this probably sounds silly

[10001]

It is scientifically believed that all parts of the body is connected to our brain. which mens the brain basically embodies all parts of our body in nerve form.

so... when we get a sensation in any part of the body, why do we feel it in that part?

when our finger touches an object, the signal is created then sent along the nerve path to our brain. But why do we feel it on the finger? the signal left the finger and yet we feel it there.

[TragicMonkey]

That's the whole point of the system in the first place. The brain gets the information from the finger, in this case, and the sensation you feel is the brain telling you where something is happening.

It's like when someone rings the doorbell, you know to go to the door, even though the thing that makes the actual sound is several feet away and near the ceiling.

[Beady]

Also, new amputees feeling pain or itching in their missing limb figures into this.

I forget the name of that phenomenon.

[Lisa Simpson]

Phantom Limb or something like that.

When I was a kid, I wondered how pain relievers "knew" to go to the part of the body that was hurting.

[tkingdoll]

Phantom Limb or something like that.

When I was a kid, I wondered how pain relievers "knew" to go to the part of the body that was hurting.

I used to think that too. I thought the aspirin went straight to your head if you had a headache, and to your toes if you had a toe ache. It didn't occur to me that blood goes all the way round the body, all the time.

[Marquis de Carabas]

The same reason we see a chair six feet away as being six feet away, instead of on the back of our eyeballs.

[Beerina]

It is scientifically believed that all parts of the body is connected to our brain. which mens the brain basically embodies all parts of our body in nerve form.

so... when we get a sensation in any part of the body, why do we feel it in that part?

I think it's partly hardwired and partly learned. When people have chest pains, they could be anywhere from up and down the arm to the shoulder to all over the chest or the neck or jaw. I highly suspect these "areas" are just unknown to daily experience, being internal to the body, so the brain is just making a best guess as to where to place it on the "perception mental model of the body".

[TragicMonkey]

The same reason we see a chair six feet away as being six feet away, instead of on the back of our eyeballs.

Unless you have a decidedly unpleasant accident, anyway.

[Beady]

I thought the aspirin went straight to your head if you had a headache...

And I'll be you never thought to copyright the slogan, you fool!

[wollery]

I think it's partly hardwired and partly learned. When people have chest pains, they could be anywhere from up and down the arm to the shoulder to all over the chest or the neck or jaw. I highly suspect these "areas" are just unknown to daily experience, being internal to the body, so the brain is just making a best guess as to where to place it on the "perception mental model of the body".My ex-girlfriend had a really bad kidney infection many years ago. To this day she can "feel" her kidney.

[Dogdoctor]

If you didn't have a brain you wouldn't feel. Your brain interprets information. Your brain gets a signal saying finger hurts so you feel hurt in your finger. It is interesting that your vision actually comes from an upside down image projected on your retina. Why don't we see everything upside down? Probably due to a similar reason as why we feel the pain in the finger, the brain interprets it to a more accurate image.

[Dave1001]

It is scientifically believed that all parts of the body is connected to our brain. which mens the brain basically embodies all parts of our body in nerve form.

so... when we get a sensation in any part of the body, why do we feel it in that part?

when our finger touches an object, the signal is created then sent along the nerve path to our brain. But why do we feel it on the finger? the signal left the finger and yet we feel it there.

That's a non-trivial question. We could very well perceive that we feel it between our ears, in the part of the brain that has a map of the human body, and then recognize instinctively that that corresponds to a particular part of our body. But we don't. We actually perceive it to be a couple feet away from us on that part of our body (or whatever it is).

The way perceptual consciousness works still hasn't been satisfactorily explained to me in materialistic terms.

[blutoski]

It is scientifically believed that all parts of the body is connected to our brain. which mens the brain basically embodies all parts of our body in nerve form.

so... when we get a sensation in any part of the body, why do we feel it in that part?

when our finger touches an object, the signal is created then sent along the nerve path to our brain. But why do we feel it on the finger? the signal left the finger and yet we feel it there.

What would be the point if it didn't? The purpose of the sensory apparatus is to identify the location of the event.

It should be pointed out that it doesn't always work: damage anywhere along the path will be mistaken for damage at the terminus. For example, when you cut off blood supply to a nerve in your elbow, your hand goes asleep, even though the damage is not there. If you pinch a nerve in your neck, you may feel pain anywhere along the sensory nerve's service area, ranging from your neck to your fingertip.

[Windom]

Another good example is with scissors. Call your friend, tell him close his eyes and point with scissors to his bare arm, so that both points of scissors touch the arm together. He will feel only one point, not two. Somewhere in between I suppose.

And yes, it would make no sense if you felt everything in your head. Like "oh, I feel I'm burning somewhere. Well... where? Lets try to move right hand.. still feeling.. maybe left leg then?"

[10001]

thanks guys^^

[Godmode]

You know how if you're in the car, and the oil light comes on? I think it's something like that. IT's just a system to let you know where the problem is. If you cut off your arm, you could stab that arm, shoot it, destroy it, and that arm would not feel anything, because it would have nowhere (no brain) to send the information to.
Some people don't feel pain, that's a defect in their system.

[Dog Boots]

A fun little experiment regarding this issue:

Try crossing your middle and index fingers, so that the fingertips sort of swap places. Then touch the tip of your nose with them with a gentle rubbing motion. It feels a bit like you have two noses (or four if you already have two, I guess).

[DangerousBeliefs]

You materialists!

Don't you know that the energy from your finger travels in an ether to your mind/soul!?!?

There is no brain and nervous system. That's just made up stuff by heathen athiests!

[kmortis]

It is scientifically believed that all parts of the body is connected to our brain. which mens the brain basically embodies all parts of our body in nerve form.

so... when we get a sensation in any part of the body, why do we feel it in that part?

when our finger touches an object, the signal is created then sent along the nerve path to our brain. But why do we feel it on the finger? the signal left the finger and yet we feel it there.

If you're really interested, I suggest picking up "How The Mind Works (http://www.amazon.com/How-Mind-Works-Steven-Pinker/dp/0393318486/sr=8-1/qid=1160483624/ref=pd_bbs_1/104-9872426-6994365?ie=UTF8)" by Stephen Pinker, or just about anything by Oliver Sacks (http://www.amazon.com/s/104-9872426-6994365?ie=UTF8&keywords=oliver%20sacks&tag=opera-20&index=blended&link%5Fcode=qs) or Dr. V.S. Ramachandran (http://www.amazon.com/s/104-9872426-6994365?ie=UTF8&keywords=Ramachandran&tag=opera-20&index=blended&link%5Fcode=qs).

In short, the body HAS a sixth sense, called (and I'm gonna misspell it so just get over it) proprioception. It's kind of like a feedback controller. Dr. Sacks speaks of a young lady (in his "Man who mistook his wife for a hat" book) who's proprioception "circuitry" was damaged during a pre-operative visit. If she didn't concentrate, her arms would float around, she had no sense of what her body was doing at any given moment unles she consciously focused on it. It took her a decent amount of time to learn to walk again, talk again and sit again.

Anyhoo, this feedback is part of why you feel your finger hurt and not your elbow. The brain knows that the particular nerve goes to a particular area, and therefore if it's triggered, that area must be what's providing the stimulus. If you've ever pinched a never in your back, you know that you'll feel a secondary pain in a remote area; whatever other nerve is pinched is giving an errant signal.

THis is a very breif distallation of what I've been able to learn about this by reading the authors I previous listed. Neurology, in general, is totally fascinating to me, proprioception is even more so. (Now, understand that it's quite possible that I'm misunderstanding proprioception and its role in pain generation. It's a weird little property of the body that I'm just recently, in the last six months or so, learning about.)