Merleau-Ponty's Theory Of Embodiment Space

The purpose of this paper is to describe Merleau-Ponty's space theory,which is based on his special understanding of the body.I will start from the description of the spatial orientation inverted phenomena happened in Stratton's vision inversion experiment.Confronted by this phenomena,both empiricism and intellectualism fall into an explanation plight.Then I will figure out how Merleau-Ponty's embodiment space theory explains this experiment,and during this process,I will and have to elaborate.Merleau-Ponty's embodiment space theory in details.In Stratton's experiment,the spatial orientation was inverted twice.The first time happened when the subject was made to wear glasses which correct the retinal images at the beginning of the experiment.The second time happened one day later.Empiricism conceives space as the setting in which things are arranged or as characteristics things have in common,so they take the orientated space as given along with the contents of sense experience.However,the experiment shows that the same contents can be successively orientated in one direction or another,therefore,Empiricism's space theory is proven wrong.Intellectualism thinks of space as the universal power enabling things to be connected or as an indivisible system governing the acts of unification performed by a constituting mind.But it cannot even concede that the image of the world,after the glasses are put on,is inverted.To explain what happened in Stratton's experiment,Merleau-Ponty thinks we have to look for the first-hand experience of space.In his opinion,space originated from an embodiment subject living in a world.When a body inhabits a world,space is formed.But how does a body inhabit a world?To answer this question,I will firstly elaborate how a body perceives things;the structure of perception is focus-horizon;the process of horizon synthesis is a prelogical unity process guided by the bodily schema.What counts for the synthesis is not my body as it in fact is.as a thing in objective space,but as a system of possible actions,a virtual body with its phenomenal 'place' defined by its task and situation;a body is wherever there is something to be done.So.the possession of a body implies the ability to change the orientation of the space.Space takes root in embodiment experience and is dependent upon them,and the constitution of a spatial level is simply the appearance of constituting an integrated world:my body is geared onto the world when my perception presents me with a spectacle as varied and as clearly articulated as possible,and when my motor intentions receive the responses they expect from the world,then a spatial level is constituted.Consequently,when the first time space orientation inverted.the body confronted the experiential disturbance in the specific situation and the visual field appears both inverted and unreal.After one day,when the body inhabited into the inverted world,the space orientation went back to normal.That is how the second inversion happened.Hence this paper will not only explain the spatial phenomena in Stratton's experiment,but also unfold Merleau-Ponty's embodiment space theory.