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. :-)

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

Right, but are you saying that the overtones themselves are affected by other frequencies being sounded by other instruments at the same time? Could you point to me to the evidence for this? I'm wondering whether it's the overtones themselves that change, or my ability to perceive them. (Perhaps that's what you mean, since you define "timbre" as subjective. It isn't, entirely.) In other words, are the particular overtones that give a clarinet its characteristic timbre literally changed if an oboe sounds the same pitch at the same time? This would be objectively measurable, not a matter of perception by the human ear.

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

Not quite. :smile:

Pneumenon

Right, but are you saying that the overtones themselves are affected by other frequencies being sounded by other instruments at the same time? — J

Hypothetically, I could play a frequency on another instrument that would be experienced as a change in timbre on the first.

Hypothetically, I could play a frequency on another instrument that would be experienced as a change in timbre on the first. — Pneumenon

Yes, and that's different from actually changing the characteristic overtones. As you perhaps know, both pitch and timbre have objective and subjective (listener-dependent) aspects. If I'm recording a track and want to change an instrument's pitch, I can do that by "pressing buttons" (that is, digital manipulation) and be confident that the pitch will have changed, without needing to hear it. (One can do the same thing by de-tuning a guitar.) Similarly, if I want to change the timbre of a tone, I know which buttons to press that will accentuate or de-emphasize the relevant overtones. All these manipulations are objective, though in the case of timbre, since there are infinite degrees of timbre, as contrasted with only 12 pitches in the well-tempered scale, I'm going to have to use my ears at some point to see whether I've got what I wanted. (This actually applies to pitch as well, sometimes, but that's another story, involving the relative inaccuracy of conventional pitch-measurement software.)

What a note sounds like, to me, is a different matter. You're pointing out that simultaneous sounding of other tones will affect how the target tone sounds to me. That's right; it will affect timbre for sure, and also loudness (which is subjective, as opposed to dBs), and even pitch, somewhat. But when we say "affect timbre," we don't mean the objectively analyzable group of fundamental-plus-overtones that makes an oboe sound oboe-ish. We mean whether, and how much of, that group is audible to me at a given moment.

Joshs

↪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. — Pneumenon

Just thought I’d mention that if one is taking a strictly Husserlian approach to phenomenology, all empirical facts are subjective rand relative. Not subjective in the sense of mere opinion, and not relative as merely arbitrary, but subjectively constituted from the perspective of consciousness , and relatively stable across time. But empirical facts about the world can never have the apodictic certainly of knowledge about the grounding transcendental structures of consciousness. They can always be otherwise, and Husserl’s analyses are intended to show this contingency by bracketing as reducing them to more primordial conditions of possibility, not to nail down empirical facts about perceptual experience.

Patterner

I've never heard it looked into in great depth, but I suspect two instruments could play the same tone, and produce the same overtones, and we would be able to tell them apart from the timbre. Maybe cello and bassoon, or violin and clarinet.

Moliere

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. — J

Yes, you're right. "Synesthesia" is the example I thought of to make sense of the notion, but that's very much a conceptual thing rather than something documented. I'm analogizing from that unusual experience to say perhaps others could have another unusual experience, but I don't know the mechanisms of synesthesia so I could just be full of hot air.

↪Moliere

Whether the simultaneous experience of red/green perception can happen depends on how we understand "simultaneous," I think. I've had some very mild experiences of synesthesia, and the dual-mode perception is simultaneous in the sense that, when I heard a particular tone, I also saw a particular visual field: color, but also brightness. I've heard others -- probably deeper synesthetists -- describe it as actually seeing the note as having a color, which would be another sense of simultaneity.

Red/green simultaneity doesn't seem to fit either of those models. What I picture is: A person sees the color brown, and is able, at the same time, to see both red and green "within" the brown. And no, I don't know what "within" means, exactly. If anyone reading this has had something like this happen, speak up!

Moliere

Red/green simultaneity doesn't seem to fit either of those models. What I picture is: A person sees the color brown, and is able, at the same time, to see both red and green "within" the brown. And no, I don't know what "within" means, exactly. — J

I agree it seems different.

Maybe it best to say "Because synesthesia I can imagine the possibility, even though it may not actually be possible"

The strongest of claims :D

Moliere

↪J

In the spirit of quantification....

Would you say that you can pick out a tone from a timbre while listening?

I would say so, but I would also say I cannot pick out red/green from a brown I'm seeing even though, conceptually, I know that's a way to make a brown/grey.

This would be something like a conceptual or logical divide which isn't quantification but needed for quantification, and seems related to:

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. — Pneumenon

But the definition of "orthogonal" would have to differ because clearly sight and sound affect one another at least in our perception.

Here I'm thinking that the rules of quantification might differ in describing color and sound perception -- what "counts as" a sound, timbre, color, differentiation and so on could be in an orthogonal relationship conceptually, but we are bound to all of them at once and they all e/affect one another (and it's not even known if there is a "one another", in terms of describing the senses, IMO).

Would you say that you can pick out a tone from a timbre while listening? — Moliere

You mean, a tone other than the root pitch? I would say, sometimes but not often. It's easier or harder depending on the instrument/timbre in question.

I cannot pick out red/green from a brown I'm seeing even though, conceptually, I know that's a way to make a brown/grey. — Moliere

Me neither.

Here I'm thinking that the rules of quantification might differ in describing color and sound perception — Moliere

Maybe a place to start would be to ask, is there some obvious parallel between the orthogonality of shape and color, and the orthogonality of some two sound elements. Which might those elements be? One candidate might be pitch and rhythm. We know we can vary pitch while holding rhythm steady, and vice versa, just like shape and color. But what's the parallel with the visual dictum that we (as far as we know) don't see two colors at the same time, in the same place? I think the analogy is in trouble here, because we can surely hear polyrhythms, and more than one pitch at a time. We need an entirely different construal of "at the same time and place" that would exclude polyrhythms and intervals/chords. And I don't know what that would be. We can't even say that a single rhythmic pattern can only be heard as one thing, unlike, say, a color. As for pitch, it's probably true that you can't simultaneously hear an A as a B, but you can hear a chord as two different musical objects. In both these cases, it's the musical context that makes the difference, in a way that doesn't see to come up for visual experiences. Or does it? Optical illusions?

Pneumenon

Yes, and that's different from actually changing the characteristic overtones. — J

The overtones of which sound? The one you're hearing or the one played on the first instrument?

Think about it.

As you perhaps know, both pitch and timbre have objective and subjective (listener-dependent) aspects. — J

Yep.

The overtones of which sound? The one you're hearing or the one played on the first instrument? — Pneumenon

If the actual overtones were changed, that would be a change in the sound played on the first instrument, and it would be objectively measurable. Changes in what I hear, on the other hand, don't actually change any overtones, unless by "change" we want to include "make them more or less audible." But that is necessarily subjective in large part.

Pneumenon

If the actual overtones were changed, that would be a change in the sound played on the first instrument, and it would be objectively measurable. — J

Again, the overtones of which sound?

There is nothing that makes the first instrument the "real" sound.

↪Pneumenon

I guess I'm not understanding your question. If an oboe plays an A, that is a tone with overtones. If you actually change the overtones, it doesn't sound like an oboe anymore. I don't know what the "real" sound would be that you're referring to -- can you say more? I'm sensing there's a confusion here between "sound" as referring to what an instrument creates, and "sound" as referring to what a listener hears.

Pneumenon

↪J

Maybe I'm confused, or maybe you are. But this is definitely interesting because it's forcing me to hash this out clearly. So thank you for that.

First, timbre is a subjective quality that you hear.
Second, timbre is determined by overtones.

Now, hypothetical: I play a pitch on an instrument. On a second instrument, I play a pitch in such a way that your ear hears it as an overtone of the first pitch. It sounds like one sound to you, with a timbre of its own.

Now, questions:

1. How many pitches are being played? (I would say two)
2. How many timbres do you subjectively hear? (I would say one)
3. What are the overtones of that one timbre?

↪Pneumenon

OK, that's better. I didn't realize you wanted the second instrument to be playing something that would be mistaken for an overtone produced by the first instrument.

So my answers would be:
1. Two pitches.
2. One timbre.
3. Trick question. :smile: Let's say there are four relevant overtones being produced by the first instrument. To this we add the false or apparent overtone that is actually a regular pitch being played by the second instrument. How many overtones total? It depends from whose point of view, and what we agree to count as an overtone in this bizarre case. I, the listener, believe I'm hearing a timbre composed of five overtones (though remember, it's unlikely I'd be able to actually hear the overtones as discrete pitches). Out there in the objective world, there is a timbre composed of four overtones plus a new pitch sneaking in and pretending to be one.

Some of this is just convention. We generally don't use the term "timbre" to talk about how multiple instruments sound together -- "the timbre of a chord played by the wind section," for instance. "Timbre" is reserved for single instruments. But I suppose there's no reason we couldn't broaden the usage.

timbre is a subjective quality that you hear. — Pneumenon

Well, yes, but no more subjective than most of the other elements of music. it's not subjective the way loudness, for instance, is subjective. Timbre is also used to refer to the instrument itself, not just to how it sounds to me. As we've already noted, we know how to create various timbres by tweaking the frequencies, and when we talk about timbre in this way, there's nothing subjective about it, anymore than pitch is subjective -- though of course pitch is also something that is heard, and hence part of subjective experience.

Pneumenon

Out there in the objective world, there is a timbre composed of four overtones plus a new pitch sneaking in and pretending to be one. — J

Right! But this is phenomenology, so the "objective" timbre is bracketed and we're not examining it right now. We only care about the timbre you hear/experience, 'cause we're doing phenomenology and talking about experiential qualities.

Returning to your earlier post:

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"? — J

Yep. Because in the hypothetical I cited, two sounds that wind up sounding as overtones in your phenomenal experience are mutually exclusive at point. That makes (subjectively perceived) timbre an aural example of mutual exclusivity at point, because anything else occupying that point changes (destroys) the original timbre.

I'm glad we got around to it!

Let's quantify phenomenology!

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