Text: Pages 244 and 245

Merleau-Ponty expanded phenomenology beyond Husserl and Heidegger toward a form of naturalism. In the Phenomenology of Perception, he argued that perception meant having a body which inhabits the world. Because perception was not thought, it existed in its own universe and existed prior to thought. The body as subject bridged the gap between the subjective being-for-itself with the objective being in the world. Phenomena were understood meanings associated with regular physical mundane experiences like picking up a cup, walking through a door, or touching sweets on a table. For Merleau-Ponty, it was through the perception of the simplest actions where the real mysteries of existence were found. He changed the famous Descartes statement to I think therefore other people exist. A social consciousness could never be the nothingness of Sartre or even the “clearing in the woods” of Heidegger.

In his view of the existentialism, consciousness is a folded piece of cloth crumpled to make a nest or special place in the natural world, symbolized by an individual person being part of the physical fabric of the world