Skip to content
  • News
  • Blueprints
  • Events
  • Teach
  • Contribute
  • Volunteer
  • Support us
  • About

Diversity Reading List

Helping you include authors from under-represented groups in your teaching

What is Action-Oriented Perception?

Posted on February 17, 2020May 13, 2025 by Simon Fokt

Abstract: Contemporary scientific and philosophical literature on perception often focuses on the relationship between perception and action, emphasizing the ways in which perception can be understood as geared towards action or ‘action-oriented’. In this paper I provide a framework within which to classify approaches to action-oriented perception, and I highlight important differences between the distinct approaches. I show how talk of perception as action-oriented can be applied to the evolutionary history of perception, neural or psychological perceptual mechanisms, the semantic content or phenomenal character of perceptual states, or to the metaphysical nature of perception. I argue that there are no straightforward inferences from one kind of action-oriented perception to another. Using this framework and its insights, I then explore the notion of action-oriented perceptual representation which plays a key role in some approaches to embodied cognitive science. I argue that the concept of action-oriented representation proposed by Clark and Wheeler is less straightforward than it might seem, because it seems to require both that the mechanisms of perceptual representation are action-oriented and that the content of these perceptual representations are action-oriented. Given that neither of these claims can be derived from the other, proponents of action-oriented representation owe us separate justification for each claim. I will argue that such justifications are not forthcoming in the literature, and that attempts to reconstruct them run into trouble: the sorts of arguments offered for the representational mechanisms being action-oriented seem to undermine the sorts of arguments offered for the representational content being action-oriented, and vice-versa.

Posted in Ecological Approaches to Perception, Metaphysics & Epistemology, Perception, Perception and Action, Philosophy of Cognitive Science, Philosophy of Mind, Representation in Cognitive Science, Science Logic & Mathematics, Science of Perception, The Contents of PerceptionTagged action, enactivism, perceptionLeave a comment

How Does Visual Phenomenology Constrain Object Seeing

Posted on February 17, 2020May 13, 2025 by Simon Fokt

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.

Posted in Metaphysics & Epistemology, Perception, Philosophy of Mind, The Contents of Perception, The Experience of Objects, The Objects of Perception, The Perceptual RelationTagged causal theory of perception, perceptionLeave a comment

Enactivism and the Unity of Perception and Action

Posted on February 17, 2020May 13, 2025 by Simon Fokt

Abstract: This paper contrasts two enactive theories of visual experience: the sensorimotor theory (O’Regan and Noë, Behav Brain Sci 24(5):939–1031, 2001; Noë and O’Regan, Vision and mind, 2002; Noë, Action in perception, 2004) and Susan Hurley’s (Consciousness in action, 1998, Synthese 129:3–40, 2001) theory of active perception. We criticise the sensorimotor theory for its commitment to a distinction between mere sensorimotor behaviour and cognition. This is a distinction that is firmly rejected by Hurley. Hurley argues that personal level cognitive abilities emerge out of a complex dynamic feedback system at the subpersonal level. Moreover reflection on the role of eye movements in visual perception establishes a further sense in which a distinction between sensorimotor behaviour and cognition cannot be sustained. The sensorimotor theory has recently come under critical fire (see e.g. Block, J Philos CII(5):259–272, 2005; Prinz, Psyche, 12(1):1–19, 2006; Aizawa, J Philos CIV(1), 2007) for mistaking a merely causal contribution of action to perception for a constitutive contribution. We further argue that the sensorimotor theory is particularly vulnerable to this objection in a way that Hurley’s active perception theory is not. This presents an additional reason for preferring Hurley’s theory as providing a conceptual framework for the enactive programme.

Posted in Metaphysics & Epistemology, Perception and Action, Philosophy of MindTagged action, enactivism, perception, sensorimotorLeave a comment

Molyneux’s Problem

Posted on February 17, 2020May 13, 2025 by Simon Fokt

Introduction: I am inclined to think that what was in Molyneux’s mind, because of which he drew that conclusion from those premises, was this: that what affects one’s touch so or so could have affected one’s sight such and such instead of so or so—i.e., that what feels so or so could have looked such and such instead of so or so. Thus, for example, that what standardly feels like a globe could have standardly looked like a cube instead of like a globe, and vice versa. Certainly anyway, if you did think this, it would seem to you plausible to say that if a man hasn’t had the experience of how things that feel so or so look, he can’t tell by sight, i.e., from how a thing looks, how it feels. And plausible, then, to reason, as Molyneux does, that, if a man hasn’t had the experience of how things that feel so or so look, he can’t tell by sight, i.e., from how a thing looks, whether it feels like, and so is, a globe, or whether it feels like, and so is, a cube. The best he can do is guess.

It’s a proposal worth looking at, in any case, whether it is Molyneux’s or not. Or rather, under some interpretations of it, it’s a proposal worth looking at.

Posted in 17th/18th Century Philosophy, History of Western Philosophy, Locke: Philosophy of Mind, Metaphysics & Epistemology, Molyneux's Problem, Perception, Philosophy of Mind, Sensory ModalitiesTagged Molyneux's problem, perceptionLeave a comment

Molyneux’s Question and the Amodality of Experience

Posted on February 17, 2020May 13, 2025 by Simon Fokt

Abstract: A recent study published in Nature Neuroscience purports to have answered a question posed to Locke in 1688 by his friend William Molyneux, namely, whether ‘a man born blind and made to see’ would be able to identify, immediately and by vision alone, objects previously known only by touch. The answer, according to the researchers – and as predicted by Molyneux, as well as Locke, Berkeley, and others – is ‘likely negative. The newly sighted subjects did not exhibit an immediate transfer of their tactile shape knowledge to the visual domain’. Since then, however, many commentators have argued that the answer is still not clear. Moreover, in the contemporary literature on Molyneux’s Question, and more generally on cross-modal perception and the individuation of the senses, it is sometimes hard to determine what question is being investigated. In this paper, I distinguish a number of different questions about the relation between visual and tactual perception that can arise when considering Molyneux’s problem.

Posted in Metaphysics & Epistemology, Molyneux's Problem, Perception, Perception and Action, Philosophy of Mind, Sensory ModalitiesTagged amodal perception, Molyneux's problem, perception, space, tactual and visual perceptionLeave a comment

A Brief History of Time Consciousness: Historical Precursors to James and Husserl

Posted on February 17, 2020May 13, 2025 by Simon Fokt

Abstract: William James’ Principles of Psychology, in which he made famous the ‘specious present’ doctrine of temporal experience, and Edmund Husserl’s Zur Phänomenologie des inneren Zeitbewusstseins, were giant strides in the philosophical investigation of the temporality of experience. However, an important set of precursors to these works has not been adequately investigated. In this article, we undertake this investigation. Beginning with Reid’s essay ‘Memory’ in Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man, we trace out a line of development of ideas about the temporality of experience that runs through Dugald Stewart, Thomas Brown, William Hamilton, and finally the work of Shadworth Hodgson and Robert Kelly, both of whom were immediate influences on James (though James pseudonymously cites the latter as ‘E.R. Clay’). Furthermore, we argue that Hodgson, especially his Metaphysic of Experience (1898), was a significant influence on Husserl.

Posted in 19th Century Philosophy, 20th Century Philosophy, Continental Philosophy, Edmund Husserl, History of Western Philosophy, Husserl: Philosophy of Mind, Mental States and Processes, Metaphysics & Epistemology, Phenomenology, Philosophical Traditions, Philosophy of Mind, Temporal Experience, The Specious Present, William JamesTagged Hodgson, Husserl, perception, specious present, time, time consciousness, William JamesLeave a comment

The Self-Locating Property Theory of Color

Posted on February 17, 2020May 13, 2025 by Simon Fokt

Abstract: The paper reviews the empirical evidence for highly significant variation across perceivers in hue perception and argues that color physicalism cannot accommodate this variability. Two views that can accommodate the individual differences in hue perception are considered: the self-locating property theory, according to which colors are self-locating properties, and color relationalism, according to which colors are relations to perceivers and viewing conditions. It is subsequently argued that on a plausible rendition of the two views, the self-locating theory has a slight advantage over color relationalism in being truer to the phenomenology of our color experiences

Posted in Color Experience, Metaphysics & Epistemology, Perception, Philosophy of Mind, The Contents of PerceptionTagged colour, colour irrealism, colour physicalism, colour realism, colour relativism, perception, synesthesiaLeave a comment

The rise and fall of the adaptive landscape?

Posted on January 20, 2020May 13, 2025 by Simon Fokt

Abstract: The discussion of the adaptive landscape in the philosophical literature appears to be divided along the following lines. On the one hand, some claim that the adaptive landscape is either ‘uninterpretable’ or incoherent. On the other hand, some argue that the adaptive landscape has been an important heuristic, or tool in the service of explaining, as well as proposing and testing hypotheses about evolutionary change. This paper attempts to reconcile these two views.

Posted in Philosophy of Biology, Science Logic & MathematicsTagged adaptive landscape, evolution, heuristic, metaphorLeave a comment

The Evolution of Vagueness

Posted on January 20, 2020May 13, 2025 by Simon Fokt

Abstract: Vague predicates, those that exhibit borderline cases, pose a persistent problem for philosophers and logicians. Although they are ubiquitous in natural language, when used in a logical context, vague predicates lead to contradiction. This paper will address a question that is intimately related to this problem. Given their inherent imprecision, why do vague predicates arise in the first place? I discuss a variation of the signaling game where the state space is treated as contiguous, i.e., endowed with a metric that captures a similarity relation over states. This added structure is manifested in payoffs that reward approximate coordination between sender and receiver as well as perfect coordination. I evolve these games using a variation of Herrnstein reinforcement learning that better reflects the generalizing learning strategies real-world actors use in situations where states of the world are similar. In these simulations, signaling can develop very quickly, and the signals are vague in much the way ordinary language predicates are vague – they each exclusively apply to certain items, but for some transition period both signals apply to varying degrees. Moreover, I show that under certain parameter values, in particular when state spaces are large and time is limited, learning generalization of this sort yields strategies with higher payoffs than standard Herrnstein reinforcement learning. These models may then help explain why the phenomenon of vagueness arises in natural language: the learning strategies that allow actors to quickly and effectively develop signaling conventions in contiguous state spaces make it unavoidable

Posted in General Philosophy of Science, Metaphysics & Epistemology, Philosophy of Language, Philosophy of Science General Works, Science Logic & Mathematics, Vagueness and IndeterminacyTagged evolution of language, generalization, signaling, vaguenessLeave a comment

How to Disagree Without Being Disagreeable

Posted on January 20, 2020May 13, 2025 by Simon Fokt

Abstract: It is tempting to assume that disagreements about the principles, policies and institutions that shape contemporary political life – especially the disagreements that emerge during contemporary political contests in the United States – are uniquely uncivil. But for much of human history, disagreement about such matters has often been a rough and tumble affair and the best evidence of this emerges in contests for political power. Unflattering epithets about political opponents can be found in hieroglyphics on the tombs of Egyptian pharaohs, and political insult and invective were common in political competitions in ancient Rome. Moreover, with the rise of the modern political campaign and increased sophistication and complexity in the means for transmitting and targeting campaign messages innuendo, rumor, and even outright character assassination, became familiar fixtures of political life.

Posted in Disagreement, Epistemology, History of Political Philosophy, Metaphysics & Epistemology, Social and Political Philosophy, Social Epistemology, Value TheoryTagged civility, disagreement, discourse, politicsLeave a comment

Posts navigation

Older posts
Newer posts

Topics

Aesthetics
(230)
Aesthetic Experience and Judgement
(106)
Aesthetic Normativity and Value
(117)
Artistic Movements
(7)
Artistry and Creativity
(16)
Ethics and Socio-Politics of Aesthetics
(90)
Individual Arts and Crafts
(95)
Metaphysics of Aesthetics
(92)
Epistemology
(264)
Applied Epistemology
(53)
Formal Epistemology
(19)
Metaepistemology
(27)
Social Epistemology
(82)
Standpoint Epistemology
(13)
Theoretical Epistemology
(158)
Metaphilosophy
(157)
Ethics and Socio-Politics of Philosophy
(56)
Historiography of Philosophy
(52)
Philosophical Biography
(15)
Philosophical Media and Methodology
(88)
Philosophical Translation and/or Commentary
(18)
Philosophy Education
(10)
The Nature Value and Aims of Philosophy
(22)
Metaphysics
(281)
Causation
(64)
Free Will
(27)
Identity and Change
(56)
Mereology
(7)
Metametaphysics
(7)
Modality
(33)
Ontology and Metaontology
(165)
Properties Propositions and Relations
(24)
Space Time and Space-Time
(26)
Truth and Truthmaking
(23)
Moral Philosophy
(576)
Applied Ethics
(383)
Descriptive Ethics
(4)
Metaethics
(178)
Moral Psychology
(24)
Normative Ethics
(143)
Philosophy of Action
(20)
Philosophy of Language
(129)
Communication
(48)
Ethics and Socio-Politics of Language
(45)
Grammar and Meaning
(81)
Language and Mind
(46)
Linguistics
(4)
Metaphysics of Language
(1)
Philosophy of Mind
(463)
Artificial Intelligence
(6)
Cognitive Science
(19)
Consciousness
(55)
Intentionality
(115)
Mental States and Processes
(352)
Metaphysics of Mind and Body
(84)
Neuroscience
(18)
Psychiatry
(16)
Psychology
(35)
Philosophy of Religion
(78)
Afterlife
(7)
Creation
(5)
Deities and their Attributes
(48)
Divination Faith and Miracles
(7)
Environment
(6)
Ethics and Socio-Politics of Religion
(5)
Religious Development, Experience, and Personhood
(39)
Theodicy
(14)
Philosophy of the Formal, Social, and Natural Sciences
(400)
Anthropology
(11)
Archaeology and History
(24)
Economics
(13)
Geography
(1)
Life Sciences
(109)
Logic and Mathematics
(173)
Physical Sciences
(106)
Psychology
(15)
Sociology
(15)
Political Philosophy
(432)
Equality
(117)
Forms of Government
(71)
Freedom and Rights
(158)
Justice
(270)
Law and Public Policy
(211)
Political Authority and Legitimacy
(37)
Political Economy
(25)
Political Ideologies
(13)
War and Peace
(17)
Social Philosophy
(706)
Class
(68)
Culture
(452)
Disability
(39)
Education
(36)
Gender Sex and Sexuality
(315)
Personal and Social Identity
(149)
Race
(165)
Sustainability
(23)
Technology and Material Culture
(12)
Work Labor and Leisure
(49)

Keywords

abortion art art classification autonomy causation Chinese philosophy colonialism Confucianism consciousness consent culture depiction desire disability equality ethics experimental philosophy feminism feminist philosophy fiction free will gender identity imagination justice Kant knowledge language logic methodology mind models oppression perception portrait race racism rationality Rawls representation responsibility science sex truth virtue

Figures

Anita Silvers Aristotle bell hooks Charles W. Mills Confucius David Hume David Lewis Delia Graff Fara Elisabeth von Böhmen Emilie Du Châtelet Friedrich Nietzsche G. E. Anscombe Georg Hegel Gottfried Leibniz Gottlob Frege Immanuel Kant Iris Marion Young Iris Murdoch Jennifer Jackson John Rawls Judith Jarvis Thomson Karl Marx Laozi Margaret Cavendish Mary Astell Mary Hesse Mary Midgley Maurice Merleau-Ponty Michel Foucault Pamela Sue Anderson Paul Grice Philippa Foot Plato René Descartes Rudolf Carnap Simone Weil Soran Reader Susan Hurley Val Plumwood Viola Cordova W. V. O. Quine Wilma Mankiller Xuanzang Zhuangzi Zhu Xi

Our Sponsors

Arts and Humanities Research Council
American Philosophical Association
British Philosophical Association
Marc Sanders FoundationMarc Sanders Foundation
Society for Applied Philosophy
American Society for Aesthetics
MIND AssociationMIND Association
University of St Andrews
Uehiro Oxford InstituteUehiro Oxford Institute
University of Manchester
University of Sheffield
The University of Leeds
The University of Edinburgh
EIDYN
British Society of Aesthetics
The White Rose College of the Arts & Humanities
  • Creative Commons Attribution license

    Unless otherwise stated, all elements of the Diversity Reading List licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Derivatives 4.0 International License
    Web Design by TELdesign Limited • Theme: Avant by Kaira

    filtration

Theme: Avant by Kaira
This site is registered on Toolset.com as a development site.