Charpentier's Experiments Demonstrative of an Oscillatory Process in the Organ of Vision and of its Dimensions

Abstract

ONE of the fundamental positions in Hering's physiological theory of visual sensation is that each sensificatory datum diffuses in the retino-cerebral organ beyond its precise locus of incidence, and thus directly modifies contiguous sensificatory data. A very elegant experimental substantiation of this position is contained in two simple optical observations by Charpentier¹ (of Nancy) giving not only the clearest possible demonstration of the fact itself, but an approximate measure of the physiological duration and velocity of the phenomenon.