Let's quantify phenomenology!

Pneumenon

Okay, so what I'm about to say is partially a re-statement of Husserl and Merleau-Ponty. But I'm saying it for a reason.

I'm just trying to find out if there's anything in the phenomenological literature about my third point.

1. A phenomenological space is all possible variations of an experiential quality, e.g. color, duration, size, and so on.
2. Two phenomenological spaces are orthogonal iff variations in one do not affect the other, e.g. shape is orthogonal to color because we can change a blue sphere into a red one without changing its shape, or change a sphere into a cube without changing its color.
3. If a phenomenon cannot have two qualities at the same time and in the same place, then those two qualities occupy one space (this is why different colors, besides being "qualitatively distinct", nevertheless occupy one phenomenological space; they're mutually exclusive at-point).

Now, I'm aware that the idea of different phenomenal fields or axes of differentiation or whatever are mentioned in Husserl/MP. Husserl talks about manifolds of appearance, Merleau-Ponty talks about dimensions/fields of variation; I know this isn’t a brand-new thought.

My question is: is there anything answering to my point 3?

More precisely:

- Has anyone explicitly used mutual exclusivity at a point as a criterion for when two qualities belong to the same phenomenal space?
- I.e. something like: “red and green are two positions in one and the same space because they cannot co-occur at the same place and time without introducing variation in some orthogonal dimension (e.g. temporal succession, spatial division, etc.)”?

I’m not asking about color spaces in perceptual psychology or analytic “quality space” talk in general (Shoemaker, etc.) so much as whether phenomenologists have made this move: using co-instantiation constraints (“cannot be F and G here-now”) to carve up phenomenal spaces.

If you know of:

- passages in Husserl or Merleau-Ponty that come close to this,
- later phenomenological work that does something like this explicitly,
- or even cross-over work that connects Husserl/MP with quality-space models in this way,

I’d really appreciate references (specific texts/sections if possible).

↪Pneumenon

I can't help, but I hope you get some answers. It's an interesting point you're inquiring into.

While we're waiting, here's another question: Can you think of an aural example that would be the equivalent of colors and shapes in regard to "mutual exclusivity at a point"? Trying to home in on whether this is a phenomenology of vision alone.

Patterner

Just to understand the terminology, shape and color are not Qualities? Blue and red are different qualities of color, and square in circle are different qualities of shape?

Joshs

↪Pneumenon

- Has anyone explicitly used mutual exclusivity at a point as a criterion for when two qualities belong to the same phenomenal space?
- I.e. something like: “red and green are two positions in one and the same space because they cannot co-occur at the same place and time without introducing variation in some orthogonal dimension (e.g. temporal succession, spatial division, etc.)”? I’d really appreciate references (specific texts/sections if possible). — Pneumenon

In Husserl’s Ding und Raum manuscripts (Husserliana XVI), Husserl explicitly analyzes what he calls “Inkompossibilität” of sensuous qualities; two different color-sensings cannot occupy “the selfsame point” in the visual field. In several notes he states that two incompatible color-sensings (e.g. red vs. green) cannot be given together at one identical spatial point. For them to “coexist,” the phenomenological presentation must introduce another mode of variation, typically temporal succession (first red, then green), or
spatial differentiation (red here, green there), or phantasy or imaginative layering, which is not literal co-givenness at the same actual place.

Two chromatic data cannot literally coincide at the same point in the visual field; their “coincidence” is imaginable only by introducing another dimension of variation; temporal, spatial, or modal.

Also check out sections §14–20 in Ideas I.

Pneumenon

While we're waiting, here's another question: Can you think of an aural example that would be the equivalent of colors and shapes in regard to "mutual exclusivity at a point"? Trying to home in on whether this is a phenomenology of vision alone. — J

Timbre.

Not pitch, per se, because two pitches can sound at the same time. But the timbre, the quality of a note, is made up of overtones. As soon as you change those overtones, you change the timbre.

I remark that sounding another tone on top of the first does not change its timbre if they are still heard as distinct tones.

Two chromatic data cannot literally coincide at the same point in the visual field; their “coincidence” is imaginable only by introducing another dimension of variation; temporal, spatial, or modal. — Joshs

Thank you. Before I dive in to the text itself: does Husserl make this into an identity criterion, i.e. that incompossibility implies lying in the same experiential field? If you can't answer, I'll assume this is RTFM.

jgill

↪Pneumenon

Reading this the first time, what comes to mind is a circle with a number of radii, each one a quality. Then a phenomenon corresponds to a curve on the interior of the circle, passing through each radius once. When the phenomenon changes slightly the curve is shifted slightly. A real number scale on each radii then provides a sequence of real numbers that "describe" the phenomenon. If the qualities are entirely separate then a shift in one doesn't affect the others.

On further thought, a simple functional scale might be better, with the horizontal axis the various qualities and the vertical axis the number corresponding to those qualities. If the qualities were to form a kind of continuum, then elementary calculus might be possible. Who knows.

Spaces and manifolds seems a tad esoteric in this context, with number scales somewhat abstract.

Just off the top of my noodle.

Not pitch, per se, because two pitches can sound at the same time. But the timbre, the quality of a note, is made up of overtones. As soon as you change those overtones, you change the timbre. — Pneumenon

Interesting. If two pitches can sound at the same time, that would be the aural equivalent of two colors appearing in the same space. What the colors can't do is appear in exactly the same space, as you point out. Now, can the pitches sound at exactly the same time? You say yes (and I agree), so that seems to make audition different from vision, but you also say that two timbres can't. Are you suggesting, then, that the timbre of a pitch is affected by what happens when another pitch is sounded simultaneously? There will be a variety of masking and distorting effects, but will the overtones actually be changed?

I remark that sounding another tone on top of the first does not change its timbre if they are still heard as distinct tones. — Pneumenon

So, if I understand you, we have an issue about whether and to what extent two instruments sounding the same pitch will be heard as two distinct tones, given the different timbres of the instruments. Isn't that a subjective response? It seems different from whether I can see something as both red and green, which clearly I cannot. But maybe I haven't quite got your thought yet.

(PS -- It may be relevant that, in recording, you can't double a part by simply duplicating it, and then placing it in two different places in the stereo pan. That will be heard as a single tone, in the center. In order to get two distinct tones, you have to do something to the duplicate -- maybe change the Eq or, as you say, run it through a different software to change the timbre, in which case a "new" tone will magically appear. Better yet, record two different performances!)

Moliere

It seems different from whether I can see something as both red and green, which clearly I cannot. — J

Perhaps you cannot -- but I'm thinking here of synesthesia. I can't taste colors, but some people can. Might it not be the case, along with "timbre/tone", that a person could see both red and green at the same time while distinguishing it, while the rest of us see the timbre of the mixture of red and green?

↪Moliere

Fair enough. Perhaps it's possible. I think synesthesia refers to experiencing a sensation in two different sensory modes, rather than two versions of the same mode, like red and green. But maybe simultaneous red/green perception can happen, which would be relevant to the OP's question.

Pneumenon

re you suggesting, then, that the timbre of a pitch is affected by what happens when another pitch is sounded simultaneously? — J

Yes. This is an empirical fact. You mentioned overtones yourself.

In brief: every sound has a fundamental frequency, and then a bunch of other frequencies on top of it that create its timbre. The "timbre" you hear just is a lot of pitches sounding together in a certain way.

Try this: strike a note on a guitar and lay your finger on the 12th fret (don't actually fret the note, just touch the string). You will hear a harmonic. But if you listen closely, it feels as if the bottom dropped out of the sound - and that timbre that seemed qualitatively distinct turns out to analyze into many distinct frequencies, which can be heard as distinct pitches.

Timbre, then, just is a subjective quality that arises from multiple frequencies being heard as a single pitch.

I think the rest of your questions will self-resolve once you give this some careful consideration. :-)

Let's quantify phenomenology!

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