The Contents of Visual Experience - Hardcover

Siegel, Susannah

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0195305299 ISBN 13: 9780195305296

Publisher: OUP USA, 2011

Synopsis

What do we see? We are visually conscious of colors and shapes, but are we also visually conscious of complex properties such as being John Malkovich? In this book, Susanna Siegel develops a framework for understanding the contents of visual experience, and argues that these contents involve all sorts of complex properties. Siegel starts by analyzing the notion of the contents of experience, and by arguing that theorists of all stripes should accept that experiences have contents. She then introduces a method for discovering the contents of experience: the method of phenomenal contrast. This method relies only minimally on introspection, and allows rigorous support for claims about experience. She then applies the method to make the case that we are conscious of many kinds of properties, of all sorts of causal properties, and of many other complex properties. She goes on to use the method to help analyze difficult questions about our consciousness of objects and their role in the contents of experience, and to reconceptualize the distinction between perception and sensation. Siegel's results are important for many areas of philosophy, including the philosophy of mind, epistemology, and the philosophy of science. They are also important for the psychology and cognitive neuroscience of vision.

About this title

About the Author

Susanna Siegel received her PhD in Philosophy at Cornell University in 2000. She was previously John L Loeb Associate Professor of the Humanities at Harvard University, and is currently Professor of Philosophy and an affiliate of the Program in Mind, Brain and Behavior at Harvard University.

Edition details

• Publisher: OUP USA
• Publication date: 2011
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0195305299
• ISBN 13: 9780195305296
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 232