Perceiving a House *

To indicate how we are tempted into the modalities of objective thought, Merleau-Ponty invokes the example of perceiving a house. We are the house next door as we walk past in to our own: we see it first from the one side as we approach it, then from the front as we pass it and finally from the other side as we walk up the path of our own door. If we were to enter our neighbour's backyard, if we were to go in his front door and see the inside of his house, or if we were to fly over his roof in a helicopter we would see the house differently. Since the house is seen differently from one angle than from another and since we are nevertheless aware of seeing the same house from different positions at different times, rather than six different house, we all too easily conclude that it 'itself' is an 'in-itself' -- that it exists independently of any perspective. However, such realism subverts itself as soon as we pause to consider its implications. If the house itself is indeed independent of any perspective then it must be a house 'seen from nowhere' or, or 'seen from everywhere' cannot be really seen -- it must be invisible. Yet as we were prompted to attribute autonomy to the house itself, we continue to claim that it exists. Consequently, we have a house which, though invisible, nonetheless exists; it must then belong to the realm of ideality rather than to that of reality. The house itself is now no longer a spatio-temporal thing but an idea. By a curious reversal, the naive realism with which we began has transformed itself into a full-blown idealism. Merleau-Ponty therefore sets himself the task of tracing both these positions back to their origin in experience. ~ Page 23 /24