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The Tactual Ground, Immersion, and the “Space Between”
Author(s) -
Mac Cumhaill Clare
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
the southern journal of philosophy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.281
H-Index - 21
eISSN - 2041-6962
pISSN - 0038-4283
DOI - 10.1111/sjp.12212
Subject(s) - space (punctuation) , perception , pace , figure–ground , aesthetics , worry , psychology , communication , epistemology , computer science , cognitive psychology , cognitive science , philosophy , physics , anxiety , astronomy , psychiatry , operating system
I ask whether figure‐ground structure can be realized in touch, and, if so, how. Drawing on the taxonomy of touch sketched in Katz's 1925 The World of Touch , I argue that the form of touch that is relevant to such consideration is a species of immersed touch. I consider whether we can feel the space we are immersed in and, more specifically, the empty space against which the surfaces of objects, as I shall urge, “stand out.” Harnessing M. G. F. Martin's account of bodily awareness and touch, I defend a positive thesis, pace Graham Nerlich on whose The Shape of Space (1994) I otherwise rely, both to defend the supposition that empty space can in principle be felt and to argue that touching empty space is not a mere species of absence perception. Along the way, I defuse a causal worry that might be thought to arise in the case of touching empty space.