lens system

Date1915-1930

Inventory NumberWJ0160c

ClassificationLens

Subject

Attributed to Leonard T. Troland 1889 - 1932

Cultural Region

Place of Origin

Dimensions19 × 18 × 4.7 cm (7 1/2 × 7 1/16 × 1 7/8 in.)
box: 15.2 × 43.2 × 19.7 cm (6 × 17 × 7 3/4 in.)

Material

DescriptionOptical system made of five parts: four lenses and one slide holder. They all have brackets so they could be fixed on a hard surface.

Signedunsigned

Curatorial RemarksThis lens system appears to have been used by Leonard Thompson Troland at Harvard University, in Emerson 324 (where was formerly the psychology department). According to the obituary written in <i>The American Journal of Psychology</i> Troland studied physics in parallel to his work in psychology. In fact, "The ideal towards which he was ever striving was a psychology patterned after modern physics, a psychology made up of mathematical equations." "This ideal accounts largely for his many excellent contributions to visual psychophysics. In the first place, it determined him to concentrate his experimental work in vision, the sense-department in which control and measurement of the stimulus has unquestionably reached the greatest development. In the second place, it determined him to select within his chosen field problems which were not merely soluble, but whose solution could be stated in the unambiguous language of mathematics." Since his experimental work was concentrated on vision, this lens system could very well be a good representation of the type of studies he made. WJ0160a-e are housed together in a 2-tier blue board lidless box. SMS 9/5/18

ProvenanceFrom the Department of Psychology, William James Hall, Harvard University.