Newell & Shanks (N&S) argue that an explanation for blindsight need not appeal to unconscious brain processes, citing research indicating that the condition merely reflects degraded visual experience. We reply that other evidence suggests blindsighters' predictive behavior under forced choice reflects cognitive access to low-level visual information that does not correlate with visual consciousness. Therefore, while we grant that visual consciousness may be required for full visual experience, we argue that it may not be needed for decision making and judgment.

The aim of this paper is to argue that action-guiding vision is not cognitively impenetrable and arguments that suggest otherwise rely on an unjustified identification between actionguiding vision and dorsal vision – a functional and an anatomical way of describing the mind. The examination of these arguments show the importance of making a distinction between the functional and the anatomical level when addressing the problem of cognitive penetrability.