4 ms·

I would hypothesize it's because smell is "Sparse". I believe we have so many receptors with such specificity that it's less useful to think in terms of "dense"

I would hypothesize it's because smell is "Sparse". I believe we have so many receptors with such specificity that it's less useful to think in terms of "dense" parameters. In comparisson with other senses, for music we can locate a sound in a pitch spectrum since we have many receptors (millions?) with sensitivity across a single dimension (frequency). For color, we have just three receptors, lending perceived elements to be put in a nice three dimensional space. Now with smells, we have so many different and so specific receptors that there's neither a canonical order for the receptors to be put across a dimension (the case with sound) or a dense set within a few dimensions (vision, taste). So we just associate each receptor with the most common source.

JoeAltmaier 11y ago
Nice analysis. I'd also add that smell is a lower-brain function. We react to smells; we recognize smells; we have visceral responses to smells. But our language must label smells by the indirect response we experience. So we call them by other-sense names (sharp; hot) or by source.
- hodwik 11y ago
  Synesthetic metaphors for sensory experiences are the norm, even among sight and sound. Colors are usually described as "loud", "quiet", "cool", "warm", "hot", "soft". This morning I read an album review that described the music as -- “radiant”, "textured", with a "shimmering glow", "a gilded set of songs", "seemingly to soar in a striking display of absolute iridescence". That sort of language just helps us triangulate an aesthetic experience using the language of our other senses, it doesn't mean a sense is any less direct.
  - JoeAltmaier 11y ago
    But smells are almost exclusively described in that way. There is no spectrum; there is no map like touch. That's the whole point of the OP, right?
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
    - hodwik 11y ago
      No, not at all. Smell is the least synesthetically described sense. Generally with smell we call a smell for exactly what produces that smell: "oak-y", "fecal", "flowery", "smokey" and so on. That is profoundly less synesthetic than our descriptors for the other senses, which are almost always described in metaphor -- bright sounds, loud colors. The very idea we have less smell words is nonsense. We just have less abstract smell words. Consider if we used crayola color names to describe the colors, would that mean we had less color words because we're more specific with our language?
- shepardrtc 11y ago
  To add to that, I would say that we can't actually remember smells all that well, if at all. Its a pretty big stretch to remember the smell of hamburger, yet we can all recognize it in an instant. Without the ability to remember something specific, its hard to effectively define it so that others can know exactly what you mean.
  - hodwik 11y ago
    I'd argue that the memory of a smell is as visceral as the memory of a color or sound, which is not very. The difference is that smell is so much more powerful in reality that we see through the memory-representation for what it is, an empty placeholder. When we smell fresh bacon in the morning, that experience can be all-encompassing. The same is not true for the optical experience of the thing. With colors and sounds we are merely less aware of the qualitative emptiness of their mental objects.
  - Frondo 11y ago
    Not sure about others, but when you said that I tried to recall the smell of a hamburger and found it immediately very easy. I'm also hungry, and I can remember all kinds of food smells with ease right now...wonder if that has something to do with it, heh.

JoeAltmaier 11y ago

Nice analysis. I'd also add that smell is a lower-brain function. We react to smells; we recognize smells; we have visceral responses to smells. But our language must label smells by the indirect response we experience. So we call them by other-sense names (sharp; hot) or by source.

hodwik 11y ago
Synesthetic metaphors for sensory experiences are the norm, even among sight and sound. Colors are usually described as "loud", "quiet", "cool", "warm", "hot", "soft". This morning I read an album review that described the music as -- “radiant”, "textured", with a "shimmering glow", "a gilded set of songs", "seemingly to soar in a striking display of absolute iridescence". That sort of language just helps us triangulate an aesthetic experience using the language of our other senses, it doesn't mean a sense is any less direct.
- JoeAltmaier 11y ago
  But smells are almost exclusively described in that way. There is no spectrum; there is no map like touch. That's the whole point of the OP, right?
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - hodwik 11y ago
    No, not at all. Smell is the least synesthetically described sense. Generally with smell we call a smell for exactly what produces that smell: "oak-y", "fecal", "flowery", "smokey" and so on. That is profoundly less synesthetic than our descriptors for the other senses, which are almost always described in metaphor -- bright sounds, loud colors. The very idea we have less smell words is nonsense. We just have less abstract smell words. Consider if we used crayola color names to describe the colors, would that mean we had less color words because we're more specific with our language?
shepardrtc 11y ago
To add to that, I would say that we can't actually remember smells all that well, if at all. Its a pretty big stretch to remember the smell of hamburger, yet we can all recognize it in an instant. Without the ability to remember something specific, its hard to effectively define it so that others can know exactly what you mean.
- hodwik 11y ago
  I'd argue that the memory of a smell is as visceral as the memory of a color or sound, which is not very. The difference is that smell is so much more powerful in reality that we see through the memory-representation for what it is, an empty placeholder. When we smell fresh bacon in the morning, that experience can be all-encompassing. The same is not true for the optical experience of the thing. With colors and sounds we are merely less aware of the qualitative emptiness of their mental objects.
- Frondo 11y ago
  Not sure about others, but when you said that I tried to recall the smell of a hamburger and found it immediately very easy. I'm also hungry, and I can remember all kinds of food smells with ease right now...wonder if that has something to do with it, heh.