On heat considered as the retinal intermediate of light and color sensation / by L. Webster Fox and Geo. M. Gould.

  • Fox, Lawrance Webster, 1853-1931.
Date:
[1886]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On heat considered as the retinal intermediate of light and color sensation / by L. Webster Fox and Geo. M. Gould. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    It is not our purpose to enumerate the criticisms made, or possible to be made, of the Young-Helmholtz and of the Hering theories. That has been done iterum cttque iterum. Of the first mentioned, Wundt pithily says: “Genauer betrachtet sagt jene Hypothese gar nichts Anderes als was schon im Mischungs- gesetze enthalten ist, aber eine Erkberung des letzteren e nth pelt sie nicht; denn warum aus den drei Grundfarben alle Lichtem- pfindungen zusammengesetzt werden koennen,dies wird durch die drei Fasergattungen ebenso wenig begreiflich gemacht wie durch das Newton’sche Dreieck.” 1 A similar judgment is pronounced upon the Hering theory which, though to be preferred of the two, really succeeds in nothing more than in restating the problem in other terms. These theories, although devised by practical color students, and in the full light of the nineteenth century methods of induc- tive science, seem to be entirely of the nature of deductions, su- perposed upon the facts, regardless whether they fit or not—- much like the Hegalian metaphysic. Their vagueness excites suspicion at once. One is often in doubt whether the location of the process is situated in the retina, in the optic nerve or in the brain; the Sehsubstanz is said to extend from the retina to the brain, inclusive of both ends. The theory is made large enough to cover all possibilities of future discovery. The Roman’s ox- hide can be made to cover many acres, if slit into a large enough network. Anatomical and physiological differentiations of func- tion are ignored, and we wander in a maze of glittering gener- alities which seem oblivious of the elementary principles of physics and physiology. But it is easy to be seen that the carefullest and largest minds are beginning to react against such a priori methods of proced- ure, and it is comforting to find that Wundt, the greatest liv- ing physiological psychologist, sets these theories aside and con- tents himself with the somewhat indefinite outlines of a theory ]. This hypothesis when scrutinized more closely contains nothing more than the law of the mixture of colors—no explanation of this law. It as little makes comprehensible why out of the three primary colors, all color- sensations can be produced through the mediation of the three kinds of nerve-fibres, as does the deltoid color-chart of Newton.”