 Jackson set out to support the conclusion that the immediate objects of perception are mental and that they represent physical objects. He first argues that what we immediately perceive are sense data, which are colored patches. His argument appeals to the fact that when we perceive an object, we are not in immediate contact with the whole object but only a portion of it, and that we are immediately aware of the color and shape of this portion. We see the object in virtue of seeing its surface, and the basic form of seeing its surface is to see its color and shape via sense data that represent that surface. The “in virtue of” relation does all the work here; Jackson does not draw on, and rejects, the arguments from Variation and Illusion (1977: chs. 1, 4, 7).