Several cases have been reported in Russia recently of people who can read and detect colours with their fingers, and even see through solid doors and walls. One case concerns an eleven-year-old schoolgirl, Vera Petrova, who has normal vision but who can also perceive things with different parts of her skin, and through solid walls. This ability was first noticed by her father. One day she came into his office and happened to put her hands on the door of a locked safe. Suddenly she asked her father why he kept so many old newspapers locked away there, and even described the way they were done up in bundles. Vera's curious talent was brought to the notice of a scientific research institute in the town of Ulyanovsk, near where she lives, and in April she was given a series of tests by a special commission of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federal Republic. During these tests she was able to read a newspaper through an opaque screen and, stranger still, by moving her elbow over a child's game of Lotto she was able to describe the figures and colours printed on it; and, in another instance, wearing stockings and slippers, to make out with her foot the outlines and colours of a picture hidden under a carpet. Other experiments showed that her knees and shoulders had a similar sensitivity. During all these tests Vera was blindfolded; and, indeed, except when blindfolded she lacked the ability to perceive things with her skin. It was also found that although she could perceive things with her fingers this ability ceased the moment her hands were wet.
Ernst Weber, a physiologist in Leipzig, was the first to show that people can perceive things through their fingertips as well as they can through their eyes. He found that the smaller the object, the closer it had to be to the eyes for its details to be seen. The same applies to the fingertips. The closer the object is to the fingertips, the larger it seems to be and the more details can be made out. Weber found that when the fingertips were about three inches from an object, the details of the object were as clear as when it was at the normal reading distance of about fourteen inches from the eyes. If the object was moved closer still, the fingertips could no longer make out its details. This shows that the fingertips can perceive objects in the same way as the eyes, but only up to a certain distance.
Vera Petrova's case is a good example of how people can be trained to perceive things in different ways. She was not born with the ability to perceive things with her skin, but she has learned to do so through long practice. Her father started to train her when she was a small child. He would put different objects in front of her and ask her to describe them without looking. At first she could only make out the general shape of the objects, but with more practice she was able to make out more details. As she grew older, she was able to perceive things with different parts of her skin, and through solid walls. This shows that the ability to perceive things with the skin can be developed through training.