Enfolded Sensations: Merleau-Ponty's Gestaltist Integrated Phenomena and Deleuze's Differential Perception

by Corry Shores
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Enfolded Sensations:
Merleau-Ponty's Gestaltist Integrated Phenomena and Deleuze's Differential Perception

(Animation above is my own, made with Open Office Draw and Unfreeze.)

What does integrated or differential perception got to do with us?

What we are sensing is what we are after, what we are feeling-for, what we are sensitive to. Just the natural way we feel-out the world tells us we already care about something very profound about what goes on around us. So it should matter to us to know what it is we are feeling-for. It might be we are sensing the way things are already belonging together right as we sense them. If that were so, we care about the glue that holds together the world around us. But maybe it is the opposite. Perhaps what we care about is really the moments when things do not fall together right. That is what catches our attention, is it not, when something does not fit in right or stands-out for some reason? Perhaps we are difference-feelers. What we immediately care about is not how things hang-together, but how they are cracked apart from forces of differentiation.

Brief Summary

When we see a part of something, we might also be seeing all the other parts of that something there implicitly as well. Or, when we see a part of something, we might be sensing something that stands apart from the other parts on account of its differential relations.

Points Relative to Deleuze

A Deleuzean phenomenology would be anti-Gestaltist. It would be based on the non-integration of the parts of our perceptions.

Merleau-Ponty's introductory illustration of Gestalt

[Quotation:]

Let us imagine a white patch on a homogeneous background. All the points in the patch have a certain 'function' in common, that of forming themselves into a ' shape' The colour of the shape is more intense, and as it were more resistant than that of the background; the edges of the white patch ' belong' to it, and are not part of the background although they adjoin it; the patch appears to be placed on the background and does not break it up. Each part arouses the expectation of more than it contains, and this elementary perception is therefore already charged with a meaning. But if the shape and the background, as a whole, are not sensed, they must be sensed, one may object, in each of their points. To say this is to forget that each point in its turn can be perceived only as a figure on a background. [...] The perceptual 'something' is always in the middle of something else, it always forms part of a 'field'. A really homogeneous area offering nothing to be cannot be given to any perception. [...] The pure impression is, therefore, not only undiscoverable, but also imperceptible and so inconceivable as an instant of perception. If it is introduced, it is because instead of attending to the experience of perception, we overlook it in favour of the object perceived. [...] An isolated datum of perception is inconceivable, at least if we do the mental experiment of attempting to perceive such a thing. But in the world there are either isolated objects or a physical void. (4 / fr. 26, boldface mine)

Merleau-Ponty goes on to say that we never perceive any quality by itself, but rather in relation to other qualities. There is no pure impression, but rather only composite perceptions, each one saying a bit about the whole.

I shall therefore give up any attempt to define sensation as pure impression. Rather, to see is to have colours or lights, to hear is to have sounds, to sense (sentir) is to have qualities. To know what sense experience is, then, is it not enough to have seen a red or to have heard an A? But red and green are not sensations, they are the sensed (sensibles), and quality is not an element of consciousness, but a property of the object. Instead of providing a simple means of delimiting sensation, if we consider it in the experience itself which evinces it, the quality is as rich and mysterious as the object, or indeed the whole spectacle, perceived. This red patch which I see on the carpet is red only in virtue of a shadow which lies across it, its quality is apparent only in relation to the play of light upon it, and hence as an element in a spatial configuration. Moreover the colour can be said to be there only if it occupies an area of a certain size, too small an area not being describable in these terms. (5a / fr. 26)

We will now try to clarify the theory of perception Deleuze explicates in The Fold. We will find that like Merleau-Ponty, perceptions for Deleuze are multiplicities. However, they are not formed under the assumption of greater coherent wholes.

In the chapter "Perception in the Folds," Deleuze discusses the difference between microperceptions and macroperceptions. A microperception is like an infinitely small perception. They can be perceptions of an infinitely small change, or they can be the perception of some infinitely small difference that we sense ("Tiny perceptions are as much the passage from one perception to another as they are components of each perception" p.87ab). We do not consciously notice any of these tiny perceptions, because they are too minute to stand out to us. But somehow our macroperceptions are made up of the micro ones. And yet, a macroperception is not the sum of homogeneous parts. So when we see a field of green, the perception of green does not result from many small microperceptions of green. Deleuze sees an anti-Gestaltism in Leibniz's theory. "We are not dealing with a relation of parts-and-wholes because the totality can be as imperceptible as the parts, as also when I do not sense the grinding noise of the water mill to which I am overly accustomed." (p87d) So it is not that we perceive wholes which are made up of parts. What we perceive is something different altogether than such a synthesis.

So we do not perceive something, like a green area, by moving from its parts to a whole. Instead, there is something phenomenal involved. We go from "the ordinary to what is notable or remarkable." (88a) Deleuze says that "We have to understand literally - that is, mathematically - that a conscious perception is produced when at least two heterogeneous parts enter into a differential relation that determines a singularity." (88a)

This differential relation is a calculus differential. We will need to review a basic calculus idea. Differential calculus, at least as Leibniz conceives it, deals with the ratios between infinitely small quantities. They have no magnitude in comparison with finite ones, because they are infinitely small in comparison. However, when one infinitely small magnitude differentially relates with another so to form a ratio, their relation will have a value. Leibniz devised a demonstration to help us visualize it [click link to follow the details.] For our purposes, we need to focus on one particular idea, namely, the diminution to infinitely small values that form differential relations.

So we are to imagine two triangles formed with a common line.

[From Leibniz' "Justification of the Infinitesimal Calculus by that of Ordinary Algebra.]

The diagonal line moves towards point A (crossing through the dotted diagonal line). But the whole time, the top triangle maintains the same proportions as the bottom one. So the ratio of x - c over y always tells us the ratio of c over e. By sliding the diagonal to the right, we diminish c and e to the infinitely small. With such a small magnitude, we can no longer quantify either of them first and then secondly determine their ratio. However, their ratio does maintain, and it is indicated still by x over y. See this animation.

(Animation above is my own, made with Open Office Draw and Unfreeze.)

The 'dc' means 'an infinitely small part of c.' So the ratio of an infinitely small part of c to an infinitely small part of e equals the ratio of x over y, even though neither dc or de itself has a finite determinable magnitude.

So Deleuze wrote that conscious perceptions arise when at least two heterogeneous parts enter into a differential relation (88a). "For example, the color green: yellow and blue can surely be perceived, but if their pereption vanishes by dint of progressive diminution, they enter into a differential relation

that determines green" (99b). So in this formula, db/dy, the db is an infinitely small bit of blue. It is a microperception of blue. And it has entered into a differential relation with a microperception of yellow. So consider if we see a block of blue next to a block of yellow. We won't see green. It is possible that we have a microperception of green by differentially relating the two, but it is too small to see. Now imagine if we continue shrinking the blue and yellow block, each time adding more, until there is an infinity of them. Now their differential relations stand-out more strongly on account of their sheer number. We no longer then perceive the yellow or blue, but instead just the green. See this animation for a demonstration, and consider the parallel with the triangles: the triangle sides diminished to the infinitely small, but their differential relation remained. In the case of the colors, they diminish also to the infinitely small, yet their differential relation, green, remains.

(Animation above is my own, made with Open Office Draw and Unfreeze.)

We might then wonder what about the blue and yellow? They too could be differential relations, perhaps between two other colors that are too small for us to see or perhaps instead between different shades (of black and white or yellow and blue). "And nothing impedes either yellow or blue, each on its own account, from being already determined by the differential relation of two colors that we cannot detect, or of two degrees of chiaroscuro:

[...] For example, the sound of the sea: at least two waves must be minutely perceived as nascent and heterogeneous enough to become part of a relation that can allow a perception of a third, one that "excels" over the others and comes to consciousness (implying that we are near the shoreline)." (99c.d) In the above equation, we are determining the differential relation that produces yellow (Y). It involves what might be two other infinitely small perceptions of different colors, or it could be microperceptions of different shades (either of yellow or black and white).

Let us point out one difference with Merleau-Ponty. For Merleau-Ponty, all perceptions of a quality involve already the perception of other qualities. The whole in a way is implied in all the parts, and there are never singular isolated qualities that we perceive. For Deleuze, a microperception is in fact a singularity. And green is not implied in the blue or the yellow. The macroperception is not implied in the parts. This is because the perception of green involves a differential perception between blue and yellow. The macroperception of green presents something not anywhere to be found in any of the parts. Hence Deleuze's phenomenology is anti-Gestaltist.

So we are given an infinity of infinitely small microperceptions. Then, the differences between some of them will matter to us more than others in a given context. In other words, certain differences will make more of a difference; "if we take thresholds to be so many minimal units of consciousness, tiny perceptions are in each instance smaller than the virtual minimum and, in this sense, are infinitely small. The ones selected in each order are those engaged in differential relations, and hence they produce the quality that issues forth at the given threshold of consciousness (for example, the color green). Inconspicuous perceptions are thus not parts of conscious perception, but requisites or genetic elements, "differentials of consciousness." (88-89) All the microperceptions go unnoticed until their differential relations stand out in clarity. "There are differential relations among these presently infinitely small ones that are drawn into clarity; that is to say, that establish a clear perception (the color green) with certain tiny, dark, evanescent perceptions (the colors yellow and blue). And no doubt yellow and blue can themselves be clear and conscious perceptions, but only if they too are drawn into clarity, each from its own position, by differential relations among other minute perceptions, or differentials of other orders. Differential relations always select minute perceptions that play a role in each case, and bring to light or clarify the conscious perception that comes forth. Thus differential calculus is the psychic mechanism of perception [...]." (90a)

We might put this into phenomenological terms. Every perception of a quality is on a lower order a differential between smaller perceptions. So all perceptions are differentials. We might adopt the Husserlean term, 'primordial data', but instead call it "immediate differential data". Among those differential relations, certain ones will stand out for one reason or another. This means certain microperceptions are forced together, sending a shockwave between them, if you will. This shock is the higher order perception. When yellow and blue collide, green flashes between them. When we see a color-field of green, we are sensing infinitely many differential shocks between yellow and blue. But consider when we place the checkered blue/yellow (green) next to just yellow and next to just blue.

Perhaps when we look at the green next to the yellow, the blue parts of the green stand out more. And vice versa, when we place the blue next to the green, the yellow parts stand out more:

The idea is that the yellow or the blue will stand out more on account of the parts of the green now differentially related to the added color. So difference is the grounds for appearance. Something appears only by means of a differential relation. When one of the colors stands out, it is because it no longer melts in with the rest, it is no longer as much a part of the whole; rather, it is only on account of it breaking from the whole that it appears.

So we distinguish Deleuze from Merleau-Ponty's theory of phenomenal perception in the following ways:
1) For Merleau-Ponty, there cannot be singular isolated qualities that are perceived. But for Deleuze, all perceptions are fundamentally singularities, namely, the differential relation between parts.
2) In Merleau-Ponty's Gestaltism, each part of a perception implies a whole, because the qualities of any part are conditioned by the other qualities of the thing being perceived. (So the redness of an apple is not isolated from its sheen). Yet for Deleuze, no part implies the resulting differential perception between the parts. Green is not implied in yellow or in blue, but it flashes into appearances when yellow and green are forced together and differentially relate.
3) For Merleau-Ponty, any part appears only when it is thoroughly integrated with all the other qualities holistically organized in the phenomenally appearing thing. However, for Deleuze, it is only when the part breaks-out from a holistic integration that it stands out from its context and appears to us, and in fact it is the differential relation itself between the parts that stands out. So when yellow and blue are forced together, and their differential relation matters to us at that moment, then green flashes out into appearance as a phenomenon.


Deleuze, Gilles. The Fold: Leibniz and the Baroque. Transl. Tom conley. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993.

Leibniz, Gottfried. "Justification of the Infinitesimal Calculus by that of Ordinary Algebra." Philosophical Papers and Letters. Ed. & Transl. Leroy E. Loemker. Dordrecht: D. Reidel Publishing Company, 1956.

Merleau-Ponty, Maurice. Phenomenology of Perception. Transl. Colin Smith. London/New York: Routledge, 1958.

Merleau-Ponty, Maurice. Phénoménologie de la perception. Paris: Éditions Gallimard, 1945.