Res Philosophica

Volume 91, Issue 2, April 2014

Neo-Aristotelian Themes in Metaphysics and the Philosophy of Mind

Louise Richardson
Pages 215-239

Non Sense-Specific Perception and the Distinction Between the Senses

How should interaction between the senses affect thought about them? I try to capture some ways in which non sense-specific perception might be thought to make it impossible or pointless or explanatorily idle to distinguish between senses. This task is complicated by there being more than one view of the nature of the senses, and more than one kind of non sense-specific perception. I argue, in particular, that provided we are willing to forgo certain assumptions about, for instance, the relationship between modes or kinds of experience, and about how one should count perceptual experiences at a time, at least one way of thinking about the senses survives the occurrence of various kinds of non sense-specific perception relatively unscathed.