Introduction

Abstract

This book is a systematic study of the problem of perception and knowledge. I intend to analyze the problem, to expound and criticize the most important attempts that have been made to solve it, and to propose an original solution to it. The problem of perception has fascinated philosophers for many centuries. Contemporary discussions of it grow out of a dialogue whose participants include virtually every major figure in the history of Western philosophy. Accordingly, in the course of analyzing the problem and evaluating possible solutions to it, many classical and contemporary works dealing with perception will be discussed. The choice and treatment of these works, however, is governed by an overall conception of the problem of perception, rather than by a desire to cover all the important figures or to expound any philosopher’s views in their entirety. In this sense, this book attempts to combine the ‘problem’ and the ‘historical’ approaches to its subject. It is hoped that this method will make the book useful both to students who wish to acquire an understanding of perceptual epistemology rooted in a knowledge of its history, and to professional philosophers who feel the need for a reexamination of the issues that is sympathetic to classical treatments but informed by the important strides in the philosophy of perception that have been made within the last two or three decades.