reversibility, chiasm and écart

Compiled with AI assistance and selectively reviewed. Please consult the cited passages; the books remain the authoritative source. About this companion

Editorial synthesis · provisional

Definition

Reversibility, chiasm and écart name related but distinct features of Merleau-Ponty’s embodied account in RB2: the sensing body can also be sensed, bodily and worldly relations cross, and a noncoinciding interval remains. The proposed grouped entry preserves these differences rather than making shared flesh a fusion, simultaneous identity of touching and touched or an argument that every material process has experience.

Explanation

Reversibility concerns the body’s capacity to occupy sensing and sensible roles, exemplified by touching and being touched. RB2 insists the roles do not simply coincide in one instantaneous identity. The proposal retains their relation without eliminating the asymmetry that allows a perceiver to encounter something beyond its current act.

Chiasm names the crossing or intertwining of these relations within flesh, while écart names the interval or noncoincidence that prevents closure into a perfectly self-present whole. These are connected aspects of one discussion, not three interchangeable words for sameness. Their distinct sense labels remain explicit in the grouped proposal.

The gap leaves room for resistance, correction and a world exceeding possession. AB’s native summary explicitly limits intercorporeal comparisons rather than deriving panpsychism from shared materiality. The proposal thus preserves the source’s relational ontology without claiming transparent access to another person or distributing consciousness to every physical interaction.

Scope and attribution

Preserve the inherited grouped label with three differentiated senses.

AB — The Actual Book

The native summary retains anti-fusion and anti-panpsychist limits.

Occurrence locators: 112, 206; Notes: 242, 243, 250; Reading recommendations: 252.

PB — The Possible Book

Source-verified occurrence; see the printed-page references below.

Occurrence locators: 99, 153.

RB2 — The Real Book, Volume II: Becoming Is Being

Related sensing, crossing and noncoincidence remain differentiated within embodied flesh.

Occurrence locators: 8, 160, 161, 162.

RB3 — The Real Book, Volume III: Murmurations

Source-verified occurrence; see the printed-page references below.

Occurrence locators: 337.