A Philosophical
Introduction to
Perception
Jonathan Pillow
Perception (PSY 323), Fall 2009
The University of Texas at Austin
What is Perception?
stuff in the world
What is Perception?
stuff in the world
percepts
process for:
• extracting information via the senses
• forming internal representations of the world
Outline for today:
1. Philosophy:
• What philosophical perspectives inform our
understanding and study of perception?
2. General Examples
• why is naive realism wrong?
• why is perception worth studying?
3. Principles & Approaches
• modern tools for studying perception
Epistemology = theory of knowledge
• Q: where does knowledge come from?
Answer #1: Psychological Nativism
• the mind produces ideas that are not
derived from external sources
Epistemology = theory of knowledge
• Q: where does knowledge come from?
Answer #1: Psychological Nativism
• the mind produces ideas that are not
derived from external sources
Answer #2: Empiricism
• All knowledge comes from the senses
Proponents: Hobbes, Locke, Hume
• newborn is a “blank slate” (“tabula rasa”)
Epistemology = theory of knowledge
• Q: where does knowledge come from?
Answer #1: Psychological Nativism
vs.
Answer #2: Empiricism
• resembles “nature” vs. “nurture” debate
• extreme positions at both ends are a bit absurd
(See Steve Pinker!s “The Blank Slate” for a nice critique of the blanks slate idea)
Let!s grant (at least some) claims of Empiricism
(i.e., knowledge comes to us through our senses)
Q: what is the relationship between “things in the
world” and “representations in our heads”?
1. Naive Realism (or “common sense realism”)
• We perceive the world “as it is”
• Our minds have direct access to reality
exact map
external of reality
reality
2. Idealism
• The only reality is that of mind / ideas
• There is no evidence for / reason to believe in an
external world
reality
?
René Descartes (1596–1650)
“Meditations On First Philosophy”,
1641
• undertook a program of “radical
skepticism”
• discard any idea that can be
doubted
• senses can be fooled
• all sense data could be caused by an “evil demon”
• concluded that the only thing he could be certain of was
that he existed. (“cogito ergo sum”)
René Descartes (1596–1650)
“Meditations On First Philosophy”,
1641
• undertook a program of “radical
skepticism”
• discard any idea that can be
doubted
• eventually convinces himself that God exists
• God wouldn’t trick us, so external world also exists
• arrives at a “dualist” theory of reality: matter and mind
are the two kinds of stuff that exist
2. Idealism
Descartes’ supposition:
reality
evil
demon
2. Idealism
Bishop Berkeley (1685–1753)
- idealist, empiricist
reality
GOD
Modern variants:
• Brain in a vat
Brain in a vat paradox
“ What is real? How do you
define real? If you’re talking
about what you can feel,
what you can smell, what you
can taste and see, then real
is simply electrical signals
interpreted by your brain.
This is the world that you
know.”
—Morpheus in The Matrix,
1999
Early Philosophy of Perception
Plato and “The Allegory of the Cave”
Early Philosophy of Perception
Plato and “The Allegory of the Cave”
• Actually used by Plato to argue against empiricism
• True nature of reality is (platonic) “forms”, perceivable
directly with the mind, not the senses.
3. Representative Realism
• We perceive the external world indirectly &
imperfectly, via intermediary “sense data”
representation
external of reality
reality
sense data
Note: idealism could never be tested or disproved
• science can!t “prove” that the external world exists
• or that we have any kind of access to it
We need some pragmatic assumptions to get started:
• there is an external world
• we have (indirect) access to it via our senses
Final issue: what kind of “stuff” is there in the world?
Descartes: “Dualism” - there are two kinds of stuff
- mental stuff (non-spatial, non-physical)
- physical stuff (possesses no mental properties)
Problem: how can the physical and mental stuff
interact?
Modern versions of dualism
“homunculus” - little man
The person who sits inside
our head and is responsible for
“perceiving” what we see.
Prevalent conception, even in neuroscience today.
Alternative theory: “Monism” - only one kind of stuff
Specically: “Materialism” - physical matter and
energy is all that exists
- challenge is to come up with a story that explains
how physical stuff can have “mental” properties
(consciousness, awareness, etc)
Philosophical position of this course:
• Empiricism - knowledge from senses (obviously!)
• Representative Realism - indirect knowledge of
world, via the senses
• Materialism - only one kind of stuff (matter)
• Functionalism - understanding the “function” of
the sensory systems is all that we need to know to
“understand” them.
From Philosophy to Framework
stimuli (input)
environment you
action (output)
“you” = an Information Processing Machine
by denition, an IPM takes input and performs
operations on that input to produce an output
stimuli (input)
environment you
action
(output)
In this course, “understanding” perception means:
1. We can write down an algorithm for how a
perceptual task is performed
(i.e., we could use it to design a robot to perform the same task)
2. Knowing where and how the algorithm is
implemented in the nervous system.
Next:
“General examples”
or
“why naive realism is
wrong”
or
“why perception is
interesting to study”
perceptual acuity test
change blindness
Lightness illusion
Comparison patch
Comparison patch
“Argument from Illusion”
• The fact that we are sometimes mistaken
in our sensory perceptions indicates that
we do not directly perceive the world
• (Naive realism is false!)
Hermann-Hering Illusion
Hermann variant
39
Eye movements
• we aren!t aware of them, but they are
essential for vision
• if you stabilize the eye, you become blind
within several seconds
Color perception
Color perception
• Is not absolute: depends on the
specic mechanisms in the eye
(photoreceptors) and subsequent
processing in the brain
Face and Object recognition
(prosopagnosia and object agnosia)
- Giuseppe Arcimboldo
Neurological decits
• Another important source of
information about perceptual
mechanisms
• “If you can lose function A but not
function B, then A and B must rely on
distinct perceptual mechanisms”
McGurk Effect
Illusions from conicting
information
• Brain sometimes comes up with
interesting percepts in response to
conicting sensory cues
Algorithms for perception
• if we truly understand perceptual
mechanisms, we can replace neural
processing with computer
processing
Cochlear implants
(using a “different computer” to transduce auditory signals)
Direct neural control of movement
- Wessberg etal, Nature 2000
Summary
• Empiricism vs. Psychological Nativism
• Naive Realism vs. Idealism vs. “Representative
Realism”
• Descartes! doctrine of “radical skepticism” (brain
in a vat, or The Matrix)
• Dualism vs. Monism; Materialism
• Homunculus (little man) - perceiver of our reality
• Functionalism - algorithms are what matter
extra credit take-home problem: 2 points
Figure 1.9 Berkeley’s exploration of how vision works