Touch as the Ur-Sense: From Presence to Poesy March 9th, 2024 at 2:30PM Past Event Watch the video » “Now the touch only is common to all animals.” Agrippa The very notion of sentience, with its root in feeling, cannot be understood without some reference to sensation. And sensation itself has at its bare core a “something” we feel. The response to that feeling is the mark of life: “quickening” upon touch is how we distinguish the animate from the inanimate. Touch demands physical contact. That breeze is the invisible dance of molecules on your face. Warmth is the agitation of your own particulate self, while coolness is the dissipation of that same agitation into the surround. While the scientific term mechanical refers to a physical force that contacts and thereby moves things, in the case of organisms, mechanical force incites a sensation on contact with that boundary, the skin. And whereas otherwise we say every action has an equal and opposite reaction, at that interface with the living some neuro-electrochemical reaction occurs. We understand that this new electrochemical medium somehow accounts for our inner feeling and that outer feeling of presence. The movement from sensation to perception is where talk of consciousness begins: where sensations “touch” our inner selves and form an experience we can engage and report on. This is our qualia. Citing Duchamp’s concept of the infra-thin, Marjorie Perloff depicts that interface where sensation arises. The infra-thin partakes both sides of that interface and the interface along with it: this is the space toward which poetry directs us. Participants: Tapomayukh Bhattacharjee Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science, Cornell University Tapomayukh “Tapo” Bhattacharjee is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Cornell University where he directs the EmPRISE Lab (https://emprise.cs.cornell.edu/). He completed his Ph.D. in Robotics from Georgia Institute of Technology and was an NIH Ruth L. Kirschstein NRSA postdoctoral research associate in Computer Science & Engineering at the University of Washington…. read more » Andrea Gadberry Associate Professor, Comparative Literature, New York University Andrea Gadberry is Associate Professor of Comparative Literature at New York University. Her first book, Cartesian Poetics: The Art of Thinking, from the University of Chicago Press, appeared in 2020. She is currently at work on two new book projects: one on early modern rationalism and literary causality and a second, tentatively entitled, Notes on Clapping. Pascal Massie Associate Professor of Philosophy, Miami University Pascal Massie was educated in France (Ecole Normale Supérieure, Agrégation) and completed his PhD at Vanderbilt University. He is currently associate professor at Miami University. His work focuses on Ancient and Medieval philosophy as well as contemporary continental philosophy. He is the author of Contingency, Time and Possibility; an essay on Aristotle and Duns Scotus… read more » Yalda Moayedi Assistant Professor, New York University Dr. Yalda Moayedi is an Assistant Professor at the Pain Research Center in the Department of Molecular Pathobiology at New York University College of Dentistry. Her research focuses on the biology of somatosensory neurons that innervate the oral cavity and upper airway, investigating how information from these neurons guides oral functions such as flavor perception,… read more » Sushma Subramanian Science Writer & Journalist Associate Professor of Journalism, University of Mary Washington View Papers / Presentations » Sushma Subramanian is the author of “How to Feel: The Science and Meaning of Touch,” a book that explores the scientific, physical, emotional, and cultural aspects of touch and that aims to reconnect readers to what is arguably our most important sense. Her other journalistic writings, which focus on scientific research inquiries that affect our day… read more »
Tapomayukh Bhattacharjee Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science, Cornell University Tapomayukh “Tapo” Bhattacharjee is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Cornell University where he directs the EmPRISE Lab (https://emprise.cs.cornell.edu/). He completed his Ph.D. in Robotics from Georgia Institute of Technology and was an NIH Ruth L. Kirschstein NRSA postdoctoral research associate in Computer Science & Engineering at the University of Washington…. read more »
Andrea Gadberry Associate Professor, Comparative Literature, New York University Andrea Gadberry is Associate Professor of Comparative Literature at New York University. Her first book, Cartesian Poetics: The Art of Thinking, from the University of Chicago Press, appeared in 2020. She is currently at work on two new book projects: one on early modern rationalism and literary causality and a second, tentatively entitled, Notes on Clapping.
Pascal Massie Associate Professor of Philosophy, Miami University Pascal Massie was educated in France (Ecole Normale Supérieure, Agrégation) and completed his PhD at Vanderbilt University. He is currently associate professor at Miami University. His work focuses on Ancient and Medieval philosophy as well as contemporary continental philosophy. He is the author of Contingency, Time and Possibility; an essay on Aristotle and Duns Scotus… read more »
Yalda Moayedi Assistant Professor, New York University Dr. Yalda Moayedi is an Assistant Professor at the Pain Research Center in the Department of Molecular Pathobiology at New York University College of Dentistry. Her research focuses on the biology of somatosensory neurons that innervate the oral cavity and upper airway, investigating how information from these neurons guides oral functions such as flavor perception,… read more »
Sushma Subramanian Science Writer & Journalist Associate Professor of Journalism, University of Mary Washington View Papers / Presentations » Sushma Subramanian is the author of “How to Feel: The Science and Meaning of Touch,” a book that explores the scientific, physical, emotional, and cultural aspects of touch and that aims to reconnect readers to what is arguably our most important sense. Her other journalistic writings, which focus on scientific research inquiries that affect our day… read more »