Perceptual Ephemera

As well as having perceptual experience of material objects, we also experience such things as rainbows and surfaces, shadows and absences. A team of philosophers explore the unusual interest of our experience of ephemeral aspects of the world. This is the first collective philosophical study of perceptual ephemera.

Most research on perception has focused on the perceptual experience of three-dimensional, solid, bounded, and coherent material objects - items like tables and tomatoes. But as well as having perceptual experience of such objects, we also experience such aspects of the world as, for instance, rainbows and surfaces, shadows and absences: things that are ephemeral by contrast with material objects. This book presents fifteen new essays on the perceptual experience of such ephemera. The editors' introduction provides a detailed guide to the topic as a whole, setting out the thematic background to this emerging area of research in contemporary philosophy of perception. The volume winds a path through the ephemeral, considering such topics as sounds, smells, transparency, reflection, camouflage, solidity, and ambient vision. A general aim of the volume is to make a case that the broad range of ephemera it catalogues is far from marginal, or insubstantial with respect to their philosophical interest and value. Philosophical attention to perceptul ephemera may well suggest novel routes to arriving at a more developed understanding of perceptual experience at large and its characteristic features.

Auteur
Thomas Crowther is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Warwick. His research interests are in metaphysics and philosophy of mind. His work mainly focuses on temporal ontology and the temporal aspects of experience. Clare Mac Cumhaill is Lecturer in Philosophy at Durham University. Her research interests are in perception, action, emotion and aesthetics, with a special focus on space, spatial properties, and structural explanation more generally.

Contenu

• 1: Thomas Crowther and Clare Mac Cumhaill: A Tour of the Ephemeral

• 2: Matthew Soteriou: Sounds and Illusion

• 3: Matthew Nudds: The Unitary Nature of Sounds

• 4: Cain Todd: Representation and Ephemerality in Olfaction

• 5: Louise Richardson: Odours as Olfactibilia

• 6: Roy Sorensen: Spectacular Absences: A Companion Guide

• 7: Anna Farennikova: Disappearances

• 8: Roberto Casati: Shadows, Objects and the Lexicon

• 9: Ian Phillips: No More than Meets the Eye: Shadows as Pure Visibilia

• 10: Thomas Raleigh: On Silhouettes, Surfaces and Sorensen

• 11: Mark Eli Kalderon: Aristotle on Transparency

• 12: Vivian Mizrahi: Perceptual Media, Glass and Mirrors

• 13: Thomas Crowther: In Touch with the Look of Solidity

• 14: Clare Mac Cumhaill: Nonsense and Visual Evanescence

• 15: Mohan Matthen: Ephemeral Vision