Balance uses gravity though, that’s external data. Time is a weird one. Not body clock stuff but just knowing you’ve probably been sat down reading a book for about half an hour without looking at a clock. What’s that all about?JonB wrote:I think you can draw a line between things that you sense when they make contact with your skin/body in general and things that have to make contact with a specific organ to register. Light photons anywhere other than your eye don't do anything, it's a specific sense separate from the others. It's not really a stretch to bundle together the effects of external stimuli on your skin - pressure, pain, heat etc. - and see those as distinct from the other senses.tin_robot wrote:True, I guess. But if detecting the amount of energy within the air that you're in contact with is to be filed as the same thing as detecting the pressure of something you push against - then aren't all senses just touch as well? Detecting photons of light on your retina - is that touching? Detecting chemical compounds on your tongue - surely that's touch too then? Same for the stuff going on in your nose. As for detecting vibrations in the air against a drum - that seems at least as much tangibly touch as detecting temperature change is. So, based on that, all senses are touch.
Also, when you describe sense in this way it suggests a reason why balance and proprioception wouldn't be in the same category. They're internal systems rather than reactions to or ways of interpreting external data.
In my completely made up as I went along opinion.
OK. Perhaps put that differently. Senses are what enable us to understand the physical properties of the external world.monkey wrote:Balance uses gravity though, that’s external data.
JonB wrote:I think you can draw a line between things that you sense when they make contact with your skin/body in general and things that have to make contact with a specific organ to register. Light photons anywhere other than your eye don't do anything, it's a specific sense separate from the others. It's not really a stretch to bundle together the effects of external stimuli on your skin - pressure, pain, heat etc. - and see those as distinct from the other senses. Also, when you describe sense in this way it suggests a reason why balance and proprioception wouldn't be in the same category. They're internal systems rather than reactions to or ways of interpreting external data. In my completely made up as I went along opinion.tin_robot wrote:True, I guess. But if detecting the amount of energy within the air that you're in contact with is to be filed as the same thing as detecting the pressure of something you push against - then aren't all senses just touch as well? Detecting photons of light on your retina - is that touching? Detecting chemical compounds on your tongue - surely that's touch too then? Same for the stuff going on in your nose. As for detecting vibrations in the air against a drum - that seems at least as much tangibly touch as detecting temperature change is. So, based on that, all senses are touch.
tin_robot wrote:even if I'd still argue temperature is a discrete sense in and of itself.
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