Theories of Experience

In this section we will consider the leading theories of experience of the last hundred years. These theories are understood here as responses to the Problem of Perception. (There are a number of theories of perception which are not discussed in this entry, either because they are not responses to this specific problem (like the causal theory of Grice (1961) and Lewis (1988), and Burge (2010)) or because they require an entire entry of their own (like the phenomenology of Husserl (1900–1) and Merleau-Ponty (1945); see the entry on phenomenology)).
As we understand theories of experience, they operate on two levels. On one level they tell us about the nature or structure of experience, on another level they tell us how what is said at the first level bears on grounding or explaining the phenomenal character of experience. Crudely, and with details and qualifications to explored below:

The Sense-Datum Theory: Level 1: experience is fundamentally a relation to a non-ordinary object; a sense-datum. Level 2: the character of experience is explained by the real presence of sense-data and their qualities in experience (§3.1).
The Adverbial Theory: Level 1: experience is non-relational and fundamentally a state of mind adverbially modified in a certain way (e.g., visually sensing brownly). Level 2: the character of experience is explained by the intrinsic qualities of experience which constitute the ways in which it is modified (§3.2).
The Intentionalist Theory: Level 1: experience is non-relational and fundamentally a matter of representing ordinary objects in certain ways. Level 2: the character of experience is explain by its representational nature (§3.3).
The Naive Realist Theory: Level 1: experience is fundamentally a relation to ordinary aspects of mind-independent reality. Level 2: the character of experience is explained by the real presence of ordinary aspects of mind-independent reality in experience (§3.4).

(In this exposition we do not consider much the possibility of mixed or hybrid views).
Here is what we find: The sense-datum theorist rejects our ordinary conception of perceptual experience. The adverbial theorist tries to improve upon the sense-datum theory, and holds on toAwareness. But it is unclear how they can secure Openness. Intentionalists and naive realists hold to both Openness and Awareness, but they do so in different ways, and with different responses to the Problem of Perception. (The way these positions emerge in response to the Problem of Perception is mapped most clearly in Martin (1995, 1998, 2000)).

3.1 The Sense-Datum Theory

3.1.1 The Sense-Datum Theory and The Problem of Perception

On the sense-datum theory, a perceptual experience in which something appears F to one consists in a relation of perceptual awareness to something which is actually F (Level 1). So whenever a subject has a sensory experience, there is something of which they are perceptually aware. This relational conception of experience is sometimes called an “act-object” conception, since it posits a distinction between the mental act of sensing, and the object which is sensed.
A sense-datum theorist calls the object of an experience a sense-datum. We can thus re-formulate the Phenomenal Principle espoused by the sense-datum theorists in these terms:
If there sensibly appears to a subject to be something which possesses a particular sensible quality F then there is something—a sense-datum—of which the subject is directly aware which does possess that sensible quality.
For the the sense-datum theorist, the character of an experience is somehow explained (at least in part) by the sensible qualities of the sense-datum one is aware of. (Level 2). Consider an experience which one would describe in terms of seeing a snow covered churchyard for what it is. We can isolate certain aspects of the phenomenal character of such an experience, such as the appearance of whiteness to one. We want a theory of experience to explain such aspects. The sense-datum theorist will claim that things appearing white to you consists in your perceptual awareness of a white sense-datum. The character of your experience is explained by an actual instance of whiteness manifesting itself in experience.
Now ultimately the sense-datum theory opposes our ordinary conception of experience, but it doesn’t as we have it so far. For at the moment we have no opposition between sense-data and ordinary objects. Suppose that one has an experience of a churchyard as described above, and so one is perceptually aware of a white sense-datum. Now suppose one’s experience is veridical. Well, for all we’ve said, the sense-datum one is aware of could be an ordinary bit of mind-independent reality: some white snow. This is not ruled out, for a sense-datum is just whatever it is that one is aware of in a perceptual experience which instantiates the sensible qualities which characterize the phenomenology of one’s experience. All we know about sense-data is that they must satisfy two conditions:

sense-data are objects of direct awareness; and
sense-data bear sensible qualities.

But these conditions don’t mark out an interesting ontological kind (Austin (1962)). They are consistent with sense-data (sometimes) being ordinary objects and aspects of mind-independent reality. Call the sense-datum theory we have outlined so far a minimal sense-datum theory.

But paradigm sense-datum theories are, in contrast, non-minimal. And such non-minimal sense-datum theorists do reject our ordinary conception of perceptual experience. We can make sense of this if we move to a less minimal conception of sense-data themselves, on which they are not ordinary aspects of mind-independent reality. One option here is to articulate a theory of sense-experience and sense-data independently of the problem of perception (Jackson (1977) and Lowe (1992)). But by far the most popular approach for sense-datum theorists has been to move to a more committed conception of sense-data on the basis of arguments like the argument from illusion and the argument from hallucination. How does this work?
Take first the argument from illusion. Suppose one sees a white wall as yellow. The sense-datum theorist accepts the base case of the argument, along with Leibniz’s Law, and so holds that in the illusion one is aware of a yellow sense-datum which is not the wall. And suppose the illusion occurs in a world devoid of ordinary objects which are in fact yellow. Thus the sense-datum is anon-ordinary object. Suppose we accept further that in illusions we are directly aware of such non-ordinary sense-data instead of and not as well as the relevant ordinary objects. So illusions are cases where one is directly aware of just a non-ordinary sense-datum. With this the sense-datum theorist accepts the spreading step and concludes that no perceptual experience is a case of awareness of an ordinary object, and that illusory and veridical experiences are cases of awareness of non-ordinary sense-data.
We can run a similar line of thought with the argument from hallucination. Suppose one has an hallucinatory experience as of a churchyard covered in white snow. But there is no such churchyard there to be perceived. The sense-datum theorist conceives of this experience as a case of perceptual awareness of a white sense-datum. Suppose the hallucination occurs in a world devoid of ordinary white things, so the sense-datum one is aware of is a non-ordinary sense-datum. The sense-datum theorist then endorses the spreading step stage of argument to get the conclusion that even in veridical experiences one is aware of just non-ordinary sense-data.
Initially, the arguments from illusion and hallucination were presented as aiming for a negative claim. But what we’ve seen here is that the minimal sense-datum theorist can supplement the base case with further considerations so as to get not just the negative conclusion but a positive conclusion, which is itself generalised in the spreading step stage. That is, in combination:

Base Case: (a) illusions and hallucinations are not cases of awareness of ordinary objects; but instead (b) are cases of awareness of non-ordinary sense-data.
Spreading Step:

The arguments, understood as such, are not arguments for the minimal sense-datum theory—the arguments presuppose such a theory. Rather, they serve as arguments for the transition from the minimal form of the sense-datum theory to the non-minimal form which invokes non-ordinarysense-data.
From now on when we speak of “sense-data” we will mean non-ordinary sense-data. Sense-datum theorists will divide over exactly how to understand sense-data insofar as they are non-ordinary. The early sense-datum theorists (like Moore (1914)) considered sense-data to be mind-independent, but non-physical objects. Later theories treat sense-data as mind-dependent entities (Robinson (1994)), and this is how the theory is normally understood in the second half of the twentieth century. What these different workings out of the theory have in common, though, is that they stand opposed to our ordinary conception of perceptual experience in both its aspects. On the non-minimal sense-datum theory, perceptual experiences are presentations not of ordinary objects, but of sense-data, and the character of experience, though dependent on its objects, is thus dependent upon non-ordinary objects. Thus Openness is false. The sense-datum theorist need not deny that we are presented with objects as if they are ordinary objects. But they will insist that this is an error. (So sense-datum theories are not simply refuted (as Harman 1990 seems to argue) by pointing to the phenomenological fact that the objects of experience seem to be the ordinary things around us). And in perceptual experience we are not aware of ordinary objects but non-ordinary sense-data. Thus Awareness is false.

3.1.2 Indirect Realism and Phenomenalism

Must a non-minimal sense-datum theorist deny Awareness? It seems not. Some sense-datum theorists introduce a distinction between direct and indirect awareness. With this, they don’t deny that we are ever perceptually aware of ordinary objects, only that we are ever directlyperceptually aware of ordinary objects. The sense-datum theorist can say that we are indirectlyaware of ordinary objects: that is, aware of them by (in virtue of) being aware of sense-data. A sense-datum theorist who says this is known as an indirect realist or representative realist, or as someone who holds a representative theory of perception (see Jackson (1977), Lowe (1992); see also the entry on epistemological problems of perception). A theorist who denies that we are aware of mind-independent objects at all, directly or indirectly, but only of sense-data construed as mental entities, is known as a phenomenalist or an idealist about perception (see Foster (2000) for a recent defence, see Crane and Farkas (2004: Section 2) for an introduction to the subject; and the entry on idealism).
On the face of it the indirect realist form of the sense-datum theory salvages something of our ordinary conception of perceptual experience, but securing Awareness. But this shouldn’t be at all satisfying to one who wants to defend our intuitive conception of perceptual experience, for two reasons. First, Openness is still being denied. Second, once we are given the distinction between direct and indirect perception, a defender of our ordinary conception of perceptual experience is likely to uphold Awareness in a more specific form, that is, as the idea that perceptual experience sometimes gives us direct awareness of ordinary objects. That is, the main theories of experience which uphold our ordinary conception of perceptual experience—intentionalism and naive realism—are both usually regarded as versions of direct realism.

3.1.3 Objections to the Sense-Datum Theory

The sense-datum theory was widely rejected in the second half of the 20th century, though it still had its occasional champions in this period (e.g., Jackson (1977), O’Shaughnessy (1980, 2000, 2003), Lowe (1992), Robinson (1994), Foster (2000)). A number of objections have been made to the theory. Some of these objections are objections specifically to the indirect realist version of the sense-datum theory: for example, the claim that the theory gives rise to an unacceptable “veil of perception” between the mind and the world. The idea is that the sense-data “interpose” themselves between perceivers and the mind-independent objects which we normally take ourselves to be perceiving, and therefore leaves our perceptual, cognitive and epistemic access to the world deeply problematic if not impossible. In response to this, the indirect realist can say that sense-data are the medium by which we perceive the mind-independent world, and no more create a “veil of perception” than the fact that we use words to talk about things creates a “veil of words” between us and the things we talk about. (For recent discussion see Silins (2011)).
A common objection in contemporary philosophy is to attack the Phenomenal Principle (see Barnes (1944–5); Anscombe (1965)). The objection is that the Phenomenal Principle is fallacious. It is not built into the meaning of “something appears F to one” that “one is aware of anF thing”. Defenders of the sense-datum theory can respond that the Phenomenal Principle is not supposed to be a purely logical inference; it is not supposed to be true simply because of the logical form or semantic structure of “appears” and similar locutions. Rather, it is true because of specific phenomenological facts about perceptual experience. But this just means that theorists who reject the Phenomenal Principle are not disagreeing about whether the Phenomenal Principle involves a fallacy or about some semantic issue, but rather about the nature of experience itself.

Another influential objection to sense-data comes from the prevailing naturalism of contemporary philosophy. Naturalism (or physicalism) says that the world is entirely physical in its nature: everything there is supervenes on the physical, and is governed by physical law. Many sense-datum theorists are committed to the claim that non-ordinary sense-data are mind-dependent: objects whose existence depends on the existence of states of mind. Is this consistent with naturalism? If so, the challenge is to explain how an object can be brought into existence by the existence of an experience, and how this is supposed to be governed by physical law.
Many contemporary sense-datum theorists, however, will not be moved by this challenge, since they are happy to accept the rejection of naturalism as a consequence of their sense-data theory (see Robinson 1994, Foster 2000). On the other hand, one might think that there is no conflict here with naturalism, as long as experiences themselves are part of the natural order. But if sense-data are non-ordinary in being mind-independent but non-physical, then it is much less clear how naturalism can be maintained (c.f., what Martin (2004, 2006) calls “experiential naturalism” which serves as a constraint on theories of experience and rules out some but not all forms of the sense-datum theory).

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Theories of Experience

3.1 The Sense-Datum Theory

3.1.1 The Sense-Datum Theory and The Problem of Perception

Theories of Experience :: تعاليق

3.1.2 Indirect Realism and Phenomenalism

3.1.3 Objections to the Sense-Datum Theory

Theories of Experience

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