The Phenomenological Movement: A Tradition without Method? Merleau-Ponty and Husserl

Section I tries to analyze the ambivalence of Merleau-Ponty ‘s references to Husserl. On the one hand, they indicate a deconstruction of Husserl ‘s phenomenological method; on the other hand, there are attempts to “save” Husserl. Section II is a critical evaluation ofMerleau-Ponty ‘s account of the development ofHusserl ‘s phenomenology. Section III deals with his rejection of the reduction, the account of eidetic intuition, and intentionality. Section IV is an attempt to characterize the motives behind Merleau-Ponty ‘s disinterest in method.

The preconscious, the unconscious, and the subconscious: A phenomenological explication

The Apodicticity of Absence

Husserl criticizes traditional metaphysics. Nevertheless, for Derrida, ‘metaphysics’ finest hour is represented by Husserl—The ‘return to the things themselves’ is precisely this ultimate effacement of metaphysics in the act of its predominance. The ‘principle of principles,’ that which guarantees the truth of the things themselves is an essential metaphysical one: the presence of presence to itself.”1 Derrida himself says: “The ultimate form of ideality, the ideality of ideality,... is the living present, the self-presence of transcendental life. Presence has always been and will always, forever, be the form in which, we can say apodictically, the infinite diversity of contents is produced…

Fichte's and Husserl's critique of Kant's transcendental deduction

The specific topic of this chapter is the difference between the attempt in speculative and dialectical thinking on the one hand, and transcendental phenomenology on the other, to solve the enigmas presented by Kant’s transcendental deduction. The thesis is that they are diametrically opposed. The main concern is systematic and not philological-historical. That means, among other things, that the well-known fact that Husserl has a certain preference for the deduction in edition A and that Fichte refers mostly to edition B will not be corroborated in an interpreting of all the passages in both in which they refer to the deduction. What is at stake is a general systematic and theoretical expl…

Naturalism, Historism, and Phenomenology

According to a generally accepted thesis, science and metaphysics are separate intellectual activities. The thesis is new and not generally accepted in the philosophical systems of Classical Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the first centuries in the development of the modern philosophy. The thesis presupposes the existence of sciences and their methodologies. Natural sciences in the modern sense exist since the sixteenth century, human sciences since the first half of the nineteenth century, and formal sciences since the end of the nineteenth century. Only the relation between the natural and the human sciences as empirical sciences are of interest for this investigation. Systematic reflect…

Individuals, Identity, Names: Phenomenological Considerations

In Husserl’s early writings (the Logical Investigations and the first section of Ideas I) the main concern of phenomenological investigations is the givenness of the ideal entities of logic and formal ontology. Another field in his earlier writings is the phenomenology of perception and time consciousness. This field of research broadens into the vision of a universal transcendental aesthetics, which, in his later writings, provides the basis for solving the problem of intersubjectivity.1 The final “synthesis” of these fields and problem domains is to be found in the phenomenological theory of the life-world. Lectures and research manuscripts2 of the late period show also that this second f…

The Hermeneutics of Texts

The second canon is the canon of the whole and the parts and implies the hermeneutical circle between the whole and the parts: understanding the whole presupposes understanding the parts and vice versa. The task of this essay is not to solve the methodological difficulties of the practical application of the canon to texts and their contexts. Such a solution would require a complicated and lengthy investigation of the different aspects of the application of the canon to the methodology of philological text interpretation and historical research concerning the original contexts of texts. A brief sketch of one simple aspect of the application of the second canon will be given in the last sect…

Facts, Words, and What Jurisprudence Can Teach Hermeneutics

“Deconstruction” in the Framework of Traditional Methodical Hermeneutics

(1986). “Deconstruction” in the Framework of Traditional Methodical Hermeneutics. Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology: Vol. 17, No. 3, pp. 275-288.

Husserl on the Human Sciences in Ideen II

Interpreted according to the intentions of the author in Ideen I, Ideen II (with Ideen III) analyzes the relation between phenomenology and the natural and the spiritual sciences. Dilthey and early twentieth century discussions of the Geisteswissenschaften, the historical sciences in particular, are not examined by Husserl, but reflections on the personalistic attitude explicates Dilthey’s intentions. The person, motivation, communities, cultural objects, psychology, and relations with nature and with transcendental phenomenology are considered, as are pertinent abstractive reductions. References to continuations of the analyses here in later works of Husserl are also included.