WHAT IS PHENOMENOLOGY?

Author(s): MAURICE MERLEAU-PONTY and John F. Bannan

Source: CrossCurrents, Vol. 6, No. 1 (WINTER 1956), pp. 59-70
Published by: Wiley
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WHAT IS PHENOMENOLOGY?
MAURICE MERLEAU-PONTY
is phenomenology? It may at last, a philosophical status. It is a

What seem strange that this question philosophy intent upon being an "exact
need still be posed a half century after science," but it is also an account of
the first works of Husserl. Yet it is far space, time, and the world "as lived."
from being settled. Phenomenology is It is an attempt to describe our experi
the study of essences and accordingly its ence as it is and to describe it directly,
treatment of every problem is an at without considering its psychological
tempt to define an essence, the essence genesis or the causal explanations which
of
perception, or the essence of con the scientist, historian or sociologist may
sciousness, for
example. But phenomen give. Yet Husserl in his final works men
ology is also a philosophy which replaces tions a "genetic phenomenology"1 and

essences in existence, and does not be even a "constructive phenomenology."2

lieve that man and the world can be These contradictions cannot be relieved

understood save on the basis of their by distinguishing the phenomenology of

state of fact. It is a transcendental phil Husserl from that of Heidegger, for all
osophy which suspends our spontaneous of Sein und Zeit follows a direction indi
natural affirmations in order to under cated by Husserl, and is only a render

stand them, but it is also a philosophy ing explicit of the "natiirlichen Welt
for which the world is always "already begriff" or the "Lebenswelt" which the
there" as an inalienable presence which latter, near the end of his life, gave as
precedes reflection. The whole effort of the primary theme of phenomenology.
phenomenology is to recover this naive The contradiction, then, appears in the
contact with the world and to give it, work of Husserl himself.
The hurried reader
will give up all
Maurice is professor of expectation of finding here a completely
Merleau-Ponty
at the Sorbonne and one of developed doctrine. Indeed, he may
Psychology
the more prominent figures in French wonder if a philosophy which has not

Existentialism. managed to define itself is worth all the

Phenomenological The
commotion around it, and if
frequent association of his name with generated

that of Sartre is justified both on ideo we are not in fact dealing with a myth
or a fad.
logical grounds and by the fact that he
has collaborated with the latter in the Even
if this were the case, the pres
tige of this myth and the origin of the
editorship of the periodical Les Temps
Modernes. His best known works to date
fad would still pose a problem. The one
are La Structure du Comportement
who takes philosophy seriously will trans
and Phénoménologie de la Perception.
late this situation by saying that phen
What follows is the Avant-Propos of omenology was practiced and recognized
this second work, and in it he reviews as a manner or a style, that it existed
as a movement before arriving at a com
from his own point of view the now
traditional themes. plete philosophical consciousness. It has
phenomenological
His treatment of these marks his work
1 Méditations ff.
as a prolongation of the "Lebenswelt"
Cartésiennes, pp. 120,
2 the Vie Méditation edited
Cf., Cartésienne,
motif which became so important for
by
Eugen Fink and unpublished. G. Berger has been
Husserl near the end of his career.
kind enough to make known its contents.

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*0 CROSS CURRENTS

been on the way for a long time, and through science, I know on the basis
its disciples find it everywhere: in Hegel of a view which is my own, or an ex
and Kierkegaard certainly, but also in perience of the world without which the
Marx, Nietzsche and Freud. A philolog- symbols of science would be meaning
ical commentary on texts would yield less. The entire universe of science is
nothing of to us here. We constructed the world as lived, and
importance upon

only find in the texts what we have put if we wish to think about science itself
there, and the history of philosophy, rigorously, appreciating its meaning and
more than other demands we must first of all re
any history, scope exactly,
our own It is in our- awaken that of the world of
interpretation. experience
selves that we will find the unity and which science is an inferior expression,
true of It is Science has not and will never have the
meaning phenomenology.
not so much a of same sense of that the world as
question counting being
citationsas of fixing and objectifying perceived has, for the simple reason that
that Phenomenology for us which has it is a determination or explanation of
several of our contemporaries, that world.
given
when they read Husserl and Heidegger, I am not a "living being" or even a
much less the of "man" or even a "consciousness" with
feeling encountering
a new philosophy than of meeting some- all the characteristics which zoology, so
thing which they expected. Phenomenol- cial anatomy or inductive psychology at
is accessible to a tributes to these of nature or
ogy only phenomeno- products
method. Let us then, I am the absolute source. My
logical attempt, history.
to draw the well- existence does not come from my antece
deliberately together
known themes as they dents or my and social entour
phenomenological physical
are drawn in life. but rather goes toward them and
spontaneously together age,
then we will understand why sustains them. For it is I that make exist
Perhaps
has remained so long in for (and hence "be" in the only
phenomenology myself
a state of a task to be sense that the word can have for me)
beginning, yet

accomplished. that tradition which I chose to adopt

or that horizon whose distance from me

PHENOMENOLOGICAL tends to disappear, since it would have

DESCRIPTION no such property as distance were I not
there to view it. Scientific views accord
r is a question of description, and not ing to which I am an event in the world
I of explanation or analysis. That first are always naive and hypocritical be
command which Husserl gave to the new cause, without mentioning the fact, they
phenomenology, that it be a "descrip- sustain themselves on that other view,
tive psychology" or that it return "to that consciousness by which, initially, a
the things themselves" is above all a world is disposed around me and begins
disavowal of science. I am not the re- to exist for me. To turn back to the

suit of the intersection of a multiplicity things themselves is to return to that

of causal influences which determine world to knowledge of which
prior
I cannot with regard to and
my body and my "psychism." knowledge speaks,
think of myself as a part of the world, which every scientific determination is
the simple object of biology, psychology abstractive, dependent and a sign; it is
and sociology, nor can I shut myself like the relationship of geography to
out of the universe of science. the countryside where we first learned
Every-
of the world, even what a forest, a prairie or a river was.
thing that I know

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 MAURICE MERLEAU-PONTY 41

This movement is absolutely distinct and oppose this noetic analysis which
from the idealist turning conscious makes the world depend on the synthe
upon
ness, and the demands of pure descrip tic activity of the subject with his "noe
tion exclude both the procedure of re matic reflection" which remains with
flective analysis and that of scientific the object, rendering it explicit rather
explanation. Descartes, and especially than engendering its primordial unity.
Kant, freed the subject or consciousness
The world
is there before any anal
by making clear the fact that I would
ysis which I can make of it, and it would
be unable to seize anything as existent
be artificial to derive it from a series
if I did not, first of all, experience my
of syntheses which combine the sensa
self as existent in the very act of seizing
tions and then the perspectives of the
the object. They made consciousness,
my In fact both of these are products
absolute certitude of myself, appear as object.
of analysis and have no reality prior to
the condition without which there would
it. Reflective analysis imagines itself
be nothing at all, and they established
the act of relating as the foundation of following in reverse the path of a pre
vious constitution and rejoining what
what was related. Undoubtedly the act
St. Augustine called an "interior man,"
of relating is nothing without the spec
a constituting power which he has al
tacle of the world which it relates. The
ways been. And so reflection runs away
unity of consciousness according to Kant
with itself and takes up a position in an
is exactly contemporaneous with the
invulnerable subjectivity, beyond time
unity of the world, and we lose noth
and being. But that is a naïveté, an in
ing by Descartes' methodic doubt be
cause the whole at least in
complete reflection which loses consci
world, terms
ousness of its own beginning. I began to
of our experience, is reintegrated with
reflect. My reflection is a reflection on
the Cogito, which itself is certain and
the non-reflective. It cannot ignore it
affected only with the index "thought
self as an event, and hence it
of..." appears
as a genuine creation, a change in struc
But the relations of subject and world
ture of consciousness, and it is
are not rigorously bilateral. If proper
they were, to it to as to its own
recognize, prior
the certitude of the world in Descartes'
work would be given at the beginning operations, the world which is given to
the subject because the subject is given
with that of the Cogito, and Kant would
to himself.
not speak of revolution."
"Copernican
Reflective The real must be described and not
analysis moves from our ex
perience of the world to the subject as constructed or constituted. That means

a condition of the that I cannot assimilate

possibility of that perception into

experience as distinct from it, and re syntheses which are of the order of judg
veals the universal synthesis as that ment, of acts or of predication. At each
without which there would be no world. moment my perceptive field is filled with
To this extent, such an analysis ceases reflected light, tiny noises and fleeting
to adhere to our experience, and sub tactile impressions which I cannot pre
stitutes a reconstruction for an account cisely connect with the context per
of it. It is understandable, then, that ceived but which I unhesitatingly recog
Husserl could reproach Kant for his nize as belonging to the world without

"psychologism of faculties of the soul"3 ever confusing them with my dreams.

At each instant I do
things surround
3 zur
Logische Untersucbungen, Prolegomena rri
tun Logik, p. 93. with an aura of fancy. I imagine objects

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62 CROSS CURRENTS

or whose is not in which Husserl for a

persons presence question pondered

compatible with the context but which longer time, nor is there a question
to

are not in fact part of it. They stand which he returned more often, for the

forth from it in the theatre of the imag "reduction problematic" occupies an im

inary. If the reality of my perception portant place in his unpublished works.
were founded only on the intrinsic co For a long time, and even in recent

herence of it would texts, the reduction is as the

"representations," presented

always be hesitant, and given over to return to a transcendental conscious

my probable conjectures. I would have ness before which the world is deployed
to undo at each moment illusory syn in an absolute transparence, animated

theses and reintegrate with the real the

through and through by a series of ap
aberrant phenomena which I would have
perceptions which the philosopher is
at first excluded from it. Such is defin charged to reconstitute on the basis of

itely not the case. Reality is a solid tis their result. Thus my sensation of red

sue. It does not await our judgments is apperceived as the manifestation of

to annex to itself the most surprising a certain red the latter as
experienced,
nor to reject our most like the manifestation of a red surface, which
phenomena,

ly fancies. Perception is not a science is itself the manifestation of red card

of the world, nor even an act, a delib board and this, finally, is the manifesta
erate taking up of a position. It is the tion or profile of a red thing, of this
basis from which every act issues and book. This then would be the appre
it is presupposed by them. The world hension of a certain hylè which signi
is not an object the law of whose con fies a phenomenon of a superior degree,
stitution I possess. It is the natural the Sinn-gebung, or active operation of
milieu and the field of all my thoughts giving meaning which would define
and of all my explicit perceptions. Truth consciousness. The world would simply
does not "dwell" only in the "interior be the "world of signification."
man"4 for there is no interior man. Man
Such a reduction could be
properly
is before himself in the world5 and it is
only to a transcendental idealism,
that he knows himself. long
in the world
a doctrine which treats the world as a
When I turn myself from the dog
upon
matism of common sense or the unity of value undivided by Peter and
dog
Paul. Their perspectives overlap in this
matism of science, I find, not the dwell
unity which makes for the communica
ing place of intrinsic truth, but a sub consciousness" with
tion of "Peter's
ject committed to the world.
"Paul's consciousness." The problem of
THE PHENOMENOLOGICAL communication which might arise be
REDUCTION cause the perception of the world "by
Peter" is not the fact of Peter and the
the real meaning of the cele
Now brated phenomenological reduction perception of the world "by Paul" is

can be seen. There is undoubtedy no not the fact of Paul is dissipated by the
existence in each of a con
pre-personal
4 In te redi: in interiore homine habitat Veritas.
sciousness demanded by the very defini
—St.Augustine.
5 *... tion of consciousness, meaning or truth.
Vhomme est au monde..." What is in
tended here is that man's relation to the world For this consciousness, communication
should not be taken or accident al, but
as extrinsic
is no problem. Insofar as I am conscious
as essential to his being. For Merleau-Ponty man is
ness, that is, insofar as something has
defined as a presence to the world—"être-au-monde."

Cf. this text p. 9. Trans. meaning for me, I am neither here nor

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MAURICE MERLEAU-PONTY 63

there nor Peter nor Paul. I am indis it would not be me that he sees nor he
tinguishable from an "other" conscious that I see. I must be my exterior and
ness for we are all immediate presences to he his body. This paradox and the dia
the world and the world is by definition lectic of the Ego and the Alter-Ego are
unique, since it is the system of truths. only possible if each is defined by his
Such a transcendental idealism despoils situation and not freed of all inherence.
the world of its opacity and its trans They are
only possible if philosophy
cendence. The world is that which we does not attain its completion in the
represent to ourselves, not as men or as return to the self, and if I discover by
empirical subjects, but insofar as we reflection not only my presence to my
are all one single light, and we self but also the possibility of a "foreign
partici
pate in the One without dividing it. observer." The paradox and dialectic
Reflective analysis ignores the problem are possible only if at that very moment
of the other person as well as the prob when I experience my existence, and
lem of the world because it makes until that extreme point of reflection, I
ap
pear in men, with the first spark of con still lack that absolute density which
sciousness, the power to go to a truth would permit me to step out of time,
which is universal by right, and because and I discover in myself an internal
the other person is also without loca weakness which prevents me from be
tion and without body. Alter and ing absolutely individual, me
Ego exposing
are one in the true world, the bond of to the regard of others as a man among
spirits. There is no difficulty in under men or at least a consciousness among
standing how I can think the other per consciousnesses.
son because the I and the
consequently
other are not
Up to the present the Cogito deval
person caught up in the
uated the perception of the other person.
web of phenomena. We have value ra
It taught me that the I is acces
ther than exist. There is nothing hidden only
sible to itself because
it defined me by
from me behind these faces and gestures.
the thought that I have of myself and
No countryside is inaccessible to me.
which, obviously, I am alone in having,
There is only a bit of shadow, and that
at least in this ultimate sense. If "other"
only because of the light.
is not to be a vain word, my existence
For Husserl, however, there is a prob
must never be reduced to the conscious
lem of the other and the alter
person,
ness that I have of existing. It must also
ego is a paradox. If the other person is
embrace the consciousness that can be
in his own right, and not merely for
had of it and hence
my incarnation in
me,® and if we are for each other, and
a nature and the possibility at least of a
are not one and another for God,
merely
historic situation.The Cogito must dis
we must to one another. He must
appear
cover me in situation, and it is on that
have an exterior and so must I. Beyond
condition alone that the transcendental
the Pour Soi perspective—my view of
subjectivity could, according to Husserl,
myself and his view of himself—there
be an intersubjectivity. As meditating
must be a Pour Autrui perspective—my
view of him and his view of me. Natu ego I can very well distinguish the
world and things from myself, since I
rally these two perspectives in each of
us cannot be simply juxtaposed, certainly do not exist in the same fa
for then
shion as things. I may even divest my
6 That
is, if the other person does not exist merely
self of my extended body as a thing
insofar as and to the extent that I am conscious of
him. among things, a sum of physico-chemical

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 64 CROSS CURRENTS

processes. But the thinking that I dis intentional ties which bind us to the
cover in this way, if it is unlocated in world in order to make them appear.
It

objective time and space, is not with alone is consciousness of the world be
out a place in the phenomenological cause it reveals it as strange and para
world. The world that I distinguished doxical.
from myself as a sum of things or of is not that
Husserl's transcendental
connected is re-dis
causally processes of Kant, and Husserl Kan
reproaches
covered "in me" as the hori
permanent tian philosophy for being mundane be
zon of all my thinking and as a dimen
cause it utilizes our relation to the world
sion in relation to which I never cease
which is the driving force of the trans
to situate myself. The genuine Cogito and makes the
cendental deduction,
does not define the existence of the sub
world immanent to the subject rather

ject by the thought that it has of exist than standing in awe before this rela
It does not convert the certitude
ing. tion, and conceiving the subject as trans
of the world into certitude of the world the world. All the mis
cendence toward
as thought, nor does it replace the world
which have arisen be
understandings
by the signification world. On the con with
tween Husserl and his interpreters,
it recognizes as an in
trary my thought his existential "dissidents," and finally
alienable fact and it eliminates every with himself, spring from the fact that
type of idealism in discovering me as
precisely in order to see the world and
to a world.7
presence to seize it as a it is necessary
paradox,
Our relation to the world is so pro our familiarity with it, and
to disrupt
found and so intimate that the only way that can teach us nothing
disruption
for us to notice it is to suspend its move
save the unmotivated surging forth of
ment, to refuse it our complicity (to re the world. The lesson of the
greatest
it ohne mitzumachen as Husserl
gard reduction is the impossibility of a com
often said) or to render it inoperative. reduction. That is why Husserl
plete
It is not that the certitudes of common
questioned himself again and again on
sense should be renounced. On the con
the possibility of the reduction. If we
trary, they are the constant theme of
were absolute it would be no
spirits
philosophy. precisely But because they But since we are engaged in
problem.
are the presuppositions of all thought, and since even our reflections
a world,
they "go without saying," and remain take place in the temporal flux which
unnoticed. In order to reawaken them
they attempt to arrest (since they sich
and make them we must ab
appear, einstromen, as Husserl said) there is no
stain from them for a moment. Un
thought which embraces all our thought.
doubtedly the best formula for the re
duction is given by Eugen Fink, Hus philosopher, say the unpublished
The

serl's assistant, when he of an works, is in a state of perpetual begin

speaks
"astonishment" before the world.8 Here, ning. This means that he holds noth
ing for definitively acquired which the
reflection does not retreat from the world
or the scientists be
toward the unity of a consciousness popular majority

which the world is founded. It lieve they know. It also means that phil
upon
withdraws in order to see the transcend osophy cannot consider itself as defini
ences stand forth clearly. It distends the tively established in any of the truths
which it can utter, that it is a renewed
1 "... être au monde." Cf., note S.
experience of its own beginning, and
8 Die Edmund
phânomenologische Philosophie
Husserls in der gegenwârtigen Kritik, pp. 331 £f.
that it consists entirely of a description

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 MAURICE MERLEAU-PONTY 65

of this beginning. It means, finally, that only with circumspection and after hav
this radical reflection is consciousness ing explained the numerous significa
of its own dependence upon a non-re tions which have contributed to deter
flective life which is its initial, constant mine it during the course of the seman

and final situation. Far from being, as tic evolution of the word. This logical
one might think, the formula for an positivism is at the opposite extreme
idealist philosophy, the phenomenologi from Husserl's thought. Whatever may
cal reduction is that of an existentialist have the shifts in meaning which
been
philosophy: the "In-cLer-Welt-Sein" of finally gave us the word and concept of
Heidegger only appears on the basis of consciousness as an acquisition of the

the phenomenological reduction. language, we have a direct way of ap

proaching what it designates: we have
ESSENCE the experience of ourselves. It is against
this experience that language means
misunderstanding of the same type to us. "The which
something experience
A sets up a good deal of confusion is still mute must be led to the pure
around Husserl's notion of "essences." of its own The
expression meaning."9
While every reduction is transcenden Husserlian essences draw back with them
tal, says Husserl, it is also necessarily all their living relations with experience,
eidetic. This means that we cannot sub as the net raised from the ocean floor
mit our perception of the world to
phil pulls up living algae as well as fish. Jean
osophical scrutiny without ceasing to be Wahl is incorrect in saying that "Hus
identified with that interest in the world serl essences from existence."10
separates
which defines us. We must withdraw The essences are those of lan
separated
from our to make it appear It is the function of language to
engagement guage.
as a spectacle, and from the fact make essences exist in a separation,
pass which
of our existence to the nature of our is actually since they still
only apparent
existence, from Dasein to Wesen. But on the life of con
repose antepredicative
it is clear that the essence here is not sciousness. In the silence of the original
the end but the means. It is our effec consciousness there not the
appear only
tive engagement in the world which of words also the
meanings but mean
must be understood and conceptualized, ings of things, that primary core of sig
and which all our nification around which acts of denom
polarizes conceptual
fixations. The fact that essences are in ination and are
expression organized.
strumental in reflection does not mean
Seeking the essence of consciousness
that philosophy takes them as its object,
then, will not mean developing the
but rather that our existence is too strict
Wortbedeutung consciousness, and flee
ly caught up in the world to know it
self as such at the moment when it is ing existence in a universe of things said.
It means effective
recovering my pres
thrown forth upon the world, and that
ence to myself, the fact of my conscious
it needs the idea in order to recognize
ness which is what the word and con
and its state of fact.
conquer
cept of consciousness mean.
The ultimately
Viennese school, as is known,
maintains that we can have relations Seeking the essence of the world does
not mean seeking what it is in idea once
only with meanings. For example, "con
sciousness," for the Viennese school, is
9 Méditations
Cartésiennes, p. 33.
not our selves. It is a late and
compli 10 "Réalisme
dialectique et ^Arbalète,
cated signification which we may use Automne not numb
1942, pages

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46 CROSS CURRENTS

we have reduced it to a word scheme. regard to some sort of truth as such. If

It means seeking what it is in fact for we speak of illusion, it is because we

us prior to all formulation. Sensualism have recognized illusions. We could only
"reduces" the world by remarking that have done that in the course of some
after all we never have anything other perception which, at that very moment
than states of ourselves. Transcendental attested to its own truth. Hence doubt,
Idealism also "reduces" the world be or the fear of being deceived, is also an
cause, though it renders it certain, it affirmation of our power to uncover error
does so only insofar as the world be and could not uproot us from the truth.
comes the thought or consciousness of We are steeped in truth, and evidence
world, the simple correlative of our is "the experience of truth."11 To look
consciousness. It becomes immanent to for the essence of perception is to de
consciousness, and the aseity of things clare, not that perception is presumed
is consequently suppressed. to be truth, but that it is defined for us
The eidetic reduction, on the con as access to truth.

trary, is the resolution to make the If I were to wish, with idealism, to

world appear as it is prior to all turn base this evidence of fact, this irresisti
ing upon ourselves. It is the ambition ble belief, upon an absolute evidence,
to make reflection equal to the non that is upon the absolute clarity of my
reflective life of consciousness. I envision thoughts for me, and if I wished to find
and I perceive a world. If I were to say, in myself a nature-generating thought
as sensualism does, that there is nothing which creates the framework of the
there but "states of consciousness," and world or reveals it through and through,
then attempt to distinguish my percep I would be unfaithful to my experience
tions from my "dreams" by "criteria," of the world and I would be seeking
I would miss the phenomenon of the what makes it possible rather than what
world. For if I can speak of "dreams" it is. The evidence of perception is not
and of "reality," and pose for myself the an adequate thought12 nor apodictic evi

question of the imaginary and the real, dence.13 The world is not what I think,
and if I can doubt the real, it is because but that which I live. I open out upon
that distinction is already made for me the world. Unquestionably I communi
prior to the analysis, and because I have cate with it, but I do not take possession
an experience of the real as well as of of it. It is inexhaustible. "There is a
the imaginary. Then the problem is not world," or rather, "there is the world":

to find how critical thought can arrive this is a constant theme of my life which
at secondary equivalents of that distinc I can never completely think through.
tion, but to render explicit our primor The world's state of fact is what makes
dial knowledge of the "real," to describe for the Weltlichkeit der Welt. It is what
the perception of the world as that upon makes the world the world, just as the
which our idea of truth is permanently state of fact of the Cogito is not an im
founded. perfection in it, but rather what makes
We must not wonder, then, if wre real me certain of my existence. The eidetic
ly perceive a world. Rather, we must

say that the world is that which we per 11 "Das Erlebnis der Wahrheit" (Logische Unter
ceive. More generally, we must not ask suchuttgen, Prolegomena zur reinen Logik, p. 190).
12 "An
if our evidences are really truths, or if, adequate thought would be one which ex
hausted its object."
by some vice of the spirit, what is evi 13 Formale und transzendentale
Logik says in sub
dent for us would not be illusory with stance that there is no apodictic evidence. Cf., p. 142.

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MAURICE MERLEAU-PONTY 67

method is that of a phenomenological unity of consciousness and of conscious

nesses.
positivism which bases the possible on
the real. Husserl takes up the Critique of Judg
ment when he of a teleology of
speaks
INTENTIONALITY consciousness. It is not a case of making
. human consciousness the duplicate of
, , ,
can now approach the notion of , . , · u υ ·
,.rr , . an absolute thought which would assign
We intentionality—too often cited as . . , . . . . _ ·
. , , . to it its ends from without. It is a matter
the discovery of phenomenol- P . . . . . ,
principal
r, , . . , , of recognizing consciousness as *projected
it is only comprehensible . , ,, , , . , ,,
ogy though° to a world
V .... , into the world and destined
when the reduction is understood. , . , . .
... P which it never envelops nor possesses,
Every consciousness is consciousness of . , ...... ...
but toward which it is always directed,
; . „ , , .
That is not new. In his ref- . , . . , . . . .,
something. ° the world
., ,. , , And it is a case of recognizing
utation of idealism, Kant demonstrated , , . . . ,. .? , ,
. . .,, as the pre-objective individual whose
that interior perception is impossible . . . .. , , ,
1 to knowledge
. , imperious unity prescribes
without exterior perception, that the . . : , TT . ,. .
r r That is why Husserl distin
,, , . , , its goal.
world as the connection of phenomena ., , . . .. Γ ,
, . . . guishes the intentionality of the act,
is anticipated in the consciousness of my' . . , , .
, . , ,. which is that of our judgments and of
unity and is the way for me to realize , , . , . . .,
.. . ,. . our voluntary adoption of positions (the
myself as consciousness. What distm- , . , r,
... . .. r , „ only ; one of which the Critique of Pure
guishes intentionality from the Kantian _ . .
. . .. , Reason and the operating mten
, . . , , spoke)
relation to a possible object is that the . ,. ,, , r A .
, tionahty (fungierende Intentionalitat).
unity of the world, before being posed , .
, . . , . The latter establishes the natural and
by knowledge in an act of express iden- ... . , , ,, ,
. . , . , . antepredicative unity of the world and
4 ,.
tincation, is lived as already made or , . , · ,
. . . T, . . .r . . of our life, a unity which appears more
rr
already there. Kant himself shows in the , , . , .
„ , τ j , . , . clearly in our desires, our evaluations
Critique of Judgment that there is a , ; , , . . .
. , . . . , , ,. and the general demeanor, than in ob
unity of imagination and understanding . . , , , , . , r . ,
, .... . , jective knowledge, and which furnishes
and a unity ' of subjects prior to the ob- \ , . , , , ,
, . r . . , the text of which our knowledge ° seeks
ject, and that in the experience of the , , . .
: τ , r ix · to be the exact translation. The rela
beautiful, for example, I experience an . ... ,, . ,r
, Γ , .. . , , tion with the world as it utters itself
accord of the sensible and the concept, . , · , · ,
which can
, 1f , , , , ... indefatigably ' in us is nothing _. ..
of myself and the other, an accord which , , , , . °.
...... . . be rendered clearer by analysis. Philoso
is itself without concept. Here the sub- . . . . . . „
. . . . . can it in view and offer
... , , r phy only place
ject is no longer the universal thinker of Γ ; . .
, , . . . . ,*, j it for our recognition,°
a system of objects rigorously linked,
that power of conferring reality which. Thanks to this enlarged notion of in
in forming a world, subjects the mul- tentionality, phenomenological "compre
tiple to the law of understanding. It dis- hension" is distinguished from classic
covers itself and savors itself as a nature "intellection" which is limited to "true
in spontaneous conformity to the law and unchanging natures," and phenom
of understanding. But if the subject has enology can become a phenomenology
a nature, then the hidden art of the of genesis. Whether it is a case of some
imagination the categor-must condition thing perceived, or a historical event or
izing activity. It is no longer simply the doctrine, "to understand" means to seize
esthetic judgment but also knowledge again the total intention. To under
which rests on it. It is this art of the stand, one must grasp not only what
imagination which is the basis of the these are when represented: the "proper

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«8 CROSS CURRENTS

ties" of the thing perceived, the dust of We must understand in all of these ways
"historical facts," the "ideas" introduced at once. Everything has a meaning, and
by the doctrine. Seizing the total inten we find beneath all the relations the
tion means grasping the unique manner same structure of being. All of these

of existing which is expressed in the views are true as long as they are not

properties of the pebble, the glass or isolated, as long as one goes to the foun

the piece of wax, in all the facts of a dations of history and encounters the

revolution, in all the thoughts of a phil unique core of existential meaning

osopher. In each civilization the Idea which is explicit in each perspective.
must be found. We mean Idea in the It is true, as Marx said, that history

Hegelian sense: not a law of the does not march on its head. But it is
physico
mathematic type accessible to objective also true that it does not think with its
thought, but the formula of a feet. Better still, we need not concern
unique
behavior with regard to others, nature, ourselves with either its "head" or its
time and death. What must be found is "feet" but rather with its body. All the
that certain manner of formularizing economic and psychological explanations
the world which the historian must be of a doctrine are true, since the thinker

capable of adopting and assuming. These thinks only on the basis of what is. Re
are the dimensions of history. flection upon a doctrine will only be
total if it succeeds in relating itself to
In relation to them, no single word
the history of the doctrine and with the
nor human gesture, however habitual or
external and in replacing
explanations,
distracted, is without meaning. I thought
the causes and the meaning of the doc
myself exhausted. A minister thought
trine in an existential structure. There
that he had only made a standard re
is, as Husserl says, a "genesis of mean
mark. But then my silence or his word
ing" (Sinngenesis)14 which alone teach
takes on a meaning because my fatigue
es us, in the final analysis, what the
or the recourse to a ready-made formula
doctrine "means." Like understanding,
expresses a certain disinterest, and
criticism must be pursued on all levels.
hence is still the adoption of a position
Certainly a doctrine cannot be refuted
as regards the situation. In an event con

sidered in and at the moment

simply by connecting it to this or that
close-up
accident in the life of its author—its
when it is lived, everything seems to be
meaning extends beyond that. And there
fortuitous: that favorable meeting, the
is no pure accident in existence nor in
ambition of this or that person, or an
coexistence, since one and the other as
other local circumstance seems to have
similate the fortuitous and rationalize it.
been decisive. But the chance happen
each and
Finally, just as history is indivisible in
ings compensate other, that
the present, so it is in its succession.
dust of facts forms an agglomeration.
In relation to its fundamental dimen
There appears the outline of a way of
sions, all historical periods appear as
facing the human situation, an event
manifestations of a single existence or
whose contours are defined and of which
one can Should we
episodes of a single drama of whose de
speak. understand
nouement, if it has one, we are ignorant.
history on the basis of ideology, or pol Because we are to a we
present world,
itics, or religion or economics? Should
we understand a doctrine by its mani
The term is common in the unpublished works.
fest content, or by the psychology of
The idea is already present in the Formate and
the author and by the events of his life? transzendentale Logik, pp. 184 S.

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MAURICE MERLEAU-PONTY 69

are condemned to meaning and we can cal world is not a more primary being
do or say nothing which does not take rendered explicit, but the foundation of
a place in history. being. Philosophy is not the reflection
of a more original truth but the art of

RATIONALITY, THE WORLD, making a truth real.

PHILOSOPHY It will be asked how that making real
is possible, and if it is not in fact the
HE MOST important acquisition of attaining of a Reason which pre-exists
τ is undoubtedly to in things. But the only Logos which pre
phenomenology
have joined extreme subjectivism and exists is the world itself, and the philo
extreme objectivism in its notion of sophy which makes for its manifest exist
world or of rationality. is ence does not begin by being possible,
Rationality
measured out in the It is actual or real, like the world of
exactly experiences
in which it reveals itself. There is ra- which it is part, and no explanatory

tionality, that is, perspectives overlap, hypothesis is clearer than the very act
confirm one another, and a by which we assume this incomplete
perceptions
But it cannot be set world in our attempt to totalize and
meaning appears.

apart and transformed ab- into either to think it. Rationality is no problem,
solute Spirit or world in the realist sense. Behind it lies no unknown thing that
The world is not we need determine deductively or prove
phenomenological pure

being, but the meaning which inductively. We are present at each in

appears
at the intersection of stant to this miracle of the connection
my experiences
and at the intersection of of experiences, and no one knows better
my experi-
ences with those of others the en- than we how it is done because we are
by
of one with the other. Thus it this very core of relations. The world
meshing
is from the and and reason are no problem. They are
inseparable subjectivity
from the intersubjectivity which form mysterious, but mystery defines them,
their unity by taking up my past experi- There is no question of dissipating the
ences in and the mystery by some solution, for they are
my present experiences
of others in own. For the prior to solutions. Genuine philosophy
experience my
first time the meditation of the philoso- is re-learning to see the world, and in
is conscious not to en- this sense a story recounted can signify
pher sufficiently
dow its own results with in the the world with as much "depth" as a
reality
world or prior to it. The treatise in philosophy. Our fate is in
philosopher
to think the world, the other our own hands. We become responsible
attempts
and himself and to conceive their rela- for our history by reflection, but also by
tions. But the meditating Ego, the "im- a decision in which we commit our life,

partial spectator" (uninteressierter Zu- In each case the act is violent and is
never forces with verified only in actual exercise,
schauer)15 joins
a rationality already given. It establishes Phenomenology as revelation of the
itself16 and its rationality by an initia- world rests on itself and is its own
tive which has no guarantee in being basis.17 All
knowledge in a is rooted
and whose right rests entirely on the ef- ground of postulates and finally on our
fective power which it gives us to as- communication with the world, which
sume our The communication is the primary domain
history. phenomenologi-

15 Vie Méditation Cartesienne. 17 der Phànomenologie auf sich

(Unpublished). "Ruckbeziehung
1β Ibid.
selbst," say the unpublished works.

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 70 CROSS CURRENTS

of rationality. Philosophy as a radical revelation of the mystery of the world

reflection is in principle deprived of that and the mystery of reason.18

resource. Since it too is in history it It is not accidental that phenomenol

also makes use of the world and reasons ogy was a movement before being a doc

already formulated. It must then inter trine or a system. It is as laborious as

rogate itself as it does

every type of the work of Balzac, or of Proust or of

knowledge. It will double back upon it Valéry or of Cézanne, because of the

self indefinitely, then, and will be, as same type of attention and wonder, the

Husserl said, an infinite dialogue or med same demands of consciousness, the same

itation. To the extent that it remains will to seize the meaning of the world
faithful to its own
intention, it will or of history in its state of genesis. In
never know where it is going. The in this regard it fuses with modern
completion of phenomenology and the thought.
allure of its inchoative state are not the translated by John F. Bannan
signs of failure. They are inevitable be 18 We G. Gusdorf
owe this expression to who,
cause phenomenology has for its task the
however, uses it in another sense.

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