Pain and pleasure . ort to justify ambitious hopes for the future. No psychosis (mental activity) without neurosis(nervous activity) has been the slogan, and thesupposition has been that finding the particularneurosis for every particular psychosis is only amatter of time and more detailed progress. It must be admitted, however, that pain andpleasure are not to be numbered among the con-spicuous conquests of physiological psychology upto date. Indeed it may be said that it is even yetsomething of a moot point whether pain impulsesever reach the brain proper, or whether they stopjust short of t
Pain and pleasure . ort to justify ambitious hopes for the future. No psychosis (mental activity) without neurosis(nervous activity) has been the slogan, and thesupposition has been that finding the particularneurosis for every particular psychosis is only amatter of time and more detailed progress. It must be admitted, however, that pain andpleasure are not to be numbered among the con-spicuous conquests of physiological psychology upto date. Indeed it may be said that it is even yetsomething of a moot point whether pain impulsesever reach the brain proper, or whether they stopjust short of the cerebral hemispheres. The de-tails regarding the distribution of pain nerves arelikewise far from being satisfactorily made out,although much careful work has been done alongthis line. ,The best evidence as to the brain-center forpain and pleasure, points to the so-called opticthalamus as being most directly concerned. If,for simplicitys sake, we picture the brain asformed of a top, middle and lower story, we may. i$yfi Fig. 8.— Showing schematically the ascending and descending tractsbetween cord and cortex. Impulses of pain transmitted from theskin to the spinal cord by way of C or D, ascend the sensorycolumns in the cord, and crossing over to G arrive at the thalamus,H. The cerebral hemispheres lie above. (From Pillsburys Fundamentals of Psychology, Courtesy the Macmillan Co.) IOO PAIN AND PLEASURE 101 think of the thalamus as an important part of themiddle story. Above it lie the cerebral hemis-pheres which, as is well known, subserve all ofthe special sensations but pain, and all of theimagery and association of ideas which go to makeup our perception, memory, imagination andthought. In short, this upper story may be saidto be the seat of sheer intellect and of deliberatecontrol. But it is a feelingless part of the to it is not marked by any change inthe painful or pleasant aspects of things. Theexpression cold intellectuality seems appro-priate to a
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