Criticism On The Classification Of Traditional Divisions In Perception Theory

As a theory of perception, disjunctivism argues against the sense-datum theory by doubting the common element hypothesis and finds a new path for direct realism. Disjunctivism takes disjunctive propositions, which show the different situations in the perception like veridical perceptions, illusions and hallucinations, as the representation forms of the perception. Although three concepts, veridical perception, illusion and hallucination, play the core roles in disjunctivism, disjunctivists hold different opinions of these concepts between each other and that cause different disjunctive solutions to the disjunctive proposition. The article tries to trace back the change in the development of disjunctivism and representative disjunctivists’ idea. Then make a further step to show the divide between veridical perception, illusion and hallucination is disputable because of the opaque usage of psychological term. Only by particular investigation to illusion and detailed analysis of veridical disjunctivist and hallucination can we make sure that the main aim of disjunctivism is to confirm the important role of external world in the perception experience, instead of building the human knowledge which is really an excessive demand. Referring to J.L.Austin’s critic on sense-data theory and combining with a series of argument examples against the naive realism, we replace the trinomial disjunctive proposition with the binomial disjunctive proposition and replace veridical perception, illusion and hallucination with perception under reliable cognitive conditions and perception under unreliable cognitive conditions. Then disjunctivists could get a solid theory start point. Disjunctivism developed from the binomial disjunctive proposition is a new theory which has huge difference with sense-data theory on the theoretical approach, it is a new application of the externalism in the theory of perception.