How does Husserl’s elaboration of intentionality help present the phenomena of inter-subjectivity, constitutionality and the life-world?
Phenomenology is, at one time, a school of thought on top of a methodology. At its most fundamental level, phenomenology is an expressive investigation of lived incidents that precede attempts to present theoretical explanations of the phenomena in question. It does this through an evocative analysis of the interactions of the objects of consideration as disclosed in consciousness. This understanding encompasses the insight that all individual thought is intentional (it has an object). In other words, human thinking always has the feature of “about-ness” if one is thinking about something. The term intentionality began with Jeremy Bentham, who used it as a rule of utility in his dogma of consciousness. This was for the reason of distinguishing acts that are intentional and those that are not. The term passed to Edmund Husserl in his dogma that consciousness is constantly intentional, a concept that he worked on in connection with theories set forth by Franz Brentano concerning the ontological and psychological condition of objects of thought. This is what Brentano thinks about this matter:
Every mental occurrence expressed by what the Scholars of the Middle Ages referred to as the intentional (or mental) non-existence of an object, and what we may call, though not fully unambiguously, reference to a substance, trend towards an object (which is not to be implicated here as meaning an entity), or immanent objectivity. Each rational phenomenon contains an object inside itself, although they all may not do so in a similar way. In presentation, an object present in judgment, an object accepted or rejected; in love loved, in loath loathed and desire desired. This intentional in-existence is distinctive exclusively of mental phenomena and thus no corporeal phenomenon exhibits anything like it. We could, therefore, describe mental phenomena by stating that they are those phenomena which have an object intentionally in themselves.”
Franz Brentano: Psychology from an Empirical point, edited by Linda L. McAlister (London: Routledge, 1995), page 88–89.
This paper seeks to demonstrate that the thought that consciousness is essentially intentional, or that it characterizes itself through its directness to the world, is the key discovery of phenomenology. This is the underlying assumption in Husserl’s exposition. Emmanuel Levinas (who was amongst the first in France to analyze Husserl systematically), for instance, describes intentionality as emancipation, contributing the novel idea of “a going out from one self [soi]; a primordial event affecting all others and incapable of interpretation by certain deeper but internal movement of the Soul” (Levinas 2005, 261 [1965, 35]).
Articulated in regards of transcendence, intentionality is also essential for Heidegger’s and Sartre’s existential ontology and Beauvoir’s ethics. While remaining a concept that overlooked and additionally explained within fashionable phenomenology, intentionality refers to the idea that to be conscious is being conscious of something. When someone perceives, feels, wishes or makes a judgment, these experiences point towards perceived, felt, wished and judged things, individuals or states of affair (IdI 73-74, 200 [64-65, 168-169]).
From the perspective of being in existence, it is also with respect to intentionality that Arendt considered Husserlian phenomenology a response to the current feeling of homelessness. The absence of identity of being and thought, in her elucidation, refocuses on what presents as a “second creation” of the world: the deviation through the intentional composition of consciousness (Arendt 2002 [1946], 346). Husserl’s account is an effort to describe how the logic alter ego (other I) emanates from inside transcendental subjectivity. Amid other things, this involves saying what it is to have an experience as of another or in other words, it involves providing the necessary and sufficient conditions of possessing an incident as of another. Given the assumption that, for Husserl, this perceptual experience as of another has conceptual content, this query is close to that one of what are the necessary and adequate conditions for tenure of the concept alter ego.
In the fifth meditation, Husserl focuses on answering what he refers to as the dilemma of transcendental solipsism. This transcendental solipsism is not the vision that the “I” is the only existent subject matter. Rather, it is the vision that the sense alter ego is not explainable from inside transcendental subjectivity. In accordance with Husserl’s transcendental phenomenology, a logic S can, solitarily, be legitimated by indicating how intentional states with S in their substance can be constituted amid transcendental subjectivity. If such an object is not possible, then S should be illegitimate. The reversal of transcendental solipsism is the one of presenting that and how this is not the idea for the logic alter ego. To shun transcendental solipsism, Husserl must show what it is to possess the sense alter ego. This is to be achieved by tracing the logic alter ego to a further basic, founding, stage of intentional states which provides to make it possible.
Phenomenology sometimes presents into solipsism (but not quite). The main danger is that restricting phenomenology to the activity of “my ego” infiltrates realism again. Husserl, in this case, is not discussing idealistic solipsism at all; that indicates the world as nothing but a product of “my ego”. Otherness, as constituted by my ego, gives out a “transcendental clue”. Others are not mere objects but active subjects [4th Meditation]. Correspondingly, the natural and social worlds are both noematically inter-subjective. What makes others subjects? The solution includes seeing how one presents as a subject then this may be practiced to others. The response lies in two areas as discussed below.
Discussing how one come up with categories like “mine” versus “other”.
Ones “own-ness”, the concept of self, appears as shown in the 4th meditation. This involves performing syntheses which unify and synthesizing one’s own “objects”. They form one’s own (recognizable) world, the “primordial world”. Now this, essentially, presupposes a notion of “otherness”. This otherness enables a person to transcend their earlier primordial world (to synthesize fresh products as in the works of motive in the 4th meditation). One can assume an initial otherness- others must have helped (add sense) to ones world. These other basics are not real entities, which are accessible, discovered – they originate from other men. The other regions of the world are a “collective” idea.
- Otherness of human beings is not straightforwardly accessible. In fact, if people could simply access otherness by reflection, or any other way, it would show it belonged to personal quintessence right from the start. Humans have to discover it; they discover latest knowledge about objects through a process of “appresentations” (or “apperception’). They identify, say, the front of a house the way it appears, but this presentation involves an obligatory rear view of a house (they do not perceive such directly, but figure it out from insight – they apperceive it). People can substantiate this appresentation by additional perceptions (they go around the back and 1ook). They cannot practice this for human others, in any case. They have to make use of a peculiar analogy rather than simply totaling on perceptions. They use easy analogies all the time such as in understanding newly presented objects. They say that they are similar to (analogous to) formerly experienced objects. Once more, with other people it is not that easy – it is a peculiar analogy that works.
- People get closer to this unique analogy by considering the matter of “pairing”. For instance, one can “pair” the human body of the other person with one’s. The pairing correlation “transfers sense (meaning)”. As such, if the other person’s body is alike to one’s, one can transfer sense from his/her understanding of one’s body to the other’s body. For instance, people can have similar bodies with similar movements. If one knows his/hers is dynamic (alive), one can transfer this sense and conclude the other body is too. Can one transfer one’s perception of own consciousness? Again, one knows that his/her solid body “contains” transcendental consciousness. The other body can demonstrate that they are similar. To do this, they have to provide one with certain behavior, which has to be unpredictable- past one’s control; this signifies it is genuine. It has to assume the form of a “harmonious synthesis” as it flows ultimately. If both criteria succeed, one can make out this behavior as an analogue of one’s individual activity. One can deduce that the other is a subject because it modifies synthesizes and concretize the world just like he/she does.
- Reciprocity gives an extra clue. Humans visualize the world from a definite “here” but they can alter their vantage points. Any “there” can turn into a “here” for people if they move. Therefore, they can see if the other is a legitimate other or not by perceiving the way he acts when he is there, and next going there themselves and finding out if it is the same. If perceptions of their actions enabled people to know the way they would look if they were there, then they would conclude that their world is an analogue of others’.
- There arises a problem. Even if, one currently recognizes the existence of others, still cannot explain how one can chat with others. There is the deduction, by observing the physical existence of the other that he or she exists as a body. People can make use of this appearance of their bodies to infer their full harmony as persons. With objects, appresentation occurs – people apperceive objects as 3-d harmonies even if they only see a single aspect of it. With persons, people apperceive a different harmony; they apperceive them as bodies unified with consciousness. In a similar way, they unite into parts with bodies and consciousness. Again, humans cannot presume that others’ consciousness is the same as theirs (with regard to contents, as it were) since, if so, it would not be authentic. However, they can gather that their consciousness has a transcendental structure.
Discussing how one finds belonging to a shared world, which gives them a universal “stratum of the phenomenal humanity”
All is blooming, now that there exists a prospective for communication, and one is aware that there exists intentional communication. There is thence a community amid men, inventing the analogy that, just as personal egos have transcendental egos, so the community possesses transcendental inter-subjectivity. This transcendental inter-subjectivity has unlimited possibilities, which concretize out, into specific cultural communities. Concretion performs for the inter-subjective realms the way it is for the individual. Hence we can appreciate “sociality” (the arrangements of the life-world) by reference to the organization of transcendental inter-subjectivity (Schutz et.al.).
Positivistic science, just like common-sense, is naive, crammed with paradoxes and crises, bedeviled with “unclear intentionality”, etc. So is formal sense. The first level of person is inter-subjectivity. The direction to knowledge is through self-knowledge, self-reflection, plus exploring inter- subjectivity. Thus, there is a new point to St. Augustine’s jingles “Noli fores ire, in te rede, in interior e hominis habitat,” which translates into “Do not desire to go outside: settle inside as truth dwells in the interior man.”
Edmund Husserl’s general view of Phenomenology
The manner in which Edmund Husserl presents phenomenology in this book shows that he was of the intention of proposing a cure of the “crisis of the European sciences” which by extent is “crisis of European humanity.” He sees phenomenology as an effort of improving human beings’ understanding of themselves and their world by way of careful description of experience. While it may seem a little more than naturalistic observation and introspection on the outer surface, a closer look reveal that the basic assumptions are quite different from those of the mainstream experimentally-oriented human sciences (Husserl). In other words, Husserl tries to combine mathematics, psychology and philosophy so as to provide a sound foundation for mathematics. He put into thorough analysis the psychological process required to achieve the concept of number after which the tries to construct a systematic theory on this analysis. He employs a number of methods borrowed from his teachers to obtain this. His key conceptual elaborations assert that one would need to distinguish between the act of consciousness and the phenomena at the objects intended so as to correctly study the structure of consciousness. As such the knowledge of essences would be possible only if there is “bracketing” of all assumptions about the very existence of an external world in a process he calls epoche (Greek, for “a cessation”). He uses the term to refer to the suspension of judgment on the true nature of reality. As such bracketed judgment is largely a suspension of inquiry or an epoche of an analysis which places in brackets any facts that belong to the essential being. Bracketing is also seen as neutralization of belief involving doxic positing or the positing of belief. It is argued that doxic positing can happen in every kind of consciousness for the reason that every consciousness can actually or potentially posit something regarding being (Husserl).
Husserl criticizes modernity in the book through “mathematization of nature.” He interprets nature as in reality mathematical and therefore it is amenable to a form o knowledge which is critically mathematical. He agues that modern knowledge does a “mathematical substruction of the world.” This means that the world as a whole is understood as being fundamentally mathematical. As a result, all qualitative features are therefore understood as secondary effects that are deeply rooted in human subjectivity.
The beginning of Phenomenology is in the aspect of phenomena, which in this case is appearances. An appearance is here taken to be that which human beings experience, that which is given and therefore stays with them henceforth. The definition of an experience is not limited to qualifications as to be an experience. On the contrary, however, by adopting a phenomenological attitude, human beings ask the experience to tell them what it is.
The most basic type of phenomenology is the description of a particular phenomenon which has its individual uniqueness. Good examples would be a person, a thing, or a short happening. Three steps are identified to this effect:
- Intuiting– this refers to the very act of experiencing or recalling the phenomenon itself. In other words, intuiting entails living the phenomenon, or believing in it, or holding it your awareness, dwelling on it or in it.
- Analyzing – this basically involves examining or looking for aspects relating to the phenomenon. The aspects are investigated both in their outward forms (i.e. actions, objects) and in their inward forms (i.e. feelings thoughts, and images).
- Describing – in this third step the description of the phenomenon is written down. The description is done in totally new or different manner, in a way that the reader has never experienced. The reader is adequately guided through the intuiting and analyzing by the writer. However, attitude plays a key role in these three steps. The attitude you have to maintain as you perform them makes the steps difficult although they are simple in themselves. Firstly, the is the demand or requirement to have certain level for the phenomenon itself. Intuiting is done carefully fro all angles, both mentally and physically making sure that nothing is overlooked or left out of the analysis that righty belongs to it.
Intentionality, which refers to the mutuality of the subject and the object in experience is a very basic point in phenomenology. Both an intending act and an intended object are aspects that constitute all phenomena. As such it is argued that any science which fails to take account of them commits the sin of suppressing evidence and will consequently end with a truncated universe.
However, caution is given for human beings to be on guard against including things in their descriptions that may not belong there. This is where the function of bracketing comes in, the argument being that people must put aside all biases they may have regarding the phenomenon. Consider when you have a prejudice against a person, it is definite that you will see what you expect as opposed to seeing what is there. The same is true with the phenomena as a whole. Thus one must be approach the phenomenon without any religious beliefs, theories, metaphysical assumptions, hypotheses, or even the common sense conceptions that are characteristic with human. Finally, bracketing refers to suspending judgments regarding the “true nature” or “ultimate reality” of the experience itself regardless of whether or not it exists. In other terms, the phenomenon is regarded as gospel truth and thus there are not to be any challenge or arguments to it (Husserl).
Nevertheless, phenomonologfy still leaves room for seeking the essence or structure of a thing or something. This is in appreciation of the nature of humans to always want to question or say something about the class of the phenomenon. This is especially so when it involves people or cultures, or even any other massive undertaking. For instance, there is often investigation on such aspects as being male or female, anger, happiness and so on. To the extreme, as has been the case with many a phenomenological existentialists, an attempt to have seek the essence of being human.
Edmund Husserl brings forth a method know as free imaginative variation. By this he challenges anyone who may have a modification for a phenomenon. Husserl argues that whenever a person feels that he or she has a better description of the key characteristics of any category of phenomena, they should ask themselves some basic questions first. These essential questions could something like: “What can I change or leave out without the danger of losing the phenomenon? If it is “being human,” for instance: Is a dead body human or is it a disembodied spirit, or person in a permanent coma? Is it a porpoise with intelligence and personality, or even a just-fertilized egg? or just six-month old fetus? What is truly “being human?” (Husserl).
Husserl submits that phenomenology provides people with a great better chance of developing a true understanding of their very human existence. This is because, according to Husserl, phenomenology makes the world regain some of its solidity while the mind is re-permitted to a reality of its own. In addition, with phenomenology a rather paranoid skepticism is adequately replaced with a more generous and satisfying curiosity.
Husserl regards facts or realities as the objective data of empirical intuition essences as well as being the objective data of essential intuition. He states that empirical intuition has the potential of leading to essential insight or essential intuition. The latter may either be adequate or inadequate on the basis of its clearness and distinctness. He explains that empirical or non-empirical objects can have varying degrees of intuitability while the empirical or non-empirical intuitions can vary greatly in their clearness and distinctness as well. For instance, non-empirical intuitions can apprehend those objects which come by as a result of fantasy or imagination.
Husserl description of consciousness is intriguing. He describes it as “intentional insofar as it refers to, or is directed at, an object.” He says that intentionality is the property of directedness toward an object or a thing. He also contrasts consciousness and intentionality saying that the former may have intentional and non-intentional phases while the latter is the one that gives consciousness its objective meaning (Husserl).
He identifies the cogito (meaning “I think”) as the principle of the pure ego. The correlation comes in by the fact that the pure ego performs acts of consciousness (cogitations). The consciousness or cogitations may either be immanently or transcendently directed at an object. The definition of immanently directed acts of consciousness is given as those objects which are within the same Ego. In other words, they are those objects which belong to the same stream of consciousness. On the other hand, transcendently directed acts of consciousness are the objects outside the ego, or those which belong to another stream of consciousness. The term cogitate is used to refer to objects of consciousness, the embodied or unembodied things perceived or consciously experienced.
Husserl further notes that the difference between immanent and transcendent perception is what reflects the clear difference between being as experience and being as thing. He explains that things as they exist in themselves cannot be perceived immanently therefore they can only be perceived transcendently. Furthermore, he establishes that the difference between immanent and transcendent perception is also what reflects the difference in the manner in which things are presented to the consciousness. In this respect, the givenness may either be adequate or inadequate in terms of its clearness and distinctness, as well as in its intuitability (Husserl).
It is the take of Husserl that immanently perceived objects are those that have an absolute Being insofar as their existence is logically necessary. However it is argued that the very existence of transcendently perceived objects is not logically necessary. This is because their existence is said not to be proved by the being of conciousness itself. While the latter is absolute Being the spatial-temporal world is merely perceived as a phenomenal being (Husserl).
In summary, Edmund Husserl points that phenomenology is concerned with the essence of whatever is immanent in consciousness. In this respect it is concerned with describing the immanent essences. As such to confuse the essences of things with the mental representations of these essences equals to confusing the objectives of phenomenology and psychology. He explains that phenomenology is a descriptive analysis of being as consciousness. On other hand, he defines psychology as a descriptive analysis of being as reality. Interestingly, the perceived difference between being as consciousness and being as reality is also found to be the difference between transcendental and transcendent being (Husserl).
Every actual cogito has an intentional object besides being a consciousness of something. There is chance for cogito itself becoming a cogitatum. This is if the principle of “I think” becomes an object of consciousness itself. The act of thinking is itself an intentional object in the cogito. Nonethelsess, contrary to the Cartesian principle cogito ergo sum (meaning “I think, therefore I am”), the cogito reduced phenomenologically becomes a suspension of judgment regarding whether “I am” and whether “I exist.” The phenomenologically reduced cogito is therefore a suspension of judgment about the question of whether thinking implies existence or not. In general, therefore, phenomenology explores thecogito as a pure intuition, as well as it being an act of pure consciousness (Husserl).
Finally, the other important aspect thea Husserl addresses is that about noesis and noema – the two aspects of intentionality. He gives Noesis as the process of cogitation, while the noemata (or cogitata) are termed as that which are cogitated. He states that every intentional experience has both noetic or real phase and a noematic or non-real phase. Further, every noetic phase of consciousness does correspond to a noematic phase of consciousness. The meaning to intentional objects is therefore assigned by noesis which is a process of reasoning. Both noesis and noema can be a means to explain objective meaning. Whilst the noematic meaning of the immanent objects is discoverable through pure intuition, the noetic meaning of transcendent objects is discoverable through reason. In other words, noetic meaning is transcendent whilst noematic meaning is immanent. Thus, noesis and noema correspond respectively to experience and essence of an object by a person (Husserl).
Works Cited
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