Idealization and abstraction are central concepts in the philosophy of science and in science itself. My goal in this paper is suggest an account of these concepts, building on and refining an existing view due to Jones Idealization XII: correcting the model. Idealization and abstraction in the sciences, vol 86. Rodopi, Amsterdam, pp 173–217, 2005) and Godfrey-Smith Mapping the future of biology: evolving concepts and theories. Springer, Berlin, 2009). On this line of thought, abstraction—which I call, for reasons to be (...) explained, abstractness—involves the omission of detail, whereas idealization consists in a deliberate mismatch between a description and the world. I will suggest that while the core idea underlying these authors’ view is correct, they make several assumptions and stipulations that are best avoided. For one thing, they tie abstractness too close to truth. For another, they do not allow sufficient room to the difference between idealization and error. Taking these points into account leads to a refined account of the distinction, in which abstractness is seen in terms of relative richness of detail, and idealization is seen as closely connected with the knowledge and intentions of idealizers. I lay out these accounts in turn, and then discuss the relationship between the two concepts, and several other upshots of the present way of construing the distinction. (shrink)

Challenging and rewarding in equal measure, _Phenomenology of Perception_ is Merleau-Ponty's most famous work. Impressive in both scope and imagination, it uses the example of perception to return the body to the forefront of philosophy for the first time since Plato. Drawing on case studies such as brain-damaged patients from the First World War, Merleau-Ponty brilliantly shows how the body plays a crucial role not only in perception but in speech, sexuality and our relation to others.

A number of essays and interviews published between 1997 and 2008, revised for this publication with V2_.

First published in 1996, The Eyes of the Skin has become a classic of architectural theory. It asks the far-reaching question why, when there are five senses, has one single sense – sight – become so predominant in architectural culture and design? With the ascendancy of the digital and the all-pervasive use of the image electronically, it is a subject that has become all the more pressing and topical since the first edition’s publication in the mid-1990s. Juhani Pallasmaa argues that (...) the suppression of the other four sensory realms has led to the overall impoverishment of our built environment, often diminishing the emphasis on the spatial experience of a building and architecture’s ability to inspire, engage and be wholly life enhancing. For every student studying Pallasmaa’s classic text for the first time, The Eyes of the Skin is a revelation. It compellingly provides a totally fresh insight into architectural culture. This third edition meets readers’ desire for a further understanding of the context of Pallasmaa’s thinking by providing a new essay by architectural author and educator Peter MacKeith. This text combines both a biographical portrait of Pallasmaa and an outline of his architectural thinking, its origins and its relationship to the wider context of Nordic and European thought, past and present. The focus of the essay is on the fundamental humanity, insight and sensitivity of Pallasmaa’s approach to architecture, bringing him closer to the reader. This is illustrated by Pallasmaa’s sketches and photographs of his own work. The new edition also provides a foreword by the internationally renowned architect Steven Holl and a revised introduction by Pallasmaa himself. (shrink)

Our sense of space depends on our embodiment, specifically on a topology of the lived body. ;Spatial perception does not recover static spatial dimensions that are specified outside perception, as some traditional theories claim. Chapter one shows this through studies that criticise Descartes's and Berkeley's accounts of depth perception, and trace their continuing influence. A study of The Phenomenology of Perception shows how Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology demands a new account that conceives depth and spatial perception as phenomena motivated by our embodiment. (...) ;Chapter two develops this new account. Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology and results in psychology show that there is a body schema, and that it shapes perception. A study that begins with binocular vision shows how the body schema shapes depth perception, given that perception depends on a place that supports our motor-perceptual relations to things. Another study shows that the body schema is a primordial habit. This means that the body schema--and hence spatial perception--can be labile, developmental, continuous with a world of human meaning, and that exterior places can be incorporated into our lived bodies and into our sense of space. ;Chapter three conceives webs of relations between parts of the lived body, things, others and places as topologies of the lived body that are specified in the body schema, and that give sense to spatial perception. A study of orientation perception in weightlessness reveals a topology that gives sense to orientation perception. Another study suggests a topology that gives sense to distance perception. These studies show how such topologies: are motivated by facts about the lived body that acquire meaning within the body schema, express a perceptual concern for our embodied being in the world, and relate us to place. ;In the conclusion, I suggest that spatial perception crucially reflects our relation to others, since the body schema, and hence the topology of the lived body, are rooted in habit, and develop through our embodiment within a social and cultural world. This suggests a program of future research, and that a phenomenological account of spatial perception is integral to existential understandings of our relations to others. (shrink)

It is not only in science that abstraction is found as a method of dealing with the world, and we may profitably begin by showing its wide use in ordinary practical life.