XI—Perception, Vision and Causation

Unity, Objectivity, and the Passivity of Experience

“…This passive element to perceptual experience is emphasised by Strawson, most centrally in his ‘Causation in Perception’ (). It features in Evans's work, particularly in his commentary on Strawson (Evans ). Both cash it out—as Kant did—in terms of a causal relation holding between perceiver and perceived object.…”

Utterance Interpretation and Cognitive Models

“…(i) the distinction between the perceived (external) )objet* and the (internal) )content* of the corresponding perceptual experience; (ii) the asymmetric implication between perceptions and perceptual experiences; 7 (iii) the constraint that stipulates that the perception of some object take places iff the corresponding perceptual experience is satisfied, i.e., iff the object causes this perceptual experience (see, e.g., Grice, 1961;Anscombe, 1965;Searle, 1983;Pacherie, 2000). In addition, I will assume that an )aspectualization* process derives the perceptual content from the perceived object (see Clementz, 2000): The assumption that perceptions and perceptual experiences are related this way follows from a more general rejection of the so-called )disjunctive* theory of perceptual reports (as defended by Hinton, 1967;Snowdon, 1981;Putnam, 1999;Martin, 2004). Non-Intentional theories of perception can (and, in my view, must) leave room for a comparable asymmetry (Spivey and Geng, 2001).…”

The Two-Dimensional Content of Consciousness

“…Some hold that psychological explanation makes reference to object-dependent de re senses that comprise object-dependent Fregean thoughts (Evans, 1981(Evans, , 1982McDowell, 1977McDowell, , 1984. Similarly some also hold a disjunctive theory of perception that rejects what McDowell calls the 'highest common factor' conception of thought or experience, according to which the mental or perceptual state of a hallucinating subject is the same as that of a veridically perceiving subject in a subjectively indistinguishable state (Hinton, 1973;Snowdon, 1980;McDowell, 1982). It might appear that the diagonal proposition for a mental state is just such a highest common factor.…”