Week 3

I am sooooo busy!!!  Argh!  I think week 3 is due today, so I'm going to err on the side of caution and blog...  I seem to be blogging about the class and the stuff we're learning, which I don't know if we must do or if this is just a social activity.  But heck, I'm really enjoying it!

I took a class a long time ago in sensation and perception, so this week's material is stuff I've learned and forgotten, only to learn again now...  I'm not sure I have too much to say!

One thing I do think is nifty is about size constancy.  I remember reading in Colin Turnbull's book The Forest People about an incident when Turbull took one of the tribe members (Mbuti?  I think they're "pygmies") onto open plains.  They spent their entire lives in the dense forest and apparently this guy was overwhelmed and really confused by so much open space.  He couldn't distinguish buffalo in the distance from insects.  I thought of that after reading on p111 about how people who don't live with a lot of right angles aren't as suceptible to the Muller-Lyer illusion...

Something else I like is that on p97 our textbook refers to the "mystery of smell" and says researchers haven't yet figured out exactly how it works.  I already knew that it influences your sense of taste, but I think it's strange that we have such detailed understanding of some other senses and so little is known about this one.

I've also noticed that just like with everything else, not everyone smells the same way.  There are some things I can't smell that my other half does, and vice versa.  Hmmm.

Well, that's all for now.