In Defense of Inner Perception

Do you perceive what is going on into your own mind? Is pre-reflective self-consciousness a kind of perception—inner perception¬—analogous to sense perception? According to a respectable tradition, which goes back to Descartes, Locke and Brentano, the answer is yes: self-consciousness is analogous to sense perception. Other people, however, think the answer is no. In this paper, I argue that the analogy claim do capture some relevant features of self-consciousness. Relying on insights from Brentano, I offer a case for inner perception, push the analogy further, and draw some lessons as to what extent inner perception is a reliable source of knowledge.Renaissance of Philosophy at the Turn of 19th Century: The School of Franz Brentan