Sense Perception and Knowledge

Sense perception is what provides human beings with a pathway to access the external world. The impact of sense perception on how we live is significant. Think of different senses such as seeing, hearing, smell, touch and taste. All these senses inform the way we live and the actions we undertake in life. For example, through hearing and seeing what a lecture is writing on the blackboard, we would not be able to understand the lecture being provided on any given subject (Shani, Tenkasi, & Alexander, 2017). As a result, our acquisition of sensory knowledge would be hindered in a significant way which would deprive us of the knowledge shared by the lecturer.

Given the example noted above, it is evident that sensory perception has a significant relationship with sensory knowledge. The perception gained from our sense strongly influences the knowledge formed from those experiences. The lack of sensory perception shows that human beings would not be able to acquire knowledge in any given way. Sensory perception is the process by which human beings acquire information (Shani et al., 2017). However, the apprehension of the information (data) gained from sensory perception is a responsibility that solely lies with the observer or the concerned individual.

The resulting experience is that human beings exposed to the same object or experience in the world may gain different apprehension of the information gained. This goes to show that sensory knowledge formed from sensory experience is subjective. However, sensory perception is different from sensory knowledge in that it is objective and may do not change regardless of the nature of the experience human beings are subjected to (Shani et al., 2017). Sensory knowledge is gained through someone’s intellect, while sensory perception is through senses.

As such, the process of sensory perception is often informed by what the individual aspects concerning individual biases, expectations, interests, motivations and background knowledge. How human being perceive what they sense helps them build a body of knowledge which is later on used background for the perception of other sensory experiences in the future. For example, if an individual is exposed to a hot substance that burns their hand, they are bound to associate the sensory experience of high temperature with a burning effect. As a result, one can form knowledge that hot items can burn one’s hand (Shani et al., 2017). The resulting situation being that sensory experiences and perception that takes place after that helps human beings understand the world around them.

Sensory knowledge is the ability for one to learn from sensory experiences such as sight, touch sound, taste and smell. However, one major difference between sensory knowledge and sensory perception is that while human beings may be aware of the knowledge they gain through intellect, they might always not be aware of sensory experiences. The difference in awareness is exhibited in apprehension (Shani et al., 2017). If one is not motivated to look at something or listen to a given sound, they will be unaware of the sensory experience they go through and as such gain for information from it. Attention is the key to sensory experiences. Knowledge gained through intellect would not require such a high level of as that required for sensory perception as the latter is often influenced by subjectivity of the experience.

References

Shani, A. B. R., Tenkasi, R. R. V., & Alexander, B. N. (2017). Knowledge and practice: A historical perspective on collaborative management research. In Academic-Practitioner Relationships (pp. 17-34). Routledge.