A Critique of Pure Audition Malcolm Slaney Interval Research

All sound separation systems based on perception assume a bottom-up or Marr-like view of the world. Sound is processed by a cochlear model, passed to an analysis system, grouped into objects, and then passed to higher level processing systems. The information flow is strictly bottom up, with no information flowing down from higher level expectations. Is this the right approach? This paper summarizes the existing bottom-up perceptual models, and the evidence for more top-down processing. This paper describes many of the auditory and visual effects that indicate top-down information flow. Hopefully this paper will generate discussion about the role of top-down processing, whether this information should be included in sound separation models, and how to build testable architectures.