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The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 (gcide)

Sensation \Sen*sa"tion\, n. [Cf. F. sensation. See {Sensate}.]
1. (Physiol.) An impression, or the consciousness of an
impression, made upon the central nervous organ, through
the medium of a sensory or afferent nerve or one of the
organs of sense; a feeling, or state of consciousness,
whether agreeable or disagreeable, produced either by an
external object (stimulus), or by some change in the
internal state of the body.
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Perception is only a special kind of knowledge, and
sensation a special kind of feeling. . . . Knowledge
and feeling, perception and sensation, though always
coexistent, are always in the inverse ratio of each
other. --Sir W.
Hamilton.
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2. A purely spiritual or psychical affection; agreeable or
disagreeable feelings occasioned by objects that are not
corporeal or material.
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3. A state of excited interest or feeling, or that which
causes it.
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The sensation caused by the appearance of that work
is still remembered by many. --Brougham.
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Syn: Perception.

Usage: {Sensation}, {Perseption}. The distinction between
these words, when used in mental philosophy, may be
thus stated; if I simply smell a rose, I have a
sensation; if I refer that smell to the external
object which occasioned it, I have a perception. Thus,
the former is mere feeling, without the idea of an
object; the latter is the mind's apprehension of some
external object as occasioning that feeling.
"Sensation properly expresses that change in the state
of the mind which is produced by an impression upon an
organ of sense (of which change we can conceive the
mind to be conscious, without any knowledge of
external objects). Perception, on the other hand,
expresses the knowledge or the intimations we obtain
by means of our sensations concerning the qualities of
matter, and consequently involves, in every instance,
the notion of externality, or outness, which it is
necessary to exclude in order to seize the precise
import of the word sensation." --Fleming.
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