Why Study Perception?

Question 1

Rationalism

Answer 1

We can’t trust our senses.

What matters is the real of “ideal forms” that we can only know through reason.

Question 2

Nativism

Answer 2

Also known as Innatism.

We are born already knowing the world.

Question 3

Anamnesis

Answer 3

• Our immortal souls are made of left-overs of a greater “cosmos soul” that had universal knowledge.
• We lost this knowledge when our souls incarnated in these imperfect bodies.
• We must recover this knowledge by trying to “remember” what we forgot.

Question 4

Idea that represent humans as black pieces of papers on which experience leaves its mark.

Answer 4

Tabula Rasa

Question 5

Who came up with the idea of “Tabula Rasa”?

Answer 5

John Locke

Question 6

In which idea was the beleive that humans had “simple” ideas and “complex ideas”. Give examples of simple and complex ideas.

Answer 6

Tabula Rasa.
Square and blue are two simple ideas.
Blue square is one complex idea.

Question 7

Empiricism

Answer 7

All knowledge originates from sensory experience.

Question 8

Idea that says that all knowledge originates from sensory experience.

Answer 8

Empiricism

Question 9

Give an example of something that is not directly perceived by our sensory system.

Answer 9

Pool

Question 10

David Hume

Answer 10

Inference or necessary cause and effect relationship is valid, but psychologically we believe there is a cause and effect.
Beliefs are caused by psychological “habits”.

Question 11

Immanuel Kant

Answer 11

Some concepts exist independently from sensory experience. (Noumenon)

Question 12

Bayes’ Theorem

Answer 12

P(A|B) = (P(A)P(B|A))/P(B)

Question 13

Perception

Answer 13

Process of infering what’s out there in the world based on the input of our senses.
Input: senstation
Perception: probabilistic inference that integrates the sensation with our prior knowledge of the world.