ReviewPsychonomic bulletin & review2015
The Interface Theory of Perception.
Review in Psychonomic bulletin & review, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 47 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
47 citing papers in PubMed.
- Deep neural networks trained for estimating reflectance and illumination achieve lightness constancy differently than human observers.Journal of vision · 2026Article
- From the Visible to the Invisible: On the Phenomenal Gradient of Appearance.Brain sciences · 2026Article
- From chemistry to cognition: the adaptive origins of consciousness under constraint.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2026Article
- Perceptual rationality: an evolutionary game theory of perceptually rational decision-making.Royal Society open science · 2025Article
- Seeing the unseen: A novel approach to extract latent plant root traits from digital images.Plant phenomics (Washington, D.C.) · 2025Article
- Integrated Information Theory and the Phenomenal Binding Problem: Challenges and Solutions in a Dynamic Framework.Entropy (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Editorial: Insights in consciousness research, volume II.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- FurtherFrontiers in computational neuroscience · 2025Article
- Unification of Mind and Matter through Hierarchical Extension of Cognition: A New Framework for Adaptation of Living Systems.Entropy (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Prägnanz in visual perception.Psychonomic bulletin & review · 2024Article
- Principled Limitations on Self-Representation for Generic Physical Systems.Entropy (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- A functional contextual, observer-centric, quantum mechanical, and neuro-symbolic approach to solving the alignment problem of artificial general intelligence: safe AI through intersecting computational psychological neuroscience and LLM architecture for emergent theory of mind.Frontiers in computational neuroscience · 2024Article
- Quantum-like Qualia hypothesis: from quantum cognition to quantum perception.Frontiers in psychology · 2024Article
- Interfacing consciousness.Frontiers in psychology · 2024Article
- Hierarchical consciousness: the Nested Observer Windows model.Neuroscience of consciousness · 2024Article
- Sensory perception relies on fitness-maximizing codes.Nature human behaviour · 2023Article
- How the conception of control influences our understanding of actions.Nature reviews. Neuroscience · 2023Review
- Fusions of Consciousness.Entropy (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- Virtual Reality for Vision Science.Current topics in behavioral neurosciences · 2023Article
- Alterations in white matter integrity and network topological properties are associated with a decrease in global motion perception in older adults.Frontiers in aging neuroscience · 2023Article
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Perception is a product of evolution. Our perceptual systems, like our limbs and livers, have been shaped by natural selection. The effects of selection on perception can be studied using evolutionary games and genetic algorithms. To this end, we define and classify perceptual strategies and allow them to compete in evolutionary games in a variety of worlds with a variety of fitness functions. We find that veridical perceptions--strategies tuned to the true structure of the world--are routinely dominated by nonveridical strategies tuned to fitness. Veridical perceptions escape extinction only if fitness varies monotonically with truth. Thus, a perceptual strategy favored by selection is best thought of not as a window on truth but as akin to a windows interface of a PC. Just as the color and shape of an icon for a text file do not entail that the text file itself has a color or shape, so also our perceptions of space-time and objects do not entail (by the Invention of Space-Time Theorem) that objective reality has the structure of space-time and objects. An interface serves to guide useful actions, not to resemble truth. Indeed, an interface hides the truth; for someone editing a paper or photo, seeing transistors and firmware is an irrelevant hindrance. For the perceptions of H. sapiens, space-time is the desktop and physical objects are the icons. Our perceptions of space-time and objects have been shaped by natural selection to hide the truth and guide adaptive behaviors. Perception is an adaptive interface.
Indexed as
Identifiers
26384988What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.