Why cognitive penetration of our perceptual experience is still the most plausible account.
Albert Newen, Petra Vetter
Consciousness and Cognition January 2017 DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2016.09.005 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Philosophy of mind |
| Keywords | Cognitive penetration Early visual processes Impenetrability Perception–cognition boundary Perceptual learning Predictive coding Top-down modulation V1 Visual perception |
| Key points | Argues that evidence from structural brain feedback, very early feedback loops, and category-specific top-down modulation of early visual processes undermines weak impenetrability claims, while strong impenetrability would require an implausibly large perceptual module. Concludes that cognitive penetration is the best theoretical account given available empirical evidence and that it has no problematic consequences for the relation between perception and cognition. |
Abstract
To what extent is our perceptual experience influenced by higher cognitive phenomena like beliefs, desires, concepts, templates? Given recent arguments against the possibility of cognitive penetration, we present striking evidence against the impenetrability claims. The weak impenetrability claim cannot account for (1) extensive structural feedback organization of the brain, (2) temporally very early feedback loops and (3) functional top-down processes modulating early visual processes by category-specific information. The strong impenetrability claim could incorporate these data by widening the "perceptual module" such that it includes rich but still internal processing in a very large perceptual module. We argue that this latter view leads to an implausible version of a module. Therefore, we have to accept cognitive penetration of our perceptual experience as the best theoretical account so far given the available empirical evidence. We outline that this does not have any problematic consequences for the relation between perception and cognition.
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Citations in the library
Cited by 4
- Perception and Cognition Are Largely Independent, but Still Affect Each Other in Systematic Ways: Arguments from Evolution and the Consciousness-Attention Dissociation. Frontiers in Psychology January 24, 2017
- Synthetic surprise as the foundation of the psychedelic experience Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews January 15, 2024
- Neural evidence that perception is nonconceptual February 16, 2023
- V1 as an egocentric cognitive map. Neuroscience of Consciousness 2021