In his account of human perception in De Anima, Aristotle focuses on characterizing special perception and its objects. This focus, however, comes at a price, as Aristotle neglects to explain why incidental and common objects should also be called objects of perception. My goal is to reconstruct on Aristotle’s behalf a plausible account of why the commons can rightly be called objects of perception.

Jody Azzouni argues that we involuntarily experience certain physical items, certain products of human actions, and certain human actions themselves as having meaning-properties. We understand these items as possessing meaning or as having truth values. For example, a sign on a door reading "Drinks Inside" strikes native English speakers as referring to liquids in the room behind the door. The sign has a truth value--if no drinks are found in the room, the sign is misleading. Someone pointing in a direction (...) has the same effect: we experience her gesture as significant. Azzouni does not suggest that we don't recognize the expectations or intentions of speakers ; we do recognize that the person pointing in a certain direction intends for us to understand her gesture's significance. Nevertheless, Azzouni asserts that we experience that gesture as having significance independent of her intentions. The gesture is meaningful on its own. The same is true of language, both spoken and written. We experience the meanings of language artifacts as independent of their makers' intentions in the same way that we experience an object's shape as a property independent of the object's color. There is a distinctive phenomenology to the experience of understanding language, and Semantic Perception shows how this phenomenology can be brought to bear as evidence for and against competing theories of language. (shrink)

Significant attention has been paid to Berkeley's account of perception; however, the interpretations of Berkeley's account of perception by suggestion are either incomplete or mistaken. In this paper I begin by examining a common interpretation of suggestion, the 'Propositional Account'. I argue that the Propositional Account is inadequate and defend an alternative, non-propositional, account. I then address George Pitcher's objection that Berkeley's view of sense perception forces him to adopt a 'non-conciliatory' attitude towards common sense. (...) I argue that Pitcher's charge is no longer plausible once we recognize that Berkeley endorses the non-propositional sense of mediate perception. I close by urging that the non-propositional interpretation of Berkeley's account of mediate perception affords a greater appreciation of Berkeley's attempt to bring a philosophical account of sense perception in line with some key principles of common sense. While Berkeley's account of perception and physical objects permits physical objects to be immediately perceived by some of the senses, they are, most often, mediately perceived. But for Berkeley this is not a challenge to common sense since common sense requires only that we perceive objects by our senses and that they are, more or less, as we perceive them. Mediate perception by suggestion is, for Berkeley, as genuine a form of perception as immediate perception, and both are compatible with Berkeley's understanding of the demands of common sense. (shrink)

Conjunctive philosophical theories of visual experience accept the common kind principle, according to which perceptions and their introspectively indiscriminable hallucinatory counterparts should be considered as mental states or events of the same kind. In this paper I criticize two strategies that allegedly entail the adoption of the common kind principle. First, I will take into account some causal considerations linked to vision science that might lead us to endorse the local supervenience of the phenomenal character and the sameness (...) of experiential kind. Secondly, I discuss whether introspective indiscriminability is a sufficient criterion for the identity of phenomenal character and experiential kind. I point out that these strategies do not conclusively motivate the adoption of the common kind principle as it is often assumed. Key words: common factor, visual experience, introspection, local supervenience. (shrink)

The latest volume in the critically acclaimed and highly cited Attention and Performance series presents state of the art research from leading scientists in cognitive psychology and cognitive neuroscience describing the approaches being taken to understanding the mechanisms that allow us to negotiate and respond to the world around us.

In recent years, neurophysiological evidence has accumulated in favor of a common coding between perception and execution of action. We review findings from recent neuroimaging experiments in the action domain with three complementary perspectives: perception of action, covert action triggered by perception, and reproduction of perceived action (imitation). All studies point to the parietal cortex as a key region for body movement representation, both observed and performed.

“Perception is controlled hallucination,” according to proponents of predictive processing accounts of vision. I say they are right that something like this is a consequence of their view but wrong in how they have pursued the idea. The focus of my counterproposal is the causal theory of perception, which I develop in terms of a productive concept of causation. Cases of what otherwise seem like successful perception are instead mere veridical hallucination if predictive processing accounts are correct, (...) I argue, because of the role played within such accounts by absences, which cannot enter into productive causal relations. -/- I offer two arguments in support of the productive theory of perception. The first is loosely Kantian, focusing on the role that receptivity and spontaneity play in perception. The second focuses on what perception and hallucination have in common. I conclude with a series of objections and replies. (shrink)

The Theory of Event Coding (TEC) provides a preliminary account of the interaction between perception and action, which is consistent with several recent findings in the area of motor control. Significant issues require integration and elaboration, however; particularly, distractor interference, automatic motor corrections, internal models of action, and neuroanatomical bases for the link between perception and action.

I defend the thesis that at least some moral properties can be part of the contents of experience. I argue for this claim using a _contrast argument_, a type of argument commonly found in the literature on the philosophy of perception. I first appeal to psychological research on what I call emotionally empathetic dysfunctional individuals to establish a phenomenal contrast between EEDI s and normal individuals in some moral situations. I then argue that the best explanation for this contrast, (...) assuming non-skeptical moral realism, is that _badness_ is represented in the normal individual’s experience but not in the EEDI ’s experience. I consider and reject four alternative explanations of the contrast. (shrink)

Summary Although George Davie has identified the debate between Dugald Stewart and Francis Jeffrey as a crucial chapter in the history of Scottish philosophy, their exchange remains a neglected episode. Jeffrey questioned the role of the philosophy of mind in nineteenth-century culture and suggested that it lacked a truly scientific method of investigation. Although Jeffrey was not articulating a common perception, his criticism stimulated both Stewart's further exploration of our intellectual powers and his search for a new role (...) for the philosophy of mind. The result was a stronger emphasis on education in Stewart's thought and a shift away from Reid's formulation of common sense philosophy. (shrink)

In the nineteenth century James McCosh and many others identified the Common Sense school with “Scottish philosophy” tout court: the supposedly collective “Scottish” reply to Hume was the rejection of skepticism and Ideal Theory. This chapter addresses the anticipations of the Common Sense school and its broader place in the history of Scottish philosophy. The seventeenth-century Scottish philosophers reacted to Cartesian skepticism with epistemological views which anticipate Thomas Reid: direct realism and perception as a faculty of judgment. (...) Common sense-like views seem to have been a popular strategy against skepticism already before the Common Sense school, thus providing additional evidence for McCosh’s claim of the special role of common sense in the history of Scottish philosophy. (shrink)

This paper argues that a common form of representationalism has trouble accommodating empirical findings about visual space perception. Vision science tells us that the visual system systematically gives rise to different experiences of the same spatial property. This, combined with a naturalistic account of content, suggests that the same spatial property can have different veridical looks. I use this to argue that a common form of representationalism about spatial experience must be rejected. I conclude by considering alternatives (...) to this view. (shrink)

Philosophers and cognitive scientists of perception by custom have investigated individual sense modalities in relative isolation from each other. However, perceiving is, in a number of respects, multimodal. The traditional sense modalities should not be treated as explanatorily independent. Attention to the multimodal aspects of perception challenges common assumptions about the content and phenomenology of perception, and about the individuation and psychological nature of sense modalities. Multimodal perception thus presents a valuable opportunity for a case (...) study in mature interdisciplinary cognitive science. This chapter aims to raise these issues against the background of unimodal approaches in the study of perception. It presents some of the central empirical findings concerning multimodality, and it explains the philosophical implications of these findings. Foremost, it aims to encourage and open avenues for future research. (shrink)

In this 2004 book, Noah Lemos presents a strong defense of the common sense tradition, the view that we may take as data for philosophical inquiry many of the things we ordinarily think we know. He discusses the main features of that tradition as expounded by Thomas Reid, G. E. Moore and Roderick Chisholm. For a long time common sense philosophers have been subject to two main objections: that they fail to give any non-circular argument for the reliability (...) of memory and perception; and that they pick out instances of knowledge without knowing a criterion for knowledge. Lemos defends the appeal to what we ordinarily think we know in both epistemology and ethics and thus rejects the charge that common sense is dogmatic, unphilosophical or question-begging. Written in a clear and engaging style, this book will appeal to students and philosophers in epistemology and ethics. (shrink)

Susan Haack has argued that an account of perception based on that developed by Charles Peirce can overcome the false dichotomy between realist theories that downplay perception's interpretative character and irrealist theories that deny its directness. Haack believes that this dichotomy is overcome by Peirce's distinction between the perceptual judgment, the belief that accompanies a perceptual experience, and the percept, the phenomenal, interactive aspect of a perceptual experience. But I provide reasons for thinking that Haack's account of (...) class='Hi'>perception is inadequate. (shrink)

Object perception deploys a suite of perceptual capacities that constrains attention, guides reidentification, subserves recognition, and anchors demonstrative thought. Objects for perception—perceptual objects—are the targets of such capacities. Characterizing perceptual objects for multisensory perception faces two puzzles. First is the diversity of objects across sensory modalities. Second is the unity of multisensory perceptual objects. This paper resolves the puzzles. Objects for perception are structured mereologically complex individuals. Perceptual objects are items that bear perceptible features and have (...) perceptible parts arranged to form a unified whole. This circumscribes the targets of object perception where neutral talk concerning intentional objects and objects of perception cannot. Nonetheless, it is more permissive than identifying perceptual objects with material bodies, which excludes too much and leans too heavily on vision. The account thus is tailored to capture the role of objects in perception beyond vision: tactual, auditory, and olfactory objects are individuals with differing structures. Its flexibility also enables the account to accommodate shared objects for multisensory perception: multisensory perceptual objects are mereologically complex individuals with hybrid structure. For instance, one can bimodally perceive a common whole with parts accessible to one but not both modalities. Each sense provides a partial perspective on a complex whole that is perceptible through the coordinated use of multiple senses. Understanding perceptual objects as structured mereologically complex individuals thus provides a theoretically useful notion of an object for multisensory perception that resolves the puzzles of diversity and of unity. (shrink)

In the debate over the existence of composite objects, it is sometimes suggested that perceptual evidence justifies belief in composite objects. But it is almost never suggested that we are perceptually justified in believing in composite objects on the basis of the fact that the phenomenology of our perceptual experiences enables us to discriminate between situations where there are composite objects and situations where there are merely simples arranged composite object-wise. But while the thought that the phenomenology of our perceptual (...) experiences cannot enable us to discriminate between situations where there are composite objects and situations where there are merely simples arranged composite object-wise is commonly taken for granted, it requires some defence, both in light of its importance in shaping the debate and in light of its recently coming under attack by a prominent philosopher of perception. In this paper, I offer such a defence. (shrink)

This is a discussion of the main argument of Anna Marmodoro’s _Aristotle on Perceiving Objects_. Each of the book’s three larger thematic sections is briefly summarized and discussed: Aristotle’s metaphysics of powers, his theory of modally specific perception, and his theory of more complex perceptual content. It is argued that while Marmodoro’s argument for the thesis that Aristotle is a proponent of an ontology of pure causal powers is unsuccessful, her account of modally specific perception has the merit (...) of bringing out the explanatory potential of Aristotle’s basic account of change in interesting ways. Finally, an examination of her argument for the thesis that the so–called common sense generates complex perceptual content by actively unifying input from the five senses raises questions concerning the unity and structure of the book’s overall argument. (shrink)

Wang Yangming's ``this flower'' proposition from the Chuanxi lu(傳習錄) --- ``Before you look at these flowers, they and your mind are both in a state of silent vacancy; as you come to look at them, their colors at once show up clearly. From this you know that these flowers are not outside your mind'' --- has long been subject to two opposing misreadings: either assimilated to Berkeleyan subjective idealism, or treated as a mystical intuition beyond the reach of philosophical analysis. (...) This paper argues that both misreadings stem from a common error: interpreting the proposition as an ontological claim about the existence of flowers, thereby obscuring its genuine epistemological core, namely that the manifestation of perceptual objects depends on the mind's active generative activity rather than on a unidirectional projection from the external world onto the mind. Drawing on predictive coding theory, this paper argues for a systematic structural analogy between Wang Yangming's proposition and the predictive coding framework at the level of perceptual mechanism: the mind corresponds to the generative model; ``silent vacancy'' corresponds to the non-activation of the flower-specific prediction loop; sensory contact corresponds to the triggering of prediction error; and ``colors showing up clearly'' corresponds to the stabilization of perceptual representation upon prediction error minimization. The paper also explicitly examines the genuine differences between the two frameworks --- in particular, the fundamental divergence between the innate normativity of liangzhi and the fallible, learnable generative model --- and precisely delimits the scope of the proposed analogy. The central thesis is that Wang Yangming's ``this flower'' proposition describes a perceptual generative mechanism that is coherent and precise within the framework of contemporary cognitive science---a reading that displaces both the idealist and the mystical misreadings and recovers the proposition as a genuine contribution to the epistemology of perception, while pointing toward a structural convergence between two traditions whose ultimate significance remains an open philosophical question. (shrink)

The relation between motor control and action cognition – including action-related thoughts and action- related perception – has been subject to controversial discussions in the last three decades. During these decades, cognitive neuroscience has been increasingly confronted with a huge variety of different accounts trying to understand and explain the relation between these systems, their interdependencies and the mediating mechanisms by establishing notions such as ‘‘internal models”, ‘‘simulation” or ‘‘shared representation”. These accounts, however, include a large array of partly (...) overlapping, partly con- tradictory theories using similar terms for different mechanisms and different terms for similar mecha- nisms. In the absence of a systematic work-up and comparison, this array of accounts and theories leads to confusion in the field, duplication of experimental work, and unconnected parallelism of theory forma- tion within and between different disciplines. Here we provide a systematic comparison of current mod- els and prospective theories that deal with the relation between cognition, perception and motor control mechanisms. In a second step, we propose ‘‘grounded action cognition” as a comprehensive metatheoret- ical framework which defines different hypothetical possibilities of the relations between these domains, offers systematic insights into current models and theories and last but not least may help to increase comparability of empirical research in the domain of action and action cognition. (shrink)

이 글은 『영혼론』 3권 2장에서 제시되는 지각의 지각에 대한 아리스토텔레스의 논의를 다룬다. 이 내용은 아리스토텔레스의 의식 이론, 혹은 더 나아가 통각 이론을 재구성하는 데 가장 결정적인 텍스트로 간주되어 온 것이다. 이 글에서필자는 우선 아리스토텔레스의 논의의 구조를 분석한 다음, 지각의 지각이 어떤 능력에 의해 가능한가가 그의 관심사라는 전통적인 해석에 반대하는 캐스톤의 소위 '활동-해석'을 검토할 것이다. 그의 해석은 많은 후속 논의를 촉발한 흥미로운 제안을 담고 있기는 하지만, 궁극적으로는 텍스트의 기본 취지를 왜곡하고 있다는 것임이 드러날 것이다. 필자는 마지막 단락에서 지각의 지각을 공통감각의 작용으로 (...) 이해하는 해석을 소개하고, 정확히 공통감각의 어떤 측면이 지각의 지각과 밀접히 연관되어 있다고 볼 수 있는가에 관해서 하나의 생각을 제안할 것이다. 이 제안은 지각의 지각 능력이 지각의 비활성화에 대한 지각의 능력을 함축하며, 이것이 시간에대한 지각 능력과 밀접하게 연결되어 있다는 것이다. (shrink)

Augustine is commonly interpreted as endorsing an extramission theory of perception in _De quantitate animae_. A close examination of the text shows, instead, that he is committed to its rejection. The discussion ends with some remarks about what it takes for an account of perception to be an extramission theory and with a review of the strength of evidence for attributing the extramission theory to Augustine on the basis of his other works.

In the Asian context; contributed papers presented at the Asian Media Convention, held on Feb., 2-24, 1997, at New Delhi.

Visual perception is widely taken to present properties such as redness, roundness, and so on. This in turn might be thought to give rise to accuracy conditions for experience, and so content, regardless of which metaphysical view of perception one endorses. An influential version of this argument—Susanna Siegel’s ’Argument from Appearing’—aims to establish the existence of content as common ground between representational and relational views of perception. This goes against proponents of ‘austere’ relationalism who deny that (...) content plays a substantive role in philosophical explanations of conscious perceptual experience. Though Siegel’s argument purports to be neutral with respect to the metaphysics of perception, it relies upon an equivocation between the presentation of property-types and property-instances. Consequently, the argument begs the question against the austere relational view, and so fails to establish the desired conclusion. So while relationalists can and should allow that experiences have accuracy conditions, it does not follow from this that they have contents of any philosophically interesting or significant kind. (shrink)

Augustine is commonly interpreted as endorsing an extramission theory of perception in De quantitate animae. A close examination of the text shows, instead, that he is committed to its rejection. I end with some remarks about what it takes for an account of perception to be an extramission theory and with a review of the strength of evidence for attributing the extramission the- ory to Augustine on the basis of his other works.

On the face of it, Plato's treatment of aisthesis is decidedly ambiguous. Sometimes he treats aisthesis as a faculty which, though distinct from all rational capacities, is nonetheless capable of forming judgments such as ‘This stick is bent’ or ‘The same thing is hard and soft’. In the Theaetetus, however, he appears to separate aisthesis from judgment, isolating the former from all prepositional, identificatory and recognitional capacities. The dilemma is easily expressed: Is perception a judgmental or cognitive capacity, or (...) is it a non-judgmental, non-cognitive capacity? If the former, how does perception differ from belief? If the latter, is perception a faculty of the rational or irrational soul? Not surprisingly, the topic has received much scrutiny over the years. And equally unsurprisingly, the debate has turned as much on what it means for a capacity to be judgmental, cognitive, non-judgmental or non-cognitive, as on whether Plato says that it is of either kind. (shrink)

Common-sense learning and reasoning is a landmark of human-like intelligence. While classical-AI expert systems could convince at it in only narrow domains, contemporary deep-neural network models surprise with rapid performance improvements across many domains. At the same time, Bayesian Intuitive Theories have been influential in cognitive science as formal accounts of rational learning and reasoning. This paper targets Bayesian Intuitive Theories insofar as they rely on inferential-role semantics for conceptual content, to critically evaluate the promises and limits of this (...) influential approach at mediating a theory of human-like common sense. I argue that both insights from deep-learning models and from Bayesian intuitive theories (insofar as they rely on inferential-role semantics for conceptual content) are insufficient to capture what seems to be centrally important in human-like common-sense learning and reasoning: Not just its internal consistency, but also its inherent relationship to the outside world. To address this challenge, I propose a situated revision of Bayesian Intuitive Theories that preserves the epistemic standards of rational reasoning while grounding domain-structured semantic content in ecological perception. By focusing on the role of semantic structure in embodied intervention, this proposal shows why common-sense reasoning inherently relates to the outside world. Consequently, machine-learning models mediate a theory of human-like common-sense only if the inferences that they implement satisfy both semantic and (inter)active constraints. (shrink)

In this paper, I explore Augustine’s account of sense cognition in book 11 of De Trinitate. His discussion in this context focuses on two types of sensory state—what he calls “outer vision” and “inner vision,” respectively. His analysis of both types of state is designed to show that cognitive acts involving external and internal sense faculties are susceptible of a kind of trinitarian analysis. A common way to read De Trin. 11, is to interpret Augustine’s account of “outer” vision (...) as an analysis of sense perception and his account “inner” vision as an analysis of occurrent sensory memory and imagination. I argue against such a reading of De Trin. 11, however. Insofar as we take perception to be a phenomenally conscious mode of sensory awareness, outer vision cannot, I claim, be the equivalent of ordinary sense perception. For, on Augustine’s view, the deliverances of outer vision only reach the threshold of consciousness, when outer vision occurs in conjunction with inner vision. Hence, on my analysis, sense perception turns out to be a complex, hybrid state—one that involves both outer and inner vision. If I am right, acts of sense perception turn out not to be directly susceptible to trinitarian analysis. Even so, the account is interesting and nuanced for all that. (shrink)

This article presents a formal theory of robot perception as a form of abduction. The theory pins down the process whereby low‐level sensor data is transformed into a symbolic representation of the external world, drawing together aspects such as incompleteness, top‐down information flow, active perception, attention, and sensor fusion in a unifying framework. In addition, a number of themes are identified that are common to both the engineer concerned with developing a rigorous theory of perception, such (...) as the one on offer here, and the philosopher of mind who is exercised by questions relating to mental representation and intentionality. (shrink)

What is the relation between judgment and perception? Like most Kantian commentators, it will be maintained in this chapter that the function of synthesis, which is the unity of representations according to a rule (form or norm) is the common function of each. While perceptual syntheses via intuition are pre-linguistic, they are also proto-rational, and the understanding (Verstand) makes these syntheses conceptually and thus self-consciously explicit. Emphasis will be on the normative a priori understanding of synthetic unity. The (...) main difference between intuitions and concepts as forms is held to be the degree of reason or self-consciousness in each. (shrink)

Summary Coursework is an integral part of the GCSE framework, valued for its motivational qualities and its curricular validity. It is a common perception, widely reported in the national press and educational media, that coursework can be held at least partly accountable for differential performances at GCSE; coursework, it is argued, advantages girls. This article reports on an analysis of data arising from a project which offered an opportunity to study current and post-GCSE students’ perceptions of coursework. The (...) outcomes indicate that, when categorised by their relative levels of attainment, girls’ and boys’ perceptions show limited evidence of homogeneity. In other words, to suggest that girls’ and boys’ perceptions of coursework are a function of gender is a gross over-simplification. Other factors are at play and further, more specific and tailored research is essential if we are to understand how best to optimise the benefits that are claimed for coursework. (shrink)

Pain is commonly explained in terms of the perceptual activity of a distinct sensory modality, the function of which is to enable us to perceive actual or potential damage to the body. However, the characterization of pain experience in terms of a distinct sensory modality with such content is problematic. I argue that pain is better explained as occupying a different role in relation to perception: to indicate when the stimuli that are sensed in perceiving anything by means of (...) a sensory modality exceed a significant level of intensity. Viewing the system underlying pain experience as an integral and functionally integrated feature of all the senses provides a new perspective on the diverse forms of pain, what it is like to experience pain and the contrasting natures of pain and pleasure. (shrink)

It is common to argue that doing things ourselves, using our skills, is more “authentic” than allowing automation to do things for us. Yet what this means or why it is desirable is rarely explained. Here I discuss the value of skill in terms of the effect that the widespread automation of skills—from driving to cooking—would have on our perceptual lives. The phenomenological tradition has long held that to have a skill is not just to have a productive capability; (...) more than that, skill enables me to perceive elements and aspects of the world that are inaccessible to the unskilled. Automating my skills thus amounts to losing the ability to see and know certain “niches” of reality. By showing that skill, and the determinacy of perception that it brings us, is linked to some clearly recognizable human goods, I show that the potential loss of perceptual skill through automation is worthy of moral consideration. (shrink)

In order to secure the limits of the critical use of reason, and to succeed in the critique of speculative metaphysics, Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) had to present a full account of human cognitive experience. Perception in Kant’s Model of Experience is a detailed investigation of this aspect of Kant’s grand enterprise with a special focus: perception. The overarching goal is to understand this common phenomenon both in itself and as the key to understanding Kant’s views of experience. (...) In the process, the author argues against any such reading of Kant that puts too much emphasis on concepts and understanding in perception. This means that claims of the sort that intuitions cannot play their role without concepts, that sensibility cannot bring anything to cognition without being mediated through the functions of understanding, or that there is no such thing as concept-independent perception, are shown to be either plainly false or misleading at best. Together with the contemporary topics examined by the end of the book, the findings suggest how the role of conceptual thinking in human cognition has been exaggerated partly because of a misplaced interpretation of Kant, which not only makes perception far more intellectual in character than what was intended by Kant himself, but distorts Kant’s account of cognition by overlooking what there is at the heart of his critical philosophy: the revaluation of sensible cognition. (shrink)

Common sense philosophy often resolves the threat of skepticism by appeal to epistemic realism. Reidian common sense, for instance, establishes that perception allows us to form a veridical conception of external objects from information delivered by the senses. Based on an eighteenth-century English translation of his work, some scholars have assumed that Buffier similarly relies upon common sense to defend epistemic realism. Through a comparative analysis of Reid and Buffier, this chapter shows that, for the latter, (...) common sense does not resolve external world skepticism by appealing to the metaphysical underpinnings of external objects. Instead, anticipating elements of Hume’s philosophy, Buffier argues that universal agreement concerning the existence of external objects based on the deliverances of the senses cannot be used to justify claims about their metaphysical status. His understanding of common sense is therefore distinct from Reid’s because it responds to skepticism by appealing to the recognition of the limits of sensation. This analysis thereby reveals that Buffier’s position is clearly anti-realist. (shrink)