Sensory Perception "Speed"

[Arbiter]

I find the easiest way to explain what I am looking for here is as a hypothetical question:

If you feel intense, blinding, unimaginable pain (the worst you can imagine) over your entire body and from within, for a billionth of a second, would you feel it?

Or is the human body's sensory system too slow to pick that up?

Technically, a bolt of lightning isn't there for a long time and yet you certainly feel it going through you.

How short must the duration of a very intense sensation be, that you don't feel it at all?

 

[EchoZA]

I don't know about the human body, but my mates house in JHB felt the full effect of a direct lightning strike last weekend

 

[Jonny Two Shoes]

I don't think you would register it. Especially if it is really intense. Sort of like sticking your foot in a really hot bath and not realising that it is so hot - when it feels cool for just a moment.

 

[battletoad]

Pretty sure you'll feel the after effects if there are any. Read in a book back in the day that signals are transmitted at 200km/h along the nervous system, so if the outside stimulus aint there after the roundtrip from the affected area to brain and back again you may not feel it e.g. tapping a hotplate fast enough you dont feel it (altho i'm disregarding the rate of heat transfer here)

 

[AnomalyNexus]

Doesn't matter how short imo.

Think of it in terms of your eyes. Doesn't matter how short a flash of light is, if its powerful enough (lots of photons) it will trigger the cone cells.

Bolt of lighting is a bad example. Its there for a couple of millisec. It heats the air around it. Air turns into plasma. So even if its gone soon again you'll get burned to a crisp by the after effects. Direct hit of course.

Sort of like sticking your foot in a really hot bath and not realising that it is so hot - when it feels cool for just a moment.

Thats different. Heat needs time to get through the top layers of skin which doesn't conduct heat really well (Think ppl walking on coals).

 

[Jonny Two Shoes]

I see what you mean.

Difficult one this

 

[Vegeta]

My question is wtf does it matter? why does someone ask a question like this? Do you want to kill someone really really fast?

 

[Nerfherder]

You would feel the consequences of the lightening after its happened. The initial shock - no.

A real question: Does some one who gets within 1km of a atomic bomb exploding feel anything ?

 

[Keeper]

yes you would feel it - no matter how fast it happens, you would feel it.

you can prick someone with a needle as fast as a bullet - they would feel it.

the reason you don't feel the burn on a hot plate, is because you arent burning yet - your finger is still warming up if you just touch very fast.....

 

[AnomalyNexus]

A real question: Does some one who gets within 1km of a atomic bomb exploding feel anything ?

:wtf: Hell yeah. 1km is *inside* the fireball on the bigger thermo-nukes, so yeah you'd feel it.

I suspect that you'll still feel it at 50-75km. Especially in the ears (shockwave).

 

[phoneJunky]

Well that depends if our nervous system is analogous or discreet. I think it would be analogous (I don't know) and then the pain would be filtered over a longer amount of time that you would be able to feel

 

[Sparkz0629]

i think that you will feel the pain, but just for an instant.... because the message was sent through the nervous system, and that means that it will eventually get to its destination, the brain, but will only last as long as it was initially induced for.... although the pain will be so crazy, so you will have after effects(shock, numbness etc)