.
The rainbow colors are hardly ever
seen in nature. There is reason to be-
| lieve that, psychologically the colors
of the spectrum are arranged in a cir
/ Gle, with purple between the violet and
red. The pure color is called hue, a
mixture of colors is tint. and a pure
color with white or black is a shade.
| In the auditory sensations there are
about IL 900 tones that can be discrim-
mated. One may represent tones by a
spiral, each turn one octave higher
| than the next. After tones are noises.
In many tones there are noises, and in
all noises there are tones. The most
primitive of ear sensation is that of
| giddlness and the idea of forward
movement. These sensations of rotation
have been found to be dominated by
the three semi-circular canals in the
ear. Evolutionary biology is beginning
to show that these were the first ear
organs formed, and gave to the animal
the sense of direction.
1t seems that men have not this sem
sation developed as animals Birds have
finer sense of direction than other
animals The sensation of forward
movement, as when we go up in an
elevator or are on train, is caused by
the labyrinth of the ear, which acts
as a sort Of spirit level. Taste and
smell are generally felt together. The
line between the two is very narrow.
Good cooks appeal to people by knowing
how to make foods have pleasant odors.
Sensations vary greatly in intensity.
The stimulus must increase much more
rapidly than the sensation In order that
the sensation may develop evenly.
AS to perception, the sensations come
together and are perceived either as a
whole or analytically There are prob
ably three stages in the history of per-
ception. In the first place, there must
be the entire object; next, a single
quality may call them up, and then.
they are symbolic. There are three
causes Of perception-qualit space and
| time.
J There are a great many things watch