The paper examines Husserl’s notion of teleology through the lens of necessity and argues that there are two senses of teleology—historical and transcendental—at work in the task of phenomenology, especially as Husserl comes to conceive it in theCrisis. To understand not only how these two senses are related but also how their relationship shapes Husserl’s notions of normativity, reason, and progress, I argue that we must look closely at phenomenology as a distinctive form of critique, namely critique ‘from within’. What (...) emerges is a philosophical stance that is fundamentally ambiguous: at once historical and transcendental-eidetic. This productive notion of ambiguity, I contend, differentiates Husserl’s conceptions of normativity, reason and progress from their Enlightenment guises. (shrink)

In this paper, we provide an overview of the main stages in the development of Edmund Husserl’s conception of metaphysics, highlighting its most significant characteristics. We propose that Husserl’s views on metaphysics traversed three main stages: (1) from the early 1890s until his so-called “transcendental turn” around 1906/07; (2) from his transcendental turn until the late 1920s, and (3) the metaphysical conceptualization during the 1930s, aptly characterized as—following the interpretation of László Tengelyi—a “metaphysics of primal facts” (Urfakta, Urtatsache). We further (...) demonstrate that Husserl’s considerations concerning metaphysics—throughout his entire opus—span three essential levels: (1) the epistemological level, in particular, phenomenological preparations to establish a foundation for metaphysics; (2) a level concerning metaphysics as the universal and ultimate science of reality, and (3) a level addressing metaphysics as a proper field of phenomenological investigations into the highest and ultimate questions (such as God and immortality). We argue in detail that Husserl attempted to render this field—which radically transcends the domain of possible intuitions (Anschauungen) and direct experience—accessible to a legitimate phenomenological treatment via the method of phenomenological constructions, prior to the efforts of Eugen Fink. (shrink)

Both Millikan’s brand of naturalistic analytic philosophy and Husserlian phenomenology have held on to teleological notions, despite their being out of favor in mainstream Western philosophy for most of the twentieth century. Both traditions have recognized the need for teleology in order to adequately account for intentionality, the need to adequately account for intentionality in order to adequately account for meaning, and the need for an adequate theory of meaning in order to precisely and consistently describe the world and life. (...) The stark differences between their accounts of these fundamental concepts stem from radically different conceptions of the world, the natural and life. I argue that Millikan’s teleosemantic approach relies on a teleology of determination by means of the lawfulness of nature that leaves no room for the freedom of self-determination, for reason, or for experience—for the reality of lived human life. In contrast to Millikan’s account, Husserl’s transcendental phenomenology situates teleology as a function of reason and first-personal experience, part of an extended account of intentionality and meaning according to which the full range of our making sense of the world is conceived as a rational activity that is itself a part of that world, and not an unnatural activity to be separated from it. While Husserl’s account of these issues is indeed symptomatic of what Millikan calls “meaning rationalism,” I argue that it is immune to the sorts of problems she claims will plague any such account, since these problems arise only against the background of a set of presuppositions about intentionality that Husserl does not share. Husserl’s position can itself be understood to be within the bounds of a suitably liberal conception of naturalism, and interpreting him in this way it has the added benefit—contra Millikan—of not divorcing teleology from reason, the latter construed as our first-personal striving to make sense of the world as we experience it—of life. (shrink)

Kultūrinių objektyvacijų dinamiką Husserlis įvardija sedimentacijos terminu, kuris apima atrastos prasmės formulavimą materialiose juslinėse išraiškose ir šių pasyviai egzistuojančių reikšmių reaktyvavimą. Šiame straipsnyje analizuojama sedimentacijos samprata susiejant ją su Husserlio apmąstymais apie kultūros krizę. Skirtingai nuo įprastų Husserlio kultūros filosofijos interpretacijų, teigiančių, kad mokslų krizė kyla dėl jų moksliškumo neadekvatumo ir negebėjimo spręsti gyvenimo prasmės problemų, aš teigiu, kad krizė gali būti suprasta kaip sedimentacijos dvilypumo rezultatas. Sedimentacijos ne tik išsaugo žinias, bet ir sukuria iliuziją, kad žinios atkuria pačios save. (...) Husserlis apmąstydamas kultūros krizę nuo teorinės filosofijos gręžiasi į praktinę filosofiją. (shrink)