Misperceiving properties

Abstract

Correspondence Boyd Millar, Department of Philosophy, Washington University in St. Louis, 1 Brookings Dr., St. Louis, MO 63130, USA. Email: millar.boyd@gmail.com Recently, a number of philosophers have argued that property illusions—cases in which we perceive a property, but that property is not the property it seems to us to be in virtue of our perceptual experience—and veridical illusions—cases in which we veridically perceive an object's properties, but our experience of some specific property is nonetheless unsuccessful or illusory—can occur. I defend the contrary view. First, I maintain that there are compelling reasons to conclude that property illusions and veridical illusions cannot occur; and second, I maintain that the considerations supporting the possibility of such cases are uncompelling.