Made available in DSpace on 2014-07-18T02:01:34Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 000459289-Texto+Completo-0.pdf: 904643 bytes, checksum: 494bba68668b2082672ac959477f8cff (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014 / The text of the Phenomenology of inclusiveness characterizes itself as a new work in the area of phenomenology. Seeking phenomenological sources in Husserl, Merleau-Ponty, and Waldenfels, the text attempts to develop inclusiveness in order to contemplate the inclusive/exclusive paradox and, moreover, to show its efficacy in measuring the inclusive scope of any ethical theory ever developed. From Husserl, we find the basis for a phenomenology of inclusiveness, which was put forth in his Krisis. In order to solve the constitutive paradoxes, Husserl nurtures the idea of an inclusive basis. Such inclusiveness is characterized by a latent reflective attitude, an attitude of inclusion in the lifeworld, an attitude of not closing our thesis, and, finally, an attitude that avoids the reductionism of the subjective and objective poles. With the radicality of thought from Merleau-Ponty, the text presents support for a complicity of meaning. Now, the subject sees his/herself as complicit in his/her relationship with the liveworld thus withdrawing the heavy burden that previously was placed solely on the subject as the ultimate endower of all meaning. The constitutive process entails a radical attitude that enables an incarnate inclusiveness, conveying the inclusive scope to the horizontality of life. However, as Waldenfels investigated the progress of ethical theory, he added an ethical-practical character to the constitutive dimension. Waldenfels emphasized an inevitable response before any thesis, due to our being in the world, as an event that just happens, regardless of our will or objectivications. Such responsiveness promotes the threshold of the senses as a responsive ethical possibility. In response itself, we find a responsive content that is not objectified, guiding us to the thresholds, considering them as possibilities and not as threats. For Waldenfels, what was previously excluded from the established order appears at the threshold, providing inclusive opportunities. After these considerations, the text reveals an inclusiveness which is open, latent, included in the lifeworld, non-reductionist, complicit in the constitutive process, and has an ethically responsive character. Although the studied authors do not work directly with the theme of inclusiveness, we examine sufficient sources to propose a method of phenomenology that demonstrates inclusivity, i. e., that is phenomenologically inclusive. Although the method is neither a measure nor a foundation, nevertheless it provides a base that serves as the measure and foundation of all morality ever built. Thus, we can measure the inclusive scope of all ethics and see how far the inclusivity extends, but yet not present inclusivity as the determinative basis. The foundation of the base is phenomenological, i. e., predicted within the latency and horizontality of the lifeworld. / O texto Fenomenologia da inclusividade se caracteriza por ser um novo trabalho na área da fenomenologia. Buscando fontes fenomenológicas em Husserl, Merleau-Ponty e Waldenfels, o texto procura desenvolver uma inclusividade capaz de contemplar o paradoxo inclusivo/exclusivo e, indo além, mostrando-se eficaz para medir o escopo inclusivo de qualquer tese ética já elaborada. A partir de Husserl, encontramos as bases para uma fenomenologia da inclusividade, que fora trabalhada em sua obra Krisis. Buscando resolver os paradoxos constitutivos, Husserl nutre a ideia de um fundamento inclusivo. Tal inclusividade se caracteriza por uma atitude reflexiva latente, uma atitude de inclusão no mundo-da-vida, uma atitude de não fechamento de nossas teses e, por fim, uma atitude que evite o reducionismo dos polos subjetivo e objetivo. Com a radicalidade do pensamento de Merleau-Ponty, o texto encontra subsídios para uma cumplicidade de sentido. Agora, o sujeito se vê cúmplice de toda significação em sua relação com o mundo-da-vida. Retira-se o pesado fardo que antes era concedido tão somente ao sujeito como doador último de todo o significado.O processo constitutivo enseja uma atitude radical que habilita uma inclusividade encarnada, avultando o escopo inclusivo à horizontalidade da vida. Todavia, investigando os avanços da teoria ética de Waldenfels, acresce-se, à dimensão constitutiva, um caráter ético-prático. Waldenfels enfatiza uma inevitável resposta dada antes de qualquer tese decorrente de nosso estar no mundo como um evento que simplesmente acontece, independente de nossa vontade ou objetificações. Tal responsividade promove a fronteirização dos sentidos como possibilidade ético-responsiva. Na própria resposta encontramos um teor responsivo não objetivado, guiando-nos às fronteiras, considerando-as como possibilidade e não como ameaças. Para Waldenfels, o que antes era excluído da ordem estabelecida aparece junto ao limiar, facultando possibilidades inclusivas. Feitas estas considerações, o texto revela uma inclusividade aberta, latente, incluída no mundo-da-vida, não reducionista, cúmplice nos processos constitutivos e possuindo um caráter ético-responsivo. Embora os autores estudados não trabalhem diretamente com o tema da inclusividade, obtêm-se fontes suficientes para elaborarmos uma fenomenologia com uma proposta inclusiva. O método proposto é fenomenológico inclusivo. Entretanto, apresenta-se como uma medida, como um fundamento que não é nem uma medida nem um fundamento. Mas, mesmo assim, serve como medida e fundamento de toda a eticidade já construída. Dessa forma, podemos medir o escopo inclusivo de toda eticidade, ver até onde se estende sua inclusividade, mas sem se apresentar como um fundamento determinativo. O fundamento ao qual nos pautamos é fenomenológico, ou seja, previsto dentro da latência e horizontalidade do mundo-da-vida.

Tese (doutorado)—Universidade de Brasília, Instituto de Psicologia, 2007. / Submitted by wesley oliveira leite (leite.wesley@yahoo.com.br) on 2009-10-16T18:56:17Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Tese_Monica Botelho.pdf: 1008035 bytes, checksum: b9be343b8c44153387231b9a7cdd3fb4 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Luanna Maia(luanna@bce.unb.br) on 2011-01-25T13:52:59Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Tese_Monica Botelho.pdf: 1008035 bytes, checksum: b9be343b8c44153387231b9a7cdd3fb4 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2011-01-25T13:52:59Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Tese_Monica Botelho.pdf: 1008035 bytes, checksum: b9be343b8c44153387231b9a7cdd3fb4 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2007-02 / Esta tese discute o trabalho psicoterápico da gestalt-terapia. Tem como foco seu caráter de experimentação, buscando ampliar seu significado e seus fundamentos epistemológicos. Os experimentos gestálticos nasceram no contexto original da abordagem. Instituíram a experiência como forma de ampliação da consciência, atendendo a uma mudança paradigmática que pretendia oferecer uma compreensão da vivência humana a partir da visão organísmica e holística. A partir de um diálogo com a fenomenologia de Merleau-Ponty e com a arte de Lygia Clark, o trabalho pretende ampliar a fundamentação fenomenológica da experimentação. O filósofo dedicou sua obra ao tema das relações entre homem e mundo, buscando uma compreensão que partia do mundo da experiência, de um a priori da correlação sujeito-objeto. Situou o corpo como consciência e desenvolveu um viés de pensamento que desembocou em uma ontologia do Ser. Este trabalho desenvolve um recorte das propostas merleau-pontyanas e as coloca em diálogo com as noções de campo organismo-ambiente, ajustamento criativo e agressão. Lygia Clark partiu da vocação da arte moderna de unir arte e vida e desenvolveu um trabalho peculiar fundamentado na transformação do espaço em espaço-tempo, inserindo o público no contexto da obra e propondo a experimentação como forma de acesso à totalidade. Suas obras envolviam as pessoas em um processo vivencial, se colocando como um campo de experiência. Este trabalho discute sua trajetória e aponta para a experiment-ação como ação intercorporal produtora de significados que permite a ressignificação da existência. Articula as noções de campo, corporeidade, forma e significação como dimensões constitutivas da experimentação. Sugere denominar a intervenção terapêutica como proposição, que visa a experiment-ação e tem como tarefa o desajustamento criativo. Este introduz na situação uma diferença que provoca a implicação corporal do cliente com a experiência imediata no contexto psicoterápico. Quando o cliente sente suporte na situação, a experiência tende a se desdobrar em uma ação agressiva e criativa produtora de significados que permitirão a ele ultrapassar o instituído e transgredir. Este trabalho conclui pela compreensão da psicoterapia como um campo de experiência estética que, como tal, não prescinde da corporeidade, é descentradora, produtora de significados e transgressora. _____________________________________________________________________________ ABSTRACT / This dissertation discusses the gestalt-therapy psychological work. The focus is its experimental character, seeking to amplify its meanings and its epistemological basis. The gestalt experiments were born in the original context of this theory. Experience was established as a means to amplify conscience, responding to a paradigmatic shift that intended to offer a comprehension of human living experience from organismic and holistic view. Starting from a dialogue between Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology and Lygia Clark’s art work, this dissertation intends to amplify the phenomenological basis of experimentation. The philosopher oriented his work to the theme of relation between man and world, searching for an understanding that began from the world of experience, from an a priori in the subject-object correlation. He located body as conscience and developed a line of thought that resulted in an ontology of Being. This work develops an outline of Merleau-Ponty’s proposals and puts them in dialogue with gestalt notions of field organism-environment, creative adjustment and aggression. Lygia Clark took from modern art’s inclination of uniting art and life and developed a peculiar work based on transformation of space in space-time, inserting the audience into the context of the piece and proposing experimentation as a means to access wholeness. Her work enwrapped people in an experiencing process, putting itself as a field of experience. This work discusses the course of her art and points to a experiment-action as inter corporal action that produces meaning, allowing to re-signify the existence. It articulates notions of field, embodiedness, form and meaning as constructive dimensions of experiment-action. It suggests calling therapeutic intervention as proposition, which aims at the experiment-action and has as its goal the creative des-adjustment. It places a disparity in the situation that instigates the client’s body implication with the direct experience in the psychotherapy context. When the client feels support in the circumstance, experience tends to develop into an aggressive and creative action which produces meanings that will allow him/her to surpass the established notions and transgress. This work concludes considering psychotherapy a field of aesthetic experience that, as such, does not dismiss embodiedness, is “descentering”, producer of meaning and transgressor.

Submitted by Marilene Donadel (marilene.donadel@unioeste.br) on 2018-09-06T21:08:20Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Bruna_Retameiro_2018.pdf: 1499096 bytes, checksum: eb6da56ebdbd87a5eb022705e664901a (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-09-06T21:08:20Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Bruna_Retameiro_2018.pdf: 1499096 bytes, checksum: eb6da56ebdbd87a5eb022705e664901a (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-06-07 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / This dissertation in question intends to present Merleay-Ponty and Cézanne’s piece of work, from selected texts and paintings, that show the philosopher’s and the artist’s advances, about the perceived world and its pre-reflective feature. As theoretical foundation we will be using Phenomenology of Perception, which is Merleau-Ponty’s piece of work regarding this thematic, as well as his essay about the painting and its contribution as a phenomenological achievement. Merleau-Ponty questions classical theories about the perception and criticizes them in many aspects, but mainly by the mind-body dichotomy, reason and sensation, subject and object. For him, the classical theories, mainly rationalism and empiricism, influenced by the scientism from that time, reduced the world to interpretations. He tries to get back to the previous world of science and reflection, from which these are formed. Studying Merleau-Ponty’s piece of work about the perceived world, we have noticed that the painting is a frequent subject, to which the philosopher always comes back. From that, the main problem of this dissertation consists in trying to understand the following question: how does Cézanne’s painting come to be an expression of this returning to a pre-reflective world? Since his thoughts about the questions of perception change in some aspects during his work, the painting has always followed him in these changes, considering Cézanne’s doubt, Indirect language and the voices of silence, Eye and mind, each one of them written in a different period of his life and thoughts. Merleau-Ponty attributes to the painting, and especially the artist Paul Cézanne’s piece of work, the ability to express what, until then, was silence and to become visible what was thought to be invisible in perception. It is to the pre-reflective world that, still in a wild state, Merleau-Ponty intends to return through phenomenology and, according to him, this is the world that Cézanne paints. / A referida dissertação pretende apresentar as obras de Merleau-Ponty e de Cézanne, a partir de textos e pinturas selecionadas, que indiquem os avanços do filósofo e do pintor, acerca do mundo percebido e seu caráter pré-reflexivo. Como fundamentação teórica, nos reportaremos à Fenomenologia da percepção como principal obra de Merleau-Ponty no que tange a temática em questão, nos munindo também, de ensaios do filósofo sobre a pintura e a contribuição desta como um empreendimento fenomenológico. Merleau-Ponty questiona as teorias clássicas sobre a percepção e as critica em diversos aspectos, mas principalmente pela dicotomia corpo e mente, razão e sensação, sujeito e objeto. Para ele, as teorias clássicas, principalmente o racionalismo e o empirismo, influenciadas pelo cientificismo da época, acabaram por reduzir o mundo a interpretações. O que o filósofo almeja é retomar o mundo anterior ao da ciência e da reflexão, a partir dos quais estes se formam. Ao percorrer as obras de Merleau-Ponty sobre a questão do mundo percebido, notamos que a pintura é um assunto recorrente, ao qual o filósofo sempre volta. A partir daí o problema principal desta dissertação consiste justamente em tentar compreender a seguinte questão: como a pintura de Cézanne pode ser uma expressão desse retorno a um mundo pré-reflexivo? Ainda que seu pensamento sobre a questão da percepção mude em alguns aspectos ao longo de suas obras, a pintura sempre o acompanhou nessas mudanças, haja vista os ensaios A dúvida de Cézanne, A linguagem indireta e as vozes do silêncio, O olho e o espírito, cada qual escrito em um período diferente da vida e do pensamento do filósofo. Merleau-Ponty atribui à pintura e, principalmente, aos trabalhos do pintor Paul Cézanne, a habilidade de expressar o que até então era silêncio e tornar visível o que se acreditava invisível na percepção. É ao mundo pré-reflexivo, ainda em estado selvagem, que Merleau-Ponty pretende retornar através da fenomenologia e, para o filósofo, é este mundo que Cézanne pinta.

Made available in DSpace on 2017-07-10T18:26:13Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Litiara Kohl Dors.pdf: 923425 bytes, checksum: 9ee10db55ed49fec81dbbdb2f1a52ef3 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-07-31 / ABSTRACT The new ontology or the "ontology of the flesh" as it is called, formulated by Merleau-Ponty, points largely to the important contribution of the psychoanalytic thought on the horizon of the phenomenology. Merleau-Ponty early on proved to be a big supporter of ideas of the orthodox psychoanalysts as Freud, Lacan and Melanie Klein, mainly because that movement sought to return the body its broadest sense, originating, moving away from purely mechanistic ideals prevailing over the philosophical tradition and in medical science, of Cartesian orientation. Regarding Winnicott, in turn, an eminent psychoanalyst, while having maintained close ties to his Orthodox precursors, went on to develop a very own and unique thinking. Despite the fact that they kept interlocutors in common, there is no more concrete evidence that Merleau-Ponty and Winnicott had known each other and even less had read each other s works; however, it does not cease to call attention the proximity and complementarity between the ideas developed by both. In this paper we investigate Winnicott s theory about child development and the importance of the relationship between the child and others (particularly the adult) regarding the emergence of a consciousness able to relate to the world in a healthy way. We understand that this issue, addressed by child s psychoanalysis, finds full resonance within the phenomenological debate about intersubjectivity, having as singular reference the figure of Merleau-Ponty. / RESUMO A nova ontologia, ou a chamada ontologia da carne , formulada por Merleau-Ponty, acena, em grande medida, para o importante contributo do pensamento psicanalítico no horizonte da fenomenologia. Merleau-Ponty, desde cedo, mostrou-se um grande simpatizante das ideias de psicanalistas ortodoxos como Freud, Lacan e Melanie Klein, sobretudo porque esse movimento procurou devolver ao corpo o seu sentido mais amplo, originário, afastando-se dos ideais puramente mecanicistas vigentes na tradição filosófica e nas ciências médicas, de orientação cartesiana. Quanto a Winnicott, por sua vez, trata-se de um eminente psicanalista, que, embora tendo mantido estreitos laços com seus precursores ortodoxos, acabou por desenvolver um pensamento muito próprio, original e propositivo. Malgrado o fato de que mantiveram interlocutores em comum, não há qualquer evidência mais concreta de que Merleau-Ponty e Winnicott tenham se conhecido e menos ainda pela leitura das obras um do outro; porém, não deixa de chamar atenção a proximidade e a complementaridade entre as ideias desenvolvidas por ambos. Neste trabalho pretendemos investigar a teoria winnicottiana acerca do desenvolvimento infantil, bem como a importância da relação entre a criança e outrem (particularmente, o adulto) no tocante ao surgimento de uma consciência capaz de relacionar-se com o mundo de maneira saudável. Entendemos que esse tema, abordado pela psicanálise infantil, encontra plena ressonância no interior do debate fenomenológico acerca da intersubjetividade, tendo como referência singular a figura de Merleau-Ponty.

Uppsatsens ämne berör re-performance som utställningsmetod och den fysiska kroppen som utställningsobjekt. Materialet består av Marina Abramovićs retrospektiva utställningen The Cleaner (2017) på Moderna Museet och tre re-performanceverk som framförs av tränade aktörer inne på utställningsområdet. Uppsatsens syfte och frågeställningar består av att undersöka vilka egenskaper re-performance som utställningsmetod har och hur det upplevs att betrakta fysiska kroppar som utställningsobjekt. För att besvara detta används Maurice Merleau-Pontys Phenomenology of Perception (1945) och hans fenomenologiska syn på ett förkroppsligat varande. Varje re-performanceverk analyseras utifrån några utvalda fenomenologiska verktyg presenterade av Merleau-Ponty och utvecklas med hjälp av tidigare forskning som berör relationen mellan fenomenologi och performancekonst. Ur de fenomenologiska verksanalyserna framträder resultat som jag anser är talande för betraktandet av fysiska kroppar som utställningsobjekt och performance i stort, som exempelvis en förståelse av performance som ett sätt iscensätta fenomenologi genom praktik och handling. Betraktandet av performance är beroende av ett performativt assemblage som bildas, samt av empati och intersubjektivitet. Resultatet visar även att re- performance inte enbart kan benämnas som en form av konstdokumentation, utan att betraktandet av dessa även innebär ett betraktande av självständiga performanceverk.

La thèse essaie d’analyser le rapport entre deux approches à la connaissance, comprise comme « située » dans des conditions psychiques, sociales et historiques. Deux thèmes principaux permettent de comparer les auteurs choisis, Merleau-Ponty et Foucault. 1) Premièrement, la question de l’opacité de la conscience (le problème si l’on peut considérer comme « connaissance » le produit d’une activité conditionnée par des facteurs auxquels la conscience ne peut pas soumettre à un contrôle épistémique). Merleau-Ponty trouve que les approches qui présentent la connaissance comme soumise à un décalage entre les causes de nos croyances et nos raisons conscientes arrivent à des conséquences sceptiques et auto-réfutatoires. Foucault, en revanche, cherche à approfondir les résultats de la psychanalyse et le structuralisme pour remettre en question le « primat » de la conscience. 2) Deuxièmement, la question de la possible relativité de la connaissance. D’après Merleau-Ponty, l’idée que « nos » vérités sont relatives à nos conditions impliquerait qu’elles ne sont pas du tout des vérités. Chez Foucault, par contre, l’on peut trouver un relativisme conceptuel. Cependant, l’œuvre de l’« archéologue » n’arrive pas à résoudre la question normative de la méta-justification à la lumière de laquelle pourraient être justifiées les règles relativement auxquelles « nos » vérités seraient des vérités. Sans une telle méta-justification, le relativisme tombe dans le simple constat de l’existence des régimes de vérité, ce qui ne suffit pas pour échapper aux conséquences sceptiques. En conclusion, plus de travail est nécessaire pour développer une solution relativiste tenable. / The thesis attempts to analyse the relationship between two approaches to knowledge, understood as “situated” in psychic, social and historical conditions. Two main topics enable us to compare Merleau-Ponty and Foucault, the philosophers chosen. 1) In the first place, the problem of the opacity of consciousness (the problem whether the product of an activity conditioned by factors which consciousness cannot put under epistemic control can be called “knowledge”). Merleau-Ponty finds that the analyses which present knowledge as subjected to a mismatch between the causes of our beliefs and our conscious reasons lead to skeptical and self-defeating consequences. Foucault, on the contrary, tries to deepen the results of psychoanalysis and structuralism in order to question the “primacy” of consciousness. 2) In the second place, the problem of the possible relativity of knowledge. According to Merleau-Ponty, the tenet that “our” truths are relative to our conditions would imply that they are not “truths” at all. In Foucault, on the contrary, a conceptual relativism can be found. Nevertheless, the work of the “archaeologist” fails to solve the normative question of a meta-justification in order to justify the rules relative to which “our” truths are truths. Without such a meta-justification, relativism ends up in the sheer finding of the existence of “regimes of truth” — which is not sufficient to escape from skeptical consequences. In conclusion, more work is needed in order to develop a tenable relativistic solution.

This dissertation contributes to the development of philosophy of disability by drawing on disability studies, feminist philosophy, phenomenology, and philosophy of biology in order to contest epistemic and ontological assumptions about disability within biomedical ethics as well as within philosophical work on the body, demonstrating how philosophical inquiry is radically transformed when experiences of disability are taken seriously. In the first two chapters, I focus on epistemological and ontological concerns surrounding disability within biomedical ethics. Although disabled people and their advocates have been quite vocal regarding their views on disability and in critiquing bioethicists’ approaches to issues that affect them, the interests, knowledge, and experiences of disabled people have had minimal impact on discussions within biomedical ethics textbooks. The risks of making problematic assumptions about disability are high within this subfield insofar as bioethicists impact practices within medical facilities, public policy, and, through student engagement with their texts in biomedical ethics courses, the views of potential health care professionals. All of these, in turn, affect the care provided to disabled people and potential/actual parents of disabled children. Chapter three raises ontological issues related to disability theory, examining the role of the impairment/disability distinction in framing discussions of the body as well as the status of experience. I discuss two approaches to incorporating subjective experiences of the body in disability, arguing that neither is sufficient. I examine debates within feminist theory on questions related to experience. I argue that a feminist phenomenological approach that builds on Merleau-Ponty’s work offers the best way to address bodily experiences in disability theory. The assumptions that disability theorists and Merleau-Ponty make about disability are often at odds. Chapter four points out the ableism in Merleau-Ponty’s use of a case study and considers some of the oversights within Phenomenology of Perception. In spite of my critique, I argue that his approach to phenomenology—with appropriate modifications—is useful not only for theorizing the experiences of disabled people but also for addressing other types of marginalized embodiment. Chapter five applies this method to body integrity identity disorder (BIID), arguing that combining Merleau-Ponty’s insights with those of disability theory allows us to address lived experiences of BIID and to identify assumptions about disability within research on this condition.

Pour Edmund Husserl et Maurice Merleau-Ponty, la perception est une voie d’accès fiable à la réalité. Confrontés à certains problèmes qui pourraient remettre en doute la fiabilité de la perception, ils argumentent en faveur de solutions en apparence analogues. En retraçant le détail de leurs solutions à deux de ces problèmes – la transcendance de l’objet et la possibilité de l’illusion –, l’objectif de ce mémoire sera de démontrer qu’il existe, en dépit de leur accord apparent, une opposition fondamentale dans leur manière d’envisager la perception. En effet, pour Husserl, la perception d’un objet réel et la perception d’un objet illusoire sont intrinsèquement indiscernables, et seule une différence contextuelle permet donc de les départager. Nous argumenterons qu’en adoptant cette position, c’est-à-dire en réduisant la différence entre l’illusion et la perception véridique à une simple différence contextuelle, Husserl révoque le privilège ontologique de l’acte perceptif : la perception n’est pas une voie d’accès fiable à la réalité, parce qu’elle est toujours, au final, potentiellement illusoire. Nous verrons cependant que Merleau-Ponty permet de sortir de cette impasse en expliquant qu’il y a une bel et bien une différence intrinsèque entre l’illusion et la perception véridique. Ce faisant, Merleau-Ponty parvient à démontrer la primauté ontologique de l’acte perceptif. Mieux que Husserl, Merleau-Ponty est dès lors à même de montrer en quoi et comment la perception est une voie d’accès fiable à la réalité. / According to Edmund Husserl and Maurice Merleau-Ponty, perception is a reliable path to reality. Confronted with various problems challenging perception’s reliability, they argue toward similar solutions. By comparing their solutions for two problems, namely the possibility of illusion and object transcendence, this Master’s thesis argues that, in spite of their apparent agreement on how to solve the above issues, Husserl and Merleau-Ponty defend fundamentally incompatible views concerning perception. Notably, according to Husserl, genuine and illusory perceptions are fundamentally (intrinsically) indistinguishable. Il follows that only a contextual difference allows the subject to distinguish them. We will argue that, in admitting only a contextual difference between illusion and genuine perception, Husserl revokes perception’s ontological privilege : perception is not a reliable path to reality, since it is always potentially illusory. By way of contrast, Merleau-Ponty avoids such a conclusion, since his account admits a fundamental difference between illusion and genuine perception. Merleau-Ponty can then argue for the ontological primacy of perception, which, in turn, allows him to demonstrate better than Husserl why and how perception is a reliable path to reality.

This study explores the problem of how we perceive built space and relate to its abstract representations. In 1897, Poincaré presented the problem of space for the 20th century in his essay ‘The Relativity of Space’, in which the human body and technics in our spatial experiences were already implied. Merleau-Ponty and Don Ihde's work is based on the phenomenology of Edmund Husserl and has been influenced to different degrees by Martin Heidegger. The study is presented as a comparative historical-thematic textual study. For Merleau-Ponty, our primordial perception is general, pre-self-conscious and ambiguous. It is only in reflecting on our lived experiences that we can adequately describe our perceptions. One's own body is the means of having a world that is already intersubjective. Merleau-Ponty explicates the fusion of body and soul, as well as our irreducible relation to the world by referring to studies of behavioural pathologies. From these studies the motility and spatiality of one's body, as well as habit acquisition are already informative on general spatial experiences, the syntheses of our perceptions and the unity of the world. The body-subject is the nexus of all levels of perceptions. Merleau-Ponty describes the constitution of embodiment relations (by means of habit acquisition) with artefacts that mediate our interaction and perceptions in the world. Ihde extends this aspect of Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology. Building on Merleau-Ponty's explications of the body, Ihde poses a structure of human-technology relations with different variations: embodiment, hermeneutic, alterity, background and horizonal relations that transform our perceptions of the world and ourselves. Ihde's 'body one' and 'body two' are based on the notion that perception is meaningful and culturally informed. Ihde (after Husserl), shows that geometry and Euclidean space are instances of cultural habitus as an abstraction from the lifeworld. The different human-technology relations are present in our lifeworld-experiences of which built space is constantly part in the background or foreground of our projects and actions. By comparing both philosophers' work in a phenomenological explication of built space, new light is thrown on our experiences and perceptions thereof which have implications on architectural education. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2011. / Philosophy / unrestricted

This dissertation describes the effects of a somatic mindfulness project on the way participants interact with and respond to works of art in a gallery setting. The study begins with a critique of Descartes' philosophy, Cartesianism, which emphasizes the role of the mind over that of the body and senses and argues that this thought continues to affect education even today. By contrast, phenomenology and mindfulness practices attempt to overcome Descartes' legacy by focusing on the importance of the body in lived experience. In particular, this study uses a phenomenological framework to conduct mindfulness on the relationship between the body and the perception of art. To do so, I utilized several phenomenological techniques for gathering data, including observations, video, and interviews, and I also created a unique method to analyze the data using a phenomenological verbal (written) description and visual (through photographic paintings) description. These techniques worked together to express the moment of reversibility between the meditative body and the artworks in the gallery setting. In sum, the findings of this study show that meditation changes the perceptual experience for different people in different ways. Another finding is that different forms of meditation may work better for some people than others. The findings of this study suggest that if art teachers are interested in using meditation, they need to be familiar with multiple forms of meditation. Also, they need to consider the role of the environment, as well as that of the artworks, in creating a wholistic meditative mood.