Is Perception Equivalent to Thinking in Neuroscience?

[StevieTNZ]

When you consciously perceive something, are we thinking the thing we're perceiving? Not necessarily the same kind of thinking as a thought 'I'm alive'?

For example, I see a cat. But what is that perception? Is it a generation of thoughts that produces the image I see? The stimuli makes my brain create an image, but is that image 'thinking'?

Finding it hard to put in words what I'm trying to ask...

 

[Evo]

When you consciously perceive something, are we thinking the thing we're perceiving? Not necessarily the same kind of thinking as a thought 'I'm alive'?

For example, I see a cat. But what is that perception? Is it a generation of thoughts that produces the image I see? The stimuli makes my brain create an image, but is that image 'thinking'?

Finding it hard to put in words what I'm trying to ask...

You see the object and the memory of the knowledge you've gained tells you what it is.

 

[StevieTNZ]

You see the object and the memory of the knowledge you've gained tells you what it is.

When you see, are you in a process of thinking?

So the stimuli gets the brain to generate an image, but are you thinking the image in order to see it?

 

[Evo]

When you see, are you in a process of thinking?

So the stimuli gets the brain to generate an image, but are you thinking the image in order to see it?

No, you think when you determine what the image is.

 

[Math Is Hard]

The image itself, before your brain assigns meaning, is "sensation". When you assign meaning to it, it becomes "perception", and more specifically in this case, it is "object recognition" since you have identified an object that fits in your mental category of "cat".

 

[Evo]

The image itself, before your brain assigns meaning, is "sensation". When you assign meaning to it, it becomes "perception", and more specifically in this case, it is "object recognition" since you have identified an object that fits in your mental category of "cat".

Thank you MIH!