![\"VANZAGO](\"http:\/\/www.disciplinefilosofiche.it\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/VANZAGO-COP-1.jpg\")
<\/a>If the relationships between Merleau-Ponty\u2019s philosophy and the so-called \u201chumanities\u201d (a term that is clearly inadequate with respect to the historical situation in which Merleau-Ponty worked) is well known and widely studied, the same cannot be said with respect to the debate developed by Merleau-Ponty in connection to the natural sciences. This relative ignorance is largely due to the fact that, until recently, only a reduced number of texts were known which could afford an evaluation of Merleau-Ponty\u2019s interests for the natural sciences and for the problem of the concept of nature as a whole. The publication of the three \u2013 decisive in\u00addeed \u2013 lecture courses held by Merleau-Ponty at the Coll\u00e8ge de France, and focusing on nature, deeply changed this picture. Obviously some aspects concerning the contents of these lectures were already known, in particular thanks to the publication of the \u201cr\u00e9sum\u00e9s de cours\u201d, the summaries written by Merleau-Ponty himself at the end of each year. But these summaries, however relevant and instructive, could scarcely offer an exhaustive account of the richness and complexity of Merleau-Ponty\u2019s own project. Thanks to the publication of the course notes we can now better evaluate the im\u00adportance and the far-reaching range of the questions that the French philosopher was working on, and also better understand the meaning of the elusive expression that Merleau-Ponty chose for his project, that very \u201contology of the flesh\u201d which is often, still today, considered as a meta\u00adphorical expression whose meaning remains unfathomable.\nAfter twenty years of scholarship, the meaning of the investigation on nature for Merleau-Ponty\u2019s phenomenological project is far from being exhausted. But some important pathmarks have been established. The rele\u00advance of this theme for his philosophy was stressed by Merleau-Ponty right at the start of his career, when setting up the task of his \u201cStructure of behaviour\u201d in terms of the study of the relationship<\/em> between nature and consciousness. And yet only the publication of the lectures on nature permitted to really overcome the negligence with respect to this statement. Nature is indeed at the core of Merleau-Ponty\u2019s phenomenology, yet this simple truth immediately raises complex questions. In the first place, the definition of the notion of nature with which Merleau-Ponty works is to be clarified. The reason of this choice seems rather clear: Merleau-Ponty after all is the philosopher of incarnated subjectivity. But this triviality conceals intricate entanglements. Merleau-Ponty is fully aware of the fact that an investigation of the natural bonds that attach subjectivity to natural life requires a doubling of investigation itself, for in this case the nature of the inquirer, the human subject, affects the nature of the inquired, and vice versa. Nature thus is not only an object of investigation, but also, and perhaps most of all, the \u201csoil\u201d of investigation itself, for it is the horizon and the \u201cground\u201d from which a subject emerges. In other words, in this process of emergence, something \u201cof\u201d nature brings nature itself to its own truth.
\nFrom this perspective it becomes clear that the very distinction and splitting of the investigation on nature into a philosophical and a scientific side is not simply rejected, but rather intertwined by Merleau-Ponty in view of an overcoming of commonsensical platitudes. The very opposition of philosophers into the realist versus the idealist side, and the connected attempt at demonstrating that phenomenology should either be naturalized or on the contrary preserved in its spiritual purity, is surpassed in direction of a truly phenomenological understanding of manifestation, according to which both sides matter and must be conceptually understood, but what is usually overlooked, and phenomenology definitively on the contrary shows, is the relevance of their mutual interrelation<\/em>, the third term which is actually the first one.
\nNature thus is investigated by Merleau-Ponty both and simultaneously from a philosophical and <\/em>a scientific perspective, thus factually negating their mutual exclusion while preserving their differences. His analyses of the developments of twenty-century physics are obviously carried on from the confessed standpoint of a philosopher who does not aim at replacing physicists themselves in a na\u00efve attempt at teaching them the truth they were not able to see. Rather, Merleau-Ponty wants to show that twenty-century physics poses truly philosophical problems, which require an adequate philosophical answer. It is the na\u00efve philosophy of the physicists to be outdated by their effective discoveries. Hence the need to retrieve, in a genealogical attitude, the classical philosophical roots that support this outdated philosophy. And the parallel unearthing of a possible different understanding of nature, which was somehow already present in many phi\u00adlosophical approaches, but which only the revolutions of the twentieth century forced scientists and philosophers alike to take really seriously. In the end, it is a different conception of truth that is emerging from the discoveries of physical science, as well as from other scientific realms, in particular those concerned with life. But the notion of truth, which is thus progressively uncovered, urges philosophy to react and to critically in\u00adterrogate itself, trying to come to terms with the end of a tradition while not closing itself into sterile historiographical repetitions or indulging in the celebration of the end of thinking.
\nA full evaluation of Merleau-Ponty\u2019s project is yet to be achieved. The essays included in this issue offer a wide range of approaches, varying from more philosophical discussions of Merleau-Ponty\u2019s key concepts to detailed analyses of some of the most relevant proposals contained in Merleau-Ponty\u2019s works (mostly, but not only, the lectures at the Coll\u00e8ge de France). The confrontation between Merleau-Ponty\u2019s philosophy of nature and of the natural sciences, with their epistemological questions, is an open chapter of investigation, which hopefully might lead to further findings and results.<\/p>\n
Contents<\/strong> Luca Vanzago, Introduction<\/em><\/a> If the relationships between Merleau-Ponty\u2019s philosophy and the so-called \u201chumanities\u201d (a term that is clearly inadequate with respect to the historical situation in which Merleau-Ponty worked) is well known and widely studied, the same cannot be said with respect to the debate developed by Merleau-Ponty in connection to the natural sciences. This relative ignorance is …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3682","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ultimi-numeri"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.disciplinefilosofiche.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3682","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.disciplinefilosofiche.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.disciplinefilosofiche.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.disciplinefilosofiche.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.disciplinefilosofiche.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3682"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.disciplinefilosofiche.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3682\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4001,"href":"https:\/\/www.disciplinefilosofiche.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3682\/revisions\/4001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.disciplinefilosofiche.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.disciplinefilosofiche.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3682"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.disciplinefilosofiche.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n(click on the titles to view the abstracts)<\/span><\/p>\n
\nTed Toadvine, Tempo naturale e natura immemoriale<\/em><\/a>
\nLuca Vanzago, The Problem of Nature between Philosophy and Science. Merleau-Ponty\u2019s Phenomenological Ontology and its Epistemological Implica\u00adtions<\/em><\/a>
\nRoberta Lanfredini, Essenza e Natura: Husserl e Merleau-Ponty sulla fondazione dell\u2019esse\u00adre vivente<\/em><\/a>
\nChristopher Pollard, Merleau-Ponty and Embodied Cognitive Science<\/em><\/a>
\nGianluca De Fazio, L\u2019Essere pre-logico. Una lettura ontologica dell\u2019interpretazione di Co\u00adpenhagen a partire da Merleau-Ponty<\/em><\/a>
\nDanilo Manca, La scienza allo stato nascente. Merleau-Ponty e Sellars sull\u2019immagine scientifica della natura<\/em><\/a>
\nDarian Meacham, Sense and Life: Merleau-Ponty\u2019s Philosophy of Nature and Evolutio\u00adnary Biology<\/em><\/a>
\nFranck Robert, Merleau-Ponty, Whitehead, une pens\u00e9e de la vie<\/em><\/a>
\nClaus Halberg, Emergent Life: Addressing the \u201cOntological-Diplopia\u201d of the 21st Century with Merleau-Ponty and Deacon<\/em><\/a>
\nPrisca Amoroso, Prospettive ecologiche nell\u2019opera di Merleau-Ponty<\/em><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"