Abstract
Vision presents us with a richly detailed world. Yet, there is a range of limitations in the processing of visual information, such as poor peripheral resolution and failures to notice things we do not attend. This raises a natural question: How do we seem to see so much when there is considerable evidence indicating otherwise? In an elegant series of studies, Lau and colleagues have offered a novel answer to this long-standing question, proposing that our sense of visual richness is an artifact of decisional and metacognitive deficits. I critically evaluate this proposal and conclude that it rests on questionable presuppositions concerning the relationship between decisional and metacognitive processes, on one hand, and visual phenomenology, on the other.
Highlights
Contemporary discussions in philosophy, psychology, and vision science have been concerned with the sense of phenomenological richness associated with vision
I conclude that, despite its ingenuity, the inflation view rests on evidence that is ripe for reinterpretation
All the results taken to support the inflation view are consistent with a view according to which decisional and metacognitive processes do not increase the strength of subjective presence in visual experience
Summary
Contemporary discussions in philosophy, psychology, and vision science have been concerned with the sense of phenomenological richness associated with vision. Consider the view from Coit Tower in San Francisco. You can witness hundreds of buildings, towers, cars, and pedestrians from the top of the tower. Unlike the other sense modalities, vision is well suited to revealing the richly detailed cityscape. From the top of the tower, I can smell little more than the ocean and hear only the bustle of passing cars. My senses of touch and taste are both too proximal in nature to reveal the distal landscape. It is only when I open my eyes that I am able to witness the breathtaking view of the city
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