Rudolf Steiner's theory of the senses

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The sense teachings of Rudolf Steiner was developed by Rudolf Steiner 1909-1921 as part of anthroposophy published in lectures and writings. In the course of his research, he added seven more senses to the five well-known, since Aristotle "classic" sensory abilities linked to external sensory organs ( sight , hearing , smell , taste , touch ). Four of them are particularly useful for haptic perception and surface sensitivity ; they are now also recognized by physiology : sense of movement , sense of balance , sense of life (includes pain perception via nociceptors ) and sense of warmth . In addition, Steiner describes three senses that enable human communication : the sense of language, the sense of thought and the sense of self.

Position in the complete works

Already in his first work, Rudolf Steiner referred to the importance of the qualities of sensory perception for knowledge, following on from Goethe . From 1909 he presented the differentiated consideration of the individual ten senses in lectures and in an unfinished manuscript from 1910, which was only published posthumously in 1951. In 1916 he took up the topic again and described his now twelve senses comprehensive doctrine of human sensory organism.

His doctrine of the senses is of fundamental importance in the practice of Waldorf education .

The twelve senses in Steiner's representation

The areas of perception usually known as the senses do not need to be explained here. Only those senses are to be described here which were first named as such by Rudolf Steiner's doctrine of the senses. These are on the one hand the sense of life and the sense of self-movement , i.e. the senses with which we experience our own body, and on the other hand the sense of sound , concept and the ego . They describe the area of ​​experience with which we experience and understand other people, i.e. empathy and communication. The first are physical, the second are social senses.

Meaning of life

“Viewed in this way, the most indefinite, most general sense appears to be that which can be called the sense of life . Man only really notices the existence of this sense when something is perceived through him that breaks the order of the body. Man feels lassitude and fatigue in himself. He does not hear the weariness, the languor; he does not smell them; but he perceives them in the same sense as he perceives a smell, a sound. Such perception, which relates to one's own corporeality, should be ascribed to the meaning of life. Basically, it is always present in the waking person, even if it is only noticeable when there is a disturbance. Through them, the person feels as a physical self that fills the space. "

The sense of life makes the activity of the internal organs perceptible ( visceroception ).

Sense of movement

“The second thing that is quite different as a meaning from this life meaning is what you can find out when you move any of your limbs. You move your arm or your leg. You wouldn't be a human being if you couldn't sense your own movements. A machine does not perceive its own movement, only a living being can do that by virtue of a real sense. The sense of what we move within ourselves, from winking to moving the legs, is a real second sense, the sense of self-movement. "

The experience that we owe to the sense of self-movement is proprioception in the narrower sense.

Sense of language

“[...] But a precise self-reflection shows that all hearing what is given in sounds is based on an equally direct, judgment-free relationship to the being from which the sound emanates, as is the case when a color impression is perceived. The insight into this fact is made easier if one visualises how a sound of pain lets us experience the pain of a being directly without any thought or the like interfering with the perception. - It must be taken into account that audible sound is not the only thing that reveals such inwardness to people as is the case with speech sounds. The gesture, facial expressions, the physiognomic ultimately lead to something simple, immediate, which must be included in the realm of the sense of language as well as the content of the audible sound. "

The sense of sound has to do with what is described today as empathy, the grasping of the soul's expression in sounds and gestures.

Thought sense

“But again, when I perceive the word, I do not live so intimately into the object, into the external being, as when I perceive the thought through the word. Most people no longer differentiate. But there is a difference between perceiving the mere word, the meaningful sounding, and the real perception of the thought behind the word. After all, you also perceive the word when it is solved by the thinker through the phonograph, or even through what is written. But in the living connection with the being that forms the word, directly through the word into the being, into the thinking, representing being, that requires a deeper sense than the ordinary sense of the word, that requires the sense of thought, as I call it would like to."

The empathy goes even further here, the thoughts of the other person are also followed.

I sense

The complete perceiving attention to the other person leads to the perception of the other self:

“And a relationship with the outside world that is even more intimate than the sense of thought is given to us by the sense that makes it possible for us to feel at one with another being, to know that we feel like ourselves. That is when one perceives the I of this being through thinking, through living thinking, which the being turns towards you - the I sense. "

Meeting another person is a unique experience. We encounter a being that is similar to us, another human self. Although this is an everyday experience and fundamental to social life, it has hardly been scientifically processed.

The twelve senses at a glance

The twelve senses can be arranged in three groups as follows (cf.):

12 senses
Body senses, lower senses Ambient senses, middle senses Cognitive senses, upper senses
Sense of balance Sense of warmth I sense
Sense of movement Sense of sight Thought sense
Meaning of life Sense of taste Sense of language
sense of touch Sense of smell Sense of hearing

Sensory perception and judgment

In the pedagogical context in particular, Rudolf Steiner considered the exact investigation of the sensory theory particularly important with regard to how a judgment is made. In a lecture on pedagogy, he describes how the judgment “This is a circle” comes from the connection of two sensations, one visual and a second through the sense of movement, with which we internally understand the shape of the circle.

A few years ago, experimental studies were carried out examining how we identify with our body (come to the conclusion that our body is our body). With a relatively simple experimental arrangement, this identification can be misdirected through the combination of visual and tactile perception. These experiments are examples of how judgments are made based on two perceptions, one conscious (visual) and one more dreamy (tactile).

Scientific reception

Hans Jürgen Scheuerle, student of the sensory physiologist Herbert Hensel , who also dealt with Steiner's sensory theory, explicitly refers to Rudolf Steiner's sense theory in his phenomenological presentation of the overall sense organization:

"Historically there is only one author who for the first time aims at completeness of the sensory theory and whose priority must therefore be taken into account here: Rudolf Steiner has found twelve senses which, after slight modifications, seem to me to contain all types of sensation in full."

While Steiner strictly distinguishes self and world perception, e.g. B. in relation to the perception of one's own thoughts and those of a conversation partner, these are for Scheuerle "poles of a uniform modality". In examining the individual sensory areas, Scheuerle repeatedly refers to Rudolf Steiner's doctrine of the senses.

In his dissertation at the University of Witten / Herdecke, The Sense of Language with Rudolf Steiner , Martin Peveling undertakes a critical appraisal of the sense of language in the sense of Rudolf Steiner in the light of modern linguistic research and social neurobiology. Based on the relevant scientific literature, he shows that Steiner's central theses on the sense of language are confirmed by current neurobiological and linguistic research. For example, in the physiological processing of language, in addition to sound perception and sound processing (“sense of hearing”), additional sequences of neurobiological processes can be registered that can be assigned to the perception of speech and also to the perception of thoughts (“sense of speech”, “sense of thought”).

literature

  • Rudolf Steiner: Anthroposophy. A fragment from 1910 (= GA 45). 1. A. 1951; 5. A. Dornach 2009, ISBN 978-3-7274-0452-8
  • Rudolf Steiner: Rudolf Steiner's notes on the theory of the senses. Contributions to the Rudolf Steiner Complete Edition, Issue 34, Dornach 1971, ISBN 3-7274-8034-3
  • Rudolf Steiner: On the theory of the senses. (Ed. by Christoph Lindenberg ). Free Spiritual Life, Stuttgart 1980, ISBN 3-7725-0073-0
  • Albert Soesman: The twelve senses. Gates of the soul. Free Spiritual Life, Stuttgart 1995; 6. revised A. 2007, ISBN 978-3-7725-2161-4
  • Peter Lutzker: The sense of language. Speech perception as a sensory process. Free Spiritual Life, Stuttgart 1996, ISBN 3-7725-1582-7

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ In one of his conversations with Eckermann , for example, he postulated that, according to the Critique of Pure Reason, "a person capable of [...] should write the Critique of the Senses and Common Sense" (conversation of February 17, 1829)
  2. ↑ Steiner, Baseline of an Epistemology of the Goethean Weltanschauung with special regard to Schiller (GA 2), 1886, ISBN 3-7274-6290-6 , p. 41f
  3. ↑ Steiner, Anthroposophie - Psychosophie - Pneumatosophie , 4th exp. A. Dornach 2001, ISBN 3-7274-1150-3
  4. ↑ Steiner, Anthroposophie , pp. 29–40
  5. ↑ First in: Das Rätsel des Menschen (GA 170), 3. A. Dornach 1992, ISBN 3-7274-1700-5 , lecture of August 12, 1916
  6. ↑ In writing only in one place: Steiner, Von Seelenrlocken (GA 21), 1917, IV / 5: On the real basis of the intentional relationship , ISBN 3-7274-6370-8
  7. ^ Steiner, Allgemeine Menschenkunde (GA 293), ISBN 978-3-7274-6171-2 , lecture of August 29, 1919
  8. ↑ Steiner, Anthroposophie , p. 31
  9. ↑ Steiner, Anthroposophie - Psychosophie - Pneumatosophie , p. 28
  10. ↑ Steiner, Anthroposophie , p. 36
  11. ↑ Steiner, Das Rätsel des Menschen , p. 110
  12. ↑ Steiner, Das Rätsel des Menschen , p. 110
  13. ↑ Max Scheler : On the phenomenology and theory of feelings of sympathy and of love and hate. With an appendix on the reason for assuming the existence of the strange self , Leipzig 1913
  14. ^ Bernhard Rang (2002): The perception of the strange ego according to Max Scheler's theory . In: Martin Basfeld, Thomas Kracht (Ed.), Subject and Perception. Contributions to an anthropology of sensory experience , Basel 2002, ISBN 3-7965-1861-3 , p. 71
  15. ↑ Ernst-Michael Kranich (2002): The personal perception of the other person . In: Basfeld, Kracht (Ed.) Subject and Perception , p. 85
  16. ↑ Bernd Kalwitz, The Upper Senses. Point and Circle , Christmas 2010, p. 8 ( online (PDF; 8.1 MB) )
  17. ↑ Steiner, General Human Studies as the Basis of Pedagogy (GA 293), lecture of September 29, 1919
  18. ^ Markus C. Schulte von Drach (Süddeutsche Zeitung, 2008): I am you
  19. ↑ Martin Errenst, Sensory Perception and Reality Experience, Das Goetheanum 7/2005, p. 5 online (PDF; 92 kB)
  20. ↑ Hensel, General Sensory Physiology. Skin senses, taste, smell , Berlin 1966
  21. ↑ Peter F. Matthiessen: Rudolf Steiner's university concept and the University of Witten / Herdecke . In: Peter Heusser, Johannes Weinzirl (ed.): Rudolf Steiner - Its importance for science and life today . Schattauer, 2014, ISBN 978-3-7945-6776-8 , pp. 267-328 .
  22. ↑ Scheuerle, The Total Sensory Organization. Overcoming the subject-object split in the sensory theory , 2. new edit. A. Thieme, Stuttgart 1984
  23. ↑ a b Scheuerle, Die Gesamt-Sinnes-Organization , p. 84
  24. ^ Peveling, Martin The sense of language in Rudolf Steiner. Dissertation, University of Witten / Herdecke, 2015