Festschrift in Honor of Barry Smith on the occasion of his 65th Birthday. Published as issue 4:4 of the journal Cosmos + Taxis: Studies in Emergent Order and Organization. Includes contributions by Wolfgang Grassl, Nicola Guarino, John T. Kearns, Rudolf Lüthe, Luc Schneider, Peter Simons, Wojciech Żełaniec, and Jan Woleński.

The main objective of this paper is to address the problem of the philosophical method, which consists of the lack of consensus among philosophers regarding the proper procedure to carry out this human activity. In this sense, it examines a few methodological proposals put forward by some representatives of contemporary philosophy, emphasizing the impact that the development of modern science has had on such views. In addition, the plausibility of such proposals is assessed.

Johannes Daubert est la figure centrale du Cercle de Munich ainsi que le premier véritable lecteur et critique de Husserl. Ses manuscrits contiennent, en plus d'une critique de la phénoménologie husserlienne, une conception originale de la phénoménologie laissant notamment une place importante aux analyses perceptives. Le présent article s'intéresse d'abord aux thèmes du donné et de l'évidence en tant qu'ils sont des motifs centraux à la fois chez Husserl et Daubert, pour ensuite relever, à partir d'une étude des manuscrits pertinents, (...) la particularité des analyses daubertiennes concernant ces thèmes, ainsi que les contraintes ou limites que la phénoménologie doit s'imposer pour notamment se distinguer du rationalisme.Johannes Daubert is the central figure of the Munich Circle as well as the first real critical reader of Husserl. His manuscripts contain, in addition to a critique of the husserlian phenomenology, an original conception of phenomenology leaving a significant place to the perceptive analyses. This article is initially concerned with the topics of the given and of the evidence as they are central themes in Husserl's and Daubert's works, for then raising, starting from a study of the relevant manuscripts, the peculiarity of the daubertian analyses concerning these topics, as well as the constraints or limits that the phenomenology must impose itself to be distinguished from the Rationalism. (shrink)

This study examines German educational philosopher Otto Friedrich Bollnow’s (1903–1991) existential-hermeneutic theory of discontinuous forms of education, unstetige formen der Erziehung. At the core of this theory is a view of human being subjected to education that appears disruptive and critical, influencing the development of disclosing the true powers of a person and unfolding of truths about oneself that could not be uncovered otherwise. Typically, this theory has been interpreted on the continuum of hermeneutic philosophy, as hermeneutic pedagogy with an (...) extension of Martin Heidegger’s fundamental ontology, antisubjectivism and especially his theory of truth as unconcealment. According to this line of interpretation, Bollnow’s project brings an existential addition to classical pedagogical theories, as a level of appealing pedagogy. According to this existentialist view, education in a strict sense cannot really take place: it could not affect the true core of a person, nor this person could be subjected under any pedagogical influence in any meaningful way. The only task left for education is to appeal to the conscience of an already autonomous person. However, in this study it is claimed that this line of interpretation falls short to the fact that Bollnow’s philosophy of education builds heavily on his overall philosophical-anthropological project, which springs from Kant’s first critique and especially, as shown in this work, from Edmund Husserl’s transcendental phenomenology. The study shows, that Bollnow’s discontinuous forms of education are not resulted from hermeneutic educational reality, with an extension of existential potentiality to authenticity of a person. In fact, one could not derive such a view from mere hermeneutics. Instead, what Bollnow’s structural view of educational reality indicates, is that it should be understood as a phenomenological description of a priori categorical structures. It is claimed in the work, that the discontinuous forms are the products of phenomenological reduction. They are derived from the direct experience within consciousness, from the essence of what is experienced, from the very nature of what is it like to be in a process of becoming human. From this perspective, from the subject-point, education cannot be described as a paradox of freedom and restriction between educator and educatee, nor transmission of culture between generations, but instead could be described as the subjective experience of being educated or educating oneself, disclosing oneself to oneself, which is constituted only by the necessary conditions of these subjective experiences of discontinuity. (shrink)