The Nature Of Perception

THE NATURE OF PERCEPTION This page intentionally left blank The Nature of Perception JOHN FOSTER OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS This book has been printed digitally and produced in a standard specification in order to ensure its continuing availability OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS Great Clarendon Street, Oxford 0X2 6DP Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University's objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Bangkok Buenos Aires Cape Town Chennai Dar es Salaam Delhi Hong Kong Istanbul Karachi Kolkata Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Mumbai Nairobi Sao Paulo Shanghai Taipei Tokyo Toronto Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York © John Foster 2000 The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) Reprinted 2004 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover And you must impose this same condition on any acquirer ISBN 0-19-823769-3 Photograph: Joseph Raz To Rachel, Gerard, Richard, and Alice This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS Part One The Reshaping of the Issue 1. The Traditional Issue 2. The Two Interpretations 3. SDR and BRT Part Two An Examination of Strong Direct Realism 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. The Issue Before Us The Causal Argument Contact and Content The Presentational View The Internalist View Conclusion Part Three 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. Introduction The Cognitive Theory The Imagist Proposal The Nature of the Secondary Qualities The Sense-Datum Theory The Adverbialist Alternative The Sense-Datum Theory Revised Part Four 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. The Mediating Psychological State The Problem of Perception Introduction The Emergence of the Problem An Argument from Analogy A Deepening of the Problem Taking Stock 1 1 2 14 19 19 23 43 59 72 89 93 93 100 115 130 147 170 186 196 196 198 205 218 242 viii Contents Part Five The Idealist Solution 1. The New Option 2. An Argument for Idealism 3. The Unfinished Story Bibliography Index 244 244 262 280 285 287 PART ONE THE RESHAPING OF THE ISSUE 1 THE TRADITIONAL ISSUE What is the nature of perception—the sensory perception of items in the physical world by human subjects? By tradition, there are three general theories. First, there is direct realism. This accepts a realist view of the physical world: it takes the physical world (the world of physical space and material objects) to be something whose existence is logically independent of the human mind, and something which is, in its basic character, metaphysically fundamental. And, within this realist framework, it takes our perceptual access to the physical world to be direct. Second, there is the representative theory (or representative realism). This too accepts a realist view of the physical world. But it sees this realism—in particular, the claim of mind-independence—as putting the world beyond the reach of direct perception. Thus, in place of the claim that our perceptual access to the physical world is direct, it insists that the perceiving