File spoon-archives/heidegger.archive/heidegger_1998/heidegger.9806, message 119


From: GBORGERSON-AT-delphi.com
Date: Sun, 28 Jun 1998 15:02:10 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Re:  Mind & Body, One More Time


Dear Micheal,

	To my knowledge although Merleau-Ponty was familiar with Heidegger's
work I am unaware if he ever addressed the use of the word Dasein. He 
certainly didnot use in his works as a major concept. The philosophy of
the flesh was the concept that he was working on at the time of his death
that he was never able to finish. In his last work it is clear that "the
flesh" was two sided in his formulation having the qualities of both the 
visible and the invisible. These qualities were inseparably intertwined.
Its pretty clear that just because you can make a distinction it doesn't
mean that they are not interdependent. 

	I believe that Merleau-Ponty would accept the idea of flesh as an
openness of being in the world as for Merleau-Ponty the relation of the
person to the world is everything and form the basis for "The Phenomenology
of Perception". In the "Invisible and the Invisible" M-P is returning
to this theme in a more philosophical and less psychological way. He is
also reworking his own formulations informed by developing a deeper
appreciation of the role of language.

	Merleau-Ponty would appreciate your descriptions of how the body
is inescapable and how it is a resistence. Both of these are themes he
articulates repeatedly throughout hhis work as well as the idea that the
body is an object unlike anyother object in the world because of its
inescapablity and its resistence.

	I think what distinguishes I think what distinguishes Merleau-Ponty from Heidegger is the French 
obsession with reflective experience which certainly obsesses his mentor
Sartre. But I'm still thinking this through. 

	I don't think that Merleau-Ponty could accept your formulation entirely
that it is one aspect of dasein's finiteness to be embodied. Not because
embodiment is finiteing but because to call it one aspect of Dasein's finitness
diminishes the role that embodiment plays in human experience. Embodiment
is central for Merlea-Ponty.

Thanks for the response Micheal,

Greg


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