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Publication Details

Crosscultural Dialogue, Merleau-Ponty’s Reversibility and Its Interpretation by Means of Yoga

(Original title: Interkulturálny dialóg Merleau-Pontyho, reverzibilita a jej interpretácia prostredníctvom jogy)
Filozofia, 60 (2005), 3, 185-191.
Type of work: Papers
Publication language: Slovak
Abstract

The aim of a comparison of two traditions is not an aim in itself. In the paper the „approximation“ of two cultures has the role of a mirror of self-comprehension. Merleau-Ponty’s intention to bring philosophy „down to earth“ is implemented by the boundaries of „inner-outer“ and crossing subjectivity and objectivity in the Cartesian paradigm. His phenomenology of the body is „understandable“ or, better to say, „elucidatory“ through the term of pranayama – the yogic breath control. Emphasis on experiencing, „movement in space“ – dimensionality, is endorsing this relationship. Moreover, both approaches have a common point: reversibility – switch, or reverse – of the figure and the ground back and forth at will. In Merleau-Ponty’s concept of the „lived body“ the reversibility is a continuum of the world and the body and in yoga it is pranic inspiration-expiration experience.

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