Editorial: Theoretical Issues on Sensory Perception—Approaches from Philosophy, Psychology, and Neuroscience

Frontiers in Psychology

Konstantinos Moutoussis¹ 

关键词: theoretical issues;    sensory perception;    philosophy;    psychology;    neuroscience;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01660

学科分类：心理学（综合）

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

One of the basic functions of the brain is connecting an animal to its environment. Evolution has developed several sensory systems for this purpose, each one using a different approach to give the agent a “picture” of the physical world. Inevitably, the way that we perceive our environment via these systems has always been a source of deep theoretical questions and problems concerning this very basic characteristic of our existence. It has been an interdisciplinary topic of research for many years: Philosophy is concerned with questions at the core of sensory perception, regarding the nature of perceptual events, as well as their phenomenal characteristics and epistemological value. Why does perception feel the way it does, and how successful is it in informing us about the world out there? Psychology has introduced several experimental methods in order to study the characteristics of sensory perception, as well as the relationship between the physical characteristics of the physical world and the psychological characteristic of the mental world. It uses results from behavioral experiments on sensory perception to infer knowledge about the organization and functioning of the underlying mechanisms of the mind. Finally, neuroscience is continuously struggling to understand these mechanisms by directly studying their neurobiological origins in the brain. The ultimate aim of cognitive neuroscience is to relate neuronal events taking place inside our skull to mental events and experiences happening in what we call the mind. Although we are far from reaching this endpoint, one might expect that the advances in the field of sensory neuroscience and our understanding of both the structure and functioning of perceptual systems, combined with our accumulated scientific knowledge regarding the behavioral characteristics of perception from the point of view of experimental and cognitive psychology, should put us today in a better place with respect to basic theoretical issues and fundamental philosophical questions regarding perceptual experiences.

【 授权许可】

CC BY