Concept Acquisition and Experiential Change

Many have held the Acquisition of Concepts Thesis (ACT) that concept acquisition can change perceptual experience. This paper explains the close relation of ACT to ADT, the thesis that acquisition of dispositions to quickly and reliably recognize a kind of thing can change perceptual experience. It then states a highly developed argument given by Siegel (2010) which, if successful, would offer strong support for ADT and indirect support for ACT. Examination of this argument, however, reveals difficulties that undermine its promise. Distinctions made in this examination help to clarify an alternative view that denies ADT and ACT while accepting that long exposure to a class of materials may induce changes in phenomenology that lie outside perceptual experience itself. There is a widely held view that may be expressed as the thesis that ACT Perceptual experience can be changed by the acquisition of concepts. Affirmations of this view can be found in Churchland (1979), Rosenthal (1991), Siegel (2010), Gennaro (2012), and many others. There are several common examples, e.g. experiences of wine tasters and musicians, that allegedly illustrate it, and a full discussion of the merits or Concept Acquisition 2 demerits of the claim would require far more than can be included in this paper. However, an argument derived from recent work by Susanna Siegel seems to provide a way of giving ACT support. The aim of this paper is to clarify and examine this line of support. Despite its popularity, it is clear that argument for ACT is needed. Novices with respect to Siegel’s main example — recognition of pine trees—would plausibly succeed very well on the following task. Standing in a forest clearing, an expert points to three trees that are in fact two spruces and one pine, and requires the novice to say which one is not like the others. It is natural to suppose that the novice can succeed because the trees look different. If having acquired concepts of tree types (or, dispositions to recognize tree types) is not necessary for them to look different, it surely requires an argument to show that concept or disposition acquisition can change the way trees look. The need for argument in support of ACT also arises from its suggestion of an asymmetric relation, in which the character of experience depends on having acquired concepts, but not conversely. It might be, however, that the dependence is asymmetrical, but in the reverse direction. This would be the case if the order of events went this way: (a) repeated experience, with or without tutelage by an expert, causes prolonged and repeated attention to relevant samples, which in turn causes (b) heightened sensitivity to small differences among the samples, due to small changes in synaptic weights in early sensory systems, which then cause (c) differences in experiences for which (d) new words (or other behavioral reactions) can then be learned. On such a scenario, differences in perceptual experience caused by voluminous exposure would be a requirement for acquisition of new recognitional concepts, not the other way around. It would be question-begging simply to assert that this scenario is the way things actually are, or that the apparent force of the point about novices’ discriminative abilities must be accepted without further discussion. However, no such strong assertions are being relied upon here. It is claimed only that the preceding two paragraphs present prima facie plausible considerations that raise a doubt about ACT, and offer an explanation for the correlation between concept acquisition and experiential change that is compatible with ACT’s falsity. This modest claim is sufficient to show that argument for ACT is needed. Vol. 9: Perception and Concepts 3 William S. Robinson The argument found in Siegel (2010) that this paper examines goes deeper than those found in many discussions of ACT. It is promising, in the sense that it gets well beyond appeal to intuitions about concepts and experiential change that are based on examples such as wine tasting and musical proficiency.