Existence permeates sexuality and vice versa, so that it is impossible to determine, in a given decision or action, the proportion of sexual to other motivations, impossible to label a decision or act ‘sexual’ or ‘non-sexual’ . There is no outstripping of sexuality any more than there is sexuality enclosed within itself. No one is saved and no one is totally lost.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that sexuality is intricately connected to existence and motivations, making it difficult to classify actions as purely sexual or non-sexual.
Maurice Merleau-Ponty's statement reflects on the complexity of human experience, particularly the relationship between existence and sexuality. He argues that sexuality cannot be isolated from other aspects of life, and every decision or action is influenced by an amalgamation of motivations that include, but are not limited to, sexual ones. This interconnectedness implies that human actions are multifaceted, and trying to label them strictly as 'sexual' or 'non-sexual' oversimplifies the rich tapestry of human behavior and existence.
In practice
In a discussion about the influences behind human behavior, this quote can highlight how intertwined our motivations are.
All thought of something is at the same time self-consciousness [...] At the root of all our experiences and all our reflections, we find [...] a being which immediately recognises itself, [...] and which knows its own existence, not by observation and as a given fact, nor by inference from any idea of itself, but through direct contact with that existence. Self-consciousness is the very being of mind in action.
True reflection presents me to myself not as idle and inaccessible subjectivity, but as identical with my presence in the world and to others, as I am now realizing it: I am all that I see, I am an intersubjective field, not despite my body and historical situation, but, on the contrary, by being this body and this situation, and through them, all the rest.
The number and richness of man's signifiers always surpasses the set of defined objects that could be termed signifieds. The symbolic function must always precede its object and does not encounter reality except when it precedes it into the imaginary.
Visible and mobile, my body is a thing among things; it's caught in the fabric of the world, and its cohesion is that of a thing. But, because it moves itself and sees, it holds things in a circle around itself.
We must therefore rediscover, after the natural world, the social world, not as an object or sum of objects, but as a permanent field or dimension of existence.
I will never know how you see red and you will never know how I see it. But this separation of consciousness is recognized only after a failure of communication, and our first movement is to believe in an undivided being between us.
Most minds are the slaves of external circumstances, and conform to any hand that undertakes to mould them.
When God's justice falls, we are offended because we think God owes perpetual mercy. We must not take His grace for granted. We must never lose our capacity to be amazed by grace
The history of the world is the record of the weakness, frailty and death of public opinion.
If people dying as a consequence of the implementation of measures cannot count as evidence that the legislation has detrimental effects, what would?
Humans have certain properties and characteristics which are intrinsic to them, just as every other organism does. That's human nature.
I have done for my country, and for all mankind, all that I could do, and I now resign my soul, without fear, to my God - my daughter to my country.
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