The Neural Basis of Perception: Discrimination, Information-Processing, and Biases

FAIN: FEL-273547-21

Susanna Schellenberg
Rutgers University (New Brunswick, NJ 08901-8559)

Research and writing leading to publication of a book on the nature of perception based on current neuroscience.

The Neural Basis of Perception: Discrimination, Information-Processing, and Biases is a philosophical investigation into the neural underpinnings of how we experience the world through our senses. Neuroscience is currently one of the most exciting areas of scientific research. The last two decades have seen enormous progress in understanding the neural basis of perception. Despite obvious relevance, this research has barely been taken up in philosophical accounts of perception. Similarly, philosophical work on perception has had little influence on neuroscientific accounts. My book aims to develop an encompassing understanding of the nature of perception informed by both sides thereby contributing to debates in both philosophy and neuroscience while building a bridge between them.

Associated Products

The Neural Basis of Discrimination, Classification, and Attribution (Article)
Title: The Neural Basis of Discrimination, Classification, and Attribution
Author: Susanna Schellenberg
Abstract: In light of recent neuroscientific research, this paper argues that perceptual discrimination is necessary for perception, but classification and attribution is not.
Year: 2022
Access Model: open access
Format: Journal
Publisher: Analysis

The Generality and Particularity of Perception (Article)
Title: The Generality and Particularity of Perception
Author: Susanna Schellenberg
Abstract: This paper argues that perception is fundamentally a matter of employing perceptual capacities that function to discriminate and single out features in our environment. It shows how employing such capacities constitutes a general element that qualitatively indistinguishable perceptions, hallucinations, and illusions have in common. It shows moreover that in virtue of capacities singling out particular features in the perceiver's environment, employing such capacities provides an element that is unique to the relevant perception.
Year: 2022
Access Model: open access
Format: Journal
Publisher: Mind and Language

Capacities-First Philosophy (Book Section)
Title: Capacities-First Philosophy
Author: Susanna Schellenberg
Editor: Brian McLaughlin
Editor: Jonathan Cohen
Abstract: The mind is fundamentally a matter of employing mental capacities in virtue of which we represent our environment as being a certain way. These mental capacities can take the form of concepts or low-level discriminatory capacities as they are used in perception. Understanding the mind in this way allows for a clear way of understanding how sensory states and, more generally, mental states are grounded in the physical. Being in an intentional state is understood in terms of engaging in a mental activity, namely employing mental capacities. In this paper, I show how understanding the mind in terms of employing mental capacities allows for a physicalist understanding of the mind while holding on to what is unique about mental states.
Year: 2022
Access Model: open access
Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell

The Neural Basis of Perception and Imagination (Book Section)
Title: The Neural Basis of Perception and Imagination
Author: Susanna Schellenberg
Editor: I Ferran
Editor: C. Werner
Abstract: I argue that in perceptual imaginations we employ the very same capacities that we employ in perceptions. However, we employ those capacities in an imaginative mode. As a consequence, imaginations do not purport to be of the environment. I argue that perceptual imaginations are akin to intentional hallucinations.
Year: 2023
Publisher: Oxford: Oxford University Press

Ways of Perceiving and Situation-Dependent Properties (Book Section)
Title: Ways of Perceiving and Situation-Dependent Properties
Author: Susanna Schellenberg
Editor: Farid Masrour
Editor: Ori Beck
Abstract: This paper analyzes the subjective and objective aspects of perspectival variances. I argue that the objective aspect of perspectival variance is best understood in terms of situation-dependent properties and that the subjective aspect is best understood in terms of ways of perceiving such situation-dependent properties. I show how this approach solves a host of problems that alternative accounts face.
Year: 2023
Access Model: open access
Publisher: Oxford: Oxford University Press

Capacities First: Epistemic Externalism without Epistemic Disjunctivism (Book Section)
Title: Capacities First: Epistemic Externalism without Epistemic Disjunctivism
Author: Susanna Schellenberg
Editor: Anil Gupta
Editor: Ori Beck
Editor: Miloš Vuletić
Abstract: This paper develops a distinctive externalist view of knowledge according to which mental capacities are explanatory basic. This capacity view is an externalist view that does not invoke reliability, remains steadfastly naturalistic, and in recognizing a metaphysically substantive common element between perception and hallucination avoids any commitment to disjunctivism. So it argues for a view of epistemic externalism that does not entail any version of epistemic disjunctivism. The basic idea of this capacity view is that in experience we employ perceptual capacities that function to discriminate and single out particulars in our environment. It is because a given subject is employing a perceptual capacity with a certain nature that her mental states have epistemic force. Employing such perceptual capacities yields a mental state that provides us with phenomenal evidence, and employing such capacities in the good case also provides us with knowledge-worthy factive evidence. In perceptual Gettier cases the subject only has phenomenal evidence and so lacks sufficient evidence for knowledge. This approach is distinctive in three respects: it groups perceptual Gettier cases in with hallucinations, it treats both via a lack of sufficient evidence (rather than through invoking some sort of fourth condition), and it divides up perceptual Gettier cases from fake barn cases and broken clock cases. The underlying picture of perceptual knowledge avoids the pitfalls of both externalist disjunctivist views and internalist views, while revealing what is right in both externalist and internalist approaches. The capacity view is an externalist view that does not invoke reliability, remains steadfastly naturalistic, and in recognizing a metaphysically substantive common element between perception and hallucination avoids any commitment to disjunctivism. I show how this view allows us to acknowledge internalist insights by arguing that mental state are constituted by the perceptual
Year: 2023
Access Model: open access
Publisher: Oxford University Press

Perceptual Discrimination without Attribution (Book Section)
Title: Perceptual Discrimination without Attribution
Author: Susanna Schellenberg
Editor: Miloš Vuletić
Editor: Anil Gupta
Editor: Ori Beck
Abstract: I respond to commentaries by Aaron Cahen, Jack Lyons, and Lisa Mirrachi, and further develop my view that perception is fundamentally a matter of employing perceptual capacities that function to discriminate and single out particulars.
Year: 2023
Access Model: open access
Publisher: Oxford University Press

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