[lit-ideas] Odor Ratae ("The Smell of a Rat") (Was: The object of the five senses
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 22 Oct 2007 19:46:25 EDT
The Philosophy of Odours -- re J. O. Urmson, "The Object of the Five
Senses", PBA.
I was recently browsing through Tyndale's incorporations to the English
Language. One reminded me of Geary's Sunday polemic:
>still you can smell
>and it doesn't smell half so bad as having no smell at all.
The use of 'odour' is in the New Testament:
"a substance that emits a sweet smell or perfume."
1526 Bible (Tyndale) Luke i. 9
His lott was to bren odoures [R.V. incense].
I was also, on the same subject, was recently reading LUCRETIUS, de rerum
natura:
"We smell the various odours of things and yet we never see them approaching
our nostrils"
("tum porro various rerum sentimus odores/ nec tamen ad naris nenientis
cernimus umquam", Loeb).
He then considers, since there _are_ odourless things, that there _must_ be
colourless things:
"Some bodies we know are without smell, hence we can conceive bodies without
colour"
"Postremo quoniam non omnia corpora mittere concedis odorem, propterea fit
ut omnibus adtribus colore".
At some points, it seems that Lucretius's philosophy is informed by a very
limited account of the science --. In those days, for example, there were no
freezers, and thus Lucretius could not conceive of a liquid turning into a
solid.:
"Sold bodies can make soft things, but not soft bodies hard things".
"soliddissima materiai copora cum constant possit, mollia quae fiunt".
"It is possible to give an explenation of how all those things which are
soft become soft. But contrariwise if the first beginning of things were soft,
no explantion will be possible to say of what hard things can be produced"
("non poterit ratio reddi").
At other points, his weakness seems to derive from the impossibility of
conceiving anything like an air-conditioner:
"Limited is the path from fiery heat onwards to cold frost, and it is
measured backwards in the same way for all the heat and cold and middle warmth
lies
between these extremes filling up the sum in succession."
("extima enim calor ac frigus mediique tepores interutrasque iacent
explentes ordine summam").
Cheers,
JL
************************************** See what's new at http://www.aol.com
Other related posts:
- » [lit-ideas] Odor Ratae ("The Smell of a Rat") (Was: The object of the five senses
