TIME 59 



been able to compare subjective sensation of weight with 

 the objective process, and to set up a fundamental law. It can 

 be shown, that is to say, that the same amount of water 

 poured in by no means always corresponds to the same thres- 

 hold, but that the amount of water required to overcome the 

 threshold increases proportionally to what has been poured 

 into the pail. If, for instance, there was one cubic decimetre 

 in the pail, the addition of only one cubic centimetre was 

 necessary to overcome the swell ; if there were already two 

 cubic decimetres of water in the pail, two cubic centimetres 

 would be required for doing the same thing. 



The law according to which the threshold increases pro- 

 portionally to the magnitude of the stimulus, finds its applica- 

 tion in all the domains of sense, so long as the qualities undergo 

 any increase in their intensity. 



FILLING UP THE MOMENT-SIGNS 



In looking at a picture, it is important to choose our 

 position so that it corresponds to the position from which 

 the artist looked at his painting. Only then shall we employ 

 on the picture the same number of local signs as he himself 

 used. If we go to the right distance from the picture, the 

 objects represented in it seem to us correct ; that is to say, 

 they appear within the same optical angle as that in which 

 the painter looked at them. It is this angle, however, that 

 decides the quantity of local signs stimulated. 



If we go too near the picture, we see details that we are 

 meant to overlook, because we are using more local signs on the 

 representation than the painter used on the thing he was repre- 

 senting. As a consequence, the picture gets broken up into 

 brush-strokes. It is vain to expect that the object depicted 

 will display more intimate details than the actual object 

 itself does. 



