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Burge‘s comment that phenomenal consciousness may be a necessary condition on perceptual representational content was very noncommittal, exploratory and in the context of trying to find something conjecturally positive in Loar‘s essay; it was before the fuller development of his views on this topic (Burge in private correspondence). However, given the idea that it is something conjecturally positive, what would Burge‘s position be if he did commit to it? Which of the two statements above would he reject? Burge would reject the idea that

phenomenal consciousness is dissociable from perceptual constancies, instead of rejecting the idea that perceptual constancies are not sufficient for distinguishing sensation from

perception. The reason for this choice is that his idea that perceptual constancies is the mark of perception is more central to his philosophical framework than conjectures about how phenomenal consciousness constitutively fits in with it. In particular, Burge thinks of perceptual constancies as giving a scientific explanation of how objectification is possible. Objectification, recall, is what marked the difference between non-perceptual and perceptual processes. In addition, Burge thinks that proposals about consciousness are at this point mostly inevitably conjectural.78

Thus, if Burge had held that phenomenal consciousness was necessary to perception, he would have had to accept the idea that phenomenal consciousness is not dissociable from perceptual constancies. This idea has two important components that are worth highlighting. Both relate to the nature of the ‘association.‘

One is the component idea that unconscious perception may turn out to constitutively

associate with phenomenal consciousness. This can be understood at least in three ways. First, consider abnormal cases of unconscious perception such as that occurring in blindsighted people. Blindsighted people are people who apparently do not have any phenomenal

experience, but when forced to answer questions about what they see, will ‗guess‘ correctly. Burge could hold of these people that their perceptual representational content constitutively has to associate with instances where this perceptual representational content was conscious. Second, consider that there might be types of perception in individual subjects (who are constitutively conscious individuals), that are never phenomenally conscious. Still, this

78 _{This whole section is indebted to correspondence with Burge. In particu la r, he c larified his speculations about}

the relation between perceptual and conscious content, and the relationship between empirica l conjectures and claims of constitutive conditions.

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always unconscious perceptual content might constitutively have to associate with

phenomenal experience. Third, consider an aspect of perception such as the early stages of visual processing. These early stages of visual processing might always be unconscious, but they can still constitutively associate with phenomenal consciousness. Burge could hold that these early stages constitutively serve, and even always serve, phenomenal experience

without ever, necessarily or contingently, being part of it.79 Burge would likely accept the first and third interpretation if he had held that phenomenal consciousness is constitutive to

perceptual representational content. I think he would also accept the second, but I am not sure.

Another is the component idea that perceptual constancies simply associate with phenomenal consciousness by - at least - empirically overlapping with perceptual experiences. This is the idea that the empirical facts might turn out to reveal that every normal system that contains perceptual constancies also has phenomenally conscious perceptions. This is the idea that we might find that individual subjects and perceptual constancies correlate, while remaining open on whether there is any constitutive connection. For instance, Burge does not hold that ants, desert ants in particular, have a capacity for perception representation, because they do not have perceptual constancies (Burge, 2010, pp. 499-500). And so desert ants do not have perceptual representational content. But Burge does hold that bees have a capacity for perceptual representation, because they have perceptual constancies (Burge, 2010, pp. 508, 517). And so bees can have, and do have, perceptual representational content. The stateme nts about perceptual constancies are securely established facts.80 Aside from these known facts, it might turn out empirically that both or neither of the ant and the bee has phenomenal

consciousness. In both these cases, perceptual constancies would not overlap empirically with phenomenal consciousness. In the case of both the ant and the bee having phenomenal

consciousness the ant would have experiences without perceptual constancies. If neither the ant nor the bee has phenomenal consciousness, the bee would have perceptual constancies without perceptual experiences. However, it might also turn out that the ant does not have perceptual experiences but that the bee does, just as we would expect if we thought that perceptual constancies overlap with phenomena l content. This kind of a correlation would be evidence in favor of the idea that, in general, perceptual constancies and phenomenal content

79 _{It should be apparent that this is a very comple x terra in. Obviously I have to draw a limit some where to the}

amount of detail I go into on these issues. However, I think these distinctions are worth keeping in mind.

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I grant that the bee has perceptual constancies, even if it does not have, for instance, a neo-cortex like ma mma ls do. I believe perceptual psychologists are we ll on their way in uncovering general princip les.

45 overlap empirically (i.e. if you find one in an animal, you find the other).81 And this, in turn, might be evidence for the idea that the correlation is not accidental, but has perhaps implicates a constitutive association.

With both of these components in mind, the ―dialectic‖ is the following: Burge holds that, if phenomenal consciousness is constitutive to perceptual content, then we should think of unconscious perceptual representation, in particular, as constitutively associating (at least in the first and third ways) with phenomenally conscious perceptual representation. In particular, if unconscious perceptual representation did not constitutively associate with phenomenally conscious perceptual representations. then the early stages of vision and blindsight would be knockdown objections against their constitutive connection. Blindsight would be an objection because blindsight makes use of perceptual constancies, which is the very mark of perception. The same is true of early stages in vision. However, both are unconscious.

But if Burge holds that unconscious perception constitutively associates with phenomenally conscious perceptual representation, then Burge cannot hold that insects, insofar as they lack phenomenal experience altogether, can have perception. For instance, the bee has perceptual constancies, but we do not know whether it has phenomenal consciousnes s, so if perceptual representation must constitutively associate with phenomenal consciousness, we do not know if the bee has perceptual content before we know whether the bee has phenomenal

consciousness.

If Burge were to accept that phenomenal consciousness was constitutively associated with to perception, the position would partly (by Burge himself) be evaluated by whether it is

plausible that perceptual constancies and phenomenal consciousness overlap empirically. In particular, it comes down to such questions as if and why the bee has consciousness or not, and how the answers relate to the fact that the bee has perceptual constancies.

Burge does not think that it is empirically plausible that they overlap, but he concedes that little is known about phenomenal consciousness.82 Thus, Burge thinks that opinions of whether insects do or do not have consciousness are fairly speculative at this point in time.

81 _{After this is shown, one might think that the e mpirica l corre lation is non -accidental. That is , there might be}

some deep reason why they are correlated. In particu lar, it might shift the positive cla im on the person holding that they are not constitutively related, at least, until more is known.

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Given that Burge in fact thinks that it is implausible that they overlap empirically, Burge thinks that there are no reasons for, and some reasons against holding that unconscious perceptual representations constitutively associate with phenomenally conscious perceptual representations. 83 The reasons for would be speculative, involving theoretical conjectures about consciousness. The reasons against, by contrast, simply note that it is implausible that perceptual constancies have any deep link to phenomenal experiences. This is the most immediate reason why Burge thinks that we should not take perceptual representation as being constitutively conscious.