The Principles of Psychology, Volume 2 (of 2)James, William
Science
The Principles of Psychology, Volume 2 (of 2)
James, William
Psychology
But _for the distance between the 'here' and the 'there' to be felt,
the entire intervening space must be itself an object of perception._
The consciousness of this intervening space is the _sine quâ non_ of
the joint-feeling's projection to the farther end of it. When it is
filled by our own bodily tissues (as where the projection only goes as
far as the elbow or finger-tip) we are sensible of its extent alike by
our eye, by our exploring movements, and by the resident sensations
which fill its length. When it reaches beyond the limits of our body,
the resident sensations are lacking, but limbs and hand and eye suffice
to make it known. Let me, for example, locate a feeling of motion
coming from my elbow-joint in the point of my cane a yard beyond my
hand. Either I see this yard as I flourish the cane, and the seen end
of it then absorbs my sensation just as my seen elbow might absorb
it, or I am blind and imagine the cane as an object continuing my
arm, either because I have explored both arm and cane with the other
hand, or because I have pressed them both along my body and leg. If I
project my joint-feeling farther still, it is by a conception rather
than a distinct imagination of the space. I _think_: 'farther,' 'thrice
as far,' etc.; and thus get a symbolic image of a distant path at
which I point.[196] But the 'absorption' of the joint-feeling by the
distant spot, in whatever terms the latter may be apprehended, is
never anything but that coalescence into one 'thing' already spoken
of on page 184, of whatever different sensible objects interest our
attention at once.
2. _Feelings of Muscular Contraction._
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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