Tuesday, 19 April 2011

Space, Consciousness, and Control
Robert Briscoe, Department of Philosophy
Ohio University
12:05 pm, 817R Cathedral of Learning

Abstract:  The “dual systems model” of visual processing (DSM) comprises a number of revisionary claims about the functional role of conscious visual experience and its underlying neural basis. In particular, proponents of DSM maintain that the spatial contents of conscious visual experience play only an indirect role in the control of object-directed visuomotor actions; that the neural correlates of the contents of visual experience reside exclusively in the ventral processing stream; and that visual experience represents the world using a scene-relative or “allocentric” spatial frame of reference. I examine each of these claims and argue that careful interpretation of the available psychophysical and neuropsychological evidence suggests a much more complicated picture of the relationship between visual experience and visually guided action.