Questions to the Texts/Topics for Discussion
Perception & Depiction
PHI272
Mikael Pettersson
Office: AR 125 (Office Hours: Thursdays 11:30–13:30)
Phone: 5195 6722
E-mail: mikaelpettersson@ln.edu.hk
General Questions
1. What is the main issue that is being discussed in the text?
2. Was there anything in the text that you found interesting? Why/Why not?
3. Do you agree with the main points of the text? Why/Why not?
The questions below are meant to help you in your reading of the texts, and as a basis for the discussions at the seminars. If you cannot come up with elaborate answers to them while reading the texts, don't worry – we will go through (most of) them at the seminars. But at least try to come up with a reasonable answer to each question before you come to the seminars. You will get much more out of the latter if you do.
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I. Goodman On Depiction
1. An intuitive idea about depiction is that something depicts something else to the extent that the former resembles the latter. Goodman, however, says that "more error could hardly be compressed into so short a formula," (p. 4). What, according to Goodman, is wrong with such a view?
2. What is wrong with the idea of "the innocent eye"? What does the notion amount to?
3. Goodman, then, is sceptical towards "resemblance theories" of depiction. What is Goodman's own account of depiction?
4. How may "fictional" pictures be a problem for resemblance theories?
5. How does Goodman's theory cope with the problem of fictional pictures?
6. What is "representation-as" in Goodman's theory?
7. What, in Goodman's view, determines what kind of picture a certain picture is? Is his suggestion a good one? Why/Why not?
II. Pictures and Mud Pies: Walton on Depiction
1. What is a "fictional world" on Walton's account? And in what (interesting) respects does such a world differ from "the real world"?
2. What does it mean that Walton has "entered" the fictional world of the picture on page 69 by "squeezing himself" into the picture?
3. What does it mean that Walton (and we) "enter" a fictional world when looking at the picture on page 69?
4. Walton says that we often "participate psychologically" when playing games of make-believe (p. 73). What does such participation amount to according to Walton?
5. What, exactly, is it for a picture to depict in Walton's theory?
6. How do the games of make-believe we play with pictures differ from the games of make-believe we sometimes play with words, according to Walton?
III. Seeing Things in Pictures: Wollheim's Proposal
1. What is "representational seeing"?
2. What role does the notion of representational seeing serve in Wollheim's account of depiction?
3. What is a "standard of correctness" in Wollheim's theory? What function does it have? Is it a plausible idea that depiction involves such a standard?
4. In what way are photographic images special, according to Wollheim?
5. What (interesting) features does seeing-in have?
6. What is the "twofoldness" thesis? Is it a plausible thesis? Are there any counterexamples to the thesis?
IV. The Shape of Things: Hopkins on Depiction
1. What is the point of a philosophical theory according to Hopkins? Is his suggestion a good one? Why/Why not?
2. One explanandum – i.e. one thing to be explained – is that pictures always have a relatively rich content. Is that true? Try to come up with a counterexample!
3. Another explanandum is that pictures always depict visible things. Is that true? Try to come up with a counterexample!
4. Yet another explanandum is that there is a limit to misrepresentation in the case of pictures. What does that mean? And is it true?
5. Hopkins says that Leonardo's St Anne picture represents the saint "in some nonpictorial manner" (p. 433). Why does he need to say that? And is it a plausible manoeuvre?
6. What is "outline shape"? Make an
illustration that shows how parts of a picture may share the outline shape of a
three-dimensional object!
V.
Looking at Pictures: Lopes on Pictorial Experience
1. What is "design," "content" and "subject," respectively, in Lopes' terminology?
2. What is the difference between illusion and
delusion (see pp. 29-30)?
3. What are the claims of the illusion theory
of depiction?
4. What is "design seeing" in Lopes'
terminology?
5. What does Lopes mean by saying that seeing
is sometimes "divided"?
6. Lopes says that Wollheim's reasoning in
favour of twofoldness is invalid (p. 35). Why? Do you agree?
VI.
Goodman, Good Likenesses and the Given
1. What does Goodman mean when he says:
"That nature imitates art is too timid a dictum. Nature is a product of
art and discourse" (p. 33)?
2. What, according to Goodman, is wrong with
the idea that realism has to do with deceptiveness?
3. What, according to Goodman, is wrong with
the idea that realism has to do with the amount of information a picture
provides?
4. What is Goodman's own proposal of how we
should understand the notion of realism? Is it a good suggestion?
5. Goodman says that also in the case of
familiar, realistic pictures we need a "key" to interpret them. Is
that a plausible view?
6. What does Goodman mean by saying that
"Representational customs É tend to generate resemblance" (p. 39)?
VII.
The Recognition Theory: Lopes on Depiction
1. What is it for a picture to depict according
to the recognition theory?
2. What role does the second condition in the
definition on p. 169 serve?
3. What does it mean that "recognition has
a structure" (p. 170)?
4. What does Lopes mean by saying that
"[c]ompetence in understanding pictures tracks the structure of
recognitional competence" (p. 170)?
5. How does the recognition theory explain Hopkins' six explananda?
VIII.
Perception, Pictures & Pigeons: Danto
1. What do the experiments with the pigeons
really show according to Danto?
2. Are there any possible problems with the
experiments' (alleged) demonstration of pictorial competence?
3. What explains pictorial competence according
to Danto? Is it a plausible explanation?
4. What bearing (if any) do the experiments
have on the views of Goodman, Wollheim and Walton?
5. The innocent eye, says Danto, is pictorially
competent. What other kinds of "meaning" falls outside of the
"visual field" of the innocent eye? I.e. what kinds of
"meaning" are (at least in part) culturally and historically
determined?
IV.
Transparent Pictures: Walton on Photography
1. What does it mean that photographs are
"transparent"?
2. What is counterfactual dependence?
3. What does it mean that the production of
photographs is belief-independent?
4. Why can we not "see through"
descriptions that enjoy the belief-independent counterfactual dependence
typical of photographs, according to Walton?
5. Try to come up with a reason for saying that
we see through eyeglasses and telescopes, but not "through"
photographs!
6. On page 255, Walton seems to have an
argument for transparency in terms of its (alleged) explanatory capacity. Is it
a good argument? Why/Why not?
IIV.
Troubles With Transparency: Currie
1. Currie argues at length that photographs are
representations.
What is the contrast to representations in this context? What would Walton say
about this aspect of Currie's view?
2. What is the point of the example of "Malebranchian perception" (p.
25)?
3. What is the point of the example of the two
connected clocks (p. 26)?
4. What is "egocentric information"?
5. Are there any counterexamples to the idea
that seeing involves the possibility to acquire egocentric information?