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DOES PERCEPTION OUTSTRIP OUR CONCEPTS IN FINENESS OF GRAIN?
Author(s) -
Connolly Kevin
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
ratio
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.475
H-Index - 29
eISSN - 1467-9329
pISSN - 0034-0006
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9329.2011.00498.x
Subject(s) - demonstrative , perception , subject (documents) , epistemology , aesthetics , fineness , philosophy , computer science , linguistics , chemistry , library science
We seem perfectly able to perceive fine‐grained shades of colour even without possessing precise concepts for them. The same might be said of shapes. I argue that this is in fact not the case. A subject can perceive a colour or shape only if she possesses a concept of that type of colour or shape. I provide new justification for this thesis, and do not rely on demonstrative concepts such as THIS SHADE or THAT SHAPE, a move first suggested by John McDowell, but rejected by Christopher Peacocke and Richard Heck among others. 1