The Forgotten Sense
The New Science of Smell—and the Extraordinary Power of the Nose
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A New York Public Library "Best Book of the Year" “The Forgotten Sense leaves us with the hope of new discoveries and new recoveries—so that we may once again revel in the glorious, fragrant world around us.”—Wall Street Journal
By one of the world’s leading researchers into the science of smell, a fascinating exploration of our most essential yet least understood sense—enabling us to appreciate food and drink, warning us of dangers, and even influencing who we fall in love with in this compelling work of sensory science.
Our sense of smell guides our lives far more than our screen-heavy, sight-privileged era would suggest. It animates our experience of food and drink, helps us access powerful olfactory memory, and strengthens our intimacy with each other. But, long considered our most “beastly” sense, the inner workings of smell have stumped scientists for centuries.
Now, cognitive scientist and leading smell researcher Jonas Olofsson uncovers the sophisticated processes that drive our olfactory system, with profound implications for how we perceive the world around us. Drawing from cutting-edge original brain research, Olofsson shows that not only is our sense of smell extraordinarily sensitive, its process of chemical exchange shaped human evolution on its most fundamental level.
From the pheromones, environmental signals, and emotions we process with each breath, olfaction makes us the individuals we are. Moreover, smelling is an intellectual exercise rooted in cognitive science, one that we have the remarkable capacity to strengthen and, with some effort, even regain after illness or experiencing loss of smell.
With infectious curiosity and a host of applications—from emotional health and gastronomy to literature and even politics—The Forgotten Sense is a wide-ranging and entertaining look at this most understudied function of human life.
This groundbreaking book dismantles the myths and reveals the hidden powers of our most primal sense.
The Olfactory System’s True Power: Why the long-held myth of a weak human sense of smell is wrong—and how our noses rival those of many other mammals.Neuroscience of Attraction: An exploration of body odors, chemical signals, and the controversial science of pheromones to understand how smell influences who we love.An Emotional Time Machine: How specific scents can unlock our most vivid and emotional childhood memories, acting as a direct link to our past.Recovering Your Sense of Smell: The latest research on smell training and rehabilitation, offering hope and practical insights for those who have experienced smell loss from viruses like COVID-19 or other causes.
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The human sense of smell is more potent than commonly believed, according to this entrancing debut. Debunking the myth that humans are "odor-impaired animals," Olofsson, a psychology professor at Stockholm University, cites a 2015 study that found humans are more sensitive to numerous scents than mice, spider monkeys, and all other animals that researchers looked at, except dogs. He explains that "smells have a unique capacity to evoke memories of childhood" because the olfactory brain shares more connections with the brain's memory center than do areas associated with other senses. The most fascinating sections explore Olofsson's contention that olfactory processes are shaped by culture, as when he discusses how the Dassanech people of Ethiopia consider the smell of manure attractive on a man because of its associations with livestock and wealth. Odor perceptions are also intimately bound up with ideas people have about the world, Olofsson posits, describing his own research that found people who reported feeling the most disgusted by body odor tended to rank highly in xenophobia. (He attributes the result to a metaphorical "fear of infection" that draws on racist descriptions of marginalized groups as unhygienic to conflate ingesting harmful substances with immigration.) As enlightening as it is surprising, this stimulates.
