Burge’s Defense of Perceptual Content

Abstract

1 The term “content view” has been used by Siegel (2010a) and Brewer (2011). Schellenberg (2011) speaks instead of the content thesis. Siegel’s characterization of the content view is too weak for our purposes here. The content view she defends is neutral with regard to the nature of sensory states, and Burge is explicitly defending a claim about what certain sensory states are. Siegel suggests that the deeper issue at stake in disputes with naIve realists over the content view is whether perceptions ought to be individuated by reference to the particular things perceived. Our understanding of the debate is different. Burge is not at odds with the naIve realist claim that perceptions are individuated by reference to particulars in the environment. He allows that perceptual states are individuated by their contents and that the representational content of perception constitutively possesses a singular element (2010a, pp.379-381). In defending the content view, Burge is opposed to those, like naIve realists, who identify perception with something other than sensory representation.