Abstract
It is said that transcendental phenomenology faces an unavoidable aporia, according
to which it is perfectly justified to accept the claim that the transcendental ego
constitutes the sense of all external being, including other subjects, as well as the claim
that other subjects constitute the sense of all external objects, since they are a community
of transcendental egos. The essence of the aporia is that it is impossible to
accept both of these claims if one accepts the conceptual schema of transcendental
phenomenology. In the article, I present an interpretation of transcendental phenomenology
which allows one to avoid such consequences. Firstly, the static theory of
intersubjectivity presented in Ideas of Pure Phenomenology and Carthesian Meditations
is reconstructed and analyzed. Attention is devoted to the issues of phenomenological
reduction and constitution of sense. Afterwards, it is argued that one should distinguish
two kinds of constitutive processes: one understood as an activity of the sole transcendental
ego (self), and the second one as an activity of the community of transcendental
egos. It is claimed that both processes are mutually connected. Moreover, it seems that
the second kind of constitution is metaphysically prior then the former one. This claim
will allow one to overcome solipsistic interpretations of transcendental phenomenology
and to overcome the aporia presented