The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1914-05-07
our Dull I. SENSES 5
Wonders Al! Around Us They Are
Unable to Discern. .
We LIVE IN A HIDDEN WORLD.

WE LIVE lN "A 0IUDEN vsOnlDs
There Are Colors Our yes Cannot
See and Music and Other Sounds to
Which Our Ears Are Deaf, While
Our Sense Of Feeling Is Very Crude.
If only we had keener senses what.
wonders Of nature would be revealed
to us-wonders that we touch and
know not every day Of our lives! They
are all around us, these hidden marvels,
but imperceptible to us because of our
human limitations
Of course every one knows by now
that everything we hear or see comes !
in a wave motion. But it is not so |
we'll known that there are great |
many waves that we cannot detect at !
all by means Of any of our senses and
presumably great many more that
we have never been able to detect even
artifcially.
Take ether waves, for instance. We
know that those of a certain length are
heat waves. They can be felt, but not
SEEN Shorter ones are light waves,
from the long red to the short violet.
Even shorter ones are what are known
as the ultraviolet, and these have to be
detected artidcially, by the taking of a
picture in the dark. Even shorter ones
are the x rays, which are invisible.
Much longer ones than the longest heat
wave are the electric waves of wire
less telegraphy. Now, remember that
all the waves specified differ in only
one particular-that of length.
We cannot conceive Of there being
only waves of these wave lengths tax
ing place in the ether There must be
waves of nearly all lengths, from the
trillionth Of an inch to many miles.
| We know that other media may have
waves of various lengths going through
them at the same time. The question
! is how to detect these other waves and
| what effect they have in nature.
| If our bodies had better sense organs
or more in number it is astonishing to
think of what new sensations we
should have. If the eye, for instance,
| could perceive a shorter wave length
than the color violet and longer one
than the color red we should have nu-
merous and beautiful colors added to
the list If we could detect still longer
ones than the infra-red each one of us
| would be receiving wireless station
and could get all the messages sent out
without other apparatus than our eyes.
It would simply be flash of light of
| hifhortn 11n1-nO1Nn oO(Or Qnnn9rinO
and disappearing in the sky. We could
see it, however, even if it appeared be-
hind us, as the electric wave goes
| through bodies. So convenient added
vision would be ours. If we could ac-
tually see the x rays we should need
no platino-barium-c cyanide screen to
look through to see the bones in our
hands under the ray, as we do at pres
ent.
If the ear was more delicate and our
| brains more sensitive we could per-
ceive the thousand and one wave
lengths made in the air around us, of
which we now are unconscious. The
rapid vibration Of an insects wing
would probably furnish us with even
more eery music than the mosquito S
song. The wind as it blows across a
wide meadow would give us basso
unheard at present. The soft falling
of snow would make the softest and
most beautiful music to our senses. 1t
would be like a whisper in it's lowness
but would be rather high pitched like
a Japanese tinkle mile away. The
falling of the rain would be louder and
even more high pitched.
Our very electric lights, run by an
alternating current and consequently
getting DINNER and brighter a hun
dred times a second, would cause sound
waves Of low pitch and low amplitude
in the air, but would give a known
musical note.
If our sense Of touch was more deli
cate we could feel the roughnesses
along the surface of the smoothest mir
ror, for it has them. We should be
able to detect small particles in the
air that now brush US by unconscious
ly. The breeze on our cheek woul(
. feel like so many tiny balls Of paper
Il rushing and rafting by. The body
would feel every thread of the texture
10 Of the garments covering it. Some O.
- these things, of course. would not b.
., pleasant until we got used to them.
II It is the idea Of some philosopher
that all actual heaven would be an in
crease in our perceptions and senses t
an enormous power, for then we SHOULD
certainly live in a different world, on
/ far surprising in knowledge and pleas
ure and power the one we live in-an
] yet it would be actually the sam
| world, the difference being simply il
our power to cognize it.-A. L. Hodge
- in Chicago Record-Herald.