The Forgotten Sense

Human olfaction – the sense of smell – enables us to appreciate food and drink, it warns us of dangers and it makes our environments more enjoyable. However, olfaction is one of our least explored sensory systems. Until now.

Smells and scents are the colour that enrich our experience of life. Ask anyone to reflect on their sense of smell, and they immediately start talking. First, there are discussions about food and wine, but pretty quickly they move on to personal topics: about the smells that evoke memories of childhood, dead relatives, pregnancy, love, and sex. When people talk about their sense of smell, they also tell us something about themselves, their feelings, thoughts, and relationships. Thus, the sense of smell not only reflects the chemical world outside us, but also bears witness to our inner world, our feelings, and thoughts.

The Forgotten Sense explores the unknown mind and how it shapes people: Why can smells evoke such strong memories? How much can body odours control who you fall in love with? How sensitive is the human sense of smell? In many ways, these questions are on the very forefront of our understanding, but Dr Jonas Olofsson has spent years studying the least understood of our senses. And he has discovered that it is actually possible to improve and refine one’s sense of smell, to develop it into a more useful tool to bring a powerful immediacy to your life.