Touch Without Touching

Fulkerson, Matthew

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Touch Without Touching

Matthew Fulkerson

February 2012, Volume 12, No. 5, pp. 1-15

Permalink: http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.3521354.0012.005

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Abstract

In this paper, I argue that in touch, as in vision and audition, we can and often do perceive objects and properties even when we are not in direct or even apparent bodily contact with them. Unlike those senses, however, touch experiences require a special kind of mutually interactive connection between our sensory surfaces and the objects of our experience. I call this constraint the Connection Principle. This view has implications for the proper understanding of touch, and perceptual reference generally. In particular, spelling out the implications of this principle yields a rich and compelling picture of the spatial character of touch.

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It might seem obvious, then, that to experience an object through touch requires that we come into direct bodily contact with it. Despite the intuitive appeal of such a view, the claim is implausible. The main argument of this is paper will be that, like the teleosenses of vision and audition, touch often represents objects that are far removed from the surface of the body. Even though distal touch experiences require that something make contact with our sensory surfaces, it does not follow that the objects of our tactual experiences — those objects or properties to which our tactual experiences refer — themselves need to be in direct contact with our bodies.

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