Abstract
Perceptual experiences provide an important source of information about the world. It is clear that having the capacity of undergoing such experiences yields an evolutionary advantage. But why should humans have developed not only the ability of simply seeing, but also of seeing that something is thus and so? In this paper, I explore the significance of distinguishing perception from conception for the development of the kind of minds that creatures such as humans typically have. As will become clear, it is crucial to pay careful attention to the different kinds of information that are involved in perceiving and conceiving (including the way such information is gathered and transmitted). By identifying such kinds of information and the role they play, we can then understand an important feature of why creatures like us have the kind of consciousness and mental processes we do.
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Notes
This distinction has been forcefully presented and defended by Fred Dretske (see, e.g., Dretske 2000).
For a discussion of the role played by counterfactual conditions of this sort in visual experiences, see Lewis (1980). Lewis focuses on (C1), formulated in terms of the counterfactual dependence between the scene before us and the corresponding visual experiences. But (C2) is also needed, since it does not follow from (C1), and information about stable features of the environment is required in order for us to be able to track the objects around us properly.
A searching critique of foundationalism in epistemology is provided, e.g., in Sosa (1980). Note also that perceptual experiences are not foundational in an additional sense: they are typically dependent on a number of other such experiences, thus yielding a network of mutually dependent beliefs. The resulting picture is closer to a form of coherentism rather than foundationalism.
Peter Godfrey-Smith presents an insightful account of the role played by the environment’s complexity in shaping the minds of creatures like us (Godfrey-Smith 1998). I am largely sympathetic with much of what he has to say.
Needless to say, any diagrams that may be used to describe this process are just mechanisms of description. It would be a confusion to identify the sets with the diagrams used to refer to them.
Of course, everything that is actual is also possible. In this sense, some possibilities are given in perception. But the possible-because-actual is the only kind of possibility that can be perceptually experienced.
Clearly, I do not take facts to be abstract objects. I am adopting here a very minimal characterization of facts as whatever is the case. In particular, for a fact to obtain all that is needed is for the relevant objects to be related in the appropriate way. For instance, that the dragonfly is resting on a leaf holds as long as the dragonfly is indeed resting on the leaf. To perceive such a fact nothing more is required than someone seeing a leaf and a dragonfly on it.
In particular, on this view, one cannot perceive abstract objects, since such objects do not satisfy the required causal condition for perception. The scene before my eyes would be the same whether numbers (or any other abstract objects) existed or not. Hence, I cannot perceive such numbers (or such objects). There is an obvious difference between seeing one dragonfly on the leaf and seeing two dragonflies. But that is a difference that emerges from the dragonflies I see; it is not a difference of perceiving a number.
The platonist will, no doubt, complain that in one case the number of dragonflies is 1 and in the other that number is 2. So numbers are being perceived. In response, it is correct that there is a difference in the number of dragonflies. However, it does not follow that in one case I perceive the number 1 and in the other the number 2. In none of these cases do I perceive any number. I just perceive different dragonflies.
I agree with Dretske on this point (see, e.g., Dretske 2003).
For an examination of the complex details involved in this process, see Palmer (2002).
This explains how our conceptual capacities are significantly unbounded.
For requirements on a theory of concepts along these lines, see Prinz (2002), pp. 3–22.
Nonhuman animals seem to have at least some concepts, given the way they respond to the environment. It is far less obvious, however, how one can determine their nature: what exactly these concepts are from the point of view of the animals. It is similarly unclear that nonhuman animals have abstract concepts (those whose content is not directly generated by perceptual experiences). And if they do have such concepts, it is much harder to determine what their content is exactly. Since settling these issues is not required for the argument of this paper, I will not pursue the topic further here.
Gilbert Ryle made this point a long time ago (see Ryle 1949).
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Special Issue “Origins of Mind” edited by Liz Stillwaggon Swan and Andrew M. Winters
My thanks go to Rami El Ali and Colin McGinn for many discussions about the issues examined in this paper. Liz Swan and Andrew Winters gave me very helpful comments on earlier versions of the work. I am very grateful to them.
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Bueno, O. Perception and Conception: Shaping Human Minds. Biosemiotics 6, 323–336 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12304-013-9170-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12304-013-9170-z