Any of the faculties by which stimuli from outside or inside the body are received and recognized, including hearing, seeing, smelling, touching, tasting, and balancing, all of which receive impressions through specific bodily organs and the nerves associated with them: The olfactory nerves are used in the sense of smelling, while the sense of touch is considered to be a tactile sense.

The bodily senses provide information about one's environment and about the body's internal existence, all of which are collected and transported to the central nervous system, including the brain and the spinal cord.

The faculties or senses by which stimuli from outside or inside the body are received and recognized by parts of the body are explained in the following:

The Five Senses Explained in Greater Detail

• Touch: The skin contains nerve endings that send messages to the brain and determine degrees of pressure, cold, warmth, and pain.
• Taste: The tongue is estimated to contain more than 10,000 taste buds which indicate chemicals in food and drink.

  A baby is born with taste buds all over its mouth, but they slowly disappear. Taste buds are usually renewed on a weekly basis.

• Smell: The nose provides smells by sensing chemicals in the air.

  A person can identify 2,000-4,000 different smells which are processed by the same part of the brain that deals with emotions and memories.

• Hearing: Sound vibrations trigger a chain of movements in the skull or head.

  The ears can detect 1,500 different tones, 350 degrees of loudness, and they can gauge the direction of a sound within three degrees.

• Sight: Light is perceived by the eyes and focused to form images.

  With normal vision, humans can see a lighted candle 1 mile (1.6 km) away.

1. To receive information from one's surroundings through the body's nerves and other physical organs: Sitting quietly by the side of the river, Melony was able to sense the change in the wind and decided she should go home before it started to rain.

While Mark was walking home from the bus, he sensed a movement behind him which happened to be his daughter who was trying to catch up with him after getting off a different bus.

2. To detect and to identify a change in something: The store's device at the back senses when the door is opened at night and sounds the alarm.
3. Etymology: from Latin sensus, "feeling, perception"; from sens-, past participle stem of sentire, "to feel".

The sensation of the movements of muscles that are felt while they are contracting: While using the specialized gym equipment, Lawrence experienced the kinesthetic senses of his muscles stretching and contracting.