Indirect RealismIndirect Realism

Problems (and solutions?) 

Do ideas resemble external objects?Do ideas resemble external objects?

• Suppose you watch a square piece of steelSuppose you watch a square piece of steel plate being heated with a blowtorch until it glows red hot.  You can feel the heat coming off it.  Is your idea of the object square, red or hot?– Assuming that the idea itself is some sort of brain event, we can say that the idea isn’t hot, red or square.

– Rather, the idea represents the external object ashot red and squarehot, red and square.

A PuzzleA Puzzle

• But in that case how does the idea representBut in that case, how does the idea represent the object, with properties that it lacks itself?  

• How can there be representation other than• How can there be representation, other than by resemblance?  

N B Th l bj l h• N.B. The external object surely causes the idea, but causation isn’t sufficient for 

i D irepresentation, as Dancy points out.

• Mysterious?

Ideas are ‘transparent’?Ideas are  transparent ?

• It appears that we’re not conscious of anyIt appears that we re not conscious of any properties of the idea itself (e.g. where they occur in the brain, what the spiking frequencies are), but only of the properties that the idea attributes to the external object.  

• We’re only aware of its representational content.

• This is sometimes called the ‘transparency thesis’.

The Transparency ThesisThe Transparency Thesis• If you have a conscious experience, all that you are conscious of

are the objects and features of the objects that the experienceare the objects and features of the objects that the experience is an experience of.

Elaborations of Transparency Introspective access to

experience simply looks through experience to the external world

We are never introspectively aware of features of experiences themselves

(Slide copied from Pete Mandik)

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(Slide copied from Pete Mandik)

If maps were conscious ...

• If maps were conscious, would they be aware of being made of paper, of being so many square g p p , g y qinches, etc.?

• Or could they be designed to just be aware of the information they contain about the territory?information they contain about the territory?

An Error theory of colour?An Error theory of colour?

• An ‘error theory’ in philosophy is a theory e o t eo y p osop y s a t eo yaccording to which the common‐sense understanding of something is mistaken.

• (Generally we avoid error theories, as far as possible.  We minimise the attribution of error to di f lk )ordinary folks.)

• But if colours are part of the representational content of our ideas then it seems that commoncontent of our ideas, then it seems that common sense does indeed ascribe colours to external objects, and hence is in error.j ,

“Original Intentionality”g y“On this view, sentences of natural languages have no intrinsic meaning of and by themselves. Nor do utterances g yof sentences have an intrinsic content. Sentences of natural languages would fail to have any meaning unless it was conferred to them by people who use them to express their thoughts and communicate them to others. Utterances borrow whatever ‘derived’ intentionality they have from the ‘original’ (or ‘primitive’) intentionality of human beings”

(SEP entry “Intentionality”)

• A percept, as a natural representation, is quite unlike artificial representations (e.g. maps).  Percepts are intrinsically representational, not merely by convention.

Problem of ‘qualia’Problem of  qualia

• A number of philosophers (Thomas Nagel FrankA number of philosophers (Thomas Nagel, Frank Jackson, David Chalmers) have argued that perceptual states cannot be purely physical p p p y p yanyway, on the grounds that colours, tastes and smells cannot be defined in physical terms.

“Nothing you could tell of a physical sort capturesNothing you could tell of a physical sort captures the smell of a rose, for instance.” (Jackson, “Epiphenomenal Qualia”.)

Internal objects and belief statesInternal objects and belief states

Claims of non‐existence 

Internal objects and belief statesInternal objects and belief states

• If someone believes that Hesperus andIf someone believes that Hesperus and Phosphorus are distinct planets, then what are their (subjective) meanings of ‘Hesperus’ andtheir (subjective) meanings of  Hesperus  and ‘Phosphorus’?

• The meanings are surely components of their ‘ bj i ld’ ‘ i i ’ A ’‘subjective world’, or ‘epistemic state’.  Aren’t they internal objects then?

On inferential realismOn inferential realism

1 Inferential realism needs to respect the1. Inferential realism needs to respect the distinction between what is seen and what is inferred.  Both are beliefs, but only one is f , yaccompanied by a visual experience.  

2. ‘See’ refers then to automatic, unconscious2. See  refers then to automatic, unconscious inference accompanied by a visual experience?

3. With this in place, what is the difference3. With this in place, what is the difference between this and the usual ‘double awareness’ indirect realism?  Is it more than semantic?

Hume on perception• What do you think of the ‘shrinking table’ argument?• My visual field represents not just the table but alsomyMy visual field represents not just the table, but also my 

spatial relation to the table.  (I am located in my own visual field)

• As I walk toward the table the table is not represented as• As I walk toward the table, the table is not represented as getting bigger!

Scepticism about external objectsScepticism about external objects

“By what argument can it be proved that the perceptions of the mind must be caused by external objects that are perfectly distinct from them and yet similar to them (if that were possible) rather than arising from the energy of the mindpossible), rather than arising from the energy of the mind itself, or from the activities of some invisible and unknown spirit, or from some other cause still more unknown to us? ...Where shall we look for an answer to it? To experience surelyWhere shall we look for an answer to it? To experience, surely, as we do with all other questions of that kind. But here experience is and must be entirely silent. The mind never has anything present to it except the perceptions, and can’t y g p p p p ,possibly experience their connection with objects. The belief in such a connection, therefore, has no foundation in reasoning because the reasoning would have to start from something k th h i ” ( 2)known through experience.” (p. 2)

Similar to DancySimilar to Dancy

“If everything we directly perceive is an ‘internal’ object, how could we be in a position to form any justified beliefs about a physical external world? For all we know, since we never perceive it directly, there is no such thing as a

h i l ld t ll It i l i ll ibl iphysical world at all. ... It is logically possible even given our awareness of internal direct objects, that there be no external world, and so an inference from the internal to the external cannot be deductive If the inference wereexternal cannot be deductive. If the inference were inductive, however, it would rely upon establishing previous successful correlations between statements about internal direct objects and external indirect ones. But ex hypothesidirect objects and external indirect ones. But ex hypothesiwe cannot establish such correlations, for to do so we would have to be aware of the external objects independently.”

• (p 16)(p. 16)

Thomas Reid on perceptionThomas Reid on perception

• “The ideas, of whose existence I require the , qproof, are not the operations of any mind, but supposed objects of those operations. They are not perception remembrance or conception butnot perception, remembrance, or conception, but things that are said to be perceived, or remembered, or imagined.”

• (p. 1 – emphasis added)

• But our beliefs (perceptual and otherwise doseem to have such “objects” as componentsseem to have such  objects  as components.

Indirect realism is an error theory?Indirect realism is an error theory?

“[Indirect realism] is directly contrary to the universal sense of[Indirect realism] is directly contrary to the universal sense of men who have not been instructed in philosophy. When we see the sun or moon, we have no doubt that the very objects which

i di l f di f d fwe immediately see are very far distant from us, and from one another. ... But how are we astonished when the philosopher informs us that we are mistaken in all this; that the sun and moon which we see are not, as we imagine, many miles distant from us, and from each other, but they are in our own mind”

• Or is it: “Of course you see the sun and moon.  Now let me tell you how that process of seeing works ...”y p g

“Material objects are disproportioned to theMaterial objects are disproportioned to the mind, and removed from it by the whole diameter of Being ”diameter of Being. This argument I cannot answer, because I do not understand it ”not understand it.

Yes!  Thank you Mr. Reid.

A better argument ...A better argument ...

“The soul without being present to the imagesThe soul, without being present to the images of the things perceived, could not possibly perceive them A living substance can onlyperceive them. A living substance can only there perceive, where it is present, either to the things themselves (as the omnipresent God isthings themselves (as the omnipresent God is to the whole universe) or to the images of things as the soul is in its proper sensorium ”things, as the soul is in its proper sensorium.

• In other words the mind is only conscious of its• In other words, the mind is only conscious of its own states, not any distant state of affairs.

• In perception the object acts upon the mind via• In perception, the object acts upon the mind via some causal process (e.g. light rays).  The mind is thereby modified in some way that we arethereby modified in some way that we are conscious of.

• Reid responds:  “An object, in being perceived, does not act at all I perceive the walls of thedoes not act at all. I perceive the walls of the room where I sit; but they are perfectly inactive, and therefore act not upon the mind ”and therefore act not upon the mind.

Realism vs. PhenomenalismRealism vs. Phenomenalism

Realism:  Objects exist out in there in the world, j ,independently of perception.  (Actually they cause our perceptions of them.)

Phenomenalism:  External objects do not exist, apart from our perceptions. (hence anti‐realism) They arefrom our perceptions.  (hence anti realism)  They are logical constructs, built out of our perceptions. For example, a phenomenalist might understand the claim, “there was a dog over there just now” to mean, “If I had looked in that direction just now then I would have seen a dog.”have seen a dog.

• Dancy says that the conditionals that theDancy says that the conditionals that the phenomenalist takes as basic themselves call out for some kind of explanation, as dispositional qualities call for a categorical basis.

• Why would I have seen a dog, had I turned around just now?  What makes this statement 

? Wh ld h d htrue?  What would have caused that perception?