The perceptual psychology — form perceived whole, as an organized configuration of figure and ground — that Cameron makes the hinge of McLuhan's late method. Cameron dates a specific turn: McLuhan reads Wolfgang Köhler's Gestalt Psychology in 1964, and from that moment everything becomes figure and ground. Across the run it widens from a source into a way of seeing change, and finally into a lens the pair turn on Bob's own chart. Start with dialogue 07.
Across the dialogues
Enters as the 1964 hinge — the book that turns McLuhan wholly to figure and ground
Cameron dates the turn precisely — Köhler's Gestalt Psychology is the 1964 hinge after which McLuhan reads everything as figure and ground.
"he reads Wolfgang Kohler's book, Gestalt Psychology. And from that moment on, from 64 until 79, everything is figure and ground for McLuhan."
Generalized into a way of seeing change itself — form as possibility
The frame widens past perception — Cameron hears Bob describing change itself in Gestalt terms, form as possibility across the technological, social, and individual.
"you've been talking about technological and sociological and individual changes in form. In Gestalt, in possibility."
Absorbed into the chart's perceptual grammar, the analytic against the synesthetic
Gestalt enters the chart's perceptual grammar as a paired opposition — the analytic against the synesthetic, a rung in Bob's sequence of sensory contrasts.
"Then analytic versus synesthetic Gestalt."
Turned reflexive — the chart's own figures read as a dynamic Gestalt
The lens turns reflexive — Cameron proposes reading the chart's own figures, Bob included, as one dynamic Gestalt.
"all of the different figures of your chart, including yourself, could be thought of in terms of this sort of dynamic Gestalt."
Connections
The Gestalt figure/ground distinction is the source McLuhan turns into his master pattern — "everything is figure and ground" from 1964 on.
McLuhan's route in is Köhler's book Gestalt Psychology, the 1964 hinge Cameron dates the turn to.
From the moment he reads Köhler, everything is figure and ground for McLuhan.