What It Is Like to Perceive: Direct Realism and the Phenomenal Character of Perception - Couverture rigide

Maloney, J. Christopher

Couverture rigide

ISBN 10 : 0190854758 ISBN 13 : 9780190854751

Editeur : Oxford University Press Inc, 2018

Synopsis

Naturalistic cognitive science, when realistically rendered, rightly maintains that to think is to deploy contentful mental representations. Accordingly, conscious perception, memory, and anticipation are forms of cognition that, despite their introspectively manifest differences, may coincide in content. Sometimes we remember what we saw; other times we predict what we will see. Why, then, does what it is like consciously to perceive, differ so dramatically from what it is like merely to recall or anticipate the same? Why, if thought is just representation, does the phenomenal character of seeing a sunset differ so stunningly from the tepid character of recollecting or predicting the sun's descent?

J. Christopher Maloney argues that, unlike other cognitive modes, perception is in fact immediate, direct acquaintance with the object of thought. Although all mental representations carry content, the vehicles of perceptual representation are uniquely composed of the very objects represented. To perceive the setting sun is to use the sun and its properties to cast a peculiar cognitive vehicle of demonstrative representation. This vehicle's embedded referential term is identical with, and demonstrates, the sun itself. And the vehicle's self-attributive demonstrative predicate is itself forged from a property of that same remote star. So, in this sense, the perceiving mind is an extended mind. Perception is unbrokered cognition of what is real, exactly as it really is. Maloney's theory of perception will be of great interest in the philosophy of mind and cognitive science.

A propos du livre

À propos de l?auteur

J. Christopher Maloney is Professor of Philosophy and Cognitive Science at the University of Arizona. He began his career at Oakland University after completing his doctorate at Indiana University. His interests and publications center on foundational issues in the intersection of the philosophy of mind and cognitive science.

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Oxford University Press Inc
• Date d'édition: 2018
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 0190854758
• ISBN 13: 9780190854751
• Reliure: Relié
• Nombre de pages: 384
• Coordonnées du fabricant: non disponible
• Personne responsable: Ufficio Anagrafiche Messaggerie; ufficio.anagrafiche@meli.it; ; Via Verdi, 8; Assago Milano; 20090; Italie