more from Jonathan Dancy

Single Idea 5681

[catalogued under 11. Knowledge Aims / C. Knowing Reality / 1. Perceptual Realism / b. Direct realism]

Full Idea

Direct realism is unlikely to be able to provide an explanation of perceptual error without collapsing into indirect realism.

Clarification

'Indirect realism' also known as 'representative realism'

Gist of Idea

Maybe we are forced from direct into indirect realism by the need to explain perceptual error

Source

Jonathan Dancy (Intro to Contemporary Epistemology [1985], 10.3)

Book Reference

Dancy,Jonathan: 'Introduction to Contemporary Epistemology' [Blackwell 1985], p.151


A Reaction

If there is an error, there must be two things which don't match: the perception, and the reality. This seems to me a powerful reason for preferring indirect or representative realism. I like the idea that we make mental 'models' (rather than inferences).