The principles of psychology . trast, by which one color modifies anotheralongside of which it is said, is explained by him as anunconscious inference. In Chapter XYII we discussed thecolor-contrast problem ; the principles which ajjplied to itssolution will prove also applicable to part of the presentproblem. In my opinion, Hering has definitively provedthat, when one color is laid beside another, it modifies thesensation of the latter, not by virtue of any mere mentalsuggestion, as Helmholtz would have it, but by actuallyexciting a new nerve- process, to which the modified feelingof color im
The principles of psychology . trast, by which one color modifies anotheralongside of which it is said, is explained by him as anunconscious inference. In Chapter XYII we discussed thecolor-contrast problem ; the principles which ajjplied to itssolution will prove also applicable to part of the presentproblem. In my opinion, Hering has definitively provedthat, when one color is laid beside another, it modifies thesensation of the latter, not by virtue of any mere mentalsuggestion, as Helmholtz would have it, but by actuallyexciting a new nerve- process, to which the modified feelingof color immediately corresponds. The explanation ispLysiological, not psychological. The transformation of * Physiol. Optik, p. 817. THE PERCEPTION OF SPACE. 245 the original color by the inducing color is due to the dis-appearance of the physiological conditions under which thefirst color was produced, and to the induction, under thenew conditions, of a genuine new sensation, with which the* suggestions of experience have naught to Fig. 64. That processes in the visual apparatus propagate them-selves laterally, if one may so express it, is also shown bythe phenomena of contrast ivMch occur after looking uponmotions of various kinds. Here are a few examples. If,over the rail of a moving vessel, we look at the water rush-ing along the side, and then transfer our gaze to the deck, aband of planks will appear to us, moving in the opposite 246 PSYCHOLOGY. direction to that in whicli, a moment previously, we hadbeen seeing the water move, whilst on either side of thisband another band of planks will move as the water at a waterfall, or at the road from out of a car-window in a moving tram, produces the same illusion, whichmay be easily verified in the laboratory by a simple pieceof apparatus. A board with a window five or six incheswide and of any convenient length is supported upright ontwo feet. On the back side of the board, above and belowthe window, are two rollers, one
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, booksubjectpsychology, bookyear1
