From Husserl to Merleau-Ponty: On the Metamorphosis of a Philosophical Example

This paper engages in a comparative study between the vital materialism in the works of political theorist Jane Bennett (primarily, The Enchantment of Modern Life) and the ontology of flesh in the late works of the phenomenologist Maurice Merleau-Ponty (“The Intertwining—The Chiasm,” “Eye and Mind”). There are striking echoes in their descriptions of the aesthetic experience of enchantment. I show how both thinkers reject philosophical accounts of form as extra-material. The reconfigured matter-form relationship in each onto-story leads to a phenomenology of enchantment with the world. The stakes of the latter are ethical and political for Bennett, who argues in The Enchantment of Modern Life that the mood of enchantment also applies to fetishized commodities and is necessary for more just social, political, and economic reconfigurations. Finally, I gesture towards a Merleau-Pontean intervention on this question through his analogy between works of art and commodities in “Marxism and Philosophy.” Can the ontology of flesh and its implicit theory of perception help us understand both commodity fetishism and enchantment? In reading Bennett and Merleau-Ponty alongside each other on the phenomenology of enchantment with worldly objects, my hope is to find grounds for drawing on the rich phenomenology of perception found in Merleau-Ponty’s late works as a resource for conversations around political aesthetics more broadly.

In this contribution, I will analyze the conceptualization of time in the work of Merleau-Ponty and how it shapes the idea of bodily intentionality. In his late work, a nonlinear concept of time prevails and fosters the idea of fleshly agency. I will draw upon “the immemorial” as “impossible past” (Merleau-Ponty 1968: 123) and ask to what extent the idea of originary pastness enables an approach to agency that broadens the current discussion of “new materialism.” In particular, I will argue that the immemorial institutes a temporality that is generative of meaning. As invisible or unconscious, it is written into the structure of flesh and makes self-differentiation possible. Hence, the emergence of self, other, and the world – or rather, as Merleau-Ponty puts it, the emergence of sentient, sensed, and the rest. Under that premise, humans and non-humans can be equated from a methodological point of view. However, there are also differences to the principle of generalized symmetry of Actor-Network Theory. I will show that only flesh comprises generative power, not matter. Finally, I will present the consequences that follow from Merleau-Ponty’s ontology of flesh and introduce video hermeneutics as developed in Kissmann (2014a).

Many criticisms of Husserl center upon his notion of an apparently all-enveloping ego.1 Recent responses to this line of attack emphasize the decidedly "non-Cartesian" elements of Husserl's later genetic phenomenology, a phenomenology marked by themes of intersubjectivity and historicity.2 As important as these genetic analyses are, they take their significance from "within" the phenomenological reduction. As critics might contend, despite the best efforts of Husserl and his expositors, reliance on the reduction brings the analyses right back to the ego. This essay employs a different strategy to address charges concerning Husserl's "reduction to the ego." Instead of appealing to Husserl's late work, it examines an anti-reductionist tendency in his early logical work. This tendency, which is clearly evident in his anti-psychologism, falls under the broad heading of "avoidance of metabasis eis allo genos" (change into some other genus). My essay consists of three parts. Part one examines the concept of metabasis and articulates Husserl's early distinction between the real and the ideal. Part two moves to an explanation of the claim that psychologism, resting upon a metabasis, eliminates the ideal in favor of the real. Part three then characterizes Husserl's early idealism as the result of avoiding psychologism, metabasis, and ontological reductionism. I conclude by pointing toward the significance of Husserl's attempts to avoid this category mistake for our understanding of his later works. The Concept of Metabasis and the Ideal and the Real In his Prolegomena, Husserl introduces the concept of "metabasis eis allo genos" (or simply "metabasis") in the general context of scientific field delimitation.3 Sciences develop by means of a hermeneutic relationship between the state of the science as practiced on one hand and that science's definition and the understanding of its proper objects on the other. The science as practiced gives rise to its definition and a determination of its field. This determination, in turn, guides the subsequent practice of the science.4 Thus, the importance of properly determining the field of a science is clear. Accurate definitions aid, while inaccurate definitions often hinder, scientific progress. But this is not an instrumentalist view. A given field demarcation is not considered accurate simply because it aids progress; rather, it aids progress because it is accurate. Hence Husserl writes that The field (Gebiet) of a science is an objectively closed unity: we cannot arbitrarily delimit fields of truth where and as we like. The realm (Reich) of truth is objectively articulated into fields: researches must orient themselves to these objective unities and must assemble themselves into sciences.' There are two basic ways in which a science can fail to properly orient itself to its objective field. The first occurs when the boundaries of a scientific field are drawn too narrowly. In such a case, the objects studied by the science comprise a subset of the full, objectively unified field that constitutes the science's true field. This is an innocuous mistake when compared with the second type, metabasis. This latter is identified as an especially pernicious mistake. As Husserl explains, metabasis is the confusion of fields (Gebietsvermengung), the mixture (Vermischung) of that which is heterogeneous in a putative fieldunity, especially when this rests on a complete misreading (Misdeutung) of the objects (Objekte) whose investigation is to be the essential aim of the proposed science." When a science is sufficiently misaligned with the "objective articulations of the field of truth" that its understanding of its field of research combines or transgresses the objeclively articulated fields, then it commits a metabasis. Clearly, ontological reductionism would be one form of this error. While the concern with field delimitation remains central to the meaning of "metabasis" in the Prolegomena, the concept is not limited to mistakes of this scale. …

Introduction. Husserl's Idea of Phenomenology as the Foundational Theory of Science. I. 'Descriptive Phenomenology': Remarks on Husserl's Approach to the Foundation of Knowledge. II. Husserl's Principle of Evidence: The Significance of a Methodological Norm for Phenomenology as a Science. III. Intentionality and Constitution: Changes in the Concept of Intentionality in Edmund Husserl's Philosophy. IV. The Problem of the Epoche in Husserl's Philosophy. V. Psychology and Phenomenology: Their Fundamental Relations in Husserl's Philosophy. VI. Psychology: A New Way Into Transcendental Philosophy? Some Thoughts on the Last Part of Husserl's Crisis. VII. Edmund Husserl's Phenomenology as Foundation of Natural Science. VIII. History and Life-World as the Foundation of the Sense of the Sciences in Husserl's Late Work. IX. The Question of History and 'History' in Husserl's Intentional Analysis. X. Time and History in Husserl's Philosophy: The Question of Their Connection. XI. Phenomenology as First Philosophy: Reflections on Husserl. XII. Crisis of European Culture: A Heritage of Problems in Husserlian Philosophy. Index of Names. Index of Topics.

Taking as its point of departure the question of light vis-à-vis the question of being in Derrida's work, this article discusses Derrida's radical conceptions of khoral (a)spatiality and alterity, by linking his first book on Edmund Husserl's “The Origin of Geometry” and his early critique of Emmanuel Levinas to his exploration of the ethico-political problematics, in part, again, via Levinas, in his latest works. The article also considers Derrida's reading of Kafka in “Before the Law,” decisive for his analysis of the problematics in question and for our understanding of the relationships between “geometry and democracy.” These relationships, the article argues, are an essential concern of much of Derrida's work and of our culture, from the pre-Socratics on.

Everyone involved in hand surgery and hand rehabilitation is well aware of the importance of well functioning hands for our patients’ well being and life quality. A powerful pain free handgrip and well-coordinated precision movements of the fingers together with well-preserved sensory functions form a base for every individual’s working capacity. Our hands are heavily involved in the interaction with other individuals in social life. Impaired hand function may have serious consequences for activities of daily living as well as subjective well being of our patients. The outer brain The philosopher Descartes named the hand the outer brain – a very clever expression for the close and intimate interaction between the hand and the brain. The hand is – like the brain – intelligent, it remembers, and it can improvise. The hand can be regarded an extension of the brain to the environment. Through the sense of touch our hands helps to explore and perceive the surrounding world. The hand is a symbol for identity and is intimately linked to our personality. The movements and gestures of our hands are important components of the body language, helping to express our feelings and being an important tool for communication with other individuals. The touch of a hand generates comfort and consolation. In fact, the pleasant feeling of well being which is generated by the touch of hands has recently been linked to a special system of small-sized nerve fibres – producing a faint sensation of pleasant touch. fMRI analysis during stimulation of these C tactile afferents in hairy skin showed activation of the insular region of the brain but not of somatosensory areas S1 and S2 (Olausson et al., 2002). The findings identify these C tactile afferents as a system for limbic touch that may underlie emotional, hormonal and affiliative responses to caress-like, skin-to-skin contact between individuals.

Touch is the sense of direct contact The verb ‘to touch’ can be used in two ways. We can say that a bottle touches the table. By this we may mean that the bottle is in direct contact with the table, that there is nothing in between the two. However, when I say that I touch the hardness of the table I may mean something different, namely, that I feel or perceive the hardness of the table. I touch the table in this way only when I am using my sense of touch. Similarly, we can say that the touch of your hand is cold. In that case too it is implied that I perceive your hand as cold by my sense of touch. Perhaps it is more usual to use the verb ‘to feel’ rather than the verb ‘to touch’ as a verb of perception. One would say ‘I feel the hardness of the table’ rather than ‘I touch it’ if one wants to say that I perceive the table rather than that I am simply leaning on it with some part of my body. That is perhaps also why it seems more natural to use the verb ‘to touch’ when the idea is just that there is contact between two things and no perception takes place.

We conducted a virtual reality study to explore virtual hand illusion through three levels of appearance (Appearance dimension: realistic vs. pixelated vs. toon hand appearances) and two levels of tactile feedback (Tactile dimension: no tactile vs. tactile feedback). We instructed our participants to complete a virtual assembly task in this study. Immediately afterward, we asked them to provide self-reported ratings on a survey that captured presence and five embodiment dimensions (hand ownership, touch sensation, agency and motor control, external appearance, and response to external stimuli). The results of our study indicate that (1) tactile feedback generated a stronger sense of presence, touch sensation, and response to external stimuli; (2) the pixelated hand appearance provided the least hand ownership and external appearance; and (3) in the presence of the pixelated hand, prior virtual reality experience of participants impacted their agency and motor control and their response to external stimuli ratings. This paper discusses our findings and provides design considerations for virtual reality applications with respect to the realistic appearance of virtual hands and tactile feedback.

The somatosensory system is a complect sensory system that differentiates individual athletes. The aim of this study is to investigate the effect of visual acuity level on throwing technique, proprioceptive sense of the shoulder joint, light touch and two-point discrimination sense of the upper extremity, and sensory function (postural control and reaction time) in visually impaired goalball players. Goalball players who have different visual acuities B1(unable to perceive light or recognize its shape); B2 (has a visual field of less than 5 degrees and can recognize shapes); B3 (visual field greater than 5 degrees and less than 20 degrees) participated in the study. The sensorial system was evaluated with proprioceptive sense of the shoulder joint and sensory tests (light touch and two-point discrimination sense of the dominant hand.). Sensory function (postural control and reaction time) was evaluated with the flamingo balance test, functional reach test, and pro-agility test. The goalball players' throwing technique was questioned. Seventeen male players, those aged 20-30 (20.8±3.9 years) who have been professionally engaged in goalball for at least three years (58.7-37.8 months) participated. Shoulder internal rotation joint position sense and the flamingo balance test were found to be different in the group with B1 visual acuity than in the group with B3 visual acuity (p = 0.042* and 0.028 respectively). There was no difference between groups with B1-B2 visual acuity (p = 0.394 and p = 0.065) and between groups with B2-B3 visual acuity (p = 0.792 and p = 0.931). There was no difference in the groups in terms of sensory tests and reaction time (p> 0.05). In goalball, joint position sense is related to throwing techniques. Although there is a general acceptance that other sensory systems should work harder to compensate for the sense of vision, fear of falling, athlete's branch year, sports year, muscle strength, and general physical condition of the athlete may affect the measurements made, especially in the dynamic position.

The somatosensory system is a complect sensory system that differentiates individual athletes. The aim of this study is to investigate the effect of visual acuity level on throwing technique, proprioceptive sense of the shoulder joint, light touch and two-point discrimination sense of the upper extremity, and sensory function (postural control and reaction time) in visually impaired goalball players. Goalball players who have different visual acuities B1(unable to perceive light or recognize its shape); B2 (has a visual field of less than 5 degrees and can recognize shapes); B3 (visual field greater than 5 degrees and less than 20 degrees) participated in the study. The sensorial system was evaluated with proprioceptive sense of the shoulder joint and sensory tests (light touch and two-point discrimination sense of the dominant hand.). Sensory function (postural control and reaction time) was evaluated with the flamingo balance test, functional reach test, and pro-agility test. The goalball players’ throwing technique was questioned. Seventeen male players, those aged 20–30 (20.8±3.9 years) who have been professionally engaged in goalball for at least three years (58.7–37.8 months) participated. Shoulder internal rotation joint position sense and the flamingo balance test were found to be different in the group with B1 visual acuity than in the group with B3 visual acuity (p = 0.042* and 0.028 respectively). There was no difference between groups with B1-B2 visual acuity (p = 0.394 and p = 0.065) and between groups with B2-B3 visual acuity (p = 0.792 and p = 0.931). There was no difference in the groups in terms of sensory tests and reaction time (p> 0.05). In goalball, joint position sense is related to throwing techniques. Although there is a general acceptance that other sensory systems should work harder to compensate for the sense of vision, fear of falling, athlete’s branch year, sports year, muscle strength, and general physical condition of the athlete may affect the measurements made, especially in the dynamic position.

Rationale Paralyzed muscles can be reanimated following spinal cord injury (SCI) using a brain-computer interface (BCI) to enhance motor function alone. Importantly, the sense of touch is a key component of motor function. Simultaneously restoring the sense of touch and movement would meet functional needs for BCI users that seek to enhance upper limb function following SCI. Methods The study met institutional requirements for the conduct of human subjects and is registered on the http://www.ClinicalTrials.gov website (identifier: NCT01997125). The participant was a 27-year-old male with stable, non-spastic C5 quadriplegia resulting from a cervical SCI. The participant underwent implantation of a 96 channel Utah microelectrode recording array (Blackrock Microsystems, Inc.; Salt Lake, Utah) in his left primary motor cortex. The hand area of motor cortex was identified preoperatively by fusing functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) activation maps obtained while the participant attempted movements co-registered to the preoperative planning MRI. During experiments, the participant was either completely blinded to the experimental conditions or given brief instructions to complete the necessary actions. Cue and trial parameters were randomized as needed. Results Results are adapted from (Ganzer PD, Colachis 4th SC, Schwemmer MA, Friedenberg DA, Dunlap CF, Swiftney CE, Sharma G in Restoring the sense of touch using a sensorimotor demultiplexing neural interface. Cell 2020). We demonstrate that a human participant with a clinically complete SCI can use a BCI to simultaneously reanimate both motor function and the sense of touch, leveraging residual touch signaling from their own hand. In primary motor cortex (M1), residual subperceptual hand touch signals are simultaneously demultiplexed from ongoing efferent motor intention, enabling intracortically controlled closed-loop sensory feedback. Using the closed-loop demultiplexing BCI almost fully restored the ability to detect object touch, and significantly improved several sensorimotor functions. Conclusion These results demonstrate that subperceptual neural signals can be decoded from human cortex and transformed into conscious perception, significantly augmenting function.

Restoring the Sense of Touch Using a Sensorimotor Demultiplexing Neural Interface

Touch and pain sense of the palmar hand was measured quantitatively. The volar side of the right hand of subjects was divided into 26 areas each, according to the location of finger joints and the innervation regions of peripheral nerves. The sense of pain was measured by electric stimulation. Current perception threshold in distal phalanx was lowest in all 26 areas. In all 26 areas, the current perception threshold of 5Hz was significantly (P<0.01) lower than that of 250Hz and 2000Hz. In all 26 areas, the current perception threshold of 250Hz was significantly (P<0.01) lower than that of 2000Hz.

This paper presents a novel approach for recognizing a human hand touch by processing pressure measurements generated by a robotic skin. Physical cooperation among humans is mainly based on the sense of touch and usually starts with hand contacts. If a robot can distinguish a human touch from a generic contact, the human-robot cooperation can be more natural and effective. The proposed approach consists in transforming the sensor pressure measurements distributed on the robot surface into a convenient 2D representation of the contact shape, i.e., a contact image. The image-based representation of contacts allows facing the problem of human touch classification by applying machine learning methods already developed for image classification. The experiments have been performed using a robotic skin, composed of 768 tactile elements, placed on a Baxter robot forearm. The contact classification has been performed using a Convolutional Neural Network obtaining an accuracy higher than 97% experimentally validating the proposed approach.

In this work we propose a supplementary haptic framework for dexterous training during rehabilitation. Based on a variety of goal-oriented tasks in a form of puzzles and a set of specifically designed objects, we aim to improve the dexterity and the sense of touch of the impaired hand and fingers w.r.t. different shapes and shape features, such as curved surfaces, edges, vertices and holes. Central to our framework is the Modular Haptic Stimulus Board (MHSB). Within the MHSB elementary shapes can be combined into a large variety of complex shape patterns. This, in turn, enables us to recreate a large set of simple environmental scenarios and to suit a large set of goal-oriented tasks. Through such modular design the framework is suitable for goal-directed training on different complexity levels in a variety of scenarios, such as haptic object discrimination, haptic memory exercises and haptic search. Based on a multimodal recording setup, including haptic glove [1], Vicon system, a microphone and video, the framework provides the necessary infrastructure for automatic evaluation of recovery progress and a detailed movement analysis. Based on this analysis, objects or tasks that pose most problems during training can be automatically included in the future training schedule. A preliminary study with healthy individuals has been conducted to test the framework. Clinical trials still need to be conducted.