M. Merleau-Ponty And Ludwig Wittgenstein: A Synthesis

Abstract

At first sight it might appear that M. Merleau-Ponty and Ludwig Wittgenstein are strange allies; for phenomenology and analytic philosophy have long been considered incompatible. However, greater insight into the similarities between the two philosophers will show that the phenomenology of MerleauPonty is a foundation for a phenomenal world in which a Wittgensteinian philosophy may flourish, though not at the expense of that foundation, but to form a more complete and comprehensive philosophy. After such a synthesis of Wittgensteinian philosophy and Mer leau-Ponty ' s phenomenology of perception, where Wittgenstein grows silent, when we reach beyond the 'language-games' and 'forms of life,' once again the phenomenology of Merleau-Ponty presents itself to point toward the Beyond. The precedence and succession of Merleau-Ponty to Wittgenstein is not a temporal or honorary one, but rather, a logical or phenomenological one. For Merleau-Ponty dares to tread where language fears to go; cannot go. While Wittgenstein has restricted himself to ordinary language, Merleau-Ponty has advocated the primacy of perception. Together, however, they find themselves condemned to meaning.1