ABSTRACT
Pictures are everywhere and we can usually recognize what they depict with ease. Yet there is considerable disagreement about how pictures represent. The problem of pictorial representation has two parts. On the one hand, it concerns how to define ‘picture,’ so as to be able to distinguish pictures from representations of other types. On the other hand, there is a question about how pictures mean what they do, a problem of pictorial semantics. In addition, although pictures are obviously objects of perception, philosophical accounts disagree about how important that fact is. I will argue that there is a fundamental division between perceptual and nonperceptual theories (Lopes 1996). Perceptual theories distinguish pictures from other representations or individuate their contents in terms of a perceiver’s response; nonperceptual theories do not. Some standard theories have versions that fall on both sides of the line – for example, resemblance theories. In those cases, the perceptual and nonperceptual versions must be defended or rejected on different grounds; thus it is important to understand the difference that the appeal to perception makes.
