The Principles of Psychology, Volume 2 (of 2)James, William
Science
The Principles of Psychology, Volume 2 (of 2)
James, William
Psychology
The interior of one's mouth-cavity feels larger when explored by the
tongue than when looked at. The crater of a newly-extracted tooth, and
the movements of a loose tooth in its socket, feel quite monstrous.
A midge buzzing against the drum of the ear will often seem as big
as a butterfly. The spatial sensibility of the tympanic membrane has
hitherto been very little studied, though the subject will well repay
much trouble. If we approach it by introducing into the outer ear some
small object like the tip of a rolled-up tissue-paper lamplighter, we
are surprised at the large radiating sensation which its presence gives
us, and at the sense of clearness and openness which comes when it is
removed. It is immaterial to inquire whether the far-reaching sensation
here be due to actual irradiation upon distant nerves or not. We are
considering now, not the objective causes of the spatial feeling,
but its subjective varieties, and the experiment shows that the same
object gives more of it to the inner than to the outer cuticle of the
ear. The pressure of the air in the tympanic cavity upon the membrane
gives an astonishingly large sensation. We can increase the pressure
by holding our nostrils and closing our mouth and forcing air through
our Eustachian tubes by an expiratory effort; and we can diminish it
by either inspiring or swallowing under the same conditions of closed
mouth and nose. In either case we get a large round tridimensional
sensation inside of the head, which seems as if it must come from the
affection of an organ much larger than the tympanic membrane, whose
surface hardly exceeds that of one's little-finger-nail.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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