Abstract
Within the framework of the theme of the First World Congress of Phenomenology “Fifty Years after Husserl: the Legacy of Husserl and Contemporary Phenomenology,” I wish to set forth in this brief article some reflections on the phenomenology of the body in Bergson and Merleau-Ponty. This analysis is not aimed directly at possible similarities and divergences between Bergson and Husserl.1 I have concentrated upon one of their heirs, Merleau-Ponty. I consider that the phenomenological method can throw light on the perennial problem of anthropology: the relationships between the psychic and the physical. On the other hand, as a student of Bergsonian thought, I would like to point out the similarity between Merleau-Ponty’s thought and the philosophy of Bergson. By way of introduction, we could say that in these two philosophers and Husserl a common project stands out: the attempt to overcome Cartesian dualism and the drawing of attention to the role of corporeality in the human constitution.
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Notes
See Mario R. Sancipriano, “Ingarden et le urai bergsonisme,” Analecta Husserliana, Vol IV (1976), pp. 141–148. “The Activity of Consciousness: Husserl and Bergson.” Analecta Husserliana, Vol III (1974), pp. 161–167.
E. Husserl, “Philosophie als strenge Wissenschaft,” Logos, Vol I, Book 3 (1911), pp. 289–341 (Tübingen: Verlag von J. C. M. Mohr/(Paul Siebeck), 1911), p. 294. Hereafter cited as PSW. H. Bergson, Oeuvres (Paris: PUF, 1959, Centenary edition). See L’énergie spirituelle, Mélanges (Paris: PUF, 1972), especially “Le parallélisme psycho-physique.”
H. Bergson, “Le cerveau et la pensée: une illusion philosophique,” Oeuvres, pp. 959–971; Mélanges, p. 463.
E. Husserl, “Philosophie als strenge Wissenschaft,” PSW, Vol I, Book 3 (1911), p. 298.
E. Husserl, “Philosophie als strenge Wissenschaft,” PSW, Vol I, Book 3 (1911), p. 309.
E. Husserl, “Philosophie als strenge Wissenschaft,” PSW, Vol I, Book 3 (1911), p. 310.
E. Husserl, “Philosophie als strenge Wissenschaft,” PSW, Vol I, Book 3 (1911), p. 313.
E. Husserl, La Filosofia como Autorrealización de la Humanidad (Buenos Aires: Editorial Nova, 1962), p. 89 trans. Elsa Tabernig, Original title, Die Philosophie als menschheitliche Selbstbesinnung, Selbst Verwicklung der Vernunft, within the work Philosophie als Strenge Wissenschaft (1937).
E. Husserl, La Filosofia en la Crisis de la Humanidad Europea (Buenos Aires: Editorial Nova, 1962). In this work appear, La Filosofia como ciencia rigurosa (Original, 1954) and Die Krisis der Europäischen Menschentums und die philosophie and Die Krisis der Europäischen Wissenschaften und die transzendentale, phänomenologie.
E. Husserl, La Filosofia en la Crisis de la Humanidad Europea (Buenos Aires: Editorial Nova, 1962)
E. Husserl, La Filosofia en la Crisis de la Humanidad Europea (Buenos Aires: Editorial Nova, 1962), p. 102.
E. Husserl, La Filosofia en la Crisis de la Humanidad Europea (Buenos Aires: Editorial Nova, 1962), p. 104.
E. Husserl, La Filosofia en la Crisis de la Humanidad Europea (Buenos Aires: Editorial Nova, 1962), pp. 128 and 129.
E. Husserl, La Filosofia en la Crisis de la Humanidad Europea (Buenos Aires: Editorial Nova, 1962), p. 133.
E. Husserl, La Filosofia en la Crisis de la Humanidad Europea (Buenos Aires: Editorial Nova, 1962)
Madison, G. B., “Du corps à la chair: Maurice Merleau-Ponty,” Analecta Husserliana, Vol XXI (1986), p. 169;
J. Pereira De Freitas, E. Husserl: La Filosofia como Ciencia Rigurosa (Madrid: Ed. Emesa, 1979), p. 148.
Madison, G. B., “Du corps à la chair: Maurice Merleau-Ponty,” Analecta Husserliana, Vol XXI (1986), p. 178.
H. Bergson, “Le cerveau et la pensée: une illusion philosophique,” Oeuvres, pp. 844 and 960 and Mëlanges, p. 482.
M. Merleau-Ponty Le Visible et l’invisible (Paris: Ed. Gallimard, 1964), especially “L’entrelacs le chiasme,” pp. 172–204, and pp. 302, 312, 313, 316, and 317.
M. Merleau-Ponty, La Structure du Comportement (Paris: PUF, 1942), p. 2.
Bergson, Oeuvres Matière et mémoire, pp. 171/14.
Ibid., pp. 172/14 and 184/30.
M. Merleau-Ponty, La Phénoménologie de la Perception (Paris: Ed. Gallimard, 1945). Translation: La Fenomenologia de la Percepcion (Fondo de Cultura Económica. Gráfica Panamericana, 1951), p. 400. Hereafter PHP.
M. Merleau-Ponty, L’union de l’áme et le corps chez Malebranche, Biran et Bergson (Paris: Ed. Jean Deprun. Vrin, 1968), p. 87.
Ibid., pp. 453, 454. 460, and 75, 92, 152.
Ibid., p. 231.
Ibid., p. 472.
J. Arias Muñoz, La antropologia fenomenológica de Merleau-Ponty (Madrid: Ed. Fragua, 1975).
Maria. J. Pinto Cantista, Sentido y ser en Merleau-Ponty (Pamplona: Ed. Eunsa, 1978). Chapter III, “El cuerpo propio, nueva noción de subjetividad”; Chapter II, “Ontologia del ser bruto, visible e invisible y la carne universal.”
Arias Muñoz, Sentido y ser en Merleau-Ponty (Pamplona: Ed. Eunsa, 1978), pp. 191 and 192.
J. Choza Armenta, Antropologia Filosófica (Madrid: Ed. Rialp, 1989).
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Itxaso, M.E. (1991). The Body as the Union of the Psychic and the Physical in Bergson and Merleau-Ponty. In: Tymieniecka, AT. (eds) Husserl’s Legacy in Phenomenological Philosophies. Analecta Husserliana, vol 36. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-3368-5_25
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