ATTENTION, BLINDSIGHT AND CONSCIOUSNESS
From: 2017-10-24 To:2017-10-24
Thematic Line
Modern & Contemporary Philosophy
Research Group
Mind, Language & Action
ATTENTION, BLINDSIGHT AND CONSCIOUSNESS
Francisco Pereira
(Universidad Alberto Hurtado - Chile)
24 de outubro 2017 (terça-feira)
15h30 | Sala do Departamento de Filosofia (Torre B - Piso 1)
Entrada livre
Abstract: The phenomenological conception of common sense inspired by James (1890/1981) claims that attending is essentially a conscious mental phenomenon. The modal philosophical implications of this thesis regarding the nature of attention are clear. It is not possible to attend something, without being conscious of that thing. This common sense phenomenological approach has also inspired indirectly some contemporary theories in the philosophy of mind, such as Jesse Prinz's (2012) AIR theory in which attention is reductively conceived as the selective mechanism for perceptual consciousness. When we are conscious? Basically, according to Prinz, when we attend. On the basis of classical studies on visual pathologies such as blindsight and recent experiments with non-pathological subjects I will attempt to show that the Jamesian philosophical conclusion regarding the metaphysics of attention is false. Evidence suggests that in fact it is possible to attend objects (not only properties or spatial locations) without consciously experiencing them.
Key words: Attention, consciousness, blindsight, common sense, phenomenology.
Imagem: Salvador Dali, The Eye (1945)
Programa MLAG Research Seminars: https://ifilosofia.up.pt/activities/mlag-research-seminar-2017-2018
Organização:
Research Group Mind Language and Action Group (MLAG)
MLAG Seminars 2017-2018 (Sofia Miguens, Luís Veríssimo, Diana Couto, José Pedro Correia)
Instituto de Filosofia da Universidade do Porto - FIL/00502
Financiamento: FCT