In some cases we automatically start responding to that input before the awareness reaches our consciousness.
Very pithy summary of the limitations, indeed, I find!
So lovely to pick up your reply (finally). I was detained by my own research into our senses so as to have a paralell thoughtline to yours and discover better where exactly your logic misses mine. Needless to say (I hope) your examination of how technology enhances our sense impressions is a great way in to appreciating the benefits of technology, while also outlining the limitation found in the primary need for such enhancements in the first place, often very time and location specific (the - let's say - traditional Papua New Guinean does not think of getting a hearing aid, or pocket camera - he has no pocket...).
Still, it remains troubling to think which brains are behind the programmes the are designed to make us function better; to what aim as well (a better participation in society? A greater sense of personal welfare?); and therein I find the greater limitations. Say, for example, a programmer is totally unaware of the sense of I? Or sense of thought (conceptual sense)? Or if the spirit constitution of the other or the inner sun, or being of the other is not catered for? Will we lose our finer sensory perception to logic? A hearing aid, e.g. is practical regards messages that need to be conveyed, but won't help you appreciate sweet little nothings in your ear any better, or connect you to the birds on a windy plain any better.
Are we perhaps, ironically, tragically, losing our humanity by focussing too hopefully on the enhancement of our five predominant (and therfore catered to) senses? Have we maybe forgotten collectively that our sensory sytem is a twelve-fold one, needing to be worked on in different stages of our life, in different intensities, hard to schedule or find applications for?
I really enjoyed your piece!
To share with you where I come from, see below: these are the 12 senses as described by R.Steiner (pencil seems to add in Swedenborg's notions).
I fully agree with your thoughts and concerns. You point out that there are many more dimensions to the area of “senses” than I ventured into, some that I hadn’t considered at all, and each worthy of their own deep discourse. There are physical (mechanical, electrical, chemical), societal, and philosophical aspects that all have implications, some trivial and some profound, for man and machine alike. I think one could make it a life’s work and still there would be aspects left unexplored for lack of time or resources!
Thank you for bringing up the list of senses beyond the five classic ones that I addressed, although a couple I might put into a different category assuming a ‘sense’ is a fundamental interface to one’s environment (for lack of a better description). Ego, language and conceptual, for example, to me seem more like computational (again, probably not the best word here) results than stimulus based entities. I’m ‘thinking out loud’ (or free writing as some would call it) here, so no doubt there are better ways of expressing these ideas! I hope it makes sense to you :) As you may have gathered, I do enjoy these explorations into areas not often considered!
It makes perfect sense, how you would categorise those "obscure" senses differently (there is a vein in psychology which I think has "discovered 39 different senses!! Clearly thinking along programming lines, detailing neurological responses,... I presume for now).
But the thing with spiritual science (which I research) is that it DOES see these 12 senses as direct and separate and critical INTERFACES for the integration of spiritual and physical realities...With trainingrounds rooted in actual life experience, independent from neurological feedback (or you'ld be dealing with loops). But I've given up on the more technical arguments for this, seeing that there is also a necessity to by-pass computational logic to even be aware of such a spiritual reality. Proving it exists is a Catch 22 in this case (very frustrating, but there is always art to try next!)
Look forward to more exciting explorations with you!