[lit-ideas] Re: The Causal Theory of Perception
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 29 Jan 2014 09:29:26 -0500 (EST)
We are considering the analysis of the verb 'to see' by Grice. Notably, the
fact that Grice states that if I say:
I see the rabbit is eating a carrot.
Then,
the rabbit IS eating a carrot.
And the rabbit's eating a carrot CAUSES my seeing the rabbit eating the
carrot.
Some people, Grice grants, misuse 'see', in what is called a 'sloppy' use.
If to implicate is to mean more than you say, to disimplicate is to mean
less. Some people do use 'see' when such existential entailment is dropped.
And they may do this consciously, as when we say, as we report a play, that
Macbeth saw Banquo.
even when we know that Banquo, a hallucination by the dramatic character,
was not there to be seen (at that point).
In a message dated 1/28/2014 12:15:30 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx writes:
Perhaps I should have continued to consider the issues or started
elsewhere, but here are some remarks bearing on the so-called “causal theory of
perception”"
so famously brought to the philosophical forum by Grice in 1961.
McEvoy:
"The ‘external world’ [of “objects”] has a causal role in creating the ‘
internal world’ of our experience, but the specifics of this role are
largely determined by the perceptual apparatus that governs our ‘internal
world’
– that is, largely determined by how that perceptual apparatus is primed
to detect and process the ‘external world’ [Kant’s point; but as to “
largely determined” see last paragraph]."
We agree. And we love the use of 'apparatus', that Geary uses more largely.
McEvoy continues:
"The ‘external world’ does not set the ‘detection-levels’ or the ‘
processing-form’ of the perceptual apparatus except via the mechanism of ‘
natural selection’ [Kant’s point when understood in the light of Darwinism: for
example, the link between light-waves and perceived colours is always
contingently dependent on the perceptual apparatus involved and not a
necessary,
intrinsic function of light-waves themselves]. But in ‘natural selection’
, selection-from-without by the ‘external world’ is on an ‘internal world’
that is never ‘instructed’ by the ‘external world’ [‘instructed’ in
the Lamarckian or inductive sense]: the ‘internal world’ of experience is
the product of ‘blind’ variation-from-within [leading to ‘selective retention
’ within a ‘nested hierarchy’, as per D.T. Campbell in his “Evolutionary
Epistemology”]."
OK. This is getting nicely and charmingly difficult! So I should check:
"Campbell, citing Grice". Or not.
"At the same time, a perceptual apparatus that emerged by blind variation ‘
from within’, but for which there was nothing ‘in reality’ that it could
detect, would not likely evolve because it could provide no useful
information: so our perceptual apparatus (and that of all creatures) works on
decoding material that exists in reality – like lightwaves, heatwaves,
soundwaves, electro-magnetic waves."
Which I think was Geary's point when he said that all knowledge is
electromagnetic in essence.
"Imagine a kind of conceivable x-wave that does not actually exist in
reality but which could conceivably be detected by a conceivable perceptual
apparatus: in Darwinian terms, it is a virtual impossibility that any such
conceivable x-detecting apparatus would evolve because there is nothing ‘in
reality’ to give it adaptive purchase. Conversely, every kind and level of
perceptual apparatus may be guessed to owe something – causally – to there
being something ‘in reality’ which makes the apparatus useful or adaptive.
When a rabbit sees a fox, that fox indeed plays a causal role in what the
rabbit sees"
Good point. Since we are basing our epistemology, rightly, on rabbits, I
should point out that Grice's 'pirot' (like a parrot, but different) was the
squarrel (like a squirrel, only different). He goes on to name the
squarrel, Toby, and his analysis is of Toby hobbling (I think is the verb
Grice
uses) nuts before it.
Here we have the rabbit seeing a fox.
This predatory sense of 'see' reminds me of yet another use of imaginary
(or not so imaginary) zoology by Grice. He is discussing 'disjunction', and
wants to say that the logical operator ("p v q") is already 'created' as a
content of a psychological attitude. And I think his example is that of an
eagle who or which sees that the rabbit is BEHIND the BUSH or out on the
open field. From this 'belief' or 'perception' (that the rabbit is here or
there), with a further perception that, on second looks by the eagle, the
rabbit is NOT behind the bush, the eagle DEDUCES (alla Gentzen, by elimination
of 'disjunction') that the rabbit is on the open field. Grice wants to say
that there is something like a disjunctive belief when the eagle just LURKS
because all she perceives is that the rabbit is HERE _or_ there.
McEvoy goes on with his example of the rabbit seeing the fox.
"when a rabbit sees a fox, that fox indeed plays a causal role in what the
rabbit sees"
--- INTERLUDE on Witters. Witters speaks of 'see as': he says that on
occasion he can see a rabbit AS a duck, and a DUCK as a rabbit. And he spends
long pages of "Philosophical Investigations". He uses German verbs "sehen"
properly translated to Anglo-Saxon by good old Miss Anscombe, as the
playmates of her children called her.
McEvoy:
"when a rabbit sees a fox, that fox indeed plays a causal role in what the
rabbit sees, for it is central to the adaptive usefulness of vision that it
is causally affected by significant features of the ‘external world’
[like a predator]: but the specifics of rabbit-vision are largely explained in
terms of ‘natural selection’, and in that explanation the fox of immediate
rabbit-perception plays no causal role."
I think we are distinguishing here then between
IMMEDIATE perception
and
MEDIATE perception
which, since we were talking about him recently, reminds me of Whitehead.
Whitehead, in one of those inspirational nights in Cambridge,
Massachusetts (he lived near the River Charles, named after the King and LOVED
his
'cottage') coined the term "prehension," which comes, of course, from the
Latin
"prehensio", meaning "to seize."
Prehension, as Whitehead uses it, is meant to indicate a kind of perception
that can be conscious or unconscious, applying to people as well as
electrons -- so I thought McEvoy would appreciate that, since while McEvoy does
not, I think, speak of 'electron knowledge', Whitehead apparently does.
Whitehead regards perception as occurring in two modes, causal efficacy (or
"physical prehension", alla Grice, "Causal Theory of Perception", 1961) and
presentational immediacy (or "conceptual prehension"), where we should be
aware of the noun 'immediacy', which connects with McEvoy's use of
'immediate', or not.
In higher organisms (like people), these two modes of perception combine
into what Whitehead terms "symbolic reference", as when I say, "Hello!".
Whitehead speaks, on top of that, of abiogenesis as the hypothetical
natural process by which life arises from simple organic compounds.
"Panexperientialism", the idea that all entities experience, has been
used to describe Whitehead's view, and to distinguish it from panpsychism,
the idea that all matter has consciousness.
We were discussing Whitehead's influence as being diffuse. Some blame it on
the perception of his chosen subjects of discussion as passé; others to
the sheer difficulty and density of his prose. (He ordered his wife to burn
anything 'unpublished' upon his death. She did -- implicating that his
handwriting was perhaps also dense?).
McEvoy continues:
"Strange to say, but it is not the fox so much as the ancestors of that fox
(as they have operated as a ‘selection pressure’ on the ancestors of the
rabbit) that may (partially) explain why and how the rabbit sees the fox as
he does – the causal role of the fox of immediate perception is minimal in
comparison (a mere trigger on an already highly developed and primed
visual detection system)."
I see what you mean. This is interesting, and may be generalised. In
England, for a time, people had immediate perception of a wolf. Now the wolf
has
become extinct in England (and the British Isles in general). So people
perceive a wolf only in a zoological garden. This may be explained with Darwin.
The last British wolf was killed by Sir Ewan Cameron in 1680 in
Killiecrankie, Perthshire, Scotland.
However, as late as 1999, Martyn Gorman, senior lecturer in zoology at
Aberdeen University called for a reintroduction of wolves to Britain.
He shelved the idea following an outcry from sheep farmers.
Later in 2002, Paul van Vlissingen, a wealthy landowner at Letterewe,
Achnasheen, Ross-shire, in the Western Highlands, proposed, again, the
reintroduction of the wolf, stating that current deer culling methods were
inadequate, and that wolves would boost the British tourist industry.
In 2007, British researchers which included experts from the Imperial
College London said that wolf reintroduction into Britain would aid the
re-establishment of plants and birds currently hampered by the deer population.
The study also assessed people's attitudes towards the idea of releasing
wolves into the wild.
While the public were generally positive, people living in rural areas were
more sensitive, though they were open to the idea provided they would be
reimbursed for livestock losses.
Richard Morley, of The Wolf Society of Britain, forecast in 2007 that
public support for wolf reintroduction would grow over the next 15 years,
though
he criticised previous talks as being too "simple or romantic".
Morley states that although wolves would be good for tourism, farmers and
crofters have serious concerns about the effect wolves could have on their
livestock, particularly sheep, that have to be acknowledged
McEvoy continues:
"Likewise, the specifics of my ‘internal world’ of visual experience when
I ‘see a lamp’ or ‘see a post box’ has much less causally to do with the
lamp or post box respectively (both of which are only very recent additions
to life in evolutionary terms, and neither of which has operated in
evolution as significant ‘selection pressures’) than with the vast hidden
reservoir of evolutionary changes to the eye as an adaptive organ set to
detect
and process and decode ‘data’ from the ‘external world’ – changes that we
may best (albeit only partially) explain in terms of ‘natural selection’."
Indeed. In fact, there is no such thing as a red pillar box as Grice saw
it, other than in Great Britain. And one may wonder as to how cultural that
perception is. To someone who is ignorant of what those red pillar boxes are
meant to do (collect your mail), the very formulation of the 'perception'
report ("I see ...") may change. One needs experiment on this area.
In the British Isles, the first red pillar post boxes were erected in
Jersey in 1852.
A lot of people (where 'lot' is possiby hyperbolic) SAW that.
It should be noted that roadside WALL boxes first appeared in 1857 as a
cheaper alternative to red pillar boxes, especially in rural districts.
In 1853 the first pillar box in the United Kingdom was installed at
Botchergate, Carlisle.
In 1856, Richard Redgrave of the Department of Science and Art designed an
ornate pillar box for use in London and other large cities.
In 1859, the design was improved, and this became the first National
Standard pillar box.
Green was adopted as the standard colour for the early Victorian post
boxes.
This possibly entails a few modifications to Grice's "Causal Theory of
Perception" ("That pillar box seems green to me").
Between 1866 and 1879 the hexagonal Penfold post box became the standard
design for pillar boxes and it was during this period that red was first
adopted as the standard colour.
It was the Queen's idea. ("I like red").
The first five boxes to be painted red were in London in July 1874, and
they were distributed all around Buckingham Palace ("as if the Queen would
ever use them!", a mailman is reported as having complained).
It would be, however, nearly 10 years before all the boxes had been
repainted from green to red. (A few are striped, with stripes of the older coat
of green, and stripes with the newer coat of red. One is displayed in the
Victoria and Albert Museum; others are of a green background with red dots --
also at the Victoria and Albert Museum -- on storage: Accession Number PB
1886-2-33).
In 2012 to celebrate Olympic gold medals for Team GB, a few red pilla boxes
selected by the Primer Minister were painted gold.
One has been vandalised briefly with graffiti ("Grice is wrong!").
One has been painted in the 'wrong' town.
McEvoy continues:
"Of course, there is a problem with phrases like “much less causally to do
with”, or with saying it is the perceptual apparatus that “largely
determines” how reality is perceived (rather than saying reality “largely
determines” the perceptual apparatus and how it perceives). For how could we
test,
measure or otherwise decide which of the myriad causal factors are most
important causally? The above account admits that only because various kinds
of wave are a (physical) reality do we have perceptual apparatus designed
to detect and process those waves into useful adaptive information: if we
combine that admission with the view that evolutionary ‘selection pressures’
test perceptual accuracy, then can we not combine these two aspects of
reality [physical waves and ‘natural selection’] so that our perceptual
apparatus is “largely caused” by these aspects of the ‘external world’?"
Yes.
"In this way, however indirectly, might we arrive at the view that the ‘
internal world’ “reflects” the ‘external world’? Perhaps. But when we say “
reflects” here, we need to remember how indirect and fallible this adaptive
process is: the perceptual apparatus of those creatures that have survived
Darwinian ‘winnowing’ (including humans) may have proved itself only
relatively useful or adaptive as against creatures more benighted. And we can
easily imagine the extinction of extant creatures (including humans) if
either their perceptual apparatus were worse or their selection pressures were
more severe."
As in the case of the extinct wolf in Britain, discussed above.
McEvoy goes on:
"At a deeper level, while science may help inform our critical guesses as
to how accurately our perceptual apparatus “reflects” reality, neither
science nor philosophy provides any definitive Archimedean vantage-point from
which this can be assessed so as to foreclose the possibility that “reality”
is something very other to how we perceive or guess it to be (notably,
advances in physics reveal the physical world generally to be quite other to
how it appears in perception – e.g. ‘solid’ matter is mostly ‘empty’
space seeded with tiny, invisible particles; ‘empty’ space is filled with
forces, radiation and ‘dark matter’)."
Very true. In any case, it is charming (I find) that Grice goes on to quote
the 'causal theory' (sic) when analysing 'knowledge', and not just 'see'
and 'perceive' -- his example of the student knowing the date of the Battle
of Waterloo. So I think there is like a philosophical use of 'cause' that
may be distinguished from a narrower one as used by scientists. Or not.
And let us recall that philosophers (on the whole) seem to LOVE a definite
Archimedean vantage point?
Thanks for your thoughts,
Cheers,
Speranza
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