Dec 2, 2017 02:04 AM
https://aeon.co/ideas/why-you-need-to-to...n-your-bag
EXCERPT: [...] Missing a whole family of sensations can be disturbing – yet the absence of tactile experiences seems to have more damaging consequences than the absence of other experiences, for instance olfactory ones.
Contrary to the proverbial expression that ‘seeing is believing’, it is touch that secures our epistemic grip on reality. Everyday situations show that touch is the ‘fact-checking’ sense. [...]
A long-standing response in philosophy agrees that touch is more objective than the other senses. For instance, when Samuel Johnson wanted to demonstrate the absurdity of Bishop Berkeley’s idea that material objects do not exist, he kicked his foot against a large stone, and triumphantly asserted: ‘I refute it thus.’ Pointing at the coloured shape was not sufficient, but Johnson assumed that touch would be unquestionable. The resistance of solid objects through touch is meant to provide us with the experience that there are things out there, independent of us and our will.
But is touch really the ‘sense of reality’? Certainly not. It generally gives no better or more immediate access to reality than the other senses. [...] If touch has no general advantage over vision and is just as subject to illusion, why do we put so much faith in it? If touch does not provide us with a more direct or a more objective representation of the world, how can we explain a widespread feeling that it does? An important aspect of touch is often missed...
MORE: https://aeon.co/ideas/why-you-need-to-to...n-your-bag
EXCERPT: [...] Missing a whole family of sensations can be disturbing – yet the absence of tactile experiences seems to have more damaging consequences than the absence of other experiences, for instance olfactory ones.
Contrary to the proverbial expression that ‘seeing is believing’, it is touch that secures our epistemic grip on reality. Everyday situations show that touch is the ‘fact-checking’ sense. [...]
A long-standing response in philosophy agrees that touch is more objective than the other senses. For instance, when Samuel Johnson wanted to demonstrate the absurdity of Bishop Berkeley’s idea that material objects do not exist, he kicked his foot against a large stone, and triumphantly asserted: ‘I refute it thus.’ Pointing at the coloured shape was not sufficient, but Johnson assumed that touch would be unquestionable. The resistance of solid objects through touch is meant to provide us with the experience that there are things out there, independent of us and our will.
But is touch really the ‘sense of reality’? Certainly not. It generally gives no better or more immediate access to reality than the other senses. [...] If touch has no general advantage over vision and is just as subject to illusion, why do we put so much faith in it? If touch does not provide us with a more direct or a more objective representation of the world, how can we explain a widespread feeling that it does? An important aspect of touch is often missed...
MORE: https://aeon.co/ideas/why-you-need-to-to...n-your-bag
