On how we perceive the social world. Criticizing Gallagher’s view on direct perception and outlining an alternative

Criticizing Gallagher’s view on direct perception, I develop a basic model of social perception. According to the Cartesians another person’s intentions (and similar properties) are not directly accessible to an observer. According to the cognitivist Cartesians (quasi-)conscious processes are necessary for social understanding. According to the Anti-Cartesians (Gallagher’s view) social perception is direct. Since both of these latter approaches face serious problems, I will argue in favor of an alternative: anti-cognitivist Cartesianism. Distinguishing between an active- and a passive part of the perceptual system we can describe the situation as follows: Some functionally individuated parts of our nervous system generate percepts that correspond to the properties that causally trigger the system, whilst others form percepts of properties that do not causally trigger the system. The model is basic in that it merely helps clarifying some of the fundamental concepts we need in order to describe empirical findings.