Sensory Integration and the Unity of Consciousness

In this volume, cognitive scientists and philosophers examine two closely relatedaspects of mind and mental functioning: the relationships among the various senses and the linksthat connect different conscious experiences to form unified wholes. The contributors address arange of questions concerning how information from one sense influences the processing ofinformation from the other senses and how unified states of consciousness emerge from the bonds thattie conscious experiences together. Sensory Integration and the Unity ofConsciousness is the first book to address both of these topics, integrating scientificand philosophical concerns.

A flood of recent work in both philosophy andperception science has challenged traditional conceptions of the sensory systems as operating inisolation. Contributors to the volume consider the ways in which perceptual contact with the worldis or may be "multisensory," discussing such subjects as the modeling of multisensoryintegration and philosophical aspects of sensory modalities. Recent years have seen a similar surgeof interest in unity of consciousness. Contributors explore a range of questions on this topic,including the nature of that unity, the degree to which conscious experiences are unified, and therelationship between unified consciousness and the self.

ContributorsTim Bayne, David J. Bennett, Berit Brogaard, BarryDainton, Ophelia Deroy, Frederique de Vignemont, Marc Ernst, Richard Held, Christopher S. Hill,Geoffrey Lee, Kristan Marlow, Farid Masrour, Jennifer Matey, Casey O'Callaghan, Cesare V. Parise,Kevin Rice, Elizabeth Schechter, Pawan Sinha, Julia Trommershaeuser, Loes C. J. van Dam, JonathanVogel, James Van Cleve, Robert Van Gulick, Jonas Wulff

David J. Bennett is Visiting Scholar at Brown University. Christopher S. Hill is Professor of Philosophy at Brown University.