Merleau-Ponty's Panoptic Perceptions & the Infinitely Doubled-Vision of Deleuze

by Corry Shores
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Merleau-Ponty's Panoptic Perceptions
& the Infinitely Doubled-Vision of Deleuze

What does the phenomenal integration of our world got to do with us?

What we can do with our lives has a lot to do with how free we feel. When we think that we are now too old to accomplish some former goal, we sense a limitation in our freedom, and this leads us to not making an attempt at it. Let's suppose that we consider any little thing we see to be thoroughly related to everything else in the world, seen or unseen. Imagine for example that we set up dominoes in a chain, so that they could fall in sequence if the first one is pushed. We look at the set-up, and we see that the last of the series is intimately connected with the first, because if the first falls, so eventually will the last. When we look at the first domino, we in a way are also looking at the last one, expressing itself in the first. We know that to touch the first is to also touch the last. This means we will be very careful with our domino set up. We will restrain ourselves from pushing the first until just the right moment, when we would also like to see the last one consequently fall as well.

Yet it's possible we do not see things this way. Perhaps when we look at the first domino, the last one comes to our mind only as much as it dares us to push the first, out of its defiance of our supposing it to be determinately related. We do not then push the first because we want to touch the last, but because we put it to fate to decide if really the relations are determined. When we glance at the first domino, the last one appears in the first only when the last one says, 'no! I am not found in the first, I am me, not he!' That is what makes us tip the first, when the last dares us the most to defy its differentiation from the rest. In other words, it is not their coherent relation that makes the last appear in the first, but the forces that wedge them apart, making them appear to us as not glued together, not cohered. Perhaps some would very scientifically tip the first to demonstrate the determinacies. But perhaps others tip the first out of rebellion of the determinations, as if saying, 'all determinations must prove themselves! none are assumed as granted'. In such a spirit, tipping the first is a rebellion against coherence. If domino chains were so clearly determined, why would we find them so fascinating? It's because we see the motion in disbelief, as if we assumed from the beginning that such a continuous connection could not have been so. In other words, the dominoes continue to astonish us because our world is not given to us as connected.

And also, if the last domino were so thoroughly implied in the first, it would not appear through the first one. This is because the difference between the first and the last would not be substantial enough for us to feel compelled to distinguish them in the first place; there would no longer be two dominoes for us but just one.

All this might be a matter of our perspective on life. We might take the view that things appearing to us already speak the others. An electrical power line speaks to us the poles suspending it, even if they range out of our field of vision. But under such a view, we might be less tempted to challenge the order of things. What would happen if an inventor saw a mechanical part always as it holistically relates to other mechanical parts? He would never invent a single thing with it. He first must say, 'no, this is not an x, it does not relate to y, instead I say it is a z, and its other relations are not yet determined.' This way he can invent new machines. So it is only on the basis of perceiving the parts of the world as incoherent that we can live in the world more freely, courageously, and creatively.

Brief Summary

For Merleau-Ponty, the things we perceive are so thoroughly integrated with one another that to focus on one is to implicitly perceive all the others.

Points Relative to Deleuze

But for a Deleuzean phenomenology, it is only on the basis of the incoherence of the parts than any one of them either stands-out explicitly or remains implied. For it is only on the basis of one part not gluing with another that we can perceive them either apart or in another.

We will continue our discussion on phenomenal horizons and the dynamic integration of objects in our world.

Consider if we look at something. We focus on it. But there are other things in the background. We are not unaware of these things, because if something strange happens in the periphery of our field of vision, we might instantly turn to it to see what is going on. This periphery, which is on the horizon of our attention, is perceived under a mode of awareness that is different from our attention to what we are focusing on. So would we say that we are merely less aware of the periphery? We could instead say that we are aware of it in a different way. There would be a reason for this in Merleau-Ponty's thinking. We see something now. But the way it appears to us has much to do with what appears marginally in its context. Before we considered the example of the moon near the skyline looking larger then when higher in the sky. While seeing the moon when it is near the skyline, we are focusing on the moon, and all the nearby things are in the periphery of our awareness. But it is these very marginal things which cause the moon to appear so largely to us. Hence we perhaps should not say that we are less aware of the things on the periphery of our awareness. Rather we might just say it is a different form of awareness, no less or greater than our focal attention.

To see an object is either to have it on the fringe of the visual field and be able to concentrate on it, or else respond to this summons by actually concentrating upon it. When I do concentrate my eyes on it, I become anchored in it, but this coming to rest of the gaze is merely a modality of its movement: I continue inside one object the exploration which earlier hovered over them all, and in one movement I close up the landscape and open the object. The two operations do not fortuitously coincide: it is not the contingent aspects of my bodily make-up, for example the retinal structure, which force me to see my surroundings vaguely if I want to see the object clearly. Even if I knew nothing of rods and cones, I should realize that it is necessary to put the surroundings in abeyance the better to see the object, and to lose in background what one gains in focal figure, because to look at the object is to plunge oneself into it, and because objects form a system in which one cannot show itself without concealing others. More precisely, the inner horizon of an object cannot become an object without the surrounding objects’ becoming a horizon, and so vision is an act with two facets. (78a-c)
Voir un objet, c'est ou bien l'avoir en marge du champ visuel et pouvoir le fixer, ou bien répondre effectivement à cette sollicitation en le fixant. Quand je le fixe, je m'ancre en lui, mais cet « arrêt » du regard n'est qu'une modalité de son mouvement : je continue à l'intérieur d'un objet l'exploration qui, tout à l'heure, les survolait tous, d'un seul mouvement je referme le paysage et j'ouvre l'objet. Les deux opérations ne coïncident pas par hasard : ce ne sont pas les contingences de mon organisation corporelle, par exemple la structure de ma rétine, qui m'obligent à voir l'entourage en flou si je veux voir l'objet en clair. Même si je ne savais rien des cônes et des bâtonnets, je concevrais qu'il est nécessaire de mettre en sommeil l'entourage pour mieux voir l'objet et de perdre en fond ce que l'on gagne en figure, | parce que regarder l'objet c'est s'enfoncer en lui, et que les objets forment un système où l'un ne peut se montrer sans en cacher d'autres. Plus précisément, l'horizon intérieur d'un objet ne peut devenir objet sans que les objets environnants deviennent horizon et la vision est un acte à deux faces. (95-96)

So we might not say that the horizon is a lesser form of awareness, because our focal perceptions could be substantially different if the horizonal intentions were otherwise. However, the things on the horizon of our awareness take some form concealedness, because there is something about them which is not yet disclosed and which calls for its unveiling.

Merleau-Ponty now notes something else. Consider when we turn our attention from one thing to something on its horizon. Let's say someone hands us a large bar of gold. We give it back. He then holds up an identical one and asks if we want to buy the second one for a really low price. From our visual perspective, both bars of gold look exactly the same. But something does not seem right, and we are not sure what. The way the second bar relates to his hands and arms is not the same as with the first bar. We also somehow sense that the second one is hollow, which in fact it is. By looking at the way the hollow one relates to his arm, we also were aware of the visual appearance of the inside. The inside of the gold appeared to us not because we could see it, but because we could see other things related to it. So the hollow inside was on the horizon of our awareness while the outside was in the focus.

Whenever we move our attention from one thing to another, the first will still be related in the second, because it will condition the way the second appears. But this also means that when we arrive upon the second thing in our attention, it is expressing the first as well, because all components of our phenomenal world are integrated in this way where each has the other on the horizon. This means that when we turn our attention away from some object, it is no longer to be found explicitly in our field of awareness, but it remains there implicitly, on the horizon. So the persisting identity of things in our world depends on all parts of our awareness having all others on their horizons.

In normal vision, on the other hand, I direct my gaze upon a sector of the landscape, which comes to life and is disclosed, while the other objects recede into the periphery and become dormant, while, however, not ceasing to be there. Now, with them, I have at my disposal their horizons, in which there is implied, as a marginal view, the object on which my eyes at present fall. The horizon, then, is what guarantees the identity of the object throughout the exploration; it is the correlative of the impending power which my gaze retains over the objects which it has just surveyed, and which it already has over the fresh details which it is about to discover. No distinct memory and no explicit conjecture could fill this rôle: they | would give only a probable synthesis, whereas my perception presents itself as actual. The object-horizon structure, or the perspective, is no obstacle to me when I want to see the object: for just as it is the means whereby objects are distinguished from each other, it is also the means whereby they are disclosed. To see is to enter a universe of beings which display themselves, and they would not do this if they could not be hidden behind each other or behind me. In other words: to look at an object is to inhabit it, and from this habitation to grasp all things in terms of the aspect which they present to it. But in so far as I see those things too, they remain abodes open to my gaze, and, being potentially [( virtuellement)] lodged in them, I already perceive from various angles the central object of my present vision. Thus every object is the mirror of all others. When I look at the lamp on my table, I attribute to it not only the qualities visible from where I am, but also those which the chimney, the walls, the table can ‘see’; but back of my lamp is nothing but the face which it ‘shows’ to the chimney. I can therefore see an object in so far as objects form a system or a world, and in so far as each one treats the others round it as spectators of its hidden aspects and as guarantee of the permanence of those aspects. Any seeing of an object by me is instantaneously reiterated among all those objects in the world which are apprehended as co-existent, because each of them is all that the others ‘see’ of it. Our previous formula must therefore be modified; the house itself is not the house seen from nowhere, but the house seen from everywhere. The completed object is translucent, being shot through from all sides by an infinite number of present scrutinies which intersect in its depths leaving nothing hidden. (78-79c, emphasis mine)
Au contraire, dans la vision, j'appuie mon regard sur un fragment du paysage, il s'anime et se déploie, les autres objets reculent en marge et entrent en sommeil, mais ils ne cessent pas d'être là. Or, avec eux, j'ai à ma disposition leurs horizons, dans lesquels est impliqué, vu en vision marginale, l'objet que je fixe actuellement. L'horizon est donc ce qui assure l'identité de l'objet au cours de l'exploration, il est le corrélatif de la puissance prochaine que garde mon regard sur les objets qu'il vient de parcourir et qu'il a déjà sur les nouveaux détails qu'il va découvrir. Aucun souvenir exprès, aucune conjecture explicite ne pourraient jouer ce rôle : ils ne donneraient qu'une synthèse probable, alors que ma perception se donne comme effective. La structure objet-horizon, c'est-à-dire la perspective, ne me gêne donc pas quand je veux voir l'objet: si elle est le moyen qu'ont les objets de se dissimuler, elle est aussi le moyen qu'ils ont de se dévoiler. Voir, c'est entrer dans un univers d'êtres qui se montrent, et ils ne se montreraient pas s'ils ne pouvaient être cachés les uns derrière les autres ou derrière moi. En d'autres termes : regarder un objet, c'est venir l'habiter et de là saisir toutes choses selon la face qu'elles tournent vers lui. Mais, dans la mesure où je les vois elles aussi, elles restent des demeures ouvertes à mon regard, et, situé virtuellement en elles, j'aperçois déjà sous différents angles l'objet central de ma vision actuelle. Ainsi chaque objet est le miroir de tous les autres. Quand je regarde la lampe posée sur ma table, je lui attribue non seulement les qualités visibles de ma place, mais encore celle que la cheminée, que les murs, que la table peuvent « voir », le dos de ma lampe n'est rien d'autre que la face qu'elle « montre » à la cheminée. Je peux donc voir un objet en tant que les objets forment un système ou un monde et | que chacun d'eux dispose des autres autour de lui comme Spectateurs de ses aspects cachés et garantie de leur permanence. Toute vision d'un objet par moi se réitère instantanément entre tous les objets du monde qui sont saisis comme coexistants parce que chacun d'eux est tout ce que les autres « voient » de lui. Notre formule de tout à l'heure doit donc être modifiée; la maison elle-même n'est pas la maison vue de nulle part, mais la maison vue de toutes parts. L'objet achevé est translucide, il est pénétré de tous côtés par une infinité actuelle de regards qui se recoupent dans sa profondeur et n'y laissent rien de caché. (82b-83, emphasis mine)

How would things be different in a Deleuzean phenomenology? In the first place, our field of perception is made entirely of differences. We have microperceptions, which are like the differentials between infinitely small divisions of our perceptual field. Let's say we see a green apple. The green of the apple is made of very small pereptions of yellow and blue that are infinitely small and that differentially relate to one another.

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

The microperceptions of yellow and blue are infinitely small, yet somehow green flashes between them all. Would we then say that the green happens because of an integrated organization of similar parts which creates a homogenous field? If the green of the apple appears to us, does that not suggest that we perceive the world as a thorough organization of parts? For otherwise there would not be a patch of green but rather a complete chaos of sense impressions.

But we can be looking at an apple tree without first noticing the color of its apples. For Merleau-Ponty this is because the green of the apples is on the horizon of our awareness. It could later be made explicit by turning our attention to it. But let's consider a Deleuzean phenomenology. We would first assume that the green apple is like everything else; it is really made-up of differentials between vanished parts. One microperception of the differential relation between two parts of the apple is not necessarily a stronger difference than the differential relation between a part of the apple and a part of the tree branch. So we are equally motivated to see the apple as different from the tree or just the same as it. Certain forces, like our hunger, will add variations to the differential values in the field of our heterogeneous perception. It could cause the green to jump out from the brown of the branch. The differential relations between the apple's parts and the branch's parts cause one another to resonate and shake, as if we pushed two magnets together, same-pole-to-same pole.

When we go to pick the apple, what is most important to us is not the apple itself, but the difference between the apple's parts and the branch's parts, because it is only on the basis of this difference that we think we can separate them and satisfy our hunger. So what matters to us then is the incompatibility of the apple and the tree, their not-belonging together, their pushing one another apart, hence the grounds for us to pluck the apple from the branch. We might still say that the differential relations here that stand-out are not random. They are between two general regions, the region we consider the tree and the region we consider the apple. So while the relation between the apple and the tree is one of no-longer-hanging together, no longer cohering, all those differential parts of the apple seem to cohere together in their contiguity. This might be so, but we can peel the apple too. It is not that the differences making up the apple were replaced with compatibilities. Instead, just extra forces of difference pushed those in the apple more strongly away from those of the branch. What is most important to note is that when we pick the apple, when we make this important constitution, in that very moment what really appears to us is neither the apple nor the branch, but a crack between them, because it is by wedging that crack that we are able to pick the apple. But this does not just apply to when we physically divide things. Anytime something appears to us, we 'pick it out' from our field of awareness. Our perceptions are continually making divisions, which is really just amplfications of certain differences over others.

According to Merleau-Ponty's theory of how we see the world, each part of it includes many different other relations to the other parts, such that to see the front side of something is really also to see the backside, reflected in the way the backside relates to everything else around it that we do see and also the way everything else is relating to the back's side. Thus even though we might say that our perceptual field is constituted by all these different relations, we still see that their relating is based on how they all integrate coherently with one another.

For Deleuze, any sort of organization, like a conglomerate of microperceptions giving us the macroperception of green, is not based on how these microperceptions integrate with one another [1]. The are all differentials to one another. The green appears not just because its parts differentially relate, but also because these parts differentiate with parts around it. And these differentiations stand-out with more force to us. So the green field never ceases to be a heterogeneous multiplicity of differences for us, because when we perceive it as a green field, really we are fundamentally and at first noticing the differences between the colors' differentials and those of what it stands out from. So we notice the green only on account of a magnification of the incoherences between the green's parts and the other things parts.

So how then would a Deleuzean phenomenology explain the illusion of the moon's increased size near the skyline? When the moon is high in the sky, it is often surrounded by stars and dark. But when near the skyline, the moon draws near many other things whose parts are competing for our attention, like trees, buildings, and so forth. So when the moon does appear into our focal attention, it did so only on account of very strong differential forces that made the microperceptions of the moon stand-out more than the others in the region. So perceiving the moon near the horizon is seeing something in an intense differential conflict with many other things. So we sense the moon being filled with a lot of intensity, as if it were on the verge of bursting-out into the sky. Even though the moon on the skyline is the same size in our retinas as when high in the sky, its powerful tendencies to stand-out cause us to see it as more magnified in our field of awareness.


[1] Note: the differentials in the green do not integrate in the Merleau-Pontian sense of each implying the others. However, they do seem instead to integrate in the sense of an integral sum, which would be a sum of differentials, a sum of differences, and not an interwoven 'flesh'. Later we will look to Salomon Maimon's Essay on Transcendental Philosophy for more on this idea.





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.