Attention Deficit

Block argues that, with respect to attention and phenomenology, “neither is necessary for the other” (p. 540). For attention without phenomenology, he cites a study (Jiang et al. 2006) showing that subjects are drawn by nudes of the opposite sex in “conditions in which the nudes are invisible” (p. 540). Block adds that attention, in this experiment, was gauged by a “subsequent task to which distribution of attention is crucial” (p. 540). To show phenomenology without attention, he notes that subjects in some experiments, as in the work by Alvarez and Oliva, can see “scene gists”, like the presence of a face in their peripheral vision despite “maximal siphoning off of attention by a very demanding task” (p. 540-541).

Block believes these and similar experiments counter Prinz, Lycan and many others who believe that attention is necessary for phenomenology. I am not entirely convinced, however. One important issue is the definition of attention. In his reply, and even in the target article, the term is used somewhat loosely. In the Jiang et al. experiment discussion, it is not completely clear what is meant by attention—it certainly does not match a typical understanding of the term. If one does not notice the nudes or actually study them then it is difficult to say one is attending to them ordinarily speaking. Block might be helped by drawing on some of what Alison Gopnik discusses. She distinguishes between exogenous and endogenous attention. Exogenous attention is characterized by “eye movements, decelerating heart rate, and parietal activation” while endogenous is goal directed, top-down attention (p. 503). She compares exogenous attention to lantern light and endogenous attention to a spotlight.

Block does not specify what type of attention he is talking about, but it appears he is referring to exogenous attention in the Jiang et al. experiment. In another experiment (Volpe 1979; Verfaeille 1995), which he uses to show that, against Lycan, people can have representation without attention, he claims that there is unconscious seeing (p. 540). In this experiment he says that subjects are not attending to what they actually see. In the nudes experiment, Block says that the subjects’ attention is drawn by the invisible nudes. Here he seems to be relying on an exogenous notion of attention while in the unconscious sight experiment he seems to be employing a more endogenous version of attention. If he were to apply the same, broader notion of attention in both discussions the subjects in the unconscious sight experiment could be said to be attending as well. This would mean that his empirical evidence does not tell against the view of Lycan, Prinz and others without further modification.

I would have to review the experiments to see if the role of attention is clearly defined (especially in the unconscious sight experiment), but it seems that Block is equivocating between two types of attention in his replies to Prinz, Lycan and other responders in reply 5.