Abstract: Sounds are the immediate objects of audition. What else do we hear? Sounds differ from ordinary material objects and their features, but audition informs us about ordinary things and happenings. This chapter argues that a surprising class of cross-modal perceptual illusions provides the materials to resolve a puzzle concerning how audition furnishes awareness as of things and happenings beyond sounds. Explaining cross-modal interactions requires recognizing aspects of perceptual experience that cannot be understood entirely in modality-specific terms. The perceptual modalities are not autonomous modes of awareness and domains of inquiry. Comprehending what is most striking about perceptual experience — its capacity to furnish a sense of openness to a unified world of things and happenings — requires comprehending the interactions and relationships among perceptual modalities.

Keywords: audition, inter-modal, illusion, perception, experience, binding,