In defining the impressions of smell great difficulties occur. Even
normal individuals often have a passionate love for odors that are
either indifferent or disgusting to others (rotten apples, wet sponges,
cow-dung, and the odor of a horse-stable, garlic, assafoetida, very ripe
game, etc.). The same individual finds the odor of food beautiful when
hungry, pleasant when full-fed, and unendurable when he has migraine. It
would be necessary to make an accurate description of these differences
and all their accompanying circumstances. With regard to sex, the sense
of smell, according to Lombroso,[185] is twice as fine in men as in
women. This is verified by Lombroso’s pupils Ottolenghi and Sicard,
Roncoroni and Francis Galton. Experience of daily life does not confirm
this, though many smokers among men rarely possess acute sense of smell,
and this raises the percentage considerably in favor of women.
Section 43. (f) The Sense of Touch.
I combine, for the sake of simplicity, the senses of location, pressure,
temperature, etc., under the general expression: sense of touch. The
problem this sense raises is no light one because many witnesses tell of
perceptions made in the dark or when they were otherwise unable to see,
and because much is perceived by means of this sense in assaults,
wounds, and other contacts. In most cases such witnesses have been
unable to regard the touched parts of their bodies, so that we have to
depend upon this touch-sense alone. Full certainty is possible only when
sight and touch have worked together and rectified one another. It has
been shown that the conception of the third dimension can not be
obtained through the sense of sight. At the beginning we owe the
perception of this dimension only to touch and later on to experience
and habit. The truth of this statement is confirmed by the reports of
persons who, born blind, have gained sight. Some were unable to
distinguish by means of mere sight a silver pencil-holder from a large
key. They could only tell them to be different things, and recognized
their nature only after they had felt them. On the other hand, the
deceptive possibilities in touch are seen in the well-known mistakes to
which one is subjected in blind touching. At the same time practice
leads to considerable accuracy in touch and on many occasions the sense
is trusted more than sight--e.g., whenever we test the delicacy of an
object with our finger-tips. The fineness of paper, leather, the
smoothness of a surface, the presence of points, are always tested with
the fingers. So that if a witness assures us that this or that was very
smooth, or that this surface was very raw, we must regularly ask him
whether he had tested the quality by touching it with his fingers, and
we are certain only if he says yes. Whoever has to depend much on the
sense of touch increases its field of perception, as we know from the
delicacy of the sense in blind people. The statements of the blind
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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