What's the difference between sense and sensation ?

[Roger Clough]

The dictionary makes little or no differentiation between sense and sensation,
but there is a difference to psychology. Senses come from the body,
sensations are what the mind makes of the the sensual input. Psychology has this to say:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sensation_%28psychology%29

" In psychology, sensation and perception are stages of processing of the senses in human and animal systems,
such as vision, auditory, vestibular, and pain senses. These topics are considered part of psychology, and not anatomy or physiology,
because processes in the brain so greatly affect the perception of a stimulus. Included in this topic is the study of illusions such as
motion aftereffect, color constancy, auditory illusions, and depth perception.

Sensation is the function of the low-level biochemical and neurological events that begin with the impinging of a
stimulus upon the receptor cells of a sensory organ. It is the detection of the elementary properties of a stimulus.[1]

Perception is the mental process or state that is reflected in statements like "I see a uniformly blue wall",
representing awareness or understanding of the real-world cause of the sensory input. The goal of sensation [I think they meant to say "sense"] is
detection, the goal of perception is to create useful information of the surroundings.[2]

In other words, sensations are the first stages in the functioning of senses to represent stimuli from the
environment, and perception is a higher brain function about interpreting events and objects in the world.[3] Stimuli from the environment is transformed into neural signals which are then interpreted by the brain
through a process called transduction. Transduction can be likened to a bridge connecting sensation to perception.

Gestalt theorists believe that with the two together a person experiences a personal reality that is greater than the parts. "



Roger Clough, rcl...@verizon.net
10/20/2012
"Forever is a long time, especially near the end." -Woody Allen

[Craig Weinberg]

I say the Gestalt theorists have it right, and go further. It is not greater than the sum of it's parts, it is less disconnected than the un-division of its parts. I call this trans-rational algebra or apocatastatic gestalts. The rejoining of broken parts by eliding their presumed granular, sub-personal differences. I think that transduction is figurative. Like the steering column turns the axle, not be transmitting a ghostly apparition of angular momentum on one plane to another but as a confluence of circumstance. The action taking place has multiple equivalents on multiple levels or ontological castes, from the micro to the macro, personal to impersonal, under-signifying to super-signifying.

Craig