The Aesthetic Field: A Phenomenology of Aesthetic Experience by Arnold Berleant (review)

70 Books the subject which is so necessary for this type ofwork. She is clearly an empiricist and her methodology is in conformity with that of behaviorism. Her main points are that knowledge results from objects and from the environment and that perceptual experience and development consist of an increasingly better discrimination of the characteristic properties of objects. These properties of an object are never considered to be introduced by the novel responses of the subject but are always contained in and produced by the object itself. The author states her position relative to others in Chapters 1-4, where she groups theories into two categories: the cognitive theories and the response oriented theories. In particular, she distinguishes herself from the latter (pp. 61-62) in showing that a response is differentiated only if the perception is differentiated beforehand. Thus, the differentiation ofresponses is only a consequence and not a cause of perceptive differentiation. The response and, more generally, the internal process of the perceiver are secondary in comparison to the stimuli. Later (Chapters 5-8), the author devotes about 100 pages to a useful description of the general principles of perception. Perception, in her view, consists of extracting or obtaining information from the outside world, in contradistinction to changing or modifying the environment. The author also explains her position on the relation between perception and the totality of cognitive processes, in particular, the so-called productive activity that succeeds perceptual activity (Chapter 8). Chapter 6 explains the three processes by which perceptual differentiation is effected: the abstraction of the differential properties ofthe stimuli, the filtering out of all non-pertinent variables and the exploratory activity of the sense organs. The selective factors of perceptual experience are discussed in the next chapter. They consist, on the one hand, of search activities and, on the other, ofthe subject's efforts to reduce uncertainty. Even though the various theories discussed in the first third of the book (Parts 1 and 2) are not very new, it is still of value that they be explicated in order to view with the proper perspective the experiments and data reported in the following sections of the book. The subsequent chapters are devoted to learning studies (Part 3) and perceptual development (Part 4). Of the chapters concerning experiments in perception (Chapters 9-12), the one devoted to the relationships between the different sensory modalities and to their 'correspondences', will certainly interest the artist. These intermodal relationships are one of the principal sources for the development and the enrichment of our experiences (Chapter 11). Chapter 13 on phylogenesis and, in particular, Chapter 14 on imprinting, considered as a type of perceptual development, enable a better understanding of the origins and permanence ofa style, of a handwriting, ofa vision of the world. Chapters 16 and 17 describe the development of a baby's perception of space, objects and events and report in detail experiments of the past decade that have revolutionized our understanding of this subject. Chapters 18 and 19, devoted to the development of perception by the means that the author calls 'representation' (graphical translation) and 'symbols ' (the different systems of signs: language, writing, etc.) are not as original or well elaborated as the preceding material. In concluding, I wish to point out the opposition that the author more or less explicitly establishes between perception and the so-called productive activities that change or modify reality, that is, between perception and action. Although, following Eleanor Gibson, the perceptual function is not passive, she limits the perceptual activities of the perceiver to seeking and exploring. Actually, it appears difficult to hold such a position without taking account of ideas about internal organizations or structures. These are the structures that give significance to objects or events. The perceiver is much more active, first in the sense that he himself is the central ordinator and, second, in the case where certain aspects of his actions engender new organizations or structures. Even if it is possible to deal with the learning experience without considering these structures, it is not possible to conceive of development while leaving in the background the internal structural transformations of the perceiver . Eleanor Gibson has treated perception...