Online research in philosophy

This paper considers an orectic penetration hypothesis 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 orectic penetration hypothesis 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 perception 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.

One popular reason for rejecting moral realism is the lack of a plausible epistemology that explains how we come to know moral facts. Recently, a number of philosophers have insisted that it is possible to have moral knowledge in a very straightforward way—by perception. However, there is a significant objection to the possibility of moral perception: it does not seem that we could have a perceptual experience that represents a moral property, but a necessary condition for coming to know that X is F by perception is the ability to have a perceptual experience that represents something as being F . Call this the ‘Representation Objection’ to moral perception. In this paper I argue that the Representation Objection to moral perception fails. Thus I offer a limited defense of moral perception.

Discussions of the relationship between perception and cognition often proceed without a definition of these terms. The sensory-modality specific nature of low-level perceptual processes provides a means of distinguishing them from cognitive processes. A more explicit definition of terms provides insight into the nature of the evidence that can resolve questions about the relationship between perception and cognition.

People see five kinds of views in epistemology and ontology as hinging on there being words a person can learn only by private ostensive definitions, through direct acquaintance with his own sensations: skepticism about other minds, 2. skepticism about an external world, 3. foundationalism, 4. dualism, and 5. phenomenalism. People think Wittgenstein refuted these views by showing, they believe, no word is learnable only by private ostensive definition. I defend these five views from Wittgenstein’s attack.

Some issues heavily debated in perception sciences are presented: the explanatory gap and the experience measurement problem. The experimental phenomenology is said to provide substantive contribution to settle controversy over the phenome- nological adequacy of perception theory and models. An interpretation of experi- mental phenomenology as explanation of the perceptual manifold, and definition of relation varieties to eventually map onto other perception sciences’ domains is sketched.

Most accounts of veridical perception draw upon conventional causal theories of perception for an explanatory framework. Recently developed enactive or sensorimotor theories of perception pose a challenge to such accounts, necessitating a redefinition of veridical perception. I propose and defend one such definition, drawing upon empirical studies of perception, the resources of the enactive approach and phenomenology. I argue that perceptual experience engages an organism in a network of sensorimotor dependencies with the perceived object, and that veridical perceptions involve experiential mastery of these dependencies. A thought example involving the phoneme restoration effect is used to compare this definition favourably with traditional accounts of veridical perception that involve the generation of matching content with appropriate causal history or patterns of counterfactual dependence. I also defend my account of veridical perception against several objections.