The intangible ground – A neurophenomenology of the film experience

The body's relationship to the world is not merely physical but perceptual and intentional: perception and motor action together constitute an integrated world. When perception presents a clear, articulated spectacle and motor intentions receive expected responses from the world, the body is geared onto that world. This maximum sharpness of perception and action reveals a perceptual ground—a general setting for coexistence between body and world. The passage articulates a phenomenological argument that the body's engagement with the world is foundational to lived experience.

Study at a glance

Abstract

The constitution of a spatial level is simply one means of constituting an integrated world: my body is geared onto the world when my perception presents me with a spectacle as varied and as clearly articulated as possible, and when my motor intentions, as they unfold, receive the responses they expect from the world. This maximum sharpness of perception and action points clearly to a perceptual ground, a basis of my life, a general setting in which my body can co-exist with the world. – Maurice Merleau-Ponty