Close(r)

Things are progressing here. And I am not just talking about the thesis, but I am talking about that too! I mean in each area of concern to me, things are moving forward! We got couches, my fellowship stipend should be coming in soon, my books are on their way, wedding details are coming together, reading is going well, and I think I may have found my argument for the thesis.

Aristotle and I might have to fight...

In general, flesh and the tongue are related to the organs of touch and taste, as air and water are to those of sight, hearing, and smell. Hence in neither the one case nor the other can there be any perception of an object if it is placed immediately upon the organ, e.g. if a white object is placed on the surface of the eye. This again shows that what has the power of perceiving the tangible is seated inside. Only so would there be a complete analogy with all the other senses. In their case if your lace the object on the organ it is not perceived, here if you place it on the flesh it is perceived; therefore the flesh is the medium of touch. (423b 18-26)

 So, in the passage above Aristotle concedes his first claim that flesh is the sense-organ of touch (423a 15-17: if we take 'body' to represent the whole organism, making the faculty of touch commensurate with the body, melding sense-organ and medium). Instead of taking the flesh to be the organ, he claims that it is seated inside; in fact, in other writings, he claims it is next to the heart. But this argument seems a little ad hoc to me -- touch must be analogous to the other senses, therefore the sense-organ and medium must be distinct entities. Perhaps, I am being a little unfair to Aristotle here, but I want to argue in my thesis for what seems to be his original claim: touch is a unique sense in which the sense-organ and the medium are one and the same. With that being said, I will have to develop why this structure works in other senses and why it doesn't have to apply to the sense of touch. In other words, why is touch unique?

Why this project? Well, I have been fascinated by a phenomenology of exposure for a while now, and it would be an interesting project to be able to develop a view of touch that does explicitly regard expose as its primary essence -- flesh, the organ, is out there. It is exposed. Even in having a medium, the sense of exposure is present for Aristotle, and he makes all animal life dependent on the sense of touch. But I think that in mediating the sense-organ and the object, a double distance is created that acts that a wedge in later philosophies. Meaning the immediacy that is interrupted by posing an internal organ could be further interrupted by posing that the body doesn't sense at all -- it is even further inward: the mind only perceives! Perhaps a slippery slope argument, but one that has played out. It may be my own reaction to the digital age of disembodiment, but I strongly react against dualistic notions or potential dualistic notions. This is something that may have to be reigned in to a degree, but for now it is motivating.

Anyways, I will keep whoever is reading this informed or just continue to work out these crazy and ridiculous thoughts of mine in a digital space (I do appreciate the irony). Peace!