The Lived Body as Pre-Reflective Consciousness:: Merleau-Ponty on the Cogito
Luís Aguiar de Sousa, Ifilnova Post-doctoral Fellow
March 30, 2018 DOI: 10.24193/subbphil.2018.1.01 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
|---|---|
| Key points | Argues that Merleau-Ponty's account of subjectivity presupposes Sartre's anonymous, pre-reflective consciousness but relocates it in the lived body as the "tacit cogito", which underpins both everyday embodied engagement and explicit self-reflection. The "spoken cogito" that results from reflection depends on linguistic ability and the body's expressive power. Contrary to Sartre's view of pre-reflective consciousness as a nothing, the author contends that for Merleau-Ponty the lived body or tacit cogito is always something in and of the world. |
Abstract
In this paper, I sketch out Merleau-Ponty’s theory of subjectivity as it is presented in the Phenomenology of Perception. I wil l start by showing that Merleau-Ponty’s theory presupposes Sartre’s notion of consciousness as anonymous and pre-reflective. Merleau-Ponty takes up these features and embeds them in the l ived body. The result is Merleau-Ponty’s notion of the “tacit cogito” as pre-reflective subjectivity, always presupposed in our everyday embodied engagement with the world and in every explicit reflexive grasp of ourselves as such. Further, I show that the outcome of reflection, the “spoken cogito”, presupposes l inguistic ability and thus the expressive power of the body. In the end I argue that, contrary to Sartre, who viewed pre-reflective consciousness as a nothing, for Merleau-Ponty the l ived body or tacit cogito is always something in and of the world.