Merleau-Ponty’s Concept of the Unconscious in Perception and the Attempt to Model Cognitive Information Processing in Cognitive Science and AI

Abstract

In L’institution, la passivité. Notes de cours au Collège de France (1954-1955), Maurice Merleau-Ponty develops approaches to a concept of the unconscious that can also be relevant to a mental philosophy from the perspective of cognitive science and AI in the tradition of continental philosophy. I consider this all the more important as previous attempts at an analytical philosophy of AI tend to remain stuck in Cartesian or Platonic dualism, which – as a dream of Silicon Valley – could encourage gnostic thinking (Irrgang 2021).