Chapter ID: CBB391179433

Reading through Deafness: Francis Galton and the Strange Science of Psychophysics (2017)

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The second part, “Strange Bodies: Rethinking Physiology,” addresses considerations of the human body and its biological functions. Each of these essays examines how bodies could be made to perform in unusual and spectacular ways through science. Danielle Coriale’s piece examines Francis Galton’s use of psychophysics, the empirical study of the connection between the mind and body by measuring degrees of sensation. Coriale’s work brings to light an overlooked aspect of Galton’s science, one that recontextualizes and complicates his interest in eugenics. As she shows, in the 1890s, Galton’s deafness spurred him to examine how the imagination might supplement stimuli that acted on nerves that otherwise failed to produce sensation; he supported his investigations with examples of auditory imagery taken from nineteenth-century poetry. In addition to examining how scientific thinking can emerge at the intersection of personal and aesthetic experience, Coriale’s work offers an early instance of the body being posited as an entity that could be extended past its material limits. (From Introduction, pages 9-10)

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Book Lara Pauline Karpenko; Shalyn Rae Claggett (2016) Strange Science: Investigating the Limits of Knowledge in the Victorian Age. unapi

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Authors & Contributors
Kvicalova, Anna
Bauchner, Joshua
Paul Dakin
Smith, Elise Juzda
Wegener, Mai
Waller, John C.
Concepts
Eugenics
Psychology
Psychophysics
Deafness
Mind and body
Science and race
Time Periods
19th century
20th century, early
20th century
18th century
Ancient
Places
Great Britain
England
Leipzig (Germany)
Prague (Czechia)
Russia
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