-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Giada FratantonioSummary: In this paper, the author presents the so-called capacity view, namely, the view that "that perceptual states are systematically linked to what they are of in the good case, that is, the case of a successful perception, and thereby provide evidence for what they are of in the good case". The author discusses the main committments of the view and the implications it has when it comes to the justification of our beliefs and the transparency of our mental states.
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: John BaldariAbstract: We often hold people morally responsible for their emotions. We praise individuals for their compassion, think less of them for their ingratitude or hatred, reproach self-righteousness and unjust anger. In the cases I have in mind, the ascriptions of responsibility are not simply for offensive behaviors or actions which may accompany the emotions, but for the emotions themselves as motives or states of mind. We praise and blame people for what they feel and not just for how they act. In cases where people may subtly mask their hatred or ingratitude through more kindly actions, we still may find fault with the attitude we see leaking through the disguise.
Comment: Use this text as a recommended reading to compliment the earlier work on The Fabric of Character.
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Giada FratantonioSummary: The author questions the centrality of representation in perceptual experience that comes from a specific class of experience, namely, those experiences of the environment that compels you to act in a certain way.
Comment: This could work as secondary reading for a postgraduate course on philosophy of perception.
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Andrea Blomqvist, Contributed by: Will HornettSummary: This paper argues that despite the differences between perception and belief, perception involves states that are importantly similar to beliefs: conscious visual experiences. According to the Content View, these experiences have contents in the form of accuracy conditions. The paper develops and defends the Content View, discusses its significance, and argues that contrary to what is often supposed, the Content View is compatible with Naive Realist disjunctivism.
Comment: It is a fairly difficult paper because it has some technical sections and her main argument is rather dense. However, it is generally very clearly written, with numerous helpful examples, and a broad discussion of views on contemporary debate on perception. This paper could be used in a senior year or postgraduate course on the philosophy of perception as seminar reading since it is a detailed and controversial discussion of the metaphysics of perception. It has also been central to recent debates. It is is useful to teach alongside Thomas Raliegh's "Phenomenology Without Representation" (2013).
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Giada FratantonioAbstract: This paper argues that despite the differences between perception and belief, perception involves states that are importantly similar to beliefs: conscious visual experiences. According to the Content View, these experiences have contents in the form of accuracy conditions. The paper develops and defends the Content View, discusses its significance, and argues that contrary to what is often supposed, the Content View is compatible with Naive Realist disjunctivism.
Comment: This can be used as background reading for a course on epistemology of perception, insofar as the author presents clearly the Content View and its main implications (especially section 1).
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Simon Fokt, Contributed by: Simon Prosser
Abstract: I argue that there are phenomenological constraints on what it is to see an object, and that these are overlooked by some theories that offer allegedly sufficient causal and counterfactual conditions on object-seeing.
Comment: Further reading on causal theories of perception; offers an interesting counterexample to the Lewisian view.
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Giada FratantonioAbstract: properties. The book starts by analyzing the notion of the contents of experience, and by arguing that theorists of all stripes should accept that experiences have contents. It then introduces a method for discovering the contents of experience: the method of phenomenal contrast. This method relies only minimally on introspection, and allows rigorous support for claims about experience. It then applies the method to make the case that we are conscious of many kind properties, of all sorts of causal properties, and of many other complex properties. The book goes on to use the method to help analyze difficult questions about our consciousness of objects and their role in the contents of experience, and to reconceptualize the distinction between perception and sensation. The book's results are important for many areas of philosophy, including the philosophy of mind, epistemology, and the philosophy of science. They are also important for the psychology and cognitive neuroscience of vision.
Comment: Good as further reading for a postgraduate course on epistemology of percpetion.
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Giada FratantonioSummary: In this article, the author provides a great overview on the topic of perceptual content, by addressing the following main issues: i) what are perceptual experiences? ii) what can constitute the content of our experience? iii) what is the relation between the content and our experience? iv) in virtue of what experiences have content?
Comment: Great article to be used as background/overview reading for undergraduate course on the philosophy of perception.
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Simon Fokt, Contributed by: Simon Prosser
Publisher's Note: What do we see? We are visually conscious of colors and shapes, but are we also visually conscious of complex properties such as being John Malkovich? In this book, Susanna Siegel develops a framework for understanding the contents of visual experience, and argues that these contents involve all sorts of complex properties. Siegel starts by analyzing the notion of the contents of experience, and by arguing that theorists of all stripes should accept that experiences have contents. She then introduces a method for discovering the contents of experience: the method of phenomenal contrast. This method relies only minimally on introspection, and allows rigorous support for claims about experience. She then applies the method to make the case that we are conscious of many kinds of properties, of all sorts of causal properties, and of many other complex properties. She goes on to use the method to help analyze difficult questions about our consciousness of objects and their role in the contents of experience, and to reconceptualize the distinction between perception and sensation. Siegel's results are important for many areas of philosophy, including the philosophy of mind, epistemology, and the philosophy of science. They are also important for the psychology and cognitive neuroscience of vision.
Comment: Background reading on intentionalism in philosophy of perception
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Andrea BlomqvistAbstract: In discussions of perception and its relation to knowledge, it is common to distinguish what one comes to believe on the basis of perception from the distinctively perceptual basis of one's belief. The distinction can be drawn in terms of propositional contents: there are the contents that a perceiver comes to believe on the basis of her perception, on the one hand; and there are the contents properly attributed to perception itself, on the other. Siegel argues that high-level properties should be attributed to percception itself. That, high-level properties can be the content of perception.
Comment: This paper is interesting to consider in the cognition/perception debate, since high-level properties such as being a natural kind, or emotions and intentions, are normally taken to be features of cognition rather than perception. It raises interesting questions about the relationship between concepts, the content of perception and perceptual experience. It would be good in a third year module on perception.
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Giada FratantonioAbstract: An overview of the epistemology of perception, covering the nature of justification, immediate justification, the relationship between the metaphysics of perceptual experience and its rational role, the rational role of attention, and cognitive penetrability. The published version will contain a smaller bibliography, due to space constraints in the volume.
Comment: A great overview on the epistemology of perception, covering issues from the nature of justification, the rational role of experience, as well as the topic of cognitive penetrability. Good to use as background/overview reading for a course on epistemology of perception.
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Andrea BlomqvistAbstract: Imagination seems to play an epistemic role in philosophical and scientific thought experiments, mindreading, and ordinary practical deliberations insofar as it generates new knowledge of contingent facts about the world. However, it also seems that imagination is limited to creative generation of ideas. Sometimes we imagine fanciful ideas that depart freely from reality. The conjunction of these claims is what I call the puzzle of knowledge through imagination. This chapter aims to resolve this puzzle. I argue that imagination has an epistemic role to play, but it is limited to the context of discovery. Imagination generates ideas, but other cognitive capacities must be employed to evaluate these ideas in order for them to count as knowledge. Consideration of the Simulation Theory's so-called 'threat of collapse' provides further evidence that imagination does not, on its own, yield new knowledge of contingent facts, and it suggests a way to supplement imagination in order to get such knowledge.
Comment: This is a relatively difficult paper, but it deals with the interesting topic of whether we can get knowledge through imagination. It would be suitable to suggest as a further reading for senior year undergraduate students.
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Andrea BlomqvistAbstract: We often have affective responses to fictional events. We feel afraid for Desdemona when Othello approaches her in a murderous rage. We feel disgust toward Iago for orchestrating this tragic event. What mental architecture could explain these affective responses? In this paper I consider the claim that the best explanation of our affective responses to fiction involves imaginative desires. Some theorists argue that accounts that do not invoke imaginative desires imply that consumers of fiction have irrational desires. I argue that there are serious worries about imaginative desires that warrant skepticism about the adequacy of the account. Moreover, it is quite difficult to articulate general principles of rationality for desires, and even according to the most plausible of these possible principles, desires about fiction are not irrational.
Comment: This would function well as a required reading in a week on why we have emotional reactions to fiction, probably in a course for senior undergraduate students. It is suitable for a philosophy of fiction module.
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Andrea BlomqvistAbstract: Most people think of themselves as pretty good at understanding others' beliefs, desires, emotions, and intentions. Accurate mindreading is an impressive cognitive feat, and for this reason the philosophical literature on mindreading has focused exclusively on explaining such successes. However, as it turns out, we regularly make mindreading mistakes. Understanding when and how mind misreading occurs is crucial for a complete account of mindreading. In this paper, I examine the conditions under which mind misreading occurs. I argue that these patterns of mind misreading shed light on the limits of mindreading, reveal new perspectives on how mindreading works, and have implications for social epistemology.
Comment: Unlike most papers in the mindreading debate, this paper focuses on the cases in which we fail to mindread. It relates these cases to self-awareness, and suggests how this could be explored to shed light on peer disagreement and epistemic injustice. This paper would fit in well in a social cognition syllabus.
-
Expand entry
-
Added by: Andrea BlomqvistAbstract: Mirror neurons are widely regarded as an important key to social cognition. Despite such wide agreement, there is very little consensus on how or why they are important. The goal of this paper is to clearly explicate the exact role mirror neurons play in social cognition. I aim to answer two questions about the relationship between mirroring and social cognition: What kind of social understanding is involved with mirroring? How is mirroring related to that understanding? I argue that philosophical and empirical considerations lead us to accord a fairly minimal role for mirror neurons in social cognition.
Comment: What processes enable mindreading is a prominent debate in social cognition. A view that has been proposed in recent years is that mirror neurons play a role in mindreading (for example suggested by Goldman, 2006). However, exactly which conclusions mirror neuron research allows us to draw is controversial, and here Spaulding provides interesting objections to a prominent mirror neuron study. This paper is particularly suitable in a social cognition module.
Comment: Good as further reading for a postgraduate course on epistemology of percpetion.