When it comes to understanding the world around us, philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty offers a unique perspective rooted in phenomenology. His book Phenomenology of Perception challenges ideas that are normally taken for granted about our senses. While other philosophers who study the mind concentrate mainly on thoughts themselves, Merleau-Ponty’s investigation goes further: How do our senses actually function? What role does bodily movement play in this—as well as intersubjectivity (relationships with others)? All these activities contribute towards each individual forming a richly detailed picture or “world” view. Let’s explore deeper.
Who Was Maurice Merleau-Ponty?
Maurice Merleau-Ponty, a French philosopher, was born in Rochefort-sur-Mer, France on March 14th, 1908. He became known for his work in the existential and phenomenological traditions along with contemporaries like Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir.
While Merleau-Ponty made significant contributions to phenomenology overall—especially through his book Phenomenology of Perception (1945)—his interests lay primarily within human experience and perception.
Merleau-Ponty critiqued René Descartes’ dualism, the pervasive belief system that treated mind and body as separate entities. Instead, he argued that when examining how humans understand and interact with reality, we must not consider the body as simply one object among others. Rather, it plays an integral role, which is worth investigating further.
His theory of the “lived body” underscored how we grasp the world through our bodily experiences. It means perception comes before all as a way that we live in our bodies and engage with the world at once.
Outside philosophy, Merleau-Ponty’s ideas have been taken up by psychologists, cognitive scientists, artists, and others. And let’s not forget: he taught at some of France’s most prestigious universities.
When he died over 50 years ago, Merleau-Ponty left behind not only philosophical theories but also groundbreaking research. It influenced countless thinkers who were interested in perception, the human body, and lived experience today.
Understanding Phenomenology in Merleau-Ponty’s Thought
Phenomenology delves into our lived experience, asking: How do we encounter the world? This philosophical approach investigates how things present themselves to us in everyday life. Maurice Merleau-Ponty took up the challenge in his own way. Where Husserl said we build reality with our minds, Merleau-Ponty posited that it all begins with the body.
According to this view, one does not merely ponder the world but rather feels, sees, and moves within it. For instance, anybody who has ever held a cup of coffee knows more than just that “this cup is warm.” By way of their hand, they also feel its warmth, which is a physical connection with the world at large.
This is where Merleau-Ponty differs from phenomenologists like Heidegger. While the latter pondered being and existence, the former concentrated on our interactions with the world at the present moment. According to Merleau-Ponty, perception is more than just a mental event—it’s a full-body experience in real-time.
At the core of Merleau-Ponty’s work are lived experience and the reality of everyday life. If we want to grasp how perception works, then we need to begin with our bodies. They provide us with an immediate (indeed intimate) acquaintance with things in the world.
The Centrality of Perception in Merleau-Ponty’s Philosophy
The core of Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy is perception—a term that refers to far more than what the eyes and ears do. It’s how human beings make contact with the world at large.
Merleau-Ponty defined perception as our main way of grasping reality. It is an active process (not merely passively receiving information) that involves our bodies as much as our brains.
Contrary to cognition—thoughts or analyses—perceiving things for this French philosopher is immediate experience. Rather than representing the planet internally, he suggested it meant being part of its “flesh” oneself.
A simple example is walking in woodland. It’s not just a case of looking at trees. You also feel cold air against your skin, hear leaves crackling underfoot, and smell damp. Each element is part of your perception of being there.
According to Merleau-Ponty, our first experience of the world occurs through perception. This experience is direct and automatic—we don’t mull it over. We just get on with it. His view represents a U-turn from traditional thinking because he takes perception to underpin all our experiences rather than see it as something that happens after (or alongside) thinking.
Far from being neutral spectators of reality, we touch, look, and listen in order to find out what’s there. Each contact helps build up an overall picture, which is modified by every new piece of information received.
Embodiment and the “Lived Body”
Merleau-Ponty came up with the idea of the “lived body” (corps vécu), which changed everything. He said that our body isn’t just a thing – it’s how we connect with the world.
For example, when you reach for the coffee pot, you don’t think, “I’ll move my arm now.” Your body just does it – and this is what he called the lived body at work. The French philosopher believed that perception depends on our bodies. Thanks to them, we can grasp what’s going on around us.
It’s not only that an evening sky looks beautiful. As its colors are reflected on water nearby or warmth from a fire reaches our face, there is an additional layer of sensory experience provided by our body parts. All these things, too, make up how things seem overall (he calls this interplay “fleshing out”).
When we perceive things, our bodies do two jobs at once. They are the subject when we use them to explore things like touching them, seeing them, or moving towards them. But they are also objects. We can think about them, too, by reflecting on how our hands feel and move.
This idea goes against the views of Descartes. He thought that minds and bodies were entirely separate from each other.
Merleau-Ponty disagrees with this. According to him, mind and body are not really distinct at all. It is necessary to see things this way if we want to understand how perception works – along with our places in the world.
The Role of Language and Expression in Perception
According to Merleau-Ponty, language and perception are closely connected. Language isn’t only used for communicating. It also extends our ability to understand the world around us.
Consider how we talk about sunsets: by choosing words like “glowing,” “vibrant,” or “serene,” we don’t just tell people what one looks like. Those words shape both their understanding of the experience and ours.
For Merleau-Ponty, language does much more than symbolize things (even complex feelings) in the world. It shows outwardly—in words and grammar—how each of us inwardly perceives his or her surroundings at any moment.
Spoken words aren’t neutral reports on things seen or felt, though. They have an active role in bringing meaning into being.
Think, for example, about how a well-crafted poem can make you feel present at an event from the past (or imaginary). Description alone cannot do this. Here, the written sounds give existence to those old happenings as if they were happening now.
The way we express ourselves is essential when we try to show others what our senses tell us. It’s not only word choice that matters but how words work together along with their sound and pattern (or lack of one). All these things contribute to conveying the complexity of human perception.
For instance, compare “last night was so quiet” with “last night whispered stillness.” Both sentences talk about how evenings can be silent. But each does so in a different fashion thanks to its expression.
Using language, we do more than just let people know how things seem to us. We also shape these experiences, giving them an extra dimension that can (like art or music) be appreciated by others.
Inter-Subjectivity and Perception
Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology centers around the concept of inter-subjectivity. It suggests that perception isn’t something we do as individuals alone. Other people help shape our perceptions.
When a friend smiles at us while talking (for instance), their facial expression and tone of voice both affect not just what we think about them in that moment but also how it feels altogether.
According to Merleau-Ponty there is an essentially social aspect to how things seem or are understood by us. It means their presence can make a difference to our perspective on reality itself. So, being in a group of friends in a busy town street may well change your view compared with if you were there solo. Their presence, mood, and even their words color our experience of that space.
This brings us to the concept of shared reality. When individuals perceive things in similar ways, they can have common experiences: laughing at the same joke or appreciating a beautiful painting together.
These shared perceptions help create connections between people. They also make it easier to understand each other – and the world we live in.
Social and cultural influences are important here too. Objects like food, drink and art can mean very different things to different groups of people (because of how they were brought up).
But when are we able to share our way of seeing things with others? That’s when common ground starts to form. This is called intersubjectivity.
So, What Is Merleau-Ponty’s Phenomenology of Perception?
Merleau-Ponty’s Phenomenology of Perception presents a new way to think about how we experience the world. He argues that we need to consider the body as central to perception rather than separating the mind from the body as traditional theories do.
According to Merleau-Ponty, perception is not something passive. It is active and involves our whole being – including how we interact with other people and our surroundings. The philosopher introduces the idea of the lived body: through intersubjectivity (the relationship between individuals), our physicality links profoundly to what we take in.
By recognizing that perception is both shared and embodied, Merleau-Ponty wants us not only to see ourselves as observers but also to understand that by participating, we help create reality itself. This phenomenology alters how we imagine lived experience so that it becomes fuller and richer.
