DISAPPEARANCES

Abstract

When an object suddenly disappears, we experience its absence. Experiences of disappearances are pervasive, and involve automatic reactions to object offsets. Because these experiences track objective environmental changes, they may seem less problematic than other forms of absence perception. In this chapter, I put forward the argument that experiences of disappearances are as paradoxical as other forms of experiences of absence. I explain what distinguishes experiences of disappearances from other forms of event perception, and reply to a core puzzle associated with these experiences: of how basic sensory reactions to changes in the world give rise to experiences that convey absences.