Synesthesia as (Multimodal) Mental Imagery

Multisensory Research ◽

10.1163/22134808-bja10027 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 1-16

Author(s):

Bence Nanay

Keyword(s):

Mental Imagery ◽

Sensory Stimulation

Abstract It has been repeatedly suggested that synesthesia is intricately connected with unusual ways of exercising one’s mental imagery, although it is not always entirely clear what the exact connection is. My aim is to show that all forms of synesthesia are forms of (often very different kinds of) mental imagery and, further, if we consider synesthesia to be a form of mental imagery, we get significant explanatory benefits, especially concerning less central cases of synesthesia where the inducer is not sensory stimulation.

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Multimodal Mental Imagery and Perceptual Justification

The Epistemology of Non-Visual Perception ◽

10.1093/oso/9780190648916.003.0004 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 77-98

Author(s):

Bence Nanay

Keyword(s):

Mental Imagery ◽

Sensory Stimulation ◽

Amodal Completion ◽

Perceptual Processing ◽

Perceptual State ◽

Narrow Sense ◽

Perceptual Justification ◽

Close Attention ◽

Cognitive Penetrability ◽

Sense Modality

There has been a lot of discussion about how the cognitive penetrability of perception may or may not have important implications for understanding perceptual justification. The aim of this chapter is to argue that a different set of findings in perceptual psychology poses an even more serious challenge to the very idea of perceptual justification. These findings are about the importance of perceptual processing that is not driven by corresponding sensory stimulation in the relevant sense modality (such as amodal completion and multimodal completion). These findings show that everyday perception is in fact a mixture of sensory-stimulation-driven perceptual processing and perceptual processing that is not driven by corresponding sensory stimulation in the relevant sense modality and that we have strong reasons to doubt the epistemic pedigree of the latter process. The implication of this is not that we should become skeptics or deny the possibility of perceptual justification. It is, rather, that the only way in which we can understand when and whether a perceptual state justifies beliefs is by paying close attention to empirical facts about the reliability of perceptual processing that is not driven by corresponding sensory stimulation in the relevant sense modality. In this sense (a very narrow sense) epistemology needs to be naturalized.

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Sensory Substitution and Multimodal Mental Imagery

Perception ◽

10.1177/0301006617699225 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 46 (9) ◽

pp. 1014-1026 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Bence Nanay

Keyword(s):

Mental Imagery ◽

Special Form ◽

Sensory Stimulation ◽

Tactile Perception ◽

Sensory Substitution ◽

Visual Mental Imagery ◽

Sense Modality ◽

The Senses

Many philosophers use findings about sensory substitution devices in the grand debate about how we should individuate the senses. The big question is this: Is “vision” assisted by (tactile) sensory substitution really vision? Or is it tactile perception? Or some sui generis novel form of perception? My claim is that sensory substitution assisted “vision” is neither vision nor tactile perception, because it is not perception at all. It is mental imagery: visual mental imagery triggered by tactile sensory stimulation. But it is a special form of mental imagery that is triggered by corresponding sensory stimulation in a different sense modality, which I call “multimodal mental imagery.”

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