“Thought-Forms, a strange, beguiling, frequently pretentious, utterly original book first published in 1901, emerged from this ferment of late-Victorian mysticism. It was written by Annie Besant and Charles Leadbeater, erstwhile members of the London Theosophical Society alongside Yeats, and it features a stunning sequence of images that illustrate the book’s central argument: emotions, sounds, ideas and events manifest as visual auras.” — Benjamin Breen, Victorian Occultism and the Art of Synesthesia Contents Selected Reads Sensory Entrancement Sensory Resources Chuckles + […]
Music duo Polychrome multi-tracked vocals in ‘Synesthesia’, a literacy specialist shares her sensory-friendly reading log, and hypnotic laser engraving
“Unlike most reading logs, there are no requirements on the type of book to read. Readers don’t have to keep track of time or write down the book title. The only requirement? To read — anything! There is a list of interesting and fun reading opportunities, and kids check them off as they are completed. For instance, kids can read a comic book or a newspaper article, read in the bathtub or listen to an audiobook, read to a family […]
David Verdesi’s journey to discover sensory superhumans becomes a Coppola film, dyspraxia diagnoses stories, and perpetual sensory flight, fight, or freeze takes a toll
“It can result in leading oneself deeper in to a neurotic retreat and isolation in to those “oh-so-distracting pleasurable safe feelings” which one comes to cherish, finding solace in a perceived to be real yet still illusory sensation and feeling of “energy ” which is then equated with being spiritual or feeling good, without realizing that the momentary high leads nowhere concretely in term of actual mental and emotional growth, not to mention nowhere in term of genuine development. It […]
Dinosaurs apparently smelled flowers, nature sounds become a multi-million dollar industry, and a perspective shift in what students value in writers
“McKamey argues that the most important skill for a teacher is his or her ability to build trust with a student, which develops when students can sense that the educator is willing to hear their ideas, thoughts, and musings despite their challenges with grammar, low grades, or test scores in previous classes. This doesn’t mean that teachers need to cushion their feedback with fake praise, but it does mean, she thinks, that schools should help teachers develop skills to recognize […]
A bitter account of living with misophonia, sensory scientists develop a taste test that can measure sensitivity in preschoolers, and different brain areas have been identified as critical in temporal processing
“Misophonia is a troublesome disorder. My sensory issues go far beyond the grasp of sights and sounds. I feel it every time I touch water that is too hot or cold. I feel it when velvet touches my skin and makes me cringe. If I step out into the hot summer heat after my blissfully air-conditioned atmosphere I can feel the hold on my body. All of my senses are subject to sensory overload and under-load. If I do too much I feel my body pull out from under me. My back crumbles under the pressure.”
Florence Welch shares poetry in her book Useless Magic, a mind-bending sensory reading list from Tom Parks, and humans can detect quantum photons
“Welch’s mother is a professor of Renaissance studies at King’s College London who worried about her daughter skipping university to focus on her musical career, lamenting “what a waste of a brain!” Both the lyrics and the poetry in Useless Magic validate Welch’s choice, offering a chance to appreciate on the bare stage of the blank page the fineness of her words. And like fellow poet-musician Nick Cave (thanked for “inspiration and encouragement” here), Welch has found a way for the song and the voice of the rabbit-hearted girl to coexist. As she says herself: “you can have everything.”
Spoken word poet Saul Williams gathers to the ancient, formal ASMR research studies begin, and Koko the signing gorilla dies at 46
“According to Williams, however, the recent attention given to spoken word as a distinct genre within the arts is more a return to something that has deep and rich roots in our society: “The resurgence of poetry is cyclical and perpetual. It’s always engaged a new generation of youth who have brought it back to the forefront of culture and put new terms on it, whether it’s beat poetry, bebop poetry, slam poetry – there’s always been these resurgences. But it’s ancient.”
Music can lift layers of confusion, dancers’ brains react more quickly to it than professional musicians, and empaths process it differently
“Turns out that ASMR is pretty special. According to a recently published study in The Journal of Prevention of Alzheimer’s Disease (catchy name!), the part of your brain responsible for ASMR doesn’t get lost to Alzheimer’s. Alzheimer’s tends to put people into layers of confusion, and the study confirms that music can sometimes actually lift people out of the Alzheimer’s haze and bring them back to (at least a semblance of) normality… if only for a short while. ASMR is powerful stuff!”
Artist duo Semiconductor makes the invisible visible, Justyna Kopania stops time in her textured paintings, and photographer Dylan Hausthor tells a story questioning manic visual memory
“You have expressed an interest in capturing ‘the quick passage of time.’ How do you evoke this concept in your paintings?
Time…Man is looking at time constantly. He looks at the clock, he lives from hour to hour. It scares me. That’s why I try to capture time in my paintings. Stop time, a snippet of a second. I’m painting fast, I’m racing against time. A surreal challenge.
The concept of time irritates me. Man was born and has only a certain amount of time. That is life, unfortunately. This is reality. I have a big imagination. Sometimes I think it’s too big. I sometimes stop the time in my imagination. And I feel totally free, like I was the ocean. And this feeling I paint on the canvas.”
Doritos flavoring fools your senses into thinking they’re nutritious, rhythm perception may help stuttering, and cake icing videos to rest your mind
“We think we experience the aroma of food when we smell it, but it’s actually a bit more complex than that. When you bite into the food, the aroma goes into the back of your throat and through a small hole up into your nose. This is called retronasal olfaction, and is actually a more powerful form of smelling than normal smelling. This is what allows you to experience the richness and nuance of food.
Brain scans reveal the experience of flavor takes up more gray matter than any other sensory experience. Additionally, the largest portion of the human genome involves the creation of your nose. So, from an evolutionary perspective, this chemical-sensing ability appears to be particularly important.”
Hearing silent images is the most common synesthesia, UCLA transferred snail memories, and I hear “Yanny”
“Up to one in five people may show signs of a synesthesia-like phenomenon in which they ‘hear’ silent flashes or movement, according to a new study from City, University of London.
While the effect is barely known to science, the researchers found that this ‘visually-evoked auditory response’ (vEAR) is far more common than other types of synesthesia – such when certain sounds elicit a specific colour – with flashing lights and motion evoking vivid sounds.
The survival of this association may also explain other links between sound and vision, such as why we like to listen to music synchronised with flashing lights or dance.
…While other typical synesthesias are estimated to have an overall prevalence of 4.4 per cent, the vEAR effect has recently gained some prominence on social media following the rise of ‘noisy GIFs’, and in particular the ‘thudding pylon’ GIF which received thousands of retweets.”
Neuroscientist creates a sensory vest, Prometheus rises again in Westworld S2, and the precision factor in poetry and math
“Stanford neuroscientist David Eagleman invented the Versatile Extra-Sensory Transducer (VEST), a wearable tactile display that translates myriad kinds of information, from speech to sounds to digital data, into patterns of vibrations on the skin. The device was inspired by Eagleman’s study of synesthesia, the fascinating neurological phenomenon whereby stimulation of one sense involuntarily triggers another sensory pathway.”
Illustrating environmental interaction, floral foam is the new slime, and a dog’s nose is 100,000 times more sensitive than a human’s
“The people in my illustrations are almost caricatures that presume and hint at deeper stories,” says Nathan. “I write a little so I naturally seek narratives even in non-sequential images.” The characters in Noise Complaint for example, span the human demographic, with a couple fighting next to their young child, boys playing loudly in a rock-band, two women doing DIY and someone putting out a fire — the characters are thoroughly human, relatable and despite Nathan’s high level of illustrative detail, leave space for the viewers own storytelling and interpretation.”
Experiments may prove the Source Field of intelligent consciousness, Julia shares her ASD personality on Sesame Street, and the tranquility of sensory deprivation floating
“Within the field of quantum mechanics, physicists, too, have opened their eyes to the possibilities of a conscious, vibratory field that permeates the Universe. In his best-selling book, The Source Field Investigations, author David Wilcock proposes the question, “could all space, time, energy, matter, biological life, and consciousness in the Universe be the product of a source field?” He references a number of curious experiments conducted by scientists over the last century which add credence to his theory, and by the end of the book it is difficult to refute the existence of what he names the ‘Source Field’.”
Reading helps with anxiety, 50 fourth grade level book recommendations from teachers, and dyslexia makes great designers
SENSORY NEWS REPORT Sylvester, C. (1922) Journeys Through Bookland : a New and Original Plan for Reading Applied to the World’s Best Literature for Children, p.226 [photograph]. Retrieved from The Commons on Flickr (Public Domain) , https://flic.kr/p/oeRmRM. #thursdaymorning #sensoryreaders #sensorynews #multisensory #stimtoys Contents Selected Reads + Buzz Book + Stim Tool Halcyon Entrancement Chuckles Sources
Genetics affect synaesthetes, odor plays a role in social cue perception, and museums are becoming sensory-friendly
SENSORY NEWS REPORT Selected Reads + Buzz Book + Stim Tool Halcyon Entrancement Chuckles Sources From Twitter: [latest posts] #thursdaymorning #sensoryreaders #sensory #multisensory #stimtoys #news #sensorynewsreport