Seminars of Philosophy of Perception, Mind, and Language — 2018

Alon Chasid (Bar-Ilan University)

Truth-Neutral Perceptual Experience

12 dicembre 2018, h. 15:30-17:30.

Sala Enzo Paci, Direzione del Dipartimento di FIlosofia, Via Festa del Perdono 7, Milano.

Abstract

A commonly discussed feature of perceptual experience is that it has phenomenal force: it purports to reveal something about the world. In this sense, perceptual experience is truth-committal. In this talk, I will start by discussing different descriptions of this feature, and I will adopt a relatively minimal characterization of it, according to which a perceptual experience is truth-committal just in case it inclines the perceiver to believe its content. I will then introduce cases where visual experiences are truth-neutral: i.e. they have no phenomenal force. Some of these experiences are garden-variety: they may arise when the perceiver has robust evidence that her visual experience is non-veridical. Other truth-neutral experiences arise in specific contexts, e.g., in looking at a picture and experiencing the object it depicts, or in watching a visual work of fiction such as a play or a movie. Next, I will argue that what renders visual experience truth-neutral in those cases is that it is penetrated by belief-like imaginings. I will conclude by explaining why it is that when belief-like imaginings—as opposed to beliefs—penetrate visual experience, they render it truth-neutral.

La conferenza si terrà in inglese.

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