Perception and Cognition: Structural and Epistemic Elements

Robert Audi (University of Notre Dame)

Abstact: This paper sketches a theory of perception that addresses several major questions. Is perception necessarily experiential or instead simply a matter of receiving, through one or more of the senses, certain information about one’s environment in a certain (generally usable) way? If, as seems evident, perception is informational, in what sense is it “reliable?” Does it entail belief-formation regarding what is perceived? Are there perceptual levels, some more basic than others, and, if so, is the relation between them mediated by inference? Is perception, even if not inferential, in some sense “theory-laden?” Granting that perception is essential for guiding action, can it do so only by way of doxastic content, say by way of perceptual beliefs about the relevant environment?  Finally, do justification and knowledge depend on perception in the same way? In approaching these questions, the paper takes seeing as the paradigm case to be explored, but the conception of seeing it presents is intended to be applicable to other perceptual modes. The paper also draws a perceptual analogy to the distinction between basic and non-basic action and considers phenomenological as well as structural and epistemic aspects of perceptual experience. The result is to place perception, structurally, phenomenologically, and conceptually understood, in both the causal and epistemological orders.