0

There seems to be much confusion around this topic. Our eyes detect light, but do they see? Detecting light is part of the visual process. The end result is that objects become visible. This occurs in the brains visual centres. No perception occurs in the actual eye itself.

Your thoughts?

Zane Scheepers
  • 589
  • 4
  • 17
  • 1
    Difficult topic, as you say. As I understand it the eye is now considered part of the brain, which may reflect the difficulty of making a clear division between them. –  Jan 31 '18 at 11:41
  • 3
    We perceive (see, etc.) through the perceptual systems of the brain. The visual system "is the part of the central nervous system which gives organisms the ability to process visual detail." The eye is an organ of the visual system. – Mauro ALLEGRANZA Jan 31 '18 at 11:42
  • 2
    @PeterJ that may be true, but the prefrontal cortex is also part of the brain, but no visual perception occurs there. I think it has more to do with where perception occurs in the brain, than with whether the eyes should be considered part of the brain. – Zane Scheepers Jan 31 '18 at 12:17
  • "No perception occurs in the actual eye itself." That's not correct. Perception begins in the retina. In particular, ganglia cells in the retina perform initial processing of color information (through the opponent process), and the retina performs some edge detection, both through a similar process. – H Walters Jan 31 '18 at 16:04
  • This reminds me of Drax the Destroyer from Guardians of the Galaxy vol. 1. I'm quite happy we do not try to use a Fregian scientific language and semantics have more than one dimension. Doesn't make everything wrong just because we can't take it literally. – Philip Klöcking Jan 31 '18 at 17:08
  • @HWalters you said it yourself, processing begins in the retina. Perception, however, only occurs when we become consciously aware of a visual perception. The functioning word being 'consciously'. – Zane Scheepers Jan 31 '18 at 19:08
  • 1
    When we dream we see, but our eyes are closed. There isn't any light involved either. – Frank Hubeny Jan 31 '18 at 22:15
  • @ZaneScheepers If you're trying to describe what we're consciously aware of, perception isn't the word you want. What you're consciously aware of is just the tip of the iceberg for perception. Perception is all about processing sensory data, and as Frank Hubeny pointed out, you don't even need sensory data to form a percept. – H Walters Feb 01 '18 at 03:44
  • Ahhh! But as Frank wisely pointed out, it doesn't require the eyes. Which brings us back to my original question. Do eyes really see? – Zane Scheepers Feb 01 '18 at 09:45
  • You're missing the point; you already asked your question in your question; I'm not giving you an answer here, or trying to debate; I'm suggesting a correction. In the words of Mark Twain, "use the right word, not its second cousin." "Perception" and "seeing" are different words, with different meanings; they're not interchangeable. Visual perception involves the eye (and strictly the external object); processing information begins in the eye. If you want to say seeing doesn't happen in the eye, you should say that. – H Walters Feb 01 '18 at 13:32
  • In particular, visual perception is said to occur of distal objects (and begins with such). You need your eyes to produce the proximal stimulus. The processing of such begins in the eye. All of this is part of perception. When you dream, you have percepts (we think), but you don't have proximal stimuli, nor are there distal objects. So you're not perceiving something. – H Walters Feb 01 '18 at 13:41
  • This needs to go to discussion, as you obviously don't realize that we perceive the internal model, not (The external object). – Zane Scheepers Feb 01 '18 at 13:46
  • Don't bother with the discussion if the point is to try to "convince" me that we perceive the internal model. There's a fundamental mistake you're making in framing the issue; the problem here isn't about how the process works or what goes on in our mind; it's a problem of what words are for, how they acquire definitions, and what the definition of this particular word is. – H Walters Feb 01 '18 at 15:40
  • It seems pretty straightforward to me https://explorable.com/sensation-and-perception – Zane Scheepers Feb 01 '18 at 18:03

2 Answers2

4

I can see Wittgenstein in my imagination proposing that you ask yourself how the word see is used in everyday language. Do we in fact say that eyes see? It is people who see, do you see? It is you who sees with your eyes.

There is nothing metaphysical or deeply philosophical in this. Just language.

That said, in the Hebrew bible eyes are sometimes attributed with seeing

but your eyes have seen all the great work of the LORD which He did. — Deuteronomy 11

nir
  • 4,786
  • 16
  • 27
  • 1
    And yet---"Legolas, what do your elf-eyes see?" Not quite everyday, but not so far off. – Canyon Jan 31 '18 at 20:14
  • not so far off? take a look here how long ago middle earth is :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle-earth – nir Jan 31 '18 at 20:52
  • Everyday or even common usage of a word or term, in no way implies accuracy. This site is about determining the truth. I might ask for a red apple, but that doesn't mean the Apple is actually red. – Zane Scheepers Jan 31 '18 at 21:20
  • @ZaneScheepers The argument is much more complicated than that, although most of the heavily lifting was done in Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations. He's saying that you don't really have an idea of sight, except as something you as a whole posses. There is no sense (on this view) in talking about "where" sight is. – Canyon Jan 31 '18 at 22:34
  • @Canyon neuropsychology has come a long way since then. We know exactly where in the brain every aspect of vision occurs. So he's wrong. We do have a few ideas. But you're right, it is complicated. – Zane Scheepers Jan 31 '18 at 22:54
  • @ZaneScheepers I don't want to write too much more or I may as well just put up my own answer but knowing where the physical correlates of vision happen is not the same as knowing where vision "happens". And if it were that simple anyway, why ask the question? – Canyon Feb 01 '18 at 00:18
  • @ZaneScheepers, by coincidence Wittgenstein's philosophical investigations' first comment concerns asking for a red apple! "...Now think of the following use of language: I send someone shopping. I give him a slip of paper marked 'five red apples'. He takes..." It is one of the most important philosophy books of the 20th century and an excellent read. I highly recommend it as an answer to your question. – nir Feb 01 '18 at 19:15
  • Just because we speak of 'red apples', doesn't mean Apple's are red. It's just a convenient description. We're here to determine the truth. Not conventional understanding. – Zane Scheepers Feb 01 '18 at 20:00
  • @ZaneScheepers, interest in truth is yet another reason for reading the investigations. – nir Feb 01 '18 at 20:12
1

In Psychology, 'Sensation vs Perception' seems to define Sensation as 'the passive process of recollecting information through the senses', while perceiving is 'the active process of interpreting and storing the information received'. 'Seeing' is usually seen as a sensation and 'observing' as a perception, so in that sense it could be said that 'eyes see'.

On the other hand, it is impossible to make any sense out of what our eyes see without a visual cortex. In this sense, 'eyes don't see'. An interesting experiment took place a while back, where a blind patient went to visit a doctor. He, however, was not blind because his eyes didn't work, but because his visual cortex was damaged. The doctor got a pen, and told the patient to tell him how the pen was moving. The patient argued that he was blind ('How was he supposed to know?') but the doctor insisted on him following his intuition. The patient guessed correctly each time.

Eventually, it was discovered that this happened because the visual cortex is divided into two parts, one used for recognition of objects and the other for their motion.

So, it all comes down to what you define as 'see'.

Hugo Casañas Salgado
  • 11
  • 1
  • 'Seeing' is usually seen as a sensation. Do you have a citation for this claim? As far as I know, detection is a sensation. Seeing and observing are one and the same thing. You're not the first to make this claim. If it's true, then we can't see cars, trees, ect. We can only perceive them. – Zane Scheepers Jan 31 '18 at 13:37