Key Arguments

• Against both intellectualism and empiricism, he insists that 'When we say that red augments the scope of our reactions, we must not understand this as if it were a question here of two distinct facts, a sensation of red and some motor reactions; rather, it must be understood that red, through its texture that our gaze follows and joins with, is already the amplification of our motor being.'
• He explicitly redefines the subject: 'The subject of sensation is neither a thinker who notices a quality, nor an inert milieu that would be affected or modified by it; the subject of sensation is a power that is born together with a certain existential milieu or that is synchronized with it.'
• He compares the sentient–sensible relation to that of 'the sleeper and his sleep: sleep arrives when a certain voluntary attitude suddenly receives from the outside the very confirmation that it was expecting.'
• In falling asleep, 'I breathe slowly and deeply to call forth sleep, and suddenly, one might say, my mouth communicates with some immense external lung that calls my breath forth and forces it back. A certain respiratory rhythm, desired by me just a moment ago, becomes my very being, and sleep, intended until then as a signification, turns itself into a situation.'
• Likewise in perception, 'I offer my ear or my gaze with the anticipation of a sensation, and suddenly the sensible catches my ear or my gaze; I deliver over a part of my body, or even my entire body, to this manner of vibrating and of filling space named “blue” or “red.”'
• He draws a religious analogy: 'This is just as the sacrament does not merely symbolize, in a sensible way, an operation of Grace, but is the real presence of God and makes this presence occupy a fragment of space and to communicate it to those who eat the bread, given that they are inwardly prepared.'
• On this model, 'the sensible does not merely have a motor and vital signification, but is rather nothing other than a certain manner of being in the world that is proposed to us from a point in space, that our body takes up and adopts if it is capable, and sensation is, literally, a communion.'
• He concludes from this 'point of view' that 'it becomes possible to give the notion of “sense” a value that intellectualism refuses it,' i.e., 'sense' can now be understood as an existential style embodied in the sensible rather than as a purely conceptual relation.

Source Quotes

We must not, then, wonder how and why red signifies effort or violence, why green signifies rest and peace; rather, we must again learn to live these colors as our body does, as concretions of peace and violence. When we say that red augments the scope of our reactions, we must not understand this as if it were a question here of two distinct facts, a sensation of red and some motor reactions; rather, it must be understood that red, through its texture that our gaze follows and joins with, is already the amplification of our motor being. The subject of sensation is neither a thinker who notices a quality, nor an inert milieu that would be affected or modified by it; the subject of sensation is a power that is born together with a certain existential milieu or that is synchronized with it.

When we say that red augments the scope of our reactions, we must not understand this as if it were a question here of two distinct facts, a sensation of red and some motor reactions; rather, it must be understood that red, through its texture that our gaze follows and joins with, is already the amplification of our motor being. The subject of sensation is neither a thinker who notices a quality, nor an inert milieu that would be affected or modified by it; the subject of sensation is a power that is born together with a certain existential milieu or that is synchronized with it. The relations between sentient and sensible are comparable to those between the sleeper and his sleep: sleep arrives when a certain voluntary attitude suddenly receives from the outside the very confirmation that it was expecting.

The subject of sensation is neither a thinker who notices a quality, nor an inert milieu that would be affected or modified by it; the subject of sensation is a power that is born together with a certain existential milieu or that is synchronized with it. The relations between sentient and sensible are comparable to those between the sleeper and his sleep: sleep arrives when a certain voluntary attitude suddenly receives from the outside the very confirmation that it was expecting. I breathe slowly and deeply to call forth sleep, and suddenly, one might say, my mouth communicates with some immense external lung that calls my breath forth and forces it back.

The relations between sentient and sensible are comparable to those between the sleeper and his sleep: sleep arrives when a certain voluntary attitude suddenly receives from the outside the very confirmation that it was expecting. I breathe slowly and deeply to call forth sleep, and suddenly, one might say, my mouth communicates with some immense external lung that calls my breath forth and forces it back. A certain respiratory rhythm, desired by me just a moment ago, becomes my very being, and sleep, intended until then as a signification, turns itself into a situation. Similarly, I offer my ear or my gaze with the anticipation of a sensation, and suddenly the sensible catches my ear or my gaze; I deliver over a part of my body, or even my entire body, to this manner of vibrating and of filling space named “blue” or “red.”

A certain respiratory rhythm, desired by me just a moment ago, becomes my very being, and sleep, intended until then as a signification, turns itself into a situation. Similarly, I offer my ear or my gaze with the anticipation of a sensation, and suddenly the sensible catches my ear or my gaze; I deliver over a part of my body, or even my entire body, to this manner of vibrating and of filling space named “blue” or “red.” This is just as the sacrament does not merely symbolize, in a sensible way, an operation of Grace, but is the real presence of God and makes this presence occupy a fragment of space and to communicate it to those who eat the bread, given that they are inwardly prepared.

Similarly, I offer my ear or my gaze with the anticipation of a sensation, and suddenly the sensible catches my ear or my gaze; I deliver over a part of my body, or even my entire body, to this manner of vibrating and of filling space named “blue” or “red.” This is just as the sacrament does not merely symbolize, in a sensible way, an operation of Grace, but is the real presence of God and makes this presence occupy a fragment of space and to communicate it to those who eat the bread, given that they are inwardly prepared. In the same way, the sensible does not merely have a motor and vital signification, but is rather nothing other than a certain manner of being in the world that is proposed to us from a point in space, that our body takes up and adopts if it is capable, and sensation is, literally, a communion.

This is just as the sacrament does not merely symbolize, in a sensible way, an operation of Grace, but is the real presence of God and makes this presence occupy a fragment of space and to communicate it to those who eat the bread, given that they are inwardly prepared. In the same way, the sensible does not merely have a motor and vital signification, but is rather nothing other than a certain manner of being in the world that is proposed to us from a point in space, that our body takes up and adopts if it is capable, and sensation is, literally, a communion. From this point of view, it becomes possible to give the notion of “sense” a value that intellectualism refuses it.

In the same way, the sensible does not merely have a motor and vital signification, but is rather nothing other than a certain manner of being in the world that is proposed to us from a point in space, that our body takes up and adopts if it is capable, and sensation is, literally, a communion. From this point of view, it becomes possible to give the notion of “sense” a value that intellectualism refuses it.

Key Concepts

• red, through its texture that our gaze follows and joins with, is already the amplification of our motor being.
• The subject of sensation is neither a thinker who notices a quality, nor an inert milieu that would be affected or modified by it; the subject of sensation is a power that is born together with a certain existential milieu or that is synchronized with it.
• The relations between sentient and sensible are comparable to those between the sleeper and his sleep: sleep arrives when a certain voluntary attitude suddenly receives from the outside the very confirmation that it was expecting.
• my mouth communicates with some immense external lung that calls my breath forth and forces it back. A certain respiratory rhythm, desired by me just a moment ago, becomes my very being, and sleep, intended until then as a signification, turns itself into a situation.
• I offer my ear or my gaze with the anticipation of a sensation, and suddenly the sensible catches my ear or my gaze; I deliver over a part of my body, or even my entire body, to this manner of vibrating and of filling space named “blue” or “red.”
• the sacrament does not merely symbolize, in a sensible way, an operation of Grace, but is the real presence of God and makes this presence occupy a fragment of space and to communicate it to those who eat the bread, given that they are inwardly prepared.
• the sensible does not merely have a motor and vital signification, but is rather nothing other than a certain manner of being in the world that is proposed to us from a point in space, that our body takes up and adopts if it is capable, and sensation is, literally, a communion.
• From this point of view, it becomes possible to give the notion of “sense” a value that intellectualism refuses it.

Context

Closing paragraphs of subsection [b. Relations between sensing and behaviors], where Merleau-Ponty generalizes from empirical results to a positive phenomenology of the sensing subject as a bodily power entering into a quasi-sacramental communion with the sensible, thereby redefining 'sense' in existential terms.