A Multisensory Philosophy of Perception

Most of the time people perceive using multiple senses. Out walking, we see colors and motion, hear chatter and footsteps, smell petrichor after rain, feel a breeze or the brush of a shoulder. We use our senses together to navigate and learn about the world. In spite of this, scientists and philosophers alike have merely focused on one sense at a time. Nearly every theory of perception is unisensory. This book instead offers a revisionist multisensory philosophy of perception. Casey O'Callaghan considers how our senses work together, in contrast with how they work separately and independently, and how one sense can impact another, leading to surprising perceptual illusions. The joint use of multiple senses, he argues, enables novel forms of perception and experience, such as multisensory rhythms, motions, and flavors that enrich aesthetic experiences of music, dance, and gustatory pleasure.

Casey O'Callaghan is Professor of Philosophy at Washington University in St. Louis. His publications include Sounds: A Philosophical Theory (Oxford 2007) and Beyond Vision: Philosophical Essays (Oxford 2017). He is also the co-editor of Sounds and Perception: New Philosophical Essays (Oxford 2009, with Matthew Nudds).