Why Are Some Phenomenal Experiences ‘Vivid’ and Others ‘Faint’? Representationalism, Imagery, and Cognitive Phenomenology

Bourget, David

doi:10.1080/00048402.2017.1278612

Cited by 19 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…Another suggestion in this vein is that perception distinctively represents very fine-grained, or specific, properties, be they colours, shapes, or appearance-property counterparts of the latter (cf. Bourget 2017). These proposals face the objection that it is possible also to think of the allegedly distinctive properties in question (cf.…”

Section: Phenomenal Charactermentioning

confidence: 99%

The perception/cognition distinction

Nes

Sundberg

Watzl

2021

Inquiry

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The difference between perception and cognition seems introspectively obvious in many cases. Perceiving and thinking have also been assigned quite different roles, in epistemology, in theories of reference and of mental content, in philosophy of psychology, and elsewhere. Yet what is the nature of the distinction? In what way, or ways, do perception and cognition differ? The paper reviews recent work on these questions. Four main respects in which perception and cognition have been held to differ are discussed. First, their phenomenal character, such as the often-remarked vivacity or immediacy of perception. Second, the way in which they represent the world, e.g. the non-propositional nature of the contents, or non-discursive character of the vehicles, that have been held to characterise perceptual representation. Third, their place in cognitive architecture, i.e., roughly, in the information-flow of the mind, such as their alleged (non-)modularity. Fourth, their mind-world relations, e.g. the way in which perceptions seem to be tightly causally linked with distal or proximal stimuli. Against this background, we distinguish some main options for an account of the perception/cognition distinction, in particular concerning whether there is one, several, or no interesting and principled distinction(s) to be drawn here.

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Section: Phenomenal Charactermentioning

confidence: 99%

The perception/cognition distinction

Nes

Sundberg

Watzl

2021

Inquiry

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“…Intramodal representationalism, in contrast, is a version of impure representationalism that takes the extra ingredients to help determine not only whether a phenomenal state arises given the presence of a particular intentional state, but also which phenomenal state it is that arises (see Lycan 1987). Bourget (2010aBourget ( , 2010bBourget ( , 2015Bourget ( , 2017bBourget ( and 2017d argues for intermodal representationalism and against intramodal representationalism.…”

Section: Sciousness and Intentionalitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…One of us (DB) has tended to prefer a different definition of "intentionality" as a non-factive relation to propositions, which may or may not pick out the same thing as our present definition. DB's more theoretically-loaded definition is suitable for his project inBourget 2010aBourget , 2010bBourget , 2015Bourget , 2017aBourget , 2017cBourget , 2017dBourget , 2017b, forthcoming a, and forthcoming b, where his aim is to shed light on consciousness in terms of non-factive relations to propositions. Part of our aim here, however, is to discover the nature of a phenomenon that we can introspectively observe in ourselves, so employing DB's definition, or any other definition making substantive commitments with respect to the nature of intentionality, would beg the question in favor of certain views of the introspectively observed phenomenon.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Consciousness and Intentionality

Mendelovici

Bourget

2020

The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness

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Philosophers traditionally recognize two key features of mental states: intentionality and phenomenal consciousness. To a first approximation, intentionality is the ‘aboutness’ of mental states, and phenomenal consciousness is the felt, experiential, qualitative, or ‘what it’s like’ aspect of mental states. In the past few decades, these features have been widely assumed to be distinct and independent. But several philosophers have recently challenged this assumption, arguing that intentionality and consciousness are importantly related. This chapter overviews the key views on the relationship between consciousness and intentionality and describes our favored view, which is a version of the phenomenal intentionality theory, the view that the most fundamental kind of intentionality arises from phenomenal consciousness.

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“…Since olfactory experiences generally represent (putative) objects as (putatively) having various properties, 2 Such arguments are often made by representationalists, who take phenomenal consciousness to be a species of intentionality. See Harman 1990, Lycan 1996, Dretske 1995, Tye 2000, Mendelovici 2013a, 2013b, 2018a, Bourget and Mendelovici 2014, and Bourget 2015, 2017a, 2017b the question can be divided into two more specific questions, which I will address in the following two subsections:…”

Section: The Contents Of Olfactory Experiencesmentioning

confidence: 99%

How Reliably Misrepresenting Olfactory Experiences Justify True Beliefs

Mendelovici¹

2020

The Epistemology of Non-Visual Perception

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This chapter argues that olfactory experiences represent either everyday objects or ad hoc olfactory objects as having primitive olfactory properties, which happen to be uninstantiated. On this picture, olfactory experiences reliably misrepresent: they falsely represent everyday objects or ad hoc objects as having properties they do not have, and they misrepresent in the same way on multiple occasions. One might worry that this view is incompatible with the plausible claim that olfactory experiences at least sometimes justify true beliefs about the world. This chapter argues that there is no such incompatibility. Since olfactory experiences reliably misrepresent, they can lead to true and justified beliefs about putatively smelly objects.

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Why Are Some Phenomenal Experiences ‘Vivid’ and Others ‘Faint’? Representationalism, Imagery, and Cognitive Phenomenology

Cited by 19 publications

References 42 publications

The perception/cognition distinction

The perception/cognition distinction

Consciousness and Intentionality

How Reliably Misrepresenting Olfactory Experiences Justify True Beliefs

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