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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/20026
Description
Title
Merleau-Ponty and the dialectic of perception
Author(s)
Hass, Lawrence Robert
Issue Date
1991
Doctoral Committee Chair(s)
Melnick, Arthur
Department of Study
Philosophy
Discipline
Philosophy
Degree Granting Institution
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Degree Name
Ph.D.
Degree Level
Dissertation
Keyword(s)
Philosophy
Language
eng
Abstract
"Thought about perception finds itself confronting an antinomy: On one hand it would seem perception is the result of causal action--the effect of external objects upon us; on the other hand, there are compelling reasons to understand perception as an internally constituted event. The predominant post-Cartesian theory of perception--causal representation theory--has attempted to resolve this puzzle by synthesizing the two contrapositions through the postulation of sense-data. I argue that the philosophy of Maurice Merleau-Ponty offers a detailed and sustained critique of the program implicit in every phase of this dialectic: each type of theory, in its turn, attempts to explain the event of perception in terms of an ontological commitment that is essentially derivative from perception and hence a distorting abstraction from it. After developing each theory and re-constructing Merleau-Ponty's most persuasive arguments, I defend his own positive contribution--his ""phenomenology"" of perception--which identifies a range of interwoven perceptual structures that serve as ontological pre-conditions for thought: (1) the genealogy of objectivity, (2) the projective living body, and (3) the intersubjective world. I conclude that Merleau-Ponty's philosophy offers a solution to the antinomy of perception by inviting us to abandon the faulty ontological categories that inform it."
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