Experience, Science and Philosophy in Kohler

Kohler’s arguments on the epistemology of perception and the scientific method show that the philosophical tenets of phenomenology have experi­mental implications. Kohler (1944) claims that phenomenology provides the foundation of philosophy and science because it demands that a construct is admitted if justified by a valid description of phenomena. Of course, the ex­planation of

Meinong on Color Manifold

Meinong (1903) makes an analysis of the abstract structure of colors, which satisfies a general tenet on the study of experience derived from Brentano. He contends that the theory of experience is the analysis of the elements and the connections that are manifested in it. Meinong (1888: 134) holds that the phenomenal elements of

The Phenomenal Array of Experience: Boundaries and Continua in Brentano

Brentano (1976) formulates the theory of boundaries and qualitative continua for a deeper analysis of the nature of the spatial element that is a constitu­tive part of appearances (1982: 104-115). The primary object of perception is composed of the local determination of the place in the visual field where it occurs and of the

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Meaning in the Perceptual Field: Figure-Ground and Contour in Rubin

In his work on the figure-ground structure, Rubin (1921) addresses similar questions to Brentano’s theory of boundaries and qualitative continua. Ru­bin was acquainted with the theories of the Brentano School and quotes the work of Meinong, Benussi and Husserl, together with Schumann (1900) and and Schapp (1910). This section emphasizes the extent to which

Katz: The Phenomenological Method and Color and Touch Modes of Appearances

Katz recognized the importance of Husserl’s philosophical phenomenology and the application of its method to his research (Spiegelberg, 1972: 43). It is true that he acknowledges that Hering had already argued the need for a phe­nomenological analysis of color and attributes to Husserl an important role in clarifying the implications of the phenomenological method,

Wertheimer: The Perception of Movement and the “Natural” Organization

The work of Wertheimer (1912a and 1923) is correctly considered to lay bare the experimental foundations of Gestalt psychology. However, it is interesting to note the phenomenological tenets of his research that are to some extent independent of the Berlin School of Gestalt theory. It is well known that the first article deals with

Goldmeier: The Phenomenal Content of Similarity and the Structure of Visual Objects

Goldmeier (1937) gives another example of how phenomenology is embedded in the experimental research into perceptual experience. Goldmeier claims that similarity (Ahnlichkeit) is a fundamental category of perception and conceptual cognition. In ordinary experience, similarity is actually perceived and its visual effects are compelling. Since the perceived similarity founds the ordering and sets the

Kanizsa: The Independence of Perception and the Autonomy of Vision Science

Kanizsa (1980) holds that the science of perception stems from questions about how and why the perceptual world is parsed into distinct objects, in particular why just these objects appear and why they are endowed with just that shape, color, size, depth, localization, motion, smell, hardness and so on. To answer these questions with

Bozzi: The Epistemological Foundation of Experimental Phenomenology

Bozzi (1989, 2002) presents the theoretical and empirical arguments in support of experimental phenomenology as the science of perception whose domain is closed in the sense that concepts, constants and variables are admitted only if their meaning and course value is bounded by observable referents. However, the primitives of the theory have to be

The Stimulus Error. Unobservable Posits and the Variety of Data in Phenomenology

Kohler (1929a: 162) states that the psychology of perception has to avoid the “stimulus error,” namely it should not confuse “the knowledge about the physical conditions of sensory experience with this experience as such.” This phenomenological point has epistemological as well as methodological impli­cations for perception science. The stimulus error derives from assuming that

Phenomenal Structures and Comparative Judgements in Phenomenology

Koffka (1917, 1922) provides a wealth of arguments to support Kohler’s phe­nomenological point. He provides an analysis of the perceptual judgements in the experimental setting and the structure of phenomenal data. If the task is the comparison between couples of colors, sounds and spatial elements, the constancy hypothesis assumes that there must be a

Perceptual and Geometrical Properties of Visual Figures in Phenomenology

Rubin reconstructs the reason for what Kohler called the stimulus error as the inconsistent use of descriptions in which terms denoting geometric and perceptual properties occur without specification of their intended interpre­tation. The use of the same terms to denote everyday material objects, visual objects and figures of elementary geometry, as well as the

The Variety of Stimulus Errors in Phenomenology

Rubin’s remarks on the role of language are similar to Bozzi’s discussion of the variety of stimulus errors (1972). Like Rubin, Bozzi claims that the stimulus er­ror stems from the fact that the same language is used to denote mechanical and projective properties as well as perceptual properties of objects. In experi­mental practice, this

The Concomitant Variation of Stimuli and the Phenomenal Structures in Michotte

The experimental phenomenology of Michotte (1962; Thines, 1991: 15) shows that avoiding the stimulus error does not imply rejecting the concept of stim­ulus in experimental practice. Rather it is treated as a theoretical construct that denotes the controlled conditions that are varied to observe when and how the phenomenal structures systematically arise, which features

Phenomenal Mechanical Properties : Perception of Causality

Koffka (1955: 381) suggests that causality is one of the relationships encoun­tered in the phenomenal world that can be studied if the reductionist stance on perception is rejected, because it is unlikely that the perceived causality corresponds to a single stimulation or sensation. Earlier Stumpf (1930) had claimed that assuming that the fundamental concepts,

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Velocity and Time in the Perception of Movement in Phenomenology

From the phenomenological standpoint, the world of experience consists of perceivable things and events that display as many qualities, relations, states and changes as there are modes of appearances in Katz’s sense, of which move­ment has been the object of many phenomenological studies (see the classical Duncker, 1929; Oppenheimer, 1935). Brown’s work is devoted

Perceptual Forms of Movement and Naive Physics in Phenomenology

Kohler ([1917] 1927: 149) had already remarked that the knowledge explicitly formulated in physics has a kind of intuitive correlate in phenomenological form that is embedded in perception whose aim, however, is to fulfil the needs of a biological fit to the environment. The work of Bozzi (1958, 1959, 1961b) on the perception of

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The Logic of Experimental Phenomenology

Musatti (1958) argues that there is an analogy between mathematical and perceptual problems such that the logic of some fundamental questions of mathematical geometry can be used to account for the logic of experimental demonstrations in the phenomenology of perception. The rules of perception are derived from such evidence that the more it differs

The Phenomenal Space Continuum

Brentano (1988: ii8ff., 128) agrees with Mach (1905) that phenomenal space is distinguished from the abstract spaces of physics and geometry, but he criti­cizes Mach’s conception of pure spatial sensations. Every physical phenom­enon is individualized by the spatial element that is necessarily connected with the quality; hence, there is no space as an additional

The Self as Spatial Part in Phenomenology: Meaning and Relations in Space

Kohler (1938) argues that physical and phenomenal space must be distin­guished from the epistemological standpoint without being committed either to ontological dualism, which admits physical and psychic space as entities existing in the material and the mental domains, or to phenomenalist monism, which reduces every spatial entity to the numerically identical sensation each subject

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