Philosophy, Perception, and Neuroscience

This paper presents the results of some recent experiments in neuroscience and perceptual science that reveal the role of virtual reality in normal visual perception, and the use of television technology by the visual brain. This involves particularly the cholinergic system in the forebrain. This research throws new light on the nature of perception and the relation of phenomenal consciousness and its brain. It is directly relevant to criticisms by certain analytical philosophers of aspects of neuroscience relating to these matters. Particular attention is paid to their support for Naive Realism.

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Naive realism, representationalism, and the rationalizing role of visual perception

Philosophical Issues ◽

10.1111/phis.12174 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 30 (1) ◽

pp. 102-119

Author(s):

Craig French

Keyword(s):

Visual Perception ◽

Naive Realism ◽

Naïve Realism

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The Representational View of Experience

10.1093/oso/9780190495251.003.0004 ◽

2018 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Berit Brogaard

Keyword(s):

Visual Perception ◽

Visual Experience ◽

Naive Realism ◽

Naïve Realism ◽

The Subject ◽

Central Claim ◽

Content View

In chapter 3, the author presents two arguments for the view that visual experience is representational. The first shows that phenomenal ‘look’ and ‘seem’ reflect phenomenal, representational properties of visual perception. It follows that experience is representational. This conclusion is consistent with some versions of naive realism, but considerably stronger than the minimal content view that takes content to be a description of what it is like for the subject to have the experience. The second argument establishes that the perceptual relation that obtains between experience and its object in core cases cannot fully explain the phenomenology of experience. In order to explain its phenomenology, we will need to appeal to the experience’s representational nature. The second argument thus shows that visual experience is fundamentally representational and not fundamentally relational, which is the central claim of the representational view.

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Hegel on the Idealism of Practical Life

Hegel Bulletin ◽

10.1017/hgl.2016.1 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 37 (1) ◽

pp. 1-28

Author(s):

David V. Ciavatta

Keyword(s):

Naive Realism ◽

Individual Agent ◽

Property Ownership ◽

Naïve Realism ◽

The World ◽

Practical Life

AbstractThis paper investigates Hegel’s thesis that we are, in our practical relation to the world, inherently committed to certain aspects of idealistic metaphysics. For Hegel, our practical attitude is fundamentally at odds with a naïve realism that would take the world to consist ultimately of self-contained, self-sufficient individuals whose relations to one another are fundamentally external to their identities. Hegel contends that our practical attitude is premised upon an overcoming of this mutual externality, and especially the externality which is supposed to hold between individual agent and world. It is shown that his argument hinges on conceiving of external things as inadequately individuated, as compared to living agents, and that it is precisely this ontological deficiency that conditions and motivates our action. Hegel’s discussions of morality and property ownership are appealed to in order to illustrate how we might better understand the nature and practical role of this purported deficiency.

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Investigating the Role of Haptic and Visual Perception in the Material-Weight Illusion

10.31234/osf.io/2b96j ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Caitlin Elisabeth Naylor ◽

Michael Proulx ◽

Gavin Buckingham

Keyword(s):

Virtual Reality ◽

Visual Perception ◽

Prior Experience ◽

Visual Material ◽

Optimal Integration ◽

Weight Illusion ◽

Weight Illusions

Weight illusions provide a compelling demonstration that prior experience affects perception. Here we investigated how the expectation-inducing modality affected the Material-Weight Illusion (MWI), where dense-looking objects feel lighter than less dense-looking objects. Participants lifted equally-weighted polystyrene, cork, and granite cubes whilst viewing computer-generated images of the cubes in virtual reality (VR). The representation of the object in VR was manipulated to create four illusion-inducing sensory conditions: visual differences only, haptic differences only, congruent visual-haptic differences, and incongruent visual-haptic material differences. Although an MWI was induced in all conditions, whereby the polystyrene object was reported to feel heavier than the granite object, the strength of the MWI differed across conditions, with haptic material cues having a stronger influence on perceived heaviness than visual material cues. These results are consistent with optimal integration theories of multi-modal perception, highlighting that perception reflects individual cues’ reliability and relevance in specific contexts.

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Naive realism in the unmarried cohabitation controversy in the United States

Interpersona An International Journal on Personal Relationships ◽

10.5964/ijpr.v10i1.202 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 10 (1) ◽

pp. 36-55

Author(s):

Andrea A. McCracken ◽

Matthew S. McGlone

Keyword(s):

United States ◽

The United States ◽

The Other ◽

Naive Realism ◽

Naïve Realism ◽

Attitudinal Differences ◽

Egocentric Bias ◽

Unmarried Cohabitation

We explored the role of “naïve realism” in perceptions of attitudinal differences between proponents and opponents of unmarried cohabitation (UC) in the United States. Participants were presented with UC vignettes, asked to describe their own impressions of the couple in each scenario, and then to speculate about the impressions of the typical UC proponent and opponent. A comparison of these impressions yielded a pattern of false polarization in their perceptions, such that partisans’ self-reported sympathy was reliably more similar than the degree of sympathy either side attributed to the other. Partisans also exhibited egocentric bias regarding the basis for each side’s stances on UC. The relevance of this misperception and faulty assumptions toward the resolution of the debate over unmarried cohabitation is discussed.

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Top-Down Processing and Visual Reorientation Illusions in a Virtual Reality Environment

Swiss Journal of Psychology ◽

10.1024/1421-0185.63.3.143 ◽

2004 ◽

Vol 63 (3) ◽

pp. 143-149 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Fred W. Mast ◽

Charles M. Oman

Keyword(s):

Virtual Reality ◽

Visual Processing ◽

Line Length ◽

Perceptual Cues ◽

Virtual Reality Environment ◽

Top Down ◽

Test Conditions ◽

The Subject ◽

Processing Mechanisms

The role of top-down processing on the horizontal-vertical line length illusion was examined by means of an ambiguous room with dual visual verticals. In one of the test conditions, the subjects were cued to one of the two verticals and were instructed to cognitively reassign the apparent vertical to the cued orientation. When they have mentally adjusted their perception, two lines in a plus sign configuration appeared and the subjects had to evaluate which line was longer. The results showed that the line length appeared longer when it was aligned with the direction of the vertical currently perceived by the subject. This study provides a demonstration that top-down processing influences lower level visual processing mechanisms. In another test condition, the subjects had all perceptual cues available and the influence was even stronger.

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