Summary

Perception is participation between perceiver and that which is perceived. The animate world has a flow of participation opportunities which humans can engage, refuse to engage in, or objectively try to analyze. When fully engaged, there is a synaethesia, and this overlap and blending of all the senses is consistently and constantly going on—whether humans participate in it or not. Additionally, while the animate world repeats patterns that are not exactly like, like the bark on an oak trees, the mass-produced consumer products of the human world repeat without variation. This, Abram suggests, is why humans consistently need newer models of devices to stimulate our senses.

Merleau-Ponty describes the interconnectivity as a collective Flesh, a “matrix” that gives rise to the participatory experience. Here, the perceiver and perceived are made of the same matter. Abram notes that when we meet another human...