The Truly Transcendental: Merleau-Ponty, un Écart, “The Acceptance of the Truth of the Transcendental Analysis”

Abstract

Merleau-Ponty undeniably develops phenomenology beyond Husserl’s and Heidegger’s thought by emphasizing the intentionality of the body. But Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy transforms phenomenology through its understanding of the relation between time and intentionality. As he himself claims, “the ambiguity of being in the world is translated by that of the body, and this is understood through that of time” (PP 45/56).¹ Interested throughout his career in clarifying how phenomenology must understand intentionality if it is to return to the things themselves, as Merleau-Ponty’s thoughts on intentionality mature, his theory of time alters. As we shall see in this chapter, Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy and view of time moves from a view that comingles Husserlian and Heideggerian insights to a wholly original view of time as the very condition for intentionality and thus subjectivity.