scholarly journals Multistability in perception: binding sensory modalities, an overview

2012 ◽  
Vol 367 (1591) ◽  
pp. 896-905 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jean-Luc Schwartz ◽  
Nicolas Grimault ◽  
Jean-Michel Hupé ◽  
Brian C. J. Moore ◽  
Daniel Pressnitzer

This special issue presents research concerning multistable perception in different sensory modalities. Multistability occurs when a single physical stimulus produces alternations between different subjective percepts. Multistability was first described for vision, where it occurs, for example, when different stimuli are presented to the two eyes or for certain ambiguous figures. It has since been described for other sensory modalities, including audition, touch and olfaction. The key features of multistability are: (i) stimuli have more than one plausible perceptual organization; (ii) these organizations are not compatible with each other. We argue here that most if not all cases of multistability are based on competition in selecting and binding stimulus information. Binding refers to the process whereby the different attributes of objects in the environment, as represented in the sensory array, are bound together within our perceptual systems, to provide a coherent interpretation of the world around us. We argue that multistability can be used as a method for studying binding processes within and across sensory modalities. We emphasize this theme while presenting an outline of the papers in this issue. We end with some thoughts about open directions and avenues for further research.

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Barner

Why did humans develop precise systems for measuring experience, like numbers, clocks, andcalendars? I argue that precise representational systems were constructed by earlier generationsof humans because they recognized that their noisy perceptual systems were not capturingdistinctions that existed in the world. Abstract symbolic systems did not arise from perceptualrepresentations, but instead were constructed to describe and explain perceptual experience. Byanalogy, I argue that when children learn number words, they do not rely on noisy perceptualsystems, but instead acquire these words as units in a broader system of procedures, whosemeanings are ultimately defined by logical relations to one another, not perception.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (9) ◽  
pp. 1771
Author(s):  
Massimo Fabris ◽  
Nicola Cenni ◽  
Simone Fiaschi

Land subsidence is a geological hazard that affects several different communities around the world [...]


Laws ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 46
Author(s):  
Esther Salmerón-Manzano

New technologies and so-called communication and information technologies are transforming our society, the way in which we relate to each other, and the way we understand the world. By a wider extension, they are also influencing the world of law. That is why technologies will have a huge impact on society in the coming years and will bring new challenges and legal challenges to the legal sector worldwide. On the other hand, the new communications era also brings many new legal issues such as those derived from e-commerce and payment services, intellectual property, or the problems derived from the use of new technologies by young people. This will undoubtedly affect the development, evolution, and understanding of law. This Special Issue has become this window into the new challenges of law in relation to new technologies.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (15) ◽  
pp. 8206
Author(s):  
Andrew Spring ◽  
Erin Nelson ◽  
Irena Knezevic ◽  
Patricia Ballamingie ◽  
Alison Blay-Palmer

Since we first conceived of this Special Issue, “Levering Sustainable Food Systems to Address Climate Change—Possible Transformations”, COVID-19 has turned the world upside down [...]


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (7) ◽  
pp. 340
Author(s):  
Kirsi Tirri

This special issue on “Contemporary Teacher Education: A Global Perspective” contains eleven articles focused on varied current topics in teacher education all over the world [...]


2019 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 7-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Noura Erakat ◽  
Marc Lamont Hill

This introductory essay outlines the context for this special issue of the Journal of Palestine Studies on Black-Palestinian transnational solidarity (BPTS). Through the analytic of “renewal,” the authors point to the recent increase in individual and collective energies directed toward developing effective, reciprocal, and transformative political relationships within various African-descendant and Palestinian communities around the world. Drawing from the extant BPTS literature, this essay examines the prominent intellectual currents in the field and points to new methodologies and analytics that are required to move the field forward. With this essay, the authors aim not only to contextualize the field and to frame this special issue, but also to chart new directions for future intellectual and political work.


Perception ◽  
1989 ◽  
Vol 18 (6) ◽  
pp. 739-751 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Marendaz

Interindividual differences in field dependence—independence (FDI) which emerge in situations of vision—posture conflict when subjects are required to orient their bodies vertically were investigated. The first aim was to see whether the same interindividual differences are found in judgements of the orientation of forms in focal vision in which subjects have to deal with conflicting spatial references processed by different sensory modalities. The second aim was to test the idea that the FDI dimension is due to functional habits linked to balancing. Subjects performed Kopfermann's (1930) shape-orientation task in either a stable (experiment 1) or an unstable (experiment 2) postural condition. Results showed that the FDI dimension comes into play in the solution of the Kopfermann shape orientation task, and that there is an interactive link between FDI and postural balance, consistent with theoretical expectations. More generally, it appears that the ‘choice’ of a spatial reference system is the product of both individual and situational characteristics, and that the ‘vicariance’ (or inter-changeability) of the sensory systems dealing with gravitational upright is at the basis of this interaction.


2021 ◽  
Vol 33 (3) ◽  
pp. 145-161
Author(s):  
Michaeline A Crichlow ◽  
Dirk Philipsen

This special issue composed of essays that brainstorm the triadic relationship between Covid-19, Race and the Markets, addresses the fundamentals of a world economic system that embeds market values within social and cultural lifeways. It penetrates deep into the insecurities and inequalities that have endured for several centuries, through liberalism for sure, and compounded ineluctably into these contemporary times. Market fundamentalism is thoroughly complicit with biopolitical sovereignty-its racializing socioeconomic projects, cheapens life given its obsessive focus on high growth, by any means necessary. If such precarity seemed normal even opaque to those privileged enough to reap the largess of capitalism and its political correlates, the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic with its infliction of sickness and death has exposed the social and economic dehiscence undergirding wealth in the U.S. especially, and the world at large. The essays remind us of these fissures, offering ways to unthink this devastating spiral of growth, and embrace an unadulterated care centered system; one that offers a more open and relational approach to life with the planet. Care, then becomes the pursuit of a re-existence without domination, and the general toxicity that has accompanied a regimen of high growth. The contributors to this volume, join the growing global appeal to turn back from this disaster, and rethink how we relate to ourselves, to our neighbors here and abroad, and to the non-humans in order to dwell harmoniously within socionature.


2016 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. 217-219 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter D. Steinberg ◽  
Laura Airoldi ◽  
Joanne Banks ◽  
Kenneth M.Y. Leung
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