I think having the opportunity to take Smells and Bells and then experiencing a worldwide pandemic came with good timing. Oftentimes, we’re so rushed to get from one one place to another that we miss out on what happens around us. We’re so accustomed to the lifestyle of being busy that it has become the norm for many of us. However, the pandemic has forced us to slow down. We’re now appreciating everything that we had previously taken for granted and noticing things in our surroundings that we have never noticed before. Take this quarantining/social distancing as an opportunity to be more aware of what you experience through the senses. I don’t think my senses have necessarily heightened over the past 5 weeks, but I am actively making the choice to pay more attention to what I see, hear, touch, taste, and smell. I like going on nature/mindfulness walks and basking in the sunshine out in my backyard. This morning, I could hear a faint noise from the wind, hear the birds chirping, f
In the “Noses” section of her book, “A Natural History of the Senses”, Diane Ackerman writes that as we humans evolved, our sense of smell has weakened over time, and vision and hearing became more important to us for survival. This made me think of a video that I viewed in Barbara Darling’s Religion and Animals class that briefly went over the fact that a dog’s sense of smell is equivalent to our vision- they use their nose to make sense of the world and navigate it. They’re able to know if humans have diseases, find missing people, detect explosives, sniff out drugs, etc. It’s so fascinating to me that other animals, specifically dogs, can experience scent differently than humans do. When I take my dog (Conan- pictured on the right) on walks, he'll sniff the grass and he is able to detect another dog's urine scent despite it raining for consecutive days.They are able to do this because their olfactory system is able to smell chemical components that aren't airborne. While our sense of smell does not allow us to do that, our olfactory abilities trigger emotions and memories within us from years ago and we’re also able to salivate just from smelling something.
As our sense of smell diminished over time has dogs' sense of smell also be diminished when compared to their ancestors' sense of smell ?
ReplyDeleteThat's a really great question! I don't know the answer to that, but I'm assuming that since all organisms have evolved and still continue to do so, dogs' sense of smell have either diminished or have heightened.
DeleteDo you think that now our noses may be less sensitive to the smell of blood since a majority of us do not find ourselves in a hunting gathering society anymore?
ReplyDeleteThat's a really great point! I remember reading an article somewhere, which is why I included that humans are sensitive to the scent of blood to let them know that they are hurt. However, now that you bring up the point that we aren't in a hunting gathering society anymore, it would make sense that our noses would be less attuned to the smell of blood compared to how it once used to be.
DeleteI think it is very interesting how we tend to compare our senses so much to other animals without much consideration for evolutionary advantages that might help to explain the reasoning behind the differences.
ReplyDelete