• "Did you see the unicycling clown? Inattentional blindness while walking and talking on a cell phone" from Applied Cognitive Psychology

See discussion in Block and Tye.

• Daniel Simons & Ron Rensink (2005). Change Blindness: Past, Present, and Future. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 9: 16-20.
• Christof Koch & Naotsugu Tsuchiya (2007). Attention and Consciousness: Two Distinct Brain Processes. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 11:16-22.
• Christopher Mole (2008). Attention in the Absence of Consciousness? Trends in Cognitive Science 12 (2):44.
• Christopher Mole (2008). Attention and Consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Studies 15 (4):86-104.

• Daniel Simons & Ron Rensink (2005). Change Blindness: Past, Present, and Future. In Trends in Cognitive Sciences 9: 16-20.

• Tye's reply: Information about the orientation was represented in the visual system. But it does not follow that we were consciously aware of the orientation of each of the rectangle.

• Reply - Visual representations can leave things out by underrepresenting and misrepresenting.

1. if we only see what we attend to our visual experience will have gaps.

• Results: Bad performance for the first task; near 100% correct for the other two.
• Lamme: The sparse theory is wrong. The role of attention is to get conscious information into (globally accessible) stable working memory.
• Tye's reply: Information about the orientation was represented in the visual system. But it does not follow that we were consciously aware of the orientation.

1. our visual experience does not seem to have gaps.

The proposal is counter-intuitive. We normally think we see more than what we focus our attention on because:

1. it seems to us that we see all the details.
   • Reply - But appearance can be deceptive.
2. we can attend to any area of the visual field and report what we see.
   • Reply - But it might be a case of the refrigerator light illusion.
3. Our visual experience does not seem to have gaps.

• Change blindness - Failure to notice large changes to the visual scene.

• blindness vs inaccessibility

• Inattentional blindness - Failure to notice prominent items in the visual scene.

Tye objects to (b) but not (a).

Discuss: But how can (b) be true without (a) being true?

Tye: Information about the orientation was represented in the visual system. But it does not follow that we were consciously aware of the orientation.

Information about the orientation is represented in the visual system. But it does not follow that we were consciously aware of the orientation.

The proposal is counter-intuitive, because normally we think we see more than what we focus our attention on. Why?

1. We could have attended to whatever we want in the visual field.

• Tye's question - Do subjects (consciously) see the items that have changed?
  • inattentional blindness vs inaccessibility

• [Recommended] Ned Block (2007). Consciousness, Accessibility and the Mesh between Psychology and Neuroscience. In Behavioral and Brain Sciences 30, pp. 481-548. link

Relevance - the nature of consciousness, connection to attention.

According to Dretske, (a) we know on the basis of how the bricks look to us that none of them are blue or tilted. And ... (b)

Tye objects to (b) but not (a).

• [Recommended] Fred Dretske (2007). What Change Blindness Teaches About Consciousness. Philosophical Perspectives 21 (1):215–220.

@It was, in part, the way Sam looked to you that told you that none of the bricks were blue or tilted.@

Category.Mind

Can you notice the difference between the two:

you would if the extra brick looks like this

• [Recommended] Ned Block (2007). Consciousness, Accessibility and the Mesh between Psychology and Neuroscience. In Behavioral and Brain Sciences 30, pp. 481-548.

• inattentional blindness vs inaccessibility

• Reply - Is this a case of the refrigerator light illusion?

• Reply - The content of representations can be less specific.

Note - The different cases might have different explanations.

Why is that the case? According to some psychologists and philosophers (the sparse theory):

Against the sparse theory

The experiments

The theories

Why is that the case? According to some psychologists and philosophers (the sparse position):

Against the sparse position

Landman et. al.

Dretske

The proposal is counter-intuitive, because:

Hold on. The different cases might have different explanations.

• Flicker cases might be different.

1. We could report and attend to whatever we want in the visual field.
   • Is this a case of the refrigerator light illusion?
2. Our visual experiences do not seem to have gaps.
   • The content of representations can be less specific.

• ChangeBlindnessExamples - flicker, slow changes, swaps

Unitary explanation?

• The different cases might have different explanations.
• Slow changes might be a failure of memory.
• Tye's question - Do subjects (consciously) see the items that have changed?

1. We see only those things we pay attention to.

The proposal is counter-intuitive.

• We could report and attend to whatever we want in the visual field.
• Is this a case of the refrigerator light illusion?

1. We see only the items we pay attention to.

The proposal is counter-intuitive

Why is that the case? According to some psychologists and philosophers:

Why is that the case? According to some psychologists and philosophers -

• Observers often failed to notice large changes to the visual scene.
• ChangeBlindnessExamples

Why is that the case? A proposal -

1. We do not see the changes.
2. We think we see everything in the visual field, but it is an illusion.
3. Our visual experience is much sparser than is commonly supposed.

• [Required] Tye (2009) Consciousness Revisted MIT Press. Ch.7. [intranet:tye-changeblindness.pdf]

• [Required] Tye (2009) Consciousness Revisted MIT Press. Ch.7. [local:tye-changeblindness.pdf]

ChangeBlindnessExamples

• [Required] Tye (2009) Consciousness Revisted MIT Press. Ch.7. [copy will be on reserve in dept library; see also amazon and google books]

• [Required] Tye (2009) Consciousness Revisted MIT Press. Ch.7. [copy on reserve in dept library; see also

The sparse explanation

Change blindness exists because visual representations are sparse, incomplete, or non-existent.

Simons and Rensink: Must rule out these alternatives:

1. Complete representations exist, but decayed before change perception.
2. Complete representations exist, but not accessible to change detection mechanisms.
3. Complete representations exist, but not the right form for change detection (same as above?)
4. Complete representations exist, but change detection processes have not been engaged (even though they could have).

What it is

Observers often failed to notice large changes to pictures that were made during an eye movement

• 50% percent of observers failed to notice when two cowboys sitting on a bench exchanged heads.
• Most observers do not notice that the actor in a movie has changed during a shift in camera position, e.g. the person in a conversation has been replaced.

Change Blindness

Readings

• Daniel Simons & Ron Rensink, Change Blindness: Past, Present, and Future Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 9: 16-20. 2005
• Christof Koch & Naotsugu Tsuchiya, Attention and Consciousness: Two Distinct Brain Processes. Trends in Cognitive Sciences (2007) 11, 16-22
• Chris Mole, “Attention in the Absence of Consciousness?” forthcoming in Trends in Cognitive Sciences
• Chris Mole, “Attention and Consciousness”, Journal of Consciousness Studies.

Mind