Description
This course examines how humans (and in some cases, other animals) sense and perceive the world around us. It considers the philosophical questions that humans have long posed about perception, and addresses the methods and techniques scientists use to try to answer them. Sensory pathways, fundamental perceptual processing, and higher-level meaning-making will be explored. This course will examine the orienting senses, skin senses, chemical senses (smell and taste), audition, vision, and the perception of time. Students will consider sensation and perception from several perspectives: physiological, psychophysical, ecological, motivational, and computational.