What We See


We see (at least) three fundamentally different sorts of things: objects (a tomato), properties of these objects (the tomato’s size, shape, color, orientation), and facts about them (that is a tomato, that is red). Stanford philosophy professor Fred Dretske discusses the first: our perception of objects. How many objects do we see in brief but attentive observation? The answer tells us something important about the nature of conscious perceptual experience.