Do Humans Possess a Second Sense of Hearing?

By Neil Todd

The cochlea is a recent evolutionary development. Mammalian ears, including our own, still also rely on features from our early vertebrate ancestors.

This Article From Issue

September-October 2015

Volume 103, Number 5

Page 348

DOI: 10.1511/2015.116.348

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Most of us think of our senses as a group of five—vision, hearing, touch, smell, and taste—and can readily identify the parts of the body that let us process information about the world through each of these senses. Less easy to locate are the organs that underlie our sense of balance, although we depend on them at every moment.

The 1916 watercolor Acrobats—Balancing Act, by American painter Charles Demuth, plays with themes of balance, ideas of “up” versus “down,” and suggestions of music and dance—all faculties that rely on the otolith organs of the human inner ear.

Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, Montgomery, Alabama, The Blount Collection, 1989.2.9.

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