What counts as touch?

[devogue]

If I touch a rock with my finger, I am touching a rock.

However, if I put a glove on and touch a rock I am not touching a rock, just the glove. But I can feel the rock.

Discuss.

[kiki5711]

You're touching the rock through your gloves, and not directly getting the same sensation as you would without the gloves.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

There is a new version of this thread in the pub. Can we keep all non-serious discussion there please - including anything related to 'that kind' of touching!

[devogue]

You're touching the rock through your gloves,

I'm touching my glove, but I am sensing the rock - is that sense touch? Can I touch two things simultaneously with the same piece of skin? There seems to be a difference, but I can't articulate whether it's just semantics.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

You're touching the rock through your gloves,

I'm touching my glove, but I am sensing the rock - is that sense touch? Can I touch two things simultaneously with the same piece of skin? There seems to be a difference, but I can't articulate whether it's just semantics.

You are feeling the texture, warmth, softness of the glove but the pressure sensation of the unyielding rock. Touch involves more than one kind of nerve detector cell.

[FBM]

I'll take your word that you're serious about this question. You're touching the glove and making the glove touch the rock, which results in the inertial resistance that you feel as pressure in the shape of the rock. The feeling that you're touching the rock is a perceptual illusion. One way to test such things is to take them to extremes and see how they hold up. The gloves are flexible, so you imagine you're feeling the rock. But that flexibility doesn't override the fact that your skin never comes in contact with the rock; it's just an indidental aspect. This would become abundantly clear if you compare touching a live electrical wire with your bare hands as compared to touching them with insulated gloves. Since you're directing the glove with your energy, you're responsible for whatever results from the glove's contact with objects. 'You break it, you buy it' can't be avoided by saying, 'I never touched it. I was wearing gloves.' [/pedantry]

[charlou]

Dev, if you were blindfolded and gloved, and the tip of your finger was pressed to any object, would you know/sense what that object is? Still while blindfolded, several fingers and even your entire hands feeling the shape, texture and form of the object through gloves might have a better chance of a correct guess.

In your op, you're using more than your sense of touch to 'feel' the rock.

[Surendra Darathy]

It all comes down to the Pauli exclusion principle. In order really to touch something, you must react chemically with it. You have to modify some orbitals, exchange some electrons. And if you really get close enough, you can do nuclear fusion.

[FBM]

It all comes down to the Pauli exclusion principle. In order really to touch something, you must react chemically with it. You have to modify some orbitals, exchange some electrons. And if you really get close enough, you can do nuclear fusion.

You could even build a case for the idea that you never really touch anything. The electromagnetic fields repel each other and prevent actual contact of anything material.

[Surendra Darathy]

It all comes down to the Pauli exclusion principle. In order really to touch something, you must react chemically with it. You have to modify some orbitals, exchange some electrons. And if you really get close enough, you can do nuclear fusion.

You could even build a case for the idea that you never really touch anything. The electromagnetic fields repel each other and prevent actual contact of anything material.

Maybe that's why I come off to so many people as a "reactionary". I'm a man outstanding in my "field".

you're using more than your sense of touch to 'feel' the rock.

Feel the burn. Consider the "brain". Me, I'm a victim of "professional burnout".