Perception

   1) The Nature of Perception

   Perception is the immediate discriminatory response of the organism to energy-activating sense organs. . . . To discriminate is to make a choice reaction in which contextual conditions play a deciding role. (Bartley, 1969, pp. 11-12)

   2) The Problem of Recoding Perceptions to Achieve Understanding

   t seems (to many) that we cannot account for perception unless we suppose it provides us with an internal image (or model or map) of the external world, and yet what good would that image do us unless we have an inner eye to perceive it, and how are we to explain [i]its capacity for perception? It also seems (to many) that understanding a heard sentence must be somehow translating it into some internal message, but how will this message be understood: by translating it into something else? The problem is an old one, and let's call it Hume's Problem, for while he did not state it explicitly, he appreciated its force and strove mightily to escape its clutches. (Dennett, 1978a, p. 122)

   3) We Sense the Presence of a Stimulus, But We Perceive What It Is

   Perception refers to the way in which we interpret the information gathered (and processed) by the senses. In a word, we sense the presence of a stimulus, but we perceive what it is. (Levine & Schefner, 1981, p. 1)

   4) Locating the Source of a Perception or an Idea

   [W]henever we do try and find the source of . . . a perception or an idea, we find ourselves in an ever-receding fractal, and wherever we choose to delve we find it equally full of details and interdependencies. It is always the perception of a perception of a perception. (Varela, 1984, p. 320)