Frank, Matt and Laura

Making “sense”

The human body is an integral mechanism that incorporates various devices to aid its transgression through the world around it, and on a basic level kind of like a machine ie it receives input, processes this input and then reacts accordingly. To interact with our 3 dimensional world we use a combination of five senses called the sensoric system. This consists of vision, hearing, touch, taste and smell which work because of various ‘tools’ which we call organs. These all interact with and are dictated by the nervous system and are then consciously and unconsciously processed by our brain in the end.

• On an interesting note upon investigating what the definition of a ‘sense’ was, we discovered what could be deemed a legitimate sixth sense:
Our sense of gravity (balance) provides information to the brain about ones environment i.e. which way is up. It has a sense organ to acquire input being fluid in the ear.


Different parts of the brain are used for processing these different senses but they all work together to give us an ‘image’ of the world around us as we know it.




OUR INTERESTS

The senses we want to investigate are touch, smell, and their link to emotion. We believe that emotion in itself is a sense as it differentiates the way that physical input through our organs is perceived and cannot be omitted from this form of research.

Touch
Touch or haptic perception is an important means of feedback. The apparatus of touch differs from that of sight and hearing as it is not localized. The skin contains three types of sensory receptors: thermoreceptors which respond to heat and cold, noiceptors respond to which intense pressure, heat and pain, and mechanoreceptors which respond to pressure. Only the last one is of interest to us.
There are two kinds of mechanoreceptors, which respond to different types of pressure. Rapidly adapting mechanoreceptors respond to immediate pressureas the skin is indented. They also react more quickly to increased pressure. However, they stop responding if continuous pressure is applied. Slowly adapting mechanoreceptors respond to continuously applied pressure.
Another aspect of haptic perception is kinesthesis: awareness of the position of the body and the limbs. This is an important aspect as it affects both comfort and performance. For a touch typist, for example, awareness of the relative positions of the fingers and feedback from the keyboard are very important.

Emotions
This is an expert from Wikipedia:
One can also be emotionally touched. In this metaphorical sence it refers to some action or object action or object that evokes a sad or joyful emotion. For example, to say "I was touched by you letter" would imply the reader felt joy or sadness when reading it.

Movement
Speed and accuracy of movement are important considerations in the design of interactive systems, primarily in terms of time taken to move to a particular target on a screen. This affects the type of the target being designed. Hence targets should be designed so that they are as large as possible and the distance to be moved as small as possible





Smell
Odorants are volatile chemical compounds that are carried by inhaled air to the Regio olfactoria (olfactory epithelium) located in the roof of the two nasal cavities of the human nose, just below and between the eyes.



The odorant must possess certain molecular properties in order to provide sensory properties. It must have some water solubility, a sufficiently high vapor pressure, low polarity, some ability to dissolve in fat (lipophilicity), and surface activity. And to date, no known odorant possesses a molecular weight greater than 294.1
The olfactory sense is able to distinguish among a practically infinite number of chemical compounds at very low concentrations.2
The olfactory region of each of the two nasal passages in humans is a small area of about 2.5 square centimeters containing in total approximately 50 million primary sensory receptor cells.

In Art

Relating art to touch could be directly expressed by sculpture and also any visual representation as it can also be touched. More importantly art ‘touches’ us in a way that the tangible experience cannot replicate.
Certain films like AI and Bladerunner are instrumental in depicting emotional states that can be theoretically evoked by “machines’… emotions, memories and associated feelings and interestingly the ability to ‘miss’ something, yearn for it.



LETS EXPERIMENT

We spent a LOT of time trying to find a real live synesthete, and once we found one we wasted even more time trying to capture them in our special synethete-catching, highly modified bug nets… but had no luck. Idealy we could poke and probe them and get to the core of this “synesthesia” in a medical sense but we have been forced to come up with other scenarios.

The main thing we discussed and were fascinated by were the differences between a mechanical version of us humans, or more to the point a robot, and our human experience.
In a direct sense, more to the point we were proposing looking at the differences between each specific input organ/device and how it interacted with its environment.
• In the case of touch, it is interesting how if we go to pickup an egg, our fingers receive input about its structure and our brain “Knows” not to apply too much pressure to break its surface.
If a robot was to pick up an egg it would have to be programmed with distinct parameters in order to be able to pick up an egg “successfully”, i.e. not break it.




…but we will experiment with our ideas more…

JULES, LAUREN, BRITTANY

Jules, Lauren, Brittany.
Auditory and imagery
PART ONE:
1. how the senses work Our quick interpretation.
Hearing: How we hear anatomy and how it works.
Infrasound making music with infrasonic sounds.
sound as a weapon

EXPERIMENTS:
The reasoning:
Initial discussions within the group spoke about an interest in exploring the effect of sound, particularly the manipulation of the experience of the user/listener.
A combination of recorded (using video camera, ipod, mobile phone and camera) and freeware mp3 sounds, we set about creating a series of atmospheres.
The atmospheres/sound scapes were compiled using imovie and adobe premiere.


The process:
Group discussions lead to a brainstorming session where we identified key words and emotions.
From here the group slit to record a variety of sounds/imagery.
Jules: Workplace, office, transport, city
Lauren: Mechanical, drone/hum, RMIT
Brittany: Animal/wild life, garden, water.
Once collected the group reformed to compile the sound scapes.
In an open and relaxed environment the sounds were sorted into categories and possible complimentary groupings.
Construction began.

The experiments:
1. Used both visuals and sound. Explores the use of blank voids to create distantly recognisable rhythmic effect.
One word to describe: PATTERN

2.Visual/Sound
Exploration of frequency and dynamics.
One word to describe: AVERSION

3. Visuals/sound
Explores stark, void, emptiness.
One word to describe: BANAL

4. Visuals/ sound
Uses soothing and hypnotic imagery juxtaposed with alternating sounds.

5. No visual, a manipulation of the listener. Re-creating an auditory experience of an existing (recognisable) atmosphere…
One word to describe: MISLEADING

PART THREE:
Association to art.
There are amazing sound artists about.
Peruse the links for experimental sound.
Outer Ear festival of sound 2005
new zealand database
Watermeron child-like playfulness in their execution and style.
The Tom Bosely Experience
Sean Kerr Artist of sound, visual, film and other.
Ian John Time Based art maker

mei, kelly, juliet

Mei, Juliet and I undertook phase 2 with the intention of focusing on three main senses: Sound, touch and sight. To achieve a level of consistency in research and experimentation we decided that our focus would revolve around fire and the sensory effect that is imbued through our own personal interaction and those documented by others. Below are our findings and as you'll see, they we're extremely diverse.

Sound

part 1. How the brain processes sensory data

The brain processes sensory data through the limbic system includes the structures in the human brain also involving emotion, motivation, and emotional association with memory. The limbic system influences the formation of memory by integrating emotional states with stored memories of physical sensations. A human being perceives and recognizes an environment through the use of many sources of sensory information. The integration of sensory information can be complimentary, enhancing the response of one sense in response to another sense, or it can compensate for a deficiency in a sense. Fused sensory information can be more veridical than that provided by a single sensor because individual sensor measurements may be uncertain, erroneous, and incomplete, whereas the fusion of multiple sensors results in a more reliable percept.

Think about it, If vision and touch were absolutely separate systems, then each
would have to posses its own mechanism for determining orientation. This would essentially be
a replication of function. Instead, why not let the two systems share an orientation discriminator, Because vision is dominant and has a well-developed
orientation discriminator, it may be that tactions uses a resource normally devoted to vision.
Based on research findings, it is obvious that the brain is modular, and that these modules worktogether in a cooperative manner.

There are 5 sections of the hearing mechanism:

Outer ear
Middle ear
Inner ear
Acoustic nerve
Brain’s auditory processing centers

The outer ear consists of the pinna and the ear canal also known as the auditory canal. The pinna collects all sounds vibrations around us and funnels the vibration into the ear canal. It allows us to determine the direction and source of the sound. The auditory canal runs from the pinna to the eardrum and is covered with hairs and wax that prevent unwanted things like dust or insects from entering the ear.

The middle ear begins with the eardrum which then leads to three bones, the hammer, anvil, and stirrup. These three bones are called the ossicles. The way they all work is the hammer (malleus) is connected to the ear drum, the anvil (incus) to the hammer and the stirrup (stapes) to the anvil and when sound waves hit the eardrum it moves back and forth therefore casuing the ossicles to move.

The inner ear contains the sensory organs for the hearing and balance. The cochlea is the hearing part of the ear and is shaped like a snail and filled with fluid. Within the cochlea is the organ of corti, this organ holds hair cells which are the nerve receptors for hearing. When the middle ear moves and pushes the cochlea, the force moves the fluid inside the cochlea which in turn stimulates the hair cells and creates impulses.

The acoustic nerve carries the impulses from the cochlea to the mid-brain and the impulses are split unto 2 different pathways, both with which lead to opposite sides of the brain.
The central auditory system then processes the auditory information as it’s carried up to the brain.

The central auditory system then processes the auditory information as it’s carried up to the brain.

Below is a diagram of the ear.






part 2.

I find that because I am mostly interested with fire and what can come from just the pure element of it I look at the senses through a certain point of view. An example would be, to have fire you need to touch something to light it and through lighting it and once it's lit there would be a crackling noise (sound). Once the fire has started then the whole visual side of things come into play.





part 3.

There are many forms of art that is produced by fire. These including flame throwing, juggling sticks of flame, fire photography and even sports that include fire. Though these may seem to be a very abstract form of art, it still is in a way art through fire.

On the culture side of things fire has always been important to society. Without fire there would be no form of warmth other than the layering of clothes. There would be no cooking of food unless it was via the sun itself. Fire is one of the four elements that is culturaly significant to everyone.

Arts and culture:

The following is a compillation of on the various facets of fire, from the scientific to the mythological. Fire is a fascinating substance, concept, sense and symbol.
Religion and Fire
From Moses and the burning bush, to the apostles and their "tongues of fire" through to the Holy Spirit, fire has much spiritual significance in the Bible. Leviticus prescribes the use of candles in the temples and the offering of sacrifices in fire. Elijah goes up to Heaven in a Chariot of fire.
Mythology and Fire
Fire can be found representing the divine in the myths and legends of almost every culture. The Greek myth of Prometheus who stole the fire of the Gods from mount Olympus and brought it to man. The Greeek God of fire Hephaestus a craftman and was often pictured as having a smoky workshop where he worked at his forge. The Roman's adopted him for their god of fire Vulcan.

The Four Elements (focusing on fire)

The Classical Greek philosophers divided the world into four elements; earth, air, fire, and water. In the Chinese tradition there are five elements; earth, air, fire, and water, plus wood (or paper). In the Indian Buddhist tradition, the world is also composed of five elements; earth, air, fire, and water, plus space. Each of these five elements is paired with one of our five senses: fire is associated with sight; water with taste; earth with smell; and air with touch. The last element, empty space or the void, corresponds with sound and hearing.

part 4.

In this section I was just looking at the sounds of different things and if the experiment ended up looking great too then that was a plus.

http://www.putfile.com/wimei

experiment 1: lighting a match
http://media.putfile.com/lighting-a-match-89
the sound is as you'd expect it to be and the smell is something that i can't quite place.


experiment 2: lighting a match and then a box of matches
http://media.putfile.com/box-of-matches
the sound as expected is definitely more powerful once the whole box of matches is lit. the sight of it all is quite sudden - the matches catching fire all at the same time.


experiment 3: 'bic' lighter
http://media.putfile.com/Bic-lighter
a very short and 'clicky' sound.


experiment 4: zippo
http://media.putfile.com/zippo-85
when hearing it in real life it sounds great because of the high pitch of the metal sliding against each other as it opens and closes but when captured on video it unfortunately loses that sound.


experiment 5: blow torch
http://media.putfile.com/blow-torch
this was done via deoderant and a 'bic' lighter. the sounds were strong, similar to a strong wind blowing in your ear. it looked great and a lot of heat was produced from it.


experiment 6: burning paper

the sound that was produced from this was similar to the crackling of a wood fire however the sound quickly disappeared because the paper just wasn't dense enough to sustain it. there were enormous amounts of smoke that were produced by the burning of this paper along with an odd smell (the paper had a gloss covering).


experiment 7: burning paper via blow torch
http://media.putfile.com/blow-torching-paper
the sounds produced in this experiment was just a combination of both experiment 5 and 6.


note: while looking on the net I found a great sight for sound

http://www.soundrangers.com/sound-categories.cfm?cat_template=sound

-Mei

Touch

Interesting links between the senses

Until fairly recently, scientists believed that the information gathered by each of the senses touch, sight, hearing, smell and taste was processed in separate areas of the brain. Research is now revealing, however, that there is a complex interaction between the senses in the brain, an interaction that enables us to understand the world in a unified way.have recently completed studies that help explain how the brain combines sight and smell to amplify our perception of various odors. Although it’s believed that humans can recognize up to 10,000 different odors, we still have a poor sense of smell compared to other animals. To assist our sense of smell, we often rely on additional information from our visual system.
Earlier experiments have shown that when people are asked to smell an odorized liquid that has been tinted with an appropriate color red for strawberry, for example, their perception of the intensity and pleasantness of the smell is greater than if the liquid is inappropriately tinted green for strawberry or not tinted at all.

A world of the blind
A family friend of mine is blind and has been since birth. A blind friend like charlotte altered my view and made me appreciate the small things we take for granted like smelling canvas, or touching sand, tasting water. She is happy to have so vivid a visual imagination. Hers is essentially an artistic imagination, which can be impressionistic, romantic.There is increasing evidence from neuroscience for the extraordinarily rich interconnectedness and interactions of the sensory areas of the brain, and the difficulty, therefore, of saying that anything is purely visual or purely auditory, or purely anything. The world of the blind, of the blinded, it seems, can be especially rich in in-between states the intersensory, the metamodal states for which we have no common language.

Test for touch
spanish word for fire- Fuego- pink fur
expieriment- sat infront of fire excited all other sensory simuli eg lights. shutoff all sensory links eg sight and sound and just felt the fire.
soft,
mezmerizing,
excepting, arc,
africa,
suction,
glove,
white doves
rhythm, waves of heat

-Juliet

Sight

Sound seems to be well known for deriving colour or visual stimulus. Heat from the fire may also evoke colours or sounds. The presence of fire for a synaesthesia, I assume, would be an extremely overwhelming experience. There are so many aspects to focus on without having the ability to intertwine senses..

Fire is perceived to be red in colour. On international signage, red indicated the prohibitation of movement, the possibility of danger and a warning to use extreme caution. Universally similar opinions and emotions are evoked by the colour red. American’s believe that red is considered a loud colour, promises excitement; it is a powerful symbol of vibrancy and life, but also of danger and death. In the Kabalah, red refers to love, sacrifice and sin. Scarlet is fire. In china, along with being the colour symbol for fire, red means summer, the south, good luck, joy, good fortune and fertility and in most Indian mythology red is the colour of the sun.

This may be true for the majority of the population without synaesthesia however for the other portion it is possible that “…red may cause a sensation analogous to that caused by a flame, because red is colour of flame. A warm red will prove exciting, another shade of red will cause pain or disgust through association with running blood. In these cases colour awakens a corresponding physical sensation, which undoubtedly works upon the soul.”

"Synaesthesia is a re-mapping of sensory data. Signals comingthough one sense organ get re-routed in the brain and are receivedas if coming through a different sense organ. Inside the brain allsensory data are essentially the same—neural, electrical impulses.The materials of the sense data are the same, but depending on thesense organ that receives the original signal, the data are processeddifferently."

"Sometimes these signals get crossed. Sound, for example mightenter the ear, but once in the brain the sensory data travels downthe visual pathways and color is seen. [Livingstone 2002] Withother routings one might taste a whisper or smell a tickle. If neuraldata takes a detour then experience, while synchronized with theexternal source event, is mapped and perceived atypically (but notnecessarily uninterestingly). Some people are born with these detoursbuilt into their neural roadways. Most of us do not experiencethis at all. Some of us try to simulate it. We make art."

“The hall carpet glowed orange from under the living-room door…The fire burnt furiously, piled high with logs. Danny had dragged the log basket on to the hearth rug and was kneeling beside it, a log in each hand, watching the fire burn…” -extract from Border Crossing, Pat Barker.

Painting 1977, oil on canvas, by Peter Booth

“Dark red skies, the colour of congealed blood, haunt the evenings, and caustic smoke sears each lungful of air. The sound of roaring flames is as persistent as life itself as the earth is torn open and the shadowy, almost deformed, figures of miners labour through the darkness, their eyes glowing red-rimmed from coal-blackened faces."

“Peter Booth grew up amongst the industrial wasteland of Sheffield in England. He is a visionary artist obsessed with superstition, transformation and light."

On Fire: Photographs by Larry Schwarm

“Fire has a connection to our collective unconscious. It is good and evil, soothing and terrifying, protective and threatening, a force for destruction and rebirth. Elijah was taken to heaven in a chariot of fire; Saint Anthony is sometimes depicted with his feet in flames from stamping out the devil. Fire heats our houses but can destroy our homes. And grass, too, in its many forms is fundamental to our being on this planet. Fire and grass, how could I not be drawn to them?”

“The photographer engages our attention first by heightening our amazement at the sensuality of fire. Most of us have enjoyed looking into a fireplace, but few of us have observed as well as he has the astonishing shapes and colors and fluidity of fire. He is so skilled in recording its appearance that occasionally we almost hear the burning and feel the warmth.”

-Kelly

Austin Hall, Nirmal Menon & Damien Cunningham

1: How does the brain receive auditory data?

The brain interprets auditory information by deciphering the data from the ears and sending it through a complex network of pathways to the brainstem and thalamus. Information extracted by these structures is used to determine the identity and location of the sound source. The information is then filtered again through the auditory cortex where intricate links are made to the prefrontal cortex, which attaches meaning to the auditory information.

2: what are the interesting links between the senses you chose to investigate

An interesting link between Hearing and the other senses we chose, Taste and Smell are the relation to one or another form an auditory stimulus. Often simply the sound of something will remind us of a certain smell that we have experienced. Particularly with the consumption of food which is rich in information for all senses, we can link experiences of one exact sense to another sensation albeit perceived, the memories associate dominant factors of an experience to create link to another sensation.

3: What can be drawn from the arts and culture where this set of senses is investigated / called upon.

We use sound to communicate information, whether it be a grunt to convey anger from prehistoric man over a piece of meat or the sound information used for data transfer in the modern context, our hearing is a vital sense used to receive information, we have evolved with this sense to ultimately make better choices in our lives. In a modern framework we use sound and our sense of it for many varied reasons, it is an important part of our social construct whereby it is called upon for creative expression and experiences i.e. music whilst simultaneously enabling us to communicate information in new ways.

4: A series of experiments which explore the potential of these senses in particular their combination

Exp 1; Created environment composed of Auditory, Olfactory and Gustatory information aimed at exploring perception of the senses.

The observer, blindfolded, experiences the common sound of bitting into and apple whilst having a piece of lime placed under their nose. The observer is asked to consume a pulp prepared from a common fruit, the prepared pulp changes the common association of the shape and taste of the fruit.

Exp 2; Created environment composed of Auditory, Olfactory and Gustatory information aimed at exploring perception of a common sensation.

Whilst playing classical music, often associated with quality and refinement, and inexpensive bathroom air freshener should fill the air which is often interpreted as low quality. The observers expectation of a fine chocolate could change with a contrasting or confusing combination of senses.

Exp 3; Created sonic environment aimed at exploring common associations of sound to meaning of objects and colours.

Three monotones to be played, Low frequency, Mid frequency and High frequency. The observer whilst blindfolded is asked to associate the three tones with three shapes, a square, a circle and a triangle, the shapes are also coloured a white square, a green circle and a black triangle. An outcome of relating low frequencies to fuller shapes, relating mid frequency tones to rounded objects and relating higher frequencies to sharp objects is expected. Remove the blindfold and ask the observer to associate the sounds again, with a visual element now added.

Exp 4; Created environment composed of Auditory and Olfactory sensation.

The observer listens to the sound of thunder and rain, is this associated with the olfactory sensation of freshness in the air created after a thunderstorm.


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Smell

The sense of smell is called Olfaction, it is the detection of chemicals dissolved in air., psychological factors can play a part in its perception as well.
Smells come from volatile (easy to evaporate) chemical molecules, making their way to your nose. This is why some solids like steel has no smell, nothing evaporates from it, it is non-volatile. At the top of the nasal passage behind the nose rest a group of hair like protrusions called cilia. Molecules that bind onto cilia trigger neurons to make u perceive smell.
Odors molecules send messages to the limbic system which governs emotional responses. Hence smell can alter moods, evoke memories, raise and dampen spirits and self confidence.
Odors can affect sleep, stress, alertness, interactions and feelings of well being, hence aromatherapy is often used to change ones state of mind.

Pheromones are odors that are used for communication, usually between bees or animals in heat. In general, pheromones don’t seem to influence humans on a similar scale.

Current technology is in the works to mimic the human nose and analyze smell, it is used largely in the perfume industry. There are still problems in getting this to work as well as the industry would like them to. Police forces also want to use this technology for bomb detection.

Smell, taste and trigeminal receptors work together to give us the sensation of flavour. The tongue can distinguish 4 distinct tastes, the nose then adds more information to it giving carious foods different flavours. Hence food has little to no taste when the nose is blocked.

Smell disorders;
Anosmia: Lack of ability to smell
Hyposmia: Decreased ability to smell
Phantosmia: hallucinated smells
Dysosmia: things smell differently that they should

Anosmia/ Hyposmia can be temporary or permanent also it is possible that one can be anosmic towards one specific odor. While there are usually no significant problems associated with this, it could mean there is a cancerous growth near the receptors. Loosing the sense can bring feelings of depression. In some cases this leads to a loss of libido and can reach impotency.

Phantosmia: Smelling things that aren’t really present, usually unpleasant such asrotting flesh, vomit and so on. This often happens because of damage to the tissues that process smells. It can be caused by viral infections, trauma, surgery, epilepsy and toxins or drugs. Its believed to have psychiatric roots.
Culture:
Perfumes/cologne
Wine
The qualities of these products are judged on their smell, obviously more so in cologne and perfumes than in wine. In wine the aroma helps classify the style of wine.

Herbs and spices
Fine dining
Kitchens, smells of cooking is expected in some restaurants but shunned in others. It makes or breaks the experience. For example do you really want the overpowering smell of blood in the air at a steak house and would having food at an Indian restaurant be the same without the obvious smell of spices in the air.

Arts:
In 2004 Haque Design and Research made a 3D scent display called Scents of space. The installation had scent dispersers which were computer controlled with the airflow manipulated by fans and diffusion screens.

Scent of apples, Eve by Uriy Kakichev



Associations:

Smell of fresh air; sounds of rain
Smell of mangos, tastes of mangos
Smell of smog, feels like heat
Smell of lemons, look yellow

Experiments:

Linking smell and sound

Exp 1:
Playing a recording of a sound while introducing a smell and asking people to figure out what is going on. i.e. the smell of roses and the sound of people talking suggests a garden party, crackling sound with the smell of bacon suggests breakfast. Then mixing up the two stimuli, smell of grass with the sound of a restaurant and seeing how people perceive it.

Exp 2:
Associations to stimuli on their own could be another experiment. Playing a piece of music and asking people what they link it to. Giving them a scent and asking what memories they have associated with it.


Exp 3:
Select a panel of people, split them in 3, play the same track to all of them with different smells for each group pumped into the room. Talk about the songs later and see if the reactions to the songs vary over the groups.

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Taste

Sweet, sour, bitter, and salty; these are the four basic tastes. Everybody has a taste and smell they like or dislike. Our sense of taste and smell can warn us about the foods we eat. Is it too hot or too cold? Has the milk become sour? Our sense of smell can warn us about danger, too. If you smell gas or smoke, it could lead to fire. There are many types of smells. The brain puts together messages from the taste buds and nasal cavity, allowing us to make out many flavours. Our sense of taste and smell can be affected by many things. If your nose is stuffed up because of a cold or allergy, you often cannot smell anything properly. You probably cannot taste the flavour of your food. Injury to the nose from a fall or sport accident can affect your sense of smell. If the nerves that carry messages from the nose to the brain are damaged, the sense of smell will be much less, and in some cases may be destroyed completely. Smoking cigarettes can also damage the lining of the nasal cavity. It cannot respond to chemicals from the cigarette, so the sense of smell is reduced. As people get older their receptor cells are replaced less often, so their sense of taste and smell gradually become less acute. This partly explains why babies and young children often prefer plain foods and why spicy foods taste much stranger to them than adults.


Taste as a metaphor

Metaphorically, taste is described as having a small amount of experience with something that give a sense of its quality as a whole. Livy is quoted to have said “they had not yet tasted the sweetness of freedom” while Voltaire is quoted to having said “I tasted in her arms the delights of paradise”. The word is often used as a noun in this sense, typically in such expressions as “I got a taste of it” or “It left a bad taste in my mouth.”

ExperimentThere is a direct link between smell and taste. Without smell, things seem tasteless. This experiment aims to prove this. By eliminating the sense of smell, are you still able to know what you’re eating by taste? A participant will wear a blindfold. Their nose pegged, blocking their smell. They will be given an onion to bite…Similar to the above experiment, the participant’s nose will be plugged. They will be presented with 3 pieces of candy all different colours; red, yellow, and green. However, all these pieces of candy are the exact same flavour. Can they tell the difference without their sense of smell?The participant will be given certain smells and asked what they taste like…

Jimmy, Jacqueline and Eddy

Files of experiments.

Part 1.
Sound:
It works in a similar manner as to how microphones detect sound. The vibrations of sound are detected in the ear, changed to electrical signals and transmitted by the nerves to the brain where it is processed and recorded. Into more detail, the sound waves vibrate the ear drum which is inside the ear. The waves is then process through a fluid inside a narrow tube called the 'cochlea', which then vibrates tiny hairs that vibrates into messages that are sent to the brain for processing.


Smell:
Smell is the sense that tells you about scents, odours, and fumes in the air around you. Something smells when particles of it float in the air that you breathe. When you breathe in, air goes through your nostrils and the tiny nerve endings in your nostrils will detect smells then send signals to the brain that help you to recognize the smell. On their way through the brain, smell signals pass through an area that is responsible for memories and feelings. This may be the reason that smells bring back memories, and affect the way we feel.

Here are some case studies on experimenting on people who has synesthesia
Another example is a female who has synesthesia, as she takes part of a process acupuncture she can see color whilst the needle is penetrating through her skin. This is what she sees:
To hear her process http://media.putfile.com/female-with-synesthesia

Part 2.
Both hearing and smelling are dominant features of the human senses. The link between sound and smell is quite interesting. As you hear a particular sound it can remind us a particular event or a sense of smell. Vice versa, smelling an odor could also memorise an event or a piece of music. In relation to synesthesia combining sound and smell, or any other senses together its called "mixed signals". I.e smell --> sound / sound --> smell, smelling sounds. By combining these senses together, it is interesting to suggest that it could possibly increase the perception of sound or smell, or even both.
As you can see the table of possibilities of synesthesia

Smell
Sex differences:
On standard tests of smelling ability (incl. odour detection, discrimination and identification) women consistently score significantly higher than men. Other tests have shown both men and women are able to recognise their own children or spouses by scent. In one well-known experiment, women and men were able to distinguish T-shirts worn by their marriage partners, from among dozens of others, by scent alone.
Mood effects:
Our olfactory receptors are directly connected to the limbic system of the brain, which is an area that is responsible for emotion. Smells can evoke strong emotional reactions and in surveys on reactions to odours, it shows that many of our olfactory likes and dislikes are based purely on emotional associations.
Although olfactory sensitivity generally declines with age, pleasant fragrances have been found to have positive effects on mood in all age groups.

Perception effects:
The positive emotional effects of pleasant fragrance can also affect our perceptions of other people. In experiments, a pleasant fragrance tends to give higher “attractiveness rating” to people in photographs. E.g. If a person clearly outstandingly beautiful, or extremely ugly, fragrance does not affect our judgment. However, if the person is just ‘average’, a pleasant fragrance will tip the balance of our evaluation in his or her favour.
In one study, the presence of an unpleasant odour led subjects not only to give lower ratings to photographed individuals, but also to judge paintings as less professional.

Vanilla:
Scent-preferences are often a highly personal matter. There are some fragrances which appear to be universally perceived as ‘pleasant’- such as ‘vanilla’, and increasingly popular ingredient in perfumes. It has long been a standard ‘pleasant odour’ in psychological experiments. Various attempts have been made to explain the popularity of vanilla fragrances. Many have tended to focus on the pleasant childhood memories associated with the smell of vanilla, its comforting milky warmth. Vanilla scent has been also said to be novelists and poets favourite device to evoke vivid memories. Vanilla is associated not only with warmth, softness and caring, but also has connotations of purity and simplicity. The term ‘plain vanilla’ used by typesetters and graphic designer, it means ‘untouched’ text – text in its natural, basic and original state. This term is now often used outside the publishing world, and anything that is simple, pure, honest and unadulterated may be referred to as ‘plain vanilla’.

Part 3.
Sound
Art:
Composition IV, 1911, Wassily Kandinsky

Kandinsky appreaciation for both music and art, simply to express the inner feelings of the human soul. Famous quote: "Color is the power which directly influences the soul. Color is the key board, the eyes are the hammers, the soul is the piano with the strings. The artist is the hand which plays, touching one key to another, to cause vibrations in the soul"

Smell
Culture:
Western cultures:
Smell is probably the most undervalued of the senses in modern Western cultures, and is reflected in our language. All of the other senses have positive, complimentary associations in everyday language. We may speak of a person as ‘visionary’, ‘keen-eyed’, ‘having a good ear’, ‘a good listener’. We praise ‘a light touch’ and ‘good taste’ etc…the word ‘smell’ needs to use carefully because it has a negative meaning unless we specify it with an adjective. When we simply state that something or someone ‘smells’, we have specify whether they ‘smell good’ or ‘smell nice’.

Other cultures:
In many non-Western cultures, smell has long been established as the emperor of the senses.
On the Andaman Island, the universe and everything in it is defined by smell. Their calendar is constructed on the basis of the odours of the flowers which come into bloom at different times of the years. Each season is named after a particular odour. Their personal identity is also defined by smell. When greeting someone, the Ongee do not ask “How are you?”, but instead, they ask “How is your nose?”
For the Dogon people of Mali, odour and sound are believed to be intrinsically related because both travel through air.
Amazonian desana, the sense of smell is highly valued, and odour is considered to be the essence of personal identity and mixing of odours is often carefully regulated. Marriage is only allowed between persons of different odours. All members of a tribal group a believed to share a similar odour, so spouses must be chosen from other tribal group.
The dangers of odour-mixing are even more extreme for another Malay Peninsula people, the Temiar. The Temiar believe that each person has an odour-soul, located in the lower back. If you pas too closely behind a person, the odour-soul is disturbed and mingles with your body, causing disease. This must be prevented by calling out ‘odour odour’ whenever you approach a person from behind.

Part 4.
On the way to meet Eddy

Jimmy:
On the train from Dandenong to Melbourne Central (1hour travel) listening to my Ipod shuffle on my right ear, and the left ear piece is on Jacqueline's ear; at the same time my left ear is listening to the sounds inside the train as well outside the train.

Sound:
This is what i could hear while listening to the Ipod at the same time.
- People's conversation, however it's quite hard to understand to hear what they're saying, eventhough the volume of the
Ipod is quite low.
- As the train stops to the next station, I can hear the brakes screeching. As it's starts to move, I can hear the power
starting up, as if the turbines or engine powering up.
- Air movement from outside. Cars, trees, traffic.
- The wheels from the train grinding onto the tracks (metal on metal)
- Alarm going off as the door is shutting.

Smell:
- I can smell old female's perfume.
- Rain smell.
- Mint, due to the time Jacquleine offered me extra chewing gum.

Feel:
At that time, I felt abit uncomfortable as if I was clostraphobic and a heating sensation where I couldn't breathe. This was because, I believe, it was crowded. However, listening to my Ipod shuffle calmed things down and hyped up to my favourite song, "2pac keep ya head up". The awsome lyrics and background music works very well to calm me down. Overall, I want to focus more into a combination of sound and emotions, the feelings that are portrayed as you listen to music or sound.
Crowded, limited space. I felt that being in this space is clostraphobic, and being sucked in, in tight little spaces. However in some point you do feela sense of safety, which is a possitive thing because there is so many people with you.

Jacquleine:
On the train listening to Jimmy's music.

Sound:
- Train doors, beeping closing.
- People talking. Some are eating.
- People closing their umberlla.
- Mobile's ringing.

Smell:
During this time, I have a block nose and can't smell anything. But i can feel air coming through my nose.

Feel:
The floors are wet and it's raining. The train is packed, basically feeling dirty, messy because people are walking onto the train with wet hair and clothes. Most people holding their umberalla and listeing to their Ipods or MP3's. Feeling messy, and beeping sound of the train door is annoying.Jacqueline and Jimmy listening to Ipod in one ear, at the same time listening to the surrondings.

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