Genital Sensation: CNS Targets and Functions in Females

Re^2: Response to Komisaruk's paper

Barry R. Komisaruk
brk@psychology.rutgers.edu

On Tue Dec 15, Henry Szechtman wrote
------------------------------------
>Hi Barry, if i can add my two cents, i congratulate you on a really terrific piece of work - it is really impressive how you have been able to piece together a cogent anatomical story of the pathways involved in genital stimulation. As a note of aside, I'm also impressed that you still ask questions of functional significance, like that for pupil dilation. Maybe i'm getting older than you, but to me this particular phenomenon is a mere reflection of a lack of differentiation in the autonomic system; a byproduct, rather than an object of functional control (and the fact that some species close their eyes may suggest that it is even a nuisance). henry

Dear Henry,
Thank you for your comment, and also for a great conference! Mary Erskine asked a similar question, which I have tried to address in my posted response to her. I take the position that there is great efficiency in physiological mechanisms, and if we can not understand some function, we should assume there is one until shown that there is not, rather than the other way around (that there is none until shown that there is). To dismiss it as a "mere...byproduct" would be to give up trying to understand it; I prefer to leave it hanging, bugging us, and maybe it would provoke a testable hypothesis.
Barry

Tue Dec 15