8. The Attention and Perception (1)

Author: O'Shaughnessy, Brian

Source: Consciousness and the World, January 2003 , pp. 291-302(12)

Publisher: Oxford Scholarship Online Monographs

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Abstract:

The two functions of the Attention—providing psychic space for experiences, and bringing phenomenal existents to consciousness—are diverse functions of a unitary phenomenon. And so perception simply is awareness or consciousness or experience of an existent object, and cannot be an idiosyncratic indefinable capacity, being explicated in universal a priori-given terms, viz. object and awareness. But why should not any intentionally directed experience that is directed onto a phenomenal reality be rated a perception? It is because ‘aware of’ has the same meaning in ‘Perception is awareness of an existent’ and ‘We are aware of the occupants of the Attention’, and a different meaning in ‘We are aware of any actually existing object of an intentionally directed experience’. For example, we are aware of sounds and anxiety as we are not aware of actual events that are at once unperceived-by-us but visualized or thought-of by us.

Keywords: experience; consciousness; meaning; awareness; object of awareness; Attention; object of perception

Document Type: Research article

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