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Perceiving and desiring: a new look at the cognitive penetrability of experience

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Abstract

This paper considers an orectic penetration hypothesis (OPH) which says that desires and desire-like states may influence perceptual experience in a non-externally mediated way. This hypothesis is clarified with a definition, which serves further to distinguish the interesting target phenomenon from trivial and non-genuine instances of desire-influenced perception. Orectic penetration is an interesting possible case of the cognitive penetrability of perceptual experience. The OPH is thus incompatible with the more common thesis that perception is cognitively impenetrable. It is of importance to issues in the philosophy of mind and cognitive science, epistemology, and general philosophy of science. The plausibility of orectic penetration can be motivated by some classic experimental studies, and some new experimental research inspired by those same studies. The general suggestion is that orectic penetration thus defined, and evidenced by the relevant studies, cannot be deflected by the standard strategies of the cognitive impenetrability theorist.

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Notes

  1. One can think of examples from whatever sport one prefers. Think of a controversial strike called in baseball. Think of a questionable case of the basketball leaving a player’s hand before the buzzer. Think of controversial cases where the ball is close to the line in tennis (perhaps many of John McEnroe’s tantrums were based on a perceptual experience relevantly distinct from the line judge’s). All of these are candidate cases, circumstances where (even upon replay) the image is to some degree ambiguous and relevant desires may influence perceptual experience.

  2. Two brief notes. First, understanding orectic states in this way makes minimal commitments to a theory of desire or of, more broadly, orexis. A number of distinct and incompatible conceptions of desire are consistent with OP, e.g. Armstrong (1980), Smith (1994), Schroeder (2004) and Stalnaker (1984). Second, ‘desire’ will sometimes be used below as shorthand for any orectic state.

  3. It is worth noting that this way of thinking about desire comports with the thinking of potential opponents of OPH—namely, cognitive impenetrability theorists, as discussed below—who include goals, values, and “other utilities” (i.e. other than belief) as possible penetrating cognitive states (i.e. those states that the same thinkers deny can influence perception, and thereby deny the cognitive penetration of, at least some of, perception). See Pylyshyn (1999, p. 343) and Fodor (1983, 1985).

  4. For that matter, some of these cases may be effectively ruled out by clause (1), for example if the causal dependence is understood counterfactually. An olfactory experience of the sea may not depend counterfactually on a desire to smell the sea. You might drag me to the sea, and I would then experience the sea whether or not I had the corresponding desire. Clause (2) thus insures the exclusion of desire-motivated cases involving sophisticated ceteris paribus clauses—clauses to the effect that the context is such that the general causal dependence holds and (1) is satisfied.

  5. According to Fodor, processes are cognitively penetrated if they are “importantly affected by the subject’s beliefs, his background information, or his utilities” (Fodor 1983, p. 73). Given what Fodor says elsewhere, desires seem to be included amongst the relevant cognitive states (e.g. see Fodor 1983, p. 68).

  6. Indeed, OP readily generalizes to a definition of cognitive penetrability by simple replacement of the desire placeholder ‘D’ with a general placeholder for cognitive states.

  7. See Fodor (1983, 1985, 1988), Pylyshyn (1984) and Sperber (1996). See Stokes and Bergeron (MS) for a dilemma for modularity architectures, one horn of which challenges a commitment to informational encapsulation by appeal to the incompatibility with plausible cases of cognitive penetrability of perception.

  8. For a recent survey on theory-laden observation and science, and how it engages with perception and cognitive penetration, see Brewer and Lambert (2001).

  9. An unfortunate ambiguity in this literature is that some use ‘observation’ to refer to perception, others to something more like judgement or belief (about what one perceives).

  10. See Macpherson for additional discussion of possible moves for both Churchland and Fodor (Macpherson, forthcoming). See Siegel for discussion of possible relevant cases of cognitive penetrability, including cases of desire-influenced perception in the context of scientific observation (Siegel, forthcoming).

  11. Siegel presents cognitive penetration as a potential general constraint on theories of epistemic justification. In particular, she argues that dogmatist theories of justification are ill-equipped to meet the constraints imposed by cognitive penetration (Siegel, forthcoming).

  12. The conclusions presented here are experimentally sound, but there is some controversy surrounding a number of additional conclusions drawn by Epstein and others. For related studies and/or criticism, see Lazarus et al. (1953), Saugstad (1966, 1967) and Wolitzky (1967).

  13. One worry regarding this particular study is that the reports of these subjects are not to be trusted (perhaps subjects report seeing the ambiguous figure in just the way that is supposed to result in the desirable beverage). Balcetis and Dunning respond to this worry with a follow up study that uses non-ambiguous figures. In this set up, the subjects identify the non-ambiguous figures with 100% accuracy (no matter whether such identification results in the desirable or undesirable beverage). See Balcetis and Dunning (2006, p. 615).

  14. Elsewhere, Pylyshyn suggests that the allocation of attention is one way that cognition can penetrate perception: it is one of two loci where “cognition intervenes in determining the nature of perception” (Pylyshyn 1999, p. 344). However, the cognitive influence takes place in a way that fails to meet Pylyshyn’s internal, logical connection requirement (of genuine cognitive penetration). So it is unclear why such cases would be considered, by Pylyshyn or anyone else, cognitive penetration. See also Fodor (1988).

  15. Balcetis and Dunning (2010) attempt to control for this possible scenario by introducing an action-based report into later experiments. Here subjects toss an item as a distance estimate (rather than verbally providing a numerical estimate). For this to evade the relevant judgement interpretation, however, one has to make the contentious assumption that visual perception is directly linked with action and in these very kinds of perceptual circumstances.

  16. Macpherson analyzes both the judgement and attention-shift strategies, arguing that both fail to handle data from colour perception studies performed by Delk and Fillenbaum (1965) (see Macpherson, forthcoming).

  17. See Jenkin (1957) and Tajfel (1957) for important theoretical reviews that support this general conclusion.

  18. McCurdy (1956).

  19. Fodor (1988) and Pylyshyn (1999).

  20. Fodor (1983, 1985) and Pylyshyn (1999) both invoke this example.

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Acknowledgments

For discussion and feedback, thanks to Paul Bartha, Vince Di Lollo, Catherine Wilson. Special thanks to Vince Bergeron, Fiona Macpherson, Mohan Matthen, and Susanna Siegel for reading (multiple) drafts, and for invaluable conversation on this and related topics. Special thanks also to one anonymous reviewer (for this journal) for exceptionally helpful criticism.

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  1. Department of Philosophy, University of Toronto, 170 St. George St., Toronto, ON, M5R 2M8, Canada

    Dustin Stokes

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Stokes, D. Perceiving and desiring: a new look at the cognitive penetrability of experience. Philos Stud 158, 477–492 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-010-9688-8

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