Merleau-Ponty's Ontology, 2nd Edition [Paperback]

M. C. Dillon (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 306 pages
• Publisher: Northwestern University Press; 2nd edition (January 21, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 081011528X
• ISBN-13: 978-0810115286
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #365,932 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great explication of MP but a bit unfair to 'postmodernism', October 21, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Merleau-Ponty's Ontology, 2nd Edition (Paperback)

Dillon gives an illuminating discussion of the 'philosophical dualism' - e.g. in Descartes, Hume, Kant and Sartre - against which Merleau-Ponty is arguing. Dillon's treatment of Merleau-Ponty's central concepts is at once lucid and fair. I think this book would be ideal either as an introduction or as a supplement to MP's thought (Dillon offers some persuasive criticisms of MP as well). My only criticism is that Dillon's picture of 'poststructualism', of which Derrida is taken to be the 'whipping boy', is perhaps a bit unfair -- but the few oversimplifications are just as informative as Dillon's many accute insights into the "postmodern fervor." Anyone interested in MP should certainly check this mama out.

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A fabulous work., June 13, 2003

By 

Jason (Corvallis, OR United States) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Merleau-Ponty's Ontology (Studies in Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy) (Hardcover)

Pay no heed to the pretentiousness of what one reviewer decried as "bipolar" (good guys vs. bad guys) philosophy, this is the greatest secondary philosophical text I have ever read, and perhaps what really irritated the previous reviewer wasn't Dillon's "no real understanding of Husserl," or the "[tired] postmodernism-bashing [that] shows no real understanding of the positions under discussion", but rather was Dillon's own palatable disdain for such intellectual pretentiousness reverberating throughout his text. Rather than writing in ego-gratifying but incomprehensible prose, Dillon authors a wonderfully open and accessible philosophical text that clearly and cogently explains the complex issues under discussion, a feat that is ultimately more difficult than the all to common obscure and esoteric ramblings of modern philosophy.

Far from being a "bipolar" text, this book offers an intricate examination of the historical progression and ultimate failure of bipolar/reductionist thought in the western tradition, be it mind vs. body dualism, immanence vs. transcendence, or linguistic realism vs. conventionalism. Dillon demonstrates convincingly how polarizing (and ultimately second-order) constructions of reality ultimately betray the underlying ontological reality which they were designed to explain by rendering truth and judgment valuation impossible. He then goes on to explain why he believes that the thought of Merleau-Ponty, grounded on the ontological primacy of the phenomena, avoids this reifying of second-order abstractions that create ontological polarization and collapse reality into exclusive spheres of immanence or transcendence.

Moreover, contrary to what was said in the past review, Merleau-Ponty is never deified in the book as someone who "fell from the sky one day to solve all of our philosophical problems". Dillon has obvious disagreements with aspects of Merleau-Ponty's philosophy (read "The Body In Its Sexual Being" from M-P's Phenomenology of Perception and then Dillon's Beyond Romance for one example) that are not presented in this work due to its nature as a secondary text on Merleau-Ponty's ontology, published at a time when such a topic was rarely discussed. Still, this book never even approaches presenting Merleau-Ponty in such a god-like portrait; rather Dillon simply but methodically presents the case that Merleau-Ponty, unlike Sartre among others, offers a true phenomenological ontology grounded on the primacy of the phenomena that (if considered seriously) presents a real and unavoidable challenge to polarizing/reductionist ontological theories, including those that came to the fore after Merleau-Ponty's death in the "linguistic turn".

As the reviewer from the Moon says: "if good philosophy is what you want, it's rarely so bipolar."

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great, July 11, 2003

By 

Mattias Borjesson - See all my reviews

This review is from: Merleau-Ponty's Ontology, 2nd Edition (Paperback)

Dillon puts Merleau-Ponty in an historical persepctive and his thesis is that Merleau-Ponty's ontology is the first non-dualistic in western philosophy. Were Husserl failed becuse of his cartesian constraints Merelau-Ponty succedes. Dillon's masterful understanding of western philosophy and its limitations leads him to see Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology as the only true alternative to traditional thought. He now want us to understand this, and when we do continue in Merleau-Pontys direction and evolve philosophy from the constraints av tradtional dualistic thought.