This is a charming and engaging book that combines careful attention to the phenomenology of expe... more This is a charming and engaging book that combines careful attention to the phenomenology of experience with an appreciation of the psychology and neuroscience of perception. In some of its aims-for example, to show problems with a rigid version of a view of visual perception as an "inverse optics" process of constructing a static 3-D representation from static 2-D information on the retina--it succeeds admirably. As Noë points out, vision is a process that depends on interactions between the perceiver and the environment and involves contributions from sensory systems other than the eye. He is at pains to note that vision is not passive. His analogy with touch is to the point: touch involves skillful probing and movement, and so does vision, although less obviously and in my view less centrally so. This much is certainly widely accepted among vision scientists-although mainstream vision scientists (represented, for example, by Stephen Palmer's excellent textbook 2 ) view these points as best seen within a version of the inverse optics view that takes inputs as non-static and as including motor instructions (for example, involving eye movements and head movements). 3 The kind of point that Noë raises is viewed as important at the margins, but as not disturbing the main lines of the picture of vision that descends-with many changes-from the pioneering work of David Marr in the 1980s (and before him, from Helmholtz). But Noë shows little interest in mainstream vision science, focusing on non-mainstream ideas in the science of perception, specifically ideas from the anti-representational psychologist J.J. Gibson, and also drawing on Wittgenstein and the phenomenology tradition. There is a sense throughout the book of revolution, of upsetting the applecart. This is a review from the point of view of the applecart. My comments are in two parts, one mainly a priori, the other largely empirical: first, I will consider Noë's version of externalism in the light of the distinction between causation and constitution. Second, I will argue that on the most obvious reading of Noë's view, one that identifies perceptual experience with the skilled bodily exercise of "sensorimotor knowledge" (I will leave off the scare quotes in what follows) that includes visually guided action, there are empirical results that suggest that such knowledge does not reflect the phenomenology of conscious vision.
In a typical vision textbook you will see the term “object file” defined as follows: “An object f... more In a typical vision textbook you will see the term “object file” defined as follows: “An object file is a visual representation that “sticks” to a moving object over time on the basis of how and where that object moves, and stores (and updates) information about what that object looks like” (Scholl and Flombaum, 2010, p. 655). Object files are said to function in working memory (Green and Quilty-Dunn, 2021; Quilty-Dunn and Green, 2021) and to ground singular thought (Murez and Recanati, 2016). One claim of this article is that although thought and working memory often preserve some per- ceptual information, what are called the object files of both singular thought and work- ing memory are fundamentally different from what are called the object files of perception. Indeed, there is reason for doubt that the object files of perception can even ground singular thought. The object files of working memory and singular thought enclose the perceptual materials from perceptual object files in a cognitive envelope and in addition transform the perceptual information, often misrepresenting some aspects of the stimulus in order to make other aspects of the stimulus easier to use for a specific task. That is the problem for grounding singular thought.
Is perception probabilistic? This is a grand question about the fundamental nature of how our min... more Is perception probabilistic? This is a grand question about the fundamental nature of how our mind operates and how this operation is implemented in brain circuits. The question is also interpreted differently by different people, making progress difficult. In this adversarial collaboration, four scientists with different backgrounds and perspectives on this issue 1-7 engaged in considerable discussion of how the issue of probabilistic perception can be operationalized as to be made empirically tractable. We have agreed that a critical dividing line between probabilistic and non-probabilistic views of perception is defined by the following question: Can humans perform flexible and deliberate (i.e., cognitive) computations that require access to more than summary statistics (mean and variance) of a perceptual likelihood function or posterior on a single-trial basis?
So far we have discussed three views of the nature of the mind and mental properties: dualism, be... more So far we have discussed three views of the nature of the mind and mental properties: dualism, behaviorism, and identity theory. We have seen that each faces serious problems. The last view of the nature of the mind and mental properties we will discussfunctionalism-was in large part constructed to solve these problems. In "Psychophysical and theoretical identifications", Lewis introduces functionalism via his example of the detective story: "We are assembled in the drawing room of the country house; the detective reconstructs the crime. That is, he proposes a theory designed to be the best explanation of phenomena we have observed: the death of Mr. Body, the blood on the wallpaper, the silence of the dog in the night, the clock seventeen minutes fast, and so on. He launches into his story:
The functionalist view of the nature of the mind is now widely accepted. 1 Like behaviorism and p... more The functionalist view of the nature of the mind is now widely accepted. 1 Like behaviorism and physicalism, functionalism seeks to answer the question ''What are mental states?'' I shall be concerned with identity thesis formulations of functionalism. They say, for example, that pain is a functional state, just as identity thesis formulations of physicalism say that pain is a physical state. I shall begin by describing functionalism, and sketching the functionalist critique of behaviorism and physicalism. Then I shall argue that the troubles ascribed by functionalism to behaviorism and physicalism infect functionalism as well. One characterization of functionalism that is probably vague enough to be acceptable to most functionalists is: each type of mental state is a state consisting of a disposition to act in certain ways and to have certain mental states, given certain sensory inputs and certain mental states. So put, functionalism can be seen as a new incarnation, of behaviorism. Behaviorism identifies mental states with dispositions to act in certain ways in certain input situations. But as critics have pointed out (Chisholm, 1957; Geach, 1957; Putnam, 1963), desire for goal G cannot be identified with, say, the disposition to do A in input circumstances in which A leads to G, since, after all, the agent might not know that A leads to G and thus might not be disposed to do A. Functionalism replaces behaviorism's ''sensory inputs'' with ''sensory inputs and mental states''; and functionalism replaces behaviorism's ''dispositions to act'' with ''dispositions to act and have certain mental states.'' Functionalists want to individuate mental states causally, and since mental states have mental causes and effects as well as sensory causes and behavioral effects, functionalists individuate mental states partly in terms of causal relations to other mental states. One consequence of this difference between functionalism and behaviorism is that there are possible organisms that according to behaviorism, have mental states but, according to functionalism, do not have mental states.
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Papers by Ned Block