Derivative Images

Sometimes -- not often, actually -- I set my cell phone on vibrate. I keep it in my left front pocket. Now, it seems to me that I feel vibrations at the top of my left leg periodically, even when the phone is not vibrating, even when the phone is not in my pocket at all. I was reminded of this a few days ago when a colleague remarked on a similar experience.

My question is: What's going on here?

Here's one possibility. Primed to feel subtle vibration against that part of my leg, I sometimes misjudge whether there is vibration. Well, maybe! But here are my qualms. On the one hand, if the judgment here is supposed to about the vibration of an external object against my leg, I don't think I'm actually (or at least not usually) making that judgment. Rather, I'm judging that there's a vibrating feeling resembling the feeling when an object vibrates against my leg. But -- and this is the "other hand" -- if the judgment is just about my experience, it seems at least a little strange to say that I'm wrong in that judgment, i.e., wrong that I am experiencing a buzzing feeling of a certain sort -- though maybe!

Here's another possibility: My body is constantly -- or frequently -- abuzz with vibrations, or vibration-feelings, of various sorts, but I rarely notice them. Having the cell phone has attuned me especially to vibrations at the top front of my left leg, so now I notice them there, whereas I didn't before. Quite possibly so! But that's a pretty rich view of experience. It doesn't seem now, as I've been sitting here typing, thinking about buzzing feelings, and even pausing occasionally to reflect on whether anything is buzzing, that my bodily experience is so rich with sensation. On the other hand, it has only been about 20 minutes. If I feel five hundred buzzes a day, and one -- the one I notice -- is in that exact location on my leg (which I'd estimate to be about 1/500 of my body surface), then I should expect a buzz only about... well, doing the math (assuming 16 waking hours), actually about every two minutes! Hm!

Or maybe the buzzing is a new experience, arising somehow from the fact that I have a readiness to feel buzzing in the location, and accurately apprehended as an experience when it occurs. I do now occasionally "buzz" at the top of my leg, as a result of carrying that phone in my pocket, whereas I didn't before. Though this also seems slightly strange, it is perhaps the most appealing possibility -- intellectually appealing I mean! At another level, I'm not sure I like the idea that I've added a buzz to my stream of somatic experience....

Eric Schwitzgebel

http://schwitzsplinters.blogspot.com/2006/12/curious-effect-of-vibrating-phones.html