The Fate of Perception in a Post-Screen World: A Merleau-Pontian Inquiry

Abstract

This paper examines the evolution of human perception in a post-screen world, characterized by the growing prevalence of immersive, ambient, and wearable technologies that supplant conventional screen-based mediation. Utilizing Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology of perception, the research reevaluates embodiment, spatiality, and sensorimotor intentionality in the context of augmented reality, artificial intelligence, and pervasive computing. While current research predominantly examines screen cultures and digital visuality, this paper introduces an innovative theoretical framework by suggesting a phenomenology of post-screen perception, wherein perceptual experience is no longer chiefly structured around framed visual interfaces but is instead disseminated through bodily movement, haptic feedback, and environmental responsiveness. The paper contends that post-screen technologies transform the lived body (corps propre) from a perceiving subject in front of a screen into a dynamically integrated node within hybrid physical–digital environments. By expanding upon Merleau-Ponty's notions of flesh, intercorporeality, and operative intentionality, the research formulates a novel framework for examining the transformation of perceptual habits, attentional structures, and bodily orientation in post-screen contexts. This Merleau-Pontian investigation introduces a novel phenomenological lexicon for comprehending emerging modalities of mediated perception and presents a critical philosophical counterpoint to technologically determinist interpretations of digital experience.