We derive the knowledge of all the objects in the external world by our sense of sight and touch. Both the senses of sight and touch aid each other and also receive assistance from the muscle memory. H.P. Bowditch, a professor of Physiology at Harvard Medical School wrote a research paper completely dedicated to the idea of sight and touch. The research paper is titled ‘A Comparison of Sight and Touch’.
H.P. Bowditch writes in his research paper that,
“For all distances, however, greater than the near point of vision and less than the length of an arm, the two senses of sight and touch are in constant use determining the size and nature of surrounding objects. The question is, which sense affords us the most accurate information?”
Comparing the two senses of sight and touch, H.P. Bowditch mentions that,
“Seventy-five centimeters may be taken as the distance within which objects may be easily reached by the hand, and ten centimeters as the near point of vision. Using the above-mentioned minimum visual angle of 1’, we find that this angle is subtended at a distance of 10cm and 7cm by lines of 0.03mm and 0.2mm respectively. That is to say, two points, 0.03mm apart at a distance of 10cm from the eye, are seen to distinct and separate, and the same is true of points 0.2mm apart at 75cm from the eye.”
A series of experiments and tests conducted by H.P. Bowditch for his research paper revealed the results that the power of a blind person to determine the position of objects by the sense of touch is much greater than that of sight.
It is also based around the idea that we live in a simultaneous universe and sensory events with their constituent elements possess a natural tendency to overlap. Even in our brain, sensory networks are interconnected in complex layers and together all the networks work effortlessly to generate a single experience.
Susan Kovalik and Karen Olsen have identified 19 human senses which combine and work together to produce a single perception. Our senses are not disconnected from one another and they work hand in hand to create a unified experience.
We are accustomed to saying that we see with our eyes and touch with our hands but, we see with the help of specialized cells in our occipital lobe which is located in the posterior region of the brain. This is the reason why people who are blind and do not possess the ability to see can read, walk, and even recognize objects and people without using the retinal-cortical pathway. People who possess a sense of sight and the ability to see can produce visual images in the brain through the sense of touch. In this process, we use our minds to visualize rather than our eyes.
New research studies also reveal that the region of the cerebral cortex that is activated when we look at pictures or specific objects is also activated when we touch the same objects. All this scientific data proves that there is some kind of connection between touch and sight.
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