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A Physical Theory of Sensation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2022

James T. Culbertson
James T. Culbertson*
Affiliation:
Yale University, New Haven, Conn.
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Extract

Up to the present time the science of physics has given us no purely physical theory by which the characteristic formal properties of sensation can be derived. No explanation of the sense world purely in terms of the postulated physical world has been forthcoming, so that the psychologist has had either to ignore sensations or consider them as at least partially unaccountable additions to the entities of physics.

That there is, nevertheless, a purely physical explanation of the sense world we hope the following pages will make clear. We will present a theory in which the characteristic properties of sensation are derived from postulated physical entities.

Type
Technical Scientific Section
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 9 , Issue 2 , April 1942 , pp. 197 - 226
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1942

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Footnotes

∗

This article is an adaptation of a dissertation presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Yale University in candidacy for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, 1940, written under a Sterling Fellowship in Philosphy at Yale.

References

1 The following are some of the theorems holding in any reference frame.—Any C.T. contains an infinite number of C.T.s. If two C.T.s, X and Y each contain any C.T., Z, then X together with Y constitute a single C.T. If any two unlimited C.T.s pass through any point-event, P, then they have different velocities at P; and if they have the same velocity at any time, t, then they are at different point-events at t. (From 7.) Any C.T. is contained in only one unlimited C.T.

2 For instance, if we let ∊1 be 3 miles and ∊2 be 4 miles per hour, and if, in the reference frame we have chosen, the distance s between X and F at t is 1 mile and they are approaching, or receding from, each other at, say, 2 miles per hour (i.e. v = 2 miles per hour) then M equals 1/16. Any other units of distance and time give the same result.

3 Definition: An unlimited linear pen is any linear pen such that for any two times, t and t', it extends through both t and t’ and is not contained in any other linear pen extending through both t and t'.

4 Examples illustrating the above definition are given in Part Three (see the nine examples).

5 In certain degenerate systems, however, (3) may be lacking or even (2) and (3). We shall see examples of this.

6 AB is the class of all relata each of which is in both A and B.

ĀB “ “ “ “ “ “ “ “ “ “ “ B but not in A.

AB “ “ “ “ “ “ “ “ “ “ “ A “ “ “B.

7 I.e. each series contains N numbers, where N is some positive integer.

8 For any two classes in K there is an index, so that if there are m classes in K then there are indices.

9 Let S be the set of series assigned to K and S’ be any other set satisfying (1). Then the sum of the indices in S’ does not exceed the sum of the indices in S.

10 An “immediate subclass” of any class A is any class not identical to A and contained in itself and A but not in any other subclass of A.

11 The cardinal number of any class is defined as the class of all classes similar to it. (See Russell's Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy, chapter 2.)

12 Certain of these last distributions give the greatest uniformity for any given value of n.

13 In a statistical analysis it would only be necessary to say that it is very improbable that two C.T.s constituted of this light become physically tangent before reaching the nervous system.