Phenomenological accounts of self-consciousness are often said to combine two elements by means of a necessary connection: the primitive and irre- ducible subjective character of experiences and the idealist transcendental constitution of consciousness. In what follows I argue that this connection is not necessary in order for an account of self-consciousness to be phenomenological, as shown by early phenomenological accounts of self- consciousness – particularly in Munich phenomenology. First of all, I show that the account of self-consciousness defended by these (...) phenomenologists was not influenced as much by Husserl as by two important figures in the prehistory of phenomenology: their teacher Theodor Lipps, and – indi- rectly, through Lipps’ influence – Hermann Lotze. Second, I show that their account of self-consciousness takes the metaphysical realism underlying Lotze’s and Lipps’ views on the distinction between feeling and sensations seriously. I argue that this distinction played a central role in the development of many early phenomenological accounts of self-consciousness. (shrink)

The idea that subjectivity makes up the foundation or source of all objectivity applies to all transcendental idealists. Nevertheless, Husserl conceives of this relationship between subjectivity and objectivity in a radically different fashion than Kant. Husserl’s conception leads to a primacy of the noetic dimension of sense at the expense of the noematic dimension. In order to render this explicit, not only a closer look at Kant’s transcendental deduction is illuminating but also taking into account neo-Kantianism. In contrast to Husserl, (...) Kant and the neo-Kantians grant primacy to the objective or noematic within the correlation between subject and object or noesis and noema. (shrink)

The paper examines Schiller’s argument concerning the subjective experience of adopting a morality based on Kantian principles. On Schiller’s view, such experience must be marked by a continuous struggle to suppress nature, because the moral law is a purely rational and categorically commanding law that addresses beings who are natural as well as rational. Essential for Schiller’s conclusion is the account he has of what it takes to follow the law, that is, the mental states and functions that encapsulate the (...) idea of moral self contained in Kant’s ethics. Focusing on the fundamental psychological elements and processes to which Kant’s theory appeals and on which it depends to have application, the paper defends an alternative idea of moral self to the one Schiller attributes to Kant. (shrink)