Crosswired Senses Analysis

The human brain is capable of perceiving and interpreting information or stimuli received through the sense organs (i.e., eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and skin) (Weiten, 1998). This ability to perceive and interpret stimulus allows the human being to make meaningful sense of the world and environment around them. However, even as the human being is able to perceive and interpret stimuli information through all sense organs, stimuli is most often or primarily interpreted using the visual (eyes) and auditory (ears) sense organs (Anderson, 2009). However, for the purpose of this paper, the visual information process will be examined.

For example, a person may hear a sound but experience it as colour, i.e. they will “hear” the colour red.

He presents Mary, a scientist who focusses on colour processing in the brain, whilst having never left a black and white room, or experienced colour. Jackson’s argument rests on the premise that upon seeing colour she will learn something new, and given that she knew everything there was to know about the physical world, there must be epiphenomenal qualia which physicalism fails to explain.

The next time someone says, “I feel your pain”, they might be speaking in literal terms. But, suppose you ask a co-worker what day it is and they reply, “Yellow”. People such as these likely have synesthesia, a condition where they taste sounds, see words in color and/or feel other people’s feelings.

Synesthesia is when any two or more senses of the human body or perceptual pathways are linked. When one sense is activated so is another. So when you are eating, you may feel as if you are tasting a color instead, or when you see a color you may think of a shape. It affects 1 out of 2,000 peopled believed to be genetic, it is demonstrated more commonly in females and individuals who are left handed. Synesthesia is not diagnosed as a disease, those affected usually have average intelligence and no greater risk of mental disorders.

Explain the visual process, including the stimulus input, the structure of the eye, and the transduction of light energy.

The term sensation is used when referencing the process of sensing the environment through taste, touch, sound, smell, and sight (Goldstein, 2014). Moreover, it is the process that occurs once the sensory receptor experiences stimulation, which in turn produces nerve impulses that are sent to the brain to be processed in its raw form, then perception comes into play (Goldstein, 2014). Perception is used to describe the way people interpret these sensations and tries to make sense of everything around them on a daily basis. Perception is the occurrences of the brain

“There’s no place like home.” That is exactly what Diane Ackerman wants you to remember about her essay, The Round Walls of Home. Through many arguments, tones, and rhetorical strategies Diane Ackerman’s essay is about how our five senses can help us remember different events that have happened in our past. Historical Context and Author Information This essay is out of Diane Ackerman’s book A Natural History of the Senses written in 1990.

There are six senses in total and these are known as languages of the mind, or ‘modalities’. These are Sight, hearing, feeling, smell and taste, although the last two can be put into the ‘feeling’ category. We use all of our senses in a particular situation but all of us will have a favourite which we are more comfortable with and are likely to fall back on in times of crisis. (Chrysalis pg. 4)

28. Synesthesia is a literary term used to describe a word using senses. For example, some people describe art to be “loud” or “quite” .

Imagine walking past a garden with an assortment of flowers. Now close your eyes and take in each distinguishing familiar smell. As you take a whiff you smell the differences between the roses, lilies, and even tulips. We can tell the sound of a drum from that of a gong; the touch of cool, smooth marble as we run our fingers over it distinctively feeling the difference from that of sandpaper. Our everyday lives are continuous experiences of sensations. These sensations have characteristic qualitative features, which are called “phenomenal”, “phenomenological” or “sensory” qualities. In philosophical terms these sensations can be referred to as qualia, which are defined as properties of experiences that type them in phenomenological respects .

Sense perception is a way to gain information by using our sense: touch, feel, taste, see, hear, and smell, it is a way of knowing. When it comes to ways of knowing, like sense perception, it is questionable whether or not it affects us in a positive or negative way. It can be argued if it is leading us in the wrong direction. If you see it, do you believe it?

While these different sensations and perceptions are different many of them do go together, this is called intermodal perception. This type of perception is the integration of two or more senses at one time. An example of this would be infant’s reaction to sound. When an infant hears a noise they turn their head and look in the general direction of the sound. Typically this integration of different perceptions is seen the most after the first six months of