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			{{Short description\|Branch of philosophy}}
	The '''philosophy of perception''' concerns how mental processes and ] depend on the world internal and external to the perceiver.
			]]]
	Our ] of the external world begins with the ], which lead us to generate ] ] representing the world around us, within a mental framework relating new concepts to preexisting ones. Perception leads to a person's view of the world, so its study may be important for better understanding ], ], ] — even ].
			]

			The '''philosophy of perception''' is concerned with the nature of ] and the status of ], in particular how they relate to beliefs about, or knowledge of, the world.<ref name="Bonjour">cf. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/perception-episprob/ BonJour, Laurence (2007): "Epistemological Problems of Perception." ''Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', accessed 1.9.2010.</ref> Any explicit account of perception requires a commitment to one of a variety of ] or ] views. Philosophers distinguish ] accounts, which assume that perceptions of objects, and ] or ]s about them, are aspects of an individual's mind, and ] accounts, which state that they constitute real aspects of the world external to the individual.<ref name="Bonjour" />{{Failed verification\|date=April 2020}} The position of ]—the 'everyday' impression of physical objects constituting what is perceived—is to some extent contradicted by the occurrence of perceptual illusions and hallucinations<ref>cf. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/perception-problem/ Crane, Tim (2005): "The Problem of Perception." ''Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', accessed 1.9.2010; Drestske, Fred (1999): "Perception." In: Robert Audi, ''The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy'', Second Edition, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Cambridge University Press, pp. 654–658, here p. 656.</ref> and the relativity of perceptual experience<ref name="Bonjour" /> as well as certain insights in science.<ref>cf. ] (2006): Perception. In: Sahotra Sarkar/Jessica Pfeifer (Eds.), ''The Philosophy of Science: An Encyclopedia'', New York: Routledge, pp. 545–550, here p. 546 ff.</ref> ] conceptions include ] and ]. ] conceptions include ] and ].<ref name="Bonjour" /> Recent philosophical work have expanded on the philosophical features of perception by going beyond the single paradigm of vision (for instance, by investigating the uniqueness of olfaction<ref>{{cite book \|author1=Ann-Sophie Barwich \|author-link=Ann-Sophie Barwich \|title=Smellosophy: What the Nose tells the Mind \|date=2020 \|publisher=Harvard University Press \|isbn=9780674983694 \|pages=384 \|url=https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674983694}}</ref>).
	While ] concluded that the question "Do I exist?" can only be answered in the affirmative ('']''), ] ] suggests that self-perception is an illusion of the ego, and cannot be trusted to decide what is in fact '']''. Such questions remain: Do our perceptions allow us to experience the world as it "really is?" Can we ever know another point of view in the way we know our own?

	==Categories of perception==

	We can categorize perception as ''internal'' or ''external''.
	* Internal perception (]) tells us what's going on in our bodies. We can sense where our limbs are, whether we're sitting or standing; we can also sense whether we are hungry, or tired, and so forth.
	* External or ''Sensory'' perception (]), tells us about the world outside our bodies. Using our senses of sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste, we discover colors, sounds, textures, etc. of the world at large. There is a growing body of knowledge of the mechanics of sensory processes in ].

	The philosophy of perception is mainly concerned with exteroception. When philosophers use the word ''perception'' they usually mean exteroception, and the word is used in that sense everywhere.

	==Scientific accounts of perception==		==Scientific accounts of perception==

			An object at some distance from an observer will reflect light in all directions, some of which will fall upon the corneae of the ], where it will be focussed upon each ], forming an image. The disparity between the electrical output of these two slightly different images is resolved either at the level of the ] nucleus or in a part of the ] called 'V1'. The resolved data is further processed in the visual cortex where some areas have specialised functions, for instance area V5 is involved in the modelling of motion and V4 in adding colour. The resulting single image that subjects report as their experience is called a 'percept'. Studies involving rapidly changing scenes show the percept derives from numerous processes that involve time delays.<ref>see Moutoussis and Zeki (1997)</ref> Recent ] studies <ref>{{Cite journal\|title=Brain decoding: Reading minds\|year=2013 \|doi=10.1038/502428a \|last1=Smith \|first1=Kerri \|journal=Nature \|volume=502 \|issue=7472 \|pages=428–430 \|pmid=24153277 \|s2cid=4452222 \|doi-access=free \|bibcode=2013Natur.502..428S }}</ref> show that dreams, imaginings and perceptions of things such as faces are accompanied by activity in many of the same areas of brain as are involved with physical sight. Imagery that originates from the senses and internally generated imagery may have a shared ] at higher levels of cortical processing.
	The science of perception is concerned with how events are observed and interpreted. An event may be the occurrence of an object at some distance from an observer. According to the scientific account this object will reflect light from the sun in all directions. Some of this reflected light from a particular, unique point on the object will fall all over the corneas of the ]s and the combined ]/lens system of the eyes will divert the light to two points, one on each ]. The pattern of points of light on each retina forms an image. This process also occurs in the case of silouettes where the pattern of absence of points of light forms an image. The overall effect is to encode position data on a stream of photons and to transfer this encoding onto a pattern on the retinas. The patterns on the retinas are the only optical images found in perception, prior to the retinas, light is arranged as a fog of photons going in all directions.

			] is analyzed in term of pressure waves sensed by the ] in the ear. Data from the eyes and ears is combined to form a 'bound' percept. The problem of how this is produced, known as the ].
	The images on the two retinas are slightly different and the disparity between the electrical outputs from these is resolved either at the level of the ] nucleus or in a part of the ] called 'V1'. The resolved data is further processed in the visual cortex where some areas have more specialised functions, for instance area V5 is involved in the modelling of motion and V4 in adding colour. The resulting single image that subjects report as their experience is called a 'percept'. Studies involving rapidly changing scenes show that the percept derives from numerous processes that each involve time delays (see Moutoussis and Zeki (1997)).

			Perception is analyzed as a ] in which ] is used to transfer information into the mind where it is related to other information. Some psychologists propose that this processing gives rise to particular mental states (]) whilst others envisage a direct path back into the external world in the form of action (radical ]). Behaviourists such as ] and ] have proposed that perception acts largely as a process between a stimulus and a response but have noted that ]'s "] of the brain" still seems to exist. "The objection to inner states is not that they do not exist, but that they are not relevant in a functional analysis".<ref>Skinner 1953</ref> This view, in which experience is thought to be an incidental by-product of information processing, is known as ].
	Recent ] studies show that dreams, imaginings and perceptions of similar things such as faces are accompanied by activity in many of the same areas of brain. It seems that imagery that originates from the senses and internally generated imagery may have a shared ] at higher levels of cortical processing.

			Contrary to the behaviouralist approach to understanding the elements of cognitive processes, ] sought to understand their organization as a whole, studying perception as a process of ].
	If an object is also a source of sound this is transmitted as pressure waves that are sensed by the cochlear in the ear. If the observer is blindfolded it is difficult to locate the exact source of sound waves, if the blindfold is removed the sound can usually be located at the source. The data from the eyes and the ears is combined to form a 'bound' percept. The problem of how the bound percept is produced is known as the ] and is the subject of considerable study. The binding problem is also a question of how different aspects of a single sense (say, color and contour in vision) are bound to the same object when they are processed by spatially different areas of the brain.

			==Problem of Perception==
	==Philosophical ideas about perception==
			Important philosophical problems derive from the ] of perception—how we can gain knowledge via perception—such as the question of the nature of ].<ref>Chalmers DJ. (1995) "Facing up to the hard problem of consciousness." ''Journal of Consciousness Studies'' 2, 3, 200–219</ref> Within the biological study of perception naive realism is unusable.<ref>Smythies J. (2003) "Space, time and consciousness." ''Journal of Consciousness Studies'' 10, 3, 47–64.</ref> However, outside biology modified forms of naive realism are defended. ], the eighteenth-century founder of the ], formulated the idea that sensation was composed of a set of data transfers but also declared that there is still a direct connection between perception and the world. This idea, called direct realism, has again become popular in recent years with the rise of ].
	{{Unreferenced\|date=December 2007\|article's section called "Philosophical ideas about perception"}}
	{{Cleanup-section\|date=December 2007}}

			The succession of data transfers involved in perception suggests that ] are somehow available to a perceiving subject that is the substrate of the percept. Indirect realism, the view held by ] and ], proposes that we can only be aware of ]s of objects. However, this may imply an infinite regress (a perceiver within a perceiver within a perceiver...), though a finite regress is perfectly possible.<ref>Edwards JC. (2008) "Are our spaces made of words?" ''Journal of Consciousness Studies'' 15, 1, 63–83.</ref> It also assumes that perception is entirely due to data transfer and information processing, an argument that can be avoided by proposing that the percept does not depend wholly upon the transfer and rearrangement of data. This still involves basic ontological issues of the sort raised by ]<ref>Woolhouse RS and Franks R. (1998) ''GW Leibniz, Philosophical Texts'', Oxford University Press.</ref> Locke, ], ] and others, which remain outstanding particularly in relation to the ], the question of how different perceptions (e.g. color and contour in vision) are "bound" to the same object when they are processed by separate areas of the brain.
	Historically, the most important philosophical problems posed by perception concerned the epistemology of perception--the question of how we can gain knowledge via perception. However, the problems raised by perception also touch on other fields of philosophy--the nature of ] is an important topic in the philosophy of mind<ref> Chalmers DJ. (1995) Facing up to the hard problem of consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Studies 2, 3, 200-219</ref> Moreover, any fully explicit account of perception requires a commitment to one of a variety of ontological (metaphysical) viewpoints on a spectrum of ], ], and ].

			Indirect realism (representational views) provides an account of issues such as perceptual contents,<ref>Siegel, S. (2011)."The Contents of Perception", ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' (Winter 2011 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = <http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2011/entries/perception-contents/>.</ref><ref>Siegel, S.: The Contents of Visual Experience. New York: Oxford University Press. 2010</ref> ], dreams, imaginings, ], illusions, the resolution of ], the resolution of ], the modelling of motion that allows us to watch TV, the sensations that result from direct brain stimulation, the update of the mental image by saccades of the eyes and the referral of events backwards in time. Direct realists must either argue that these experiences do not occur or else refuse to define them as perceptions.
	The most common belief about perception, probably universal in childhood, is ], in which people believe that what they perceive are things in themselves. Many people who have not studied biology carry this belief into adult life. In this form, naive realism is not strictly a theory but rather an axiom on which all thought and use of language is based. In a sense it is transparently true. If I see a chair it is a chair that I see. When biologists say that this is mistaken, there has been a subtle change in the meaning of the word see (or perceive) that is necessary for a scientific account of how the brain works but unfortunately is not made clear by new terminology. Cross purpose arguments can result. That childhood naive realism is indeed a belief that amounts to an implicit theory is shown by the common humbling experience of arguing its validity as a first year biology student only to be forced to admit that one's position is self-contradictory even without the results of experiments on perception that demonstrate its absurdity. Within the biological study of perception naive realism is unusable<ref> Smythies J. (2003) Space, time and consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Studies 10, 3, 47-64. </ref>. However, outside biology modified forms of naive realism are defended. ] in the eighteenth century realised that sensation was composed of a set of data transfers but declared that these were in some way transparent so that there is a direct connection between perception and the world. This idea is called ] and has become popular in recent years with the rise of ]. Direct realism does not clearly specify the nature of the bit of the world that is an object in perception, especially in cases where the object is something like a silhouette.

			Idealism holds that reality is limited to mental qualities while skepticism challenges our ability to know anything outside our minds. One of the most influential proponents of idealism was ] who maintained that everything was mind or dependent upon mind. Berkeley's idealism has two main strands, ] in which physical events are viewed as a special kind of mental event and ]. ] is probably the most influential proponent of skepticism.
	The succession of data transfers that are involved in perception suggests that somewhere in the brain there is a final set of events, in which ] are somehow available to a perceiving subject, that is the substrate of the percept. Perception would then be some form of brain activity and somehow some part of the brain would be able to perceive signals provided by some other (or the same??) part of the brain. This concept is known as ] or ]. In indirect realism it is held that we can only be aware of external objects by being aware of representations of objects. This idea was held by ] and ]. The common argument against indirect realism is that it implies a ] with an infinite regress (a perceiver within a perceiver within a perceiver...). However, as long as each stage of sensory processing achieves a different task a finite regress is perfectly possible <ref> Edwards JC. (2008) Are our spaces made of words? Journal of Consciousness Studies 15, 1, 63-83. </ref>. The above argument against indirect realism has also been challenged on the grounds that it assumes that perception is entirely due to data transfer and classical information processing (see ]). It is suggested that the argument can be avoided by proposing that the percept is a phenomenon that does not depend wholly upon the transfer and rearrangement of data. The real problem here probably relates not so much to issues of infinite regress as to basic ontological issues of the sort raised by ] <ref> Woolhouse RS and Franks R. (1998) GW Leibniz, Philosophical Texts, Oxford University Press. </ref> Locke, ], ] and others, which fall beyond the scope of this account.

			A fourth theory of perception in opposition to naive realism, ], attempts to find a middle path between direct realist and indirect realist theories, positing that ] is a process of dynamic interplay between an organism's sensory-motor capabilities and the environment it brings forth.<ref>p 206, Varela F, Thompson E, Rosch E (1991) "The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience" MIT Press</ref> Instead of seeing perception as a passive process determined entirely by the features of an independently existing world, enactivism suggests that organism and environment are structurally coupled and co-determining. The theory was first formalized by Francisco Varela, Evan Thompson, and Eleanor Rosch in "The Embodied Mind".<ref>Varela F, Thompson E, Rosch E (1991) "The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience" MIT Press</ref>
	Direct realism and indirect realism are known as 'realist' theories of perception because they hold that there is a world external to the mind. Direct realism holds that the representation of an object is located next to, or is even part of, the actual physical object whereas indirect realism holds that the representation of an object is brain activity. Direct realism proposes some as yet unknown direct connection between external representations and the mind whilst indirect realism requires the resolution of ontological issues relating to fundamental physics which remain outstanding, particularly in relation to the ]. Indirect realism provides an account of issues such as:

			==Spatial representation==
	], dreams, imaginings, ], illusions, the resolution of ], the resolution of ], the modelling of motion that allows us to watch TV, the sensations that result from direct brain stimulation, the update of the mental image by saccades of the eyes and the referral of events backwards in time
			An aspect of perception that is common to both realists and anti-realists is the idea of mental or ]. ] concluded that things appear extended because they have attributes of colour and solidity. A popular modern philosophical view is that the brain cannot contain images so our sense of space must be due to the actual space occupied by physical things. However, as René Descartes noticed, perceptual space has a projective geometry, things within it appear as if they are viewed from a point. The phenomenon of ] was closely studied by artists and architects in the Renaissance, who relied mainly on the 11th century polymath, ] (Ibn al-Haytham), who affirmed the visibility of perceptual space in geometric structuring projections.<ref>{{cite journal\|title=La perception de la profondeur: Alhazen, Berkeley et Merleau-Ponty\|author=Nader El-Bizri\|journal=Oriens-Occidens, CNRS\|volume=5\|year=2004\|publisher=]\|pages=171–184\|author-link=Nader El-Bizri}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal\|title=In Defence of the Sovereignty of Philosophy: al-Baghdadi's Critique of Ibn al-Haytham's Geometrisation of Place\|author=Nader El-Bizri\|journal=]\|volume=17\|year=2007\|publisher=]\|pages=57–80\|doi=10.1017/s0957423907000367\|s2cid=170960993 }}</ref> Mathematicians now know of many types of projective geometry such as complex ] that might describe the layout of things in perception (see Peters (2000)) and it has also emerged that parts of the brain contain patterns of electrical activity that correspond closely to the layout of the retinal image (this is known as ]). How or whether these become conscious experience is still unknown (see McGinn (1995)).

			==Beyond spatial representation==
	whereas direct realism has to argue either that these experiences do not occur or avoids the problem by defining perception as only those experiences that are consistent with direct realism.
			Traditionally, the philosophical investigation of perception has focused on the sense of vision as the paradigm of sensory perception.<ref>{{cite book \|last1= Barwich \|first1=Ann-Sophie \|date=2020 \|title=Smellosophy: What the Nose tells the Mind \|publisher=Harvard University Press \|page=310 \|isbn=9780674983694}}</ref> However, studies on the other sensory modalities, such as the sense of smell, can challenge what we consider characteristic or essential features of perception. Take olfaction as an example. Spatial representation relies on a "mapping" paradigm that maps the spatial structures of the stimuli onto discrete neural structures and representations.<ref>{{Cite web\|date=2020-12-11\|title=Nautilus {{!}} Science Connected\|url=http://nautil.us/\|access-date=2020-12-11\|website=Nautilus}}</ref> However, olfactory science has shown us that perception is also a matter of associative learning, observational refinement, and a decision-making process that is context-dependent. One of the consequences of these discoveries on the philosophy of perception is that common perceptual effects such as conceptual imagery turn more on the neural architecture and its development than the topology of the stimulus itself.<ref>{{cite book \|last1= Barwich \|first1=Ann-Sophie \|date=2020 \|title=Smellosophy: What the Nose tells the Mind \|publisher=Harvard University Press \|page=311 \|isbn=9780674983694}}</ref>

			==See also==
	Apart from the realist theories of perception there are also anti-realist theories. There are two varieties of anti-realism: ] and ]. Idealism holds that reality is limited to mental qualities, while skepticism challenges our ability to gain knowledge of any reality external to our mind. One of the most influential proponents of idealism was ] who maintained that everything was mind or dependent upon mind.
			{{div col\|colwidth=15em}}
	Berkeley's idealism has two main strands, ] in which physical events are viewed as a special kind of mental event and ]. ] is probably the most influential proponent of skepticism.
			* ]

	A third theory of perception attempts to find a middle path between realist and anti-realist theories. Called enactivism, the theory posits that reality arises as a result of the dynamic interplay between an organism's sensorimotor capabilities and its environment. Instead of seeing perception as a passive process determined entirely by the features of an independently existing world, enactivism suggests that organism and environment are structurally coupled and codetermining. The theory was first formalized by Francisco Varela, Evan Thompson, and Eleanor Rosch in "The Embodied Mind" <ref>Varela F, Thompson E, Rosch E (1991) "The Embodied Mind : Cognitive Science and Human Experience" MIT Press</ref>.

	==Cognitive processing and epiphenomenalism==

	Perception is sometimes referred to as a ] in which ] is used to transfer information from the world into the brain and mind where it is further processed and related to other information. Some philosophers and psychologists propose that this processing gives rise to particular mental states (]) whilst others envisage a direct path back into the external world in the form of action (radical ]).

	Many eminent behaviourists such as ] and ] have proposed that perception acts largely as a process between a stimulus and a response but despite this have noted that Ryle's "ghost in the machine" of the brain still seems to exist. As Skinner wrote:

	"The objection to inner states is not that they do not exist, but that they are not relevant in a functional analysis" Skinner 1953.

	This view, in which experience is thought to be an incidental by-product of information processing, is known as ].

	==Perceptual space==

	Another aspect of perception that is common to both realists and anti-realists is the idea of mental or perceptual space. ] considers this at some length and concludes that things appear extended because they have the attributes of colour and solidity. A popular modern philosophical view is that the brain cannot contain images so our sense of space must be due to the actual space occupied by physical things. However, as René Descartes noticed, perceptual space has a projective geometry, things within it appear as if they are viewed from a point and are not simply objects arranged in 3D. Mathematicians now know of many types of projective geometry such as complex ] that might describe the layout of things in perception (see Peters (2000)). It is also known that many parts of the brain contain patterns of electrical activity that correspond closely to the layout of the retinal image (this is known as ]). There are indeed images in the brain but how or whether these become conscious experience is a mystery (see McGinn (1995)).

	== See also ==
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			==Notes==
			{{Reflist}}

	==References==		==References==
			* {{cite SEP \|url-id=perception-episprob \|title=Epistemological Problems of Perception \|first=L. \|last=BonJour \|date=2007}}
	<references/>
			* {{cite SEP \|url-id=perception-problem \|title=The Problem of Perception \|first=Tim \|last=Crane \|first2=C. \|last2=French \|date=2015}}
			* {{cite IEP \|url-id=cog-pene \|title=Cognitive Penetrability of Perception and Epistemic Justification \|first=Christos \|last=Georgakakis \|first2=Luca \| last2= Moretti}}
			* {{cite SEP \|url-id=merleau-ponty \|title=Maurice Merleau-Ponty \|date=2004 \|last1=Flynn \|first1=Bernard}}
			* {{cite IEP \|url-id=epis-per \|title=Epistemology of Perception \|first=Daniel \|last=O'Brien}}
			* {{cite IEP \|url-id=perc-obj \|title=Objects of Perception \|first=Daniel \|last=O'Brien}}
			* {{cite SEP\| last=Siegel \|first=Susanna \|date=2005 \|title=The Contents of Perception\| url-id=perception-contents}}

	==~~Other references and further~~ reading==		==Further reading==

	{{Nofootnotes\|date=February 2008}}
			===Historical===
	*Chalmers DJ. (1995) Facing up to the hard problem of consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Studies 2, 3, 200-219.
			* Descartes, Rene (1641). ''Meditations on First Philosophy''.
	*
			* Hume, David (1739–40). ''A Treatise of Human Nature: Being An Attempt to Introduce the Experimental Method of Reasoning Into Moral Subjects''.
	*
			* Kant, Immanuel (1781). ''Critique of Pure Reason''. Norman Kemp Smith (trans.) with preface by ], Palgrave Macmillan.
	*
			* Locke, John (1689). ''An Essay Concerning Human Understanding''.
	*
			* Russell, Bertrand (1912). ''The Problems of Philosophy'', London: Williams and Norgate; New York: Henry Holt and Company.
	* ]

	* BonJour, Laurence (2001). "Epistemological Problems of Perception," ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Edward Zalta (ed.).
			===Contemporary===
			{{Wikibooks\|Consciousness Studies}}
	* Burge, Tyler (1991). "Vision and Intentional Content," in E. LePore and R. Van Gulick (eds.) ''John Searle and his Critics'', Oxford: Blackwell.		* Burge, Tyler (1991). "Vision and Intentional Content," in E. LePore and R. Van Gulick (eds.) ''John Searle and his Critics'', Oxford: Blackwell.
			* Chalmers DJ. (1995) "Facing up to the hard problem of consciousness." ''Journal of Consciousness Studies'' 2, 3, 200–219.
	* Crane, Tim (2005). "The Problem of Perception," ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Edward Zalta (ed.).
	* Descartes, Rene (1641). ''Meditations on First Philosophy''.
	* Dretske, Fred (1981). ''Knowledge and the Flow of Information'', Oxford: Blackwell.		* Dretske, Fred (1981). ''Knowledge and the Flow of Information'', Oxford: Blackwell.
	* Evans, Gareth (1982). ''The Varieties of Reference'', Oxford: Clarendon Press.		* Evans, Gareth (1982). ''The Varieties of Reference'', Oxford: Clarendon Press.
			* McDowell, John, (1982). "Criteria, Defeasibility, and Knowledge," ''Proceedings of the British Academy'', pp. 455–79.
	* Flynn, Bernard (2004). "Maurice Merleau-Ponty," ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Edward Zalta (ed.).
			* McDowell, John, (1994). ''Mind and World'', Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
	* Hume, David (1739-40). ''A Treatise of Human Nature: Being An Attempt to Introduce the Experimental Method of Reasoning Into Moral Subjects''.
			* McGinn, Colin (1995). "Consciousness and Space," In ''Conscious Experience'', Thomas Metzinger (ed.), Imprint Academic.
	* Kant, Immanuel (1781). ''Critique of Pure Reason''. Norman Kemp Smith (trans.) with preface by Howard Caygill, Palgrave Macmillan.
			* Mead, George Herbert (1938). "Mediate Factors in Perception," Essay 8 in ''The Philosophy of the Act'', Charles W. Morris with John M. Brewster, Albert M. Dunham and David Miller (eds.), Chicago: University of Chicago, pp. 125–139.
	* Lacewing, Michael (unpublished). "Phenomenalism."
			* Moutoussis, K. and Zeki, S. (1997). "A Direct Demonstration of Perceptual Asynchrony in Vision," ''Proceedings of the Royal Society of London'', Series B: Biological Sciences, 264, pp. 393–399.
	* Locke, John (1689). ''An Essay Concerning Human Understanding''.
			* Noe, Alva/Thompson, Evan T.: Vision and Mind: Selected Readings in the Philosophy of Perception, Cambridge: MIT Press, 2002.
	* McCreery, Charles (2006). "Perception and Hallucination: the Case for Continuity." ''Philosophical Paper No. 2006-1''. Oxford: Oxford Forum.
	* McDowell, John, (1982). "Criteria, Defeasibility, and Knowledge," ''Proceedings of the British Academy'', pp. 455–79.
	* McDowell, John, (1994). ''Mind and World'', Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
	* McGinn, Colin (1995). "Consciousness and Space," In ''Conscious Experience'', Thomas Metzinger (ed.), Imprint Academic.
	* Mead, George Herbert (1938). "Mediate Factors in Perception," Essay 8 in ''The Philosophy of the Act'', Charles W. Morris with John M. Brewster, Albert M. Dunham and David Miller (eds.), Chicago: University of Chicago, pp. 125-139.
	* Moutoussis, K. and Zeki, S. (1997). "A Direct Demonstration of Perceptual Asynchrony in Vision," ''Proceedings of the Royal Society of London'', Series B: Biological Sciences, 264, pp. 393-399.
	* Peacocke, Christopher (1983). ''Sense and Content'', Oxford: Oxford University Press.		* Peacocke, Christopher (1983). ''Sense and Content'', Oxford: Oxford University Press.
	* Peters, G. (2000). "Theories of Three-Dimensional Object Perception - A Survey," Recent Research Developments in Pattern Recognition, Transworld Research Network.
	* Putnam, Hilary (1999). ''The Threefold Cord'', New York: Columbia University Press.		* Putnam, Hilary (1999). ''The Threefold Cord'', New York: Columbia University Press.
			* Shoemaker, Sydney (1990). "Qualities and Qualia: What's in the Mind?" ''Philosophy and Phenomenological Research'' 50, Supplement, pp. 109–31.
	* Read, Czerne (unpublished). "Dreaming in Color."
			* Tong, Frank (2003). "Primary Visual Cortex and Visual Awareness," Nature Reviews, ''Neuroscience'', Vol 4, 219.
	* Russell, Bertrand (1912). ''The Problems of Philosophy'', London: Williams and Norgate; New York: Henry Holt and Company.
			* Tye, Michael (2000). ''Consciousness, Color and Content'', Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press.
	* Shoemaker, Sydney (1990). "Qualities and Qualia: What's in the Mind?" ''Philosophy and Phenomenological Research'' 50, Supplement, pp. 109–31.
	* Siegel, Susanna (2005). "The Contents of Perception," ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', Edward Zalta (ed.).
	* Tong, Frank (2003). "Primary Visual Cortex and Visual Awareness," Nature Reviews, ''Neuroscience'', Vol 4, 219.
	* Tye, Michael (2000). ''Consciousness, Color and Content'', Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
	*Infoactivity
	{{Philosophy topics}}

			{{Epistemology}}
	{{philosophy of mind}}		{{philosophy of mind}}
			{{Authority control}}
	{{philosophy of science}}

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Latest revision as of 17:33, 21 November 2024

Branch of philosophy

The philosophy of perception is concerned with the nature of perceptual experience and the status of perceptual data, in particular how they relate to beliefs about, or knowledge of, the world. Any explicit account of perception requires a commitment to one of a variety of ontological or metaphysical views. Philosophers distinguish internalist accounts, which assume that perceptions of objects, and knowledge or beliefs about them, are aspects of an individual's mind, and externalist accounts, which state that they constitute real aspects of the world external to the individual. The position of naïve realism—the 'everyday' impression of physical objects constituting what is perceived—is to some extent contradicted by the occurrence of perceptual illusions and hallucinations and the relativity of perceptual experience as well as certain insights in science. Realist conceptions include phenomenalism and direct and indirect realism. Anti-realist conceptions include idealism and skepticism. Recent philosophical work have expanded on the philosophical features of perception by going beyond the single paradigm of vision (for instance, by investigating the uniqueness of olfaction).

Scientific accounts of perception

An object at some distance from an observer will reflect light in all directions, some of which will fall upon the corneae of the eyes, where it will be focussed upon each retina, forming an image. The disparity between the electrical output of these two slightly different images is resolved either at the level of the lateral geniculate nucleus or in a part of the visual cortex called 'V1'. The resolved data is further processed in the visual cortex where some areas have specialised functions, for instance area V5 is involved in the modelling of motion and V4 in adding colour. The resulting single image that subjects report as their experience is called a 'percept'. Studies involving rapidly changing scenes show the percept derives from numerous processes that involve time delays. Recent fMRI studies show that dreams, imaginings and perceptions of things such as faces are accompanied by activity in many of the same areas of brain as are involved with physical sight. Imagery that originates from the senses and internally generated imagery may have a shared ontology at higher levels of cortical processing.

Sound is analyzed in term of pressure waves sensed by the cochlea in the ear. Data from the eyes and ears is combined to form a 'bound' percept. The problem of how this is produced, known as the binding problem.

Perception is analyzed as a cognitive process in which information processing is used to transfer information into the mind where it is related to other information. Some psychologists propose that this processing gives rise to particular mental states (cognitivism) whilst others envisage a direct path back into the external world in the form of action (radical behaviourism). Behaviourists such as John B. Watson and B.F. Skinner have proposed that perception acts largely as a process between a stimulus and a response but have noted that Gilbert Ryle's "ghost in the machine of the brain" still seems to exist. "The objection to inner states is not that they do not exist, but that they are not relevant in a functional analysis". This view, in which experience is thought to be an incidental by-product of information processing, is known as epiphenomenalism.

Contrary to the behaviouralist approach to understanding the elements of cognitive processes, gestalt psychology sought to understand their organization as a whole, studying perception as a process of figure and ground.

Problem of Perception

Important philosophical problems derive from the epistemology of perception—how we can gain knowledge via perception—such as the question of the nature of qualia. Within the biological study of perception naive realism is unusable. However, outside biology modified forms of naive realism are defended. Thomas Reid, the eighteenth-century founder of the Scottish School of Common Sense, formulated the idea that sensation was composed of a set of data transfers but also declared that there is still a direct connection between perception and the world. This idea, called direct realism, has again become popular in recent years with the rise of postmodernism.

The succession of data transfers involved in perception suggests that sense data are somehow available to a perceiving subject that is the substrate of the percept. Indirect realism, the view held by John Locke and Nicolas Malebranche, proposes that we can only be aware of mental representations of objects. However, this may imply an infinite regress (a perceiver within a perceiver within a perceiver...), though a finite regress is perfectly possible. It also assumes that perception is entirely due to data transfer and information processing, an argument that can be avoided by proposing that the percept does not depend wholly upon the transfer and rearrangement of data. This still involves basic ontological issues of the sort raised by Leibniz Locke, Hume, Whitehead and others, which remain outstanding particularly in relation to the binding problem, the question of how different perceptions (e.g. color and contour in vision) are "bound" to the same object when they are processed by separate areas of the brain.

Indirect realism (representational views) provides an account of issues such as perceptual contents, qualia, dreams, imaginings, hallucinations, illusions, the resolution of binocular rivalry, the resolution of multistable perception, the modelling of motion that allows us to watch TV, the sensations that result from direct brain stimulation, the update of the mental image by saccades of the eyes and the referral of events backwards in time. Direct realists must either argue that these experiences do not occur or else refuse to define them as perceptions.

Idealism holds that reality is limited to mental qualities while skepticism challenges our ability to know anything outside our minds. One of the most influential proponents of idealism was George Berkeley who maintained that everything was mind or dependent upon mind. Berkeley's idealism has two main strands, phenomenalism in which physical events are viewed as a special kind of mental event and subjective idealism. David Hume is probably the most influential proponent of skepticism.

A fourth theory of perception in opposition to naive realism, enactivism, attempts to find a middle path between direct realist and indirect realist theories, positing that cognition is a process of dynamic interplay between an organism's sensory-motor capabilities and the environment it brings forth. Instead of seeing perception as a passive process determined entirely by the features of an independently existing world, enactivism suggests that organism and environment are structurally coupled and co-determining. The theory was first formalized by Francisco Varela, Evan Thompson, and Eleanor Rosch in "The Embodied Mind".

Spatial representation

An aspect of perception that is common to both realists and anti-realists is the idea of mental or perceptual space. David Hume concluded that things appear extended because they have attributes of colour and solidity. A popular modern philosophical view is that the brain cannot contain images so our sense of space must be due to the actual space occupied by physical things. However, as René Descartes noticed, perceptual space has a projective geometry, things within it appear as if they are viewed from a point. The phenomenon of perspective was closely studied by artists and architects in the Renaissance, who relied mainly on the 11th century polymath, Alhazen (Ibn al-Haytham), who affirmed the visibility of perceptual space in geometric structuring projections. Mathematicians now know of many types of projective geometry such as complex Minkowski space that might describe the layout of things in perception (see Peters (2000)) and it has also emerged that parts of the brain contain patterns of electrical activity that correspond closely to the layout of the retinal image (this is known as retinotopy). How or whether these become conscious experience is still unknown (see McGinn (1995)).

Beyond spatial representation

Traditionally, the philosophical investigation of perception has focused on the sense of vision as the paradigm of sensory perception. However, studies on the other sensory modalities, such as the sense of smell, can challenge what we consider characteristic or essential features of perception. Take olfaction as an example. Spatial representation relies on a "mapping" paradigm that maps the spatial structures of the stimuli onto discrete neural structures and representations. However, olfactory science has shown us that perception is also a matter of associative learning, observational refinement, and a decision-making process that is context-dependent. One of the consequences of these discoveries on the philosophy of perception is that common perceptual effects such as conceptual imagery turn more on the neural architecture and its development than the topology of the stimulus itself.

Notes

^ cf. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/perception-episprob/ BonJour, Laurence (2007): "Epistemological Problems of Perception." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, accessed 1.9.2010.
cf. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/perception-problem/ Crane, Tim (2005): "The Problem of Perception." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, accessed 1.9.2010; Drestske, Fred (1999): "Perception." In: Robert Audi, The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, Second Edition, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Cambridge University Press, pp. 654–658, here p. 656.
cf. Alva Noë (2006): Perception. In: Sahotra Sarkar/Jessica Pfeifer (Eds.), The Philosophy of Science: An Encyclopedia, New York: Routledge, pp. 545–550, here p. 546 ff.
Ann-Sophie Barwich (2020). Smellosophy: What the Nose tells the Mind. Harvard University Press. p. 384. ISBN 9780674983694.
see Moutoussis and Zeki (1997)
Smith, Kerri (2013). "Brain decoding: Reading minds". Nature. 502 (7472): 428–430. Bibcode:2013Natur.502..428S. doi:10.1038/502428a. PMID 24153277. S2CID 4452222.
Skinner 1953
Chalmers DJ. (1995) "Facing up to the hard problem of consciousness." Journal of Consciousness Studies 2, 3, 200–219
Smythies J. (2003) "Space, time and consciousness." Journal of Consciousness Studies 10, 3, 47–64.
Edwards JC. (2008) "Are our spaces made of words?" Journal of Consciousness Studies 15, 1, 63–83.
Woolhouse RS and Franks R. (1998) GW Leibniz, Philosophical Texts, Oxford University Press.
Siegel, S. (2011)."The Contents of Perception", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2011 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = <http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2011/entries/perception-contents/>.
Siegel, S.: The Contents of Visual Experience. New York: Oxford University Press. 2010
p 206, Varela F, Thompson E, Rosch E (1991) "The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience" MIT Press
Varela F, Thompson E, Rosch E (1991) "The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience" MIT Press
Nader El-Bizri (2004). "La perception de la profondeur: Alhazen, Berkeley et Merleau-Ponty". Oriens-Occidens, CNRS. 5. Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique: 171–184.
Nader El-Bizri (2007). "In Defence of the Sovereignty of Philosophy: al-Baghdadi's Critique of Ibn al-Haytham's Geometrisation of Place". Arabic Sciences and Philosophy. 17. Cambridge University Press: 57–80. doi:10.1017/s0957423907000367. S2CID 170960993.
Barwich, Ann-Sophie (2020). Smellosophy: What the Nose tells the Mind. Harvard University Press. p. 310. ISBN 9780674983694.
"Nautilus | Science Connected". Nautilus. 2020-12-11. Retrieved 2020-12-11.
Barwich, Ann-Sophie (2020). Smellosophy: What the Nose tells the Mind. Harvard University Press. p. 311. ISBN 9780674983694.

References

BonJour, L. (2007). "Epistemological Problems of Perception". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Crane, Tim; French, C. (2015). "The Problem of Perception". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Georgakakis, Christos; Moretti, Luca. "Cognitive Penetrability of Perception and Epistemic Justification". Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Zalta, Edward N., ed. (2004). "Maurice Merleau-Ponty". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
O'Brien, Daniel. "Epistemology of Perception". Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
O'Brien, Daniel. "Objects of Perception". Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Siegel, Susanna (2005). "The Contents of Perception". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

v t e Epistemology
Epistemologists	Thomas Aquinas Augustine of HippoлЬцУ William Alston Robert Audi A. J. Ayer George Berkeley Laurence BonJour Gilles Deleuze Keith DeRose René Descartes John Dewey Fred Dretske Edmund Gettier Alvin Goldman Nelson Goodman Paul Grice Anil Gupta Susan Haack David Hume Immanuel Kant Søren Kierkegaard Peter Klein Saul Kripke Hilary Kornblith David Lewis John Locke G. E. Moore John McDowell Robert Nozick Alvin Plantinga Plato Duncan Pritchard James Pryor Hilary Putnam W. V. O. Quine Thomas Reid Bertrand Russell Gilbert Ryle Wilfrid Sellars Susanna Siegel Ernest Sosa P. F. Strawson Baruch Spinoza Timothy Williamson Ludwig Wittgenstein Nicholas Wolterstorff Vienna Circle more...
Theories	Coherentism Constructivism Contextualism Empiricism Evolutionary epistemology Fallibilism Feminist epistemology Fideism Foundationalism Holism Infinitism Innatism Naïve realism Naturalized epistemology Phenomenalism Positivism Rationalism Reductionism Reliabilism Representational realism Skepticism Transcendental idealism
Concepts	A priori knowledge A posteriori knowledge Analysis Analytic–synthetic distinction Belief Common sense Descriptive knowledge Exploratory thought Epistemic injustice Epistemic virtue Gettier problem Induction Internalism and externalism Justification Knowledge Objectivity Privileged access Problem of induction Problem of other minds Perception Procedural knowledge Proposition Regress argument Simplicity Truth more...
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Philosophers	G. E. M. Anscombe Aristotle Armstrong Thomas Aquinas J. L. Austin Alexander Bain George Berkeley Henri Bergson Ned Block Franz Brentano C. D. Broad Tyler Burge David Chalmers Patricia Churchland Paul Churchland Andy Clark Dharmakirti Donald Davidson Daniel Dennett René Descartes Fred Dretske Fodor Goldman Martin Heidegger David Hume Edmund Husserl William James Frank Cameron Jackson Immanuel Kant David Lewis (philosopher) John Locke Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Maurice Merleau-Ponty Marvin Minsky Thomas Nagel Alva Noë Derek Parfit Plato Hilary Putnam Richard Rorty Gilbert Ryle John Searle Wilfrid Sellars Baruch Spinoza Alan Turing Michael Tye Vasubandhu Ludwig Wittgenstein Stephen Yablo Zhuangzi more...
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Latest revision as of 17:33, 21 November 2024

Scientific accounts of perception

Problem of Perception

Spatial representation

Beyond spatial representation

See also

Notes

References

Further reading

Historical

Contemporary