This book combines approaches from philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience in the study of perception. In addition to appealing to readers from all three of these disciplines, Perception: The Basics is a perfect introduction for students and general readers. Its interdisciplinary coverage of all aspects of perception does not require familiarity with either abstract philosophical concepts or neuroscientific knowledge.
Besides addressing the classic questions of how perception works, the book highlights the intricate connections between perception and action as well as perception that is not triggered by sensory input, like mental imagery, dreaming, and hallucination. Further, the book balances out an overemphasis on vision in the literature by giving almost equal coverage to all the sense modalities (although some examples are easier to present in visual form).
Questions that are discussed in detail include:
- What is the function of perception?
- Is perception an unbiased way of learning about the world?
- What is the difference between the different sense modalities, like seeing, hearing, smelling, etc.?
- What is the connection between perception and action?
- What is the relation between perception, mental imagery, dreaming, and hallucination?
With helpful chapter summaries and a comprehensive final bibliography, Perception: The Basics is sure to be the first-stop for anyone trying to better understand this important area of interdisciplinary research.
1. What is Perception?
1.1. Window to the world
1.2 The processing of sensory input
1.3 Perceptual representation
1.4 Perceptual attention
1.5 The function of perception
2. The Variety of Senses
2.1 Vision
2.2 Audition
2.3 Touch
2.4 The chemical senses
2.5 Multimodal perception
3. Perception and Cognition
3.1. The perception/cognition divide
3.2 Top-down influences on perception
3.3 Perceptual expectations
3.4 Cross-cultural differences
3.5 Perceptual justification
4. Perception and Action
4.1. How perception leads to action
4.2 Action-guiding perception
4.3. Perceptually guided actions
4.4. Perception is not all-purpose
4.5 Egocentric perception
5. Perception without Input
5.1 Offline perception
5.2 Mental imagery
5.3 Illusions and hallucination
5.4 Dreaming
5.5 Multimodal mental imagery
6. Aesthetic Perception
6.1 Aesthetic experience
6.2 Aesthetic attention
6.3 Cross-cultural aesthetic differences
6.4 Aesthetic imagery
6.5 The freedom of perception
Biography
Bence Nanay is Professor of Philosophical Psychology and BOF research professor at the University of Antwerp . He published four monographs with Oxford UP (Between Perception and Action, 2013; Aesthetics as Philosophy of Perception, 2016; Aesthetics: A Very Short Introduction, 2019; and Mental Imagery: Philosophy, Psychology, Neuroscience, 2023) with three more under contract. He is the director of the European Network for Sensory Research.
