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Eye and Mind

Eye and Mind 167 Eye and Mind MIKEL DUFRENNE Université de Paris Eye and Mind is one of the last texts of Merleau-Ponty and perhaps his finest. Sartre wrote of it, "Eye and Mind says all, provided one knows how to decipher it" (Temps modernes, n° Merleau-Ponty, p. 372). But would I know how to decipher it? Rather than risk such an undertaking, I would like principally to comment on the title itself. Eye and Mind. One notices immediately that the two words are treated unequally in the text. Eye appears repeatedly in the writings of Merleau-Ponty while mind is rarely mentioned. No doubt this is due to a certain danger in naming it in the manner that delighted philosophers of mind. For the mind is not an organ like the eye, nor is it a substance that can be designated by a substantive. If it is called by name it is for the purpose of designating certain acts characteristic of what The Structure of Behavior called the human order. These acts demonstrate a cogito which is manifest to itself as that which seeks to be transparent to itself. They are acts in which is consummated (se consomme) the separation of http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Research in Phenomenology Brill

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Publisher
Brill
Copyright
© 1980 Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands
ISSN
0085-5553
eISSN
1569-1640
DOI
10.1163/156916480X00127
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

167 Eye and Mind MIKEL DUFRENNE Université de Paris Eye and Mind is one of the last texts of Merleau-Ponty and perhaps his finest. Sartre wrote of it, "Eye and Mind says all, provided one knows how to decipher it" (Temps modernes, n° Merleau-Ponty, p. 372). But would I know how to decipher it? Rather than risk such an undertaking, I would like principally to comment on the title itself. Eye and Mind. One notices immediately that the two words are treated unequally in the text. Eye appears repeatedly in the writings of Merleau-Ponty while mind is rarely mentioned. No doubt this is due to a certain danger in naming it in the manner that delighted philosophers of mind. For the mind is not an organ like the eye, nor is it a substance that can be designated by a substantive. If it is called by name it is for the purpose of designating certain acts characteristic of what The Structure of Behavior called the human order. These acts demonstrate a cogito which is manifest to itself as that which seeks to be transparent to itself. They are acts in which is consummated (se consomme) the separation of

Journal

Research in PhenomenologyBrill

Published: Jan 1, 1980

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