Searle's Theory of Visual Experience

Abstract

The term 'visual experience' is central to contemporary philosophy of perception. The term 'sense-data', itself a successor to 'ideas' and 'impressions', has almost completely fallen out of fashion. John Searle offers an explanation for this preference. What he says about sense-data, however, is based upon a misunderstanding of traditional theories. There is, consequently, a good deal to be suspicious of in his assumption that 'visual experience' is not subject to the criticisms which brought 'sense-data' into disrepute. I am primarily interested in the similarities between the ways in which the terms 'sense-data' and 'visual experience' are introduced by their respective proponents. My main task will be to show that, in Searle's account at least, the intellectual distance between these two notions is very small indeed.