Re: pitch

["Charles S. Watson" <watson@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Al and Bill and list,

The methathetic/prothetic way of thinking about the problem is fine, so
long as you accept the inner view of conscious experience as a scientific
datum (or accept verbalizations about consciousness as equaivalent to
measurements of it).  What led me to the SC/RP distinction, in terms of
operations of measurement, was an interest in seeing how much of the
distinction between sensations and perceptions (in the lingua of
consciousness) could be preserved, while staying with the behavior of "the
other one" (as Max Meyer aptly put it).  I think that the two classes,
measures of Sensory Capabilities (ie, of sensitivity, resolving power, and
channel capacity) together with those of Response Proclivities (ie, of
tendancies to assign specific verbal labels, or to respond in specific
nonverbal ways to specific stimuli) pretty well covers the territory of
sense-based behavior...without having to resort to introspection.  I guess
I am an unrecontructed positivist...  but I'm certainly willing to learn
what the SC-RP system leaves out...that can be studied with the methods of
science.

Chuck

On Fri, 28 Aug 1998, Al Bregman wrote:

> On Thu, 27 Aug 1998 HARTMANN@PA.MSU.EDU wrote:
>
> > The discussion to date has not distinguished between prothetic and
> > metathetic quantities. Prothetic is associated with amount;  metathetic
> > is a point on a scale. Loudness is prothetic, we say, "More loudness."
> > Pitch is metathetic, we say, "Higher pitch." We don't say, "More pitch."
> >
> > Therefore, it is not appropriate to compare pitch (metathetic) with the
> > mass of animals (prothetic).
>
>
> Dear Bill (and list),
>
> Your provocative statement got me to dig out my old philosopher's cap from
> University of Toronto days, shake off the dust, and put it on.
>
> My understanding is that "prothetic" and "nomothetic" refer to dimensions
> of experience, not to dimensions of the physical world. A dimension of
> experience, such as pitch, can be either prothetic or metathetic
> (metathetic, in the case of pitch).  The mass of an animal is physical, so
> it can't be either prothetic or metathetic.
>
> It occurred to me that if we're not allowed to link quantitative physical
> variables such as wavelength or repetition rate with metathetic variables
> of experience, such as color or pitch, psychophysics (i.e., Psycho <--
> physics) becomes impossible.
>
> The argument about the big animal/low sound consists actually of two
> statements, one physical and one psychophysical, neither of which link a
> metathetic to a prothetic assertion.
>
> 1.  Physical:  The size of an animal is correlated with the frequencies it
>                produces. (maps physical to physical)
>
> 2.  Psychophysical: Frequencies that are "low" (LOW1) in a physical sense
>                give rise to pitch that is "low" (LOW2) in an experiential
>                sense. (maps psychological to physical)
>
> We use the same English word "low" for LOW1 and LOW2.  This leads to some
> confusion.  "LOW2 varies with LOW1" is an empirically determined,
> psychophysical statement.
>
> Sorry to be so pedantic but it's your fault, Bill, for switching me into
> philosophy mode.
>
> Whenever I wear my philosopher's cap, I develop a compulsion to try to get
> folks to distinguish between physical and psychological terms, so that
> clear psycho-physical statements can be made.
>
> This issue also comes up in talking about timbre.  The waveform generated
> by an instrument has no timbre (if one reserves the word "timbre" for
> describing experience) but can be described by a number of physical
> variables. I think of timbre as a dimension of the experience of "sound"
> (SOUND2) that results from the physical "sound" (SOUND1).  It would be
> helpful if we had a different word for SOUND1 and SOUND2, but we don't. If
> we did, the old philosophical question, "Does a tree falling in the woods
> make a sound if there is no one to hear it?", would never have been
> thought to be a puzzle.
>
> Best,
>
> Al
>
> McGill is running a new version of LISTSERV (1.8c on Windows NT).
> Information is available on the WEB at http://www.mcgill.ca/cc/listserv
>

McGill is running a new version of LISTSERV (1.8c on Windows NT). 
Information is available on the WEB at http://www.mcgill.ca/cc/listserv