I argue that Merleau-Ponty’s use of the case of Schneider in his arguments for the existence of non-conconceptual and non-representational motor intentionality contains a problematic methodological ambiguity. Motor intentionality is both to be revealed by its perspicuous preservation and by its contrastive impairment in one and the same case. To resolve the resulting contradiction I suggest we emphasize the second of Merleau-Ponty’s two lines of argument. I argue that this interpretation is the one in best accordance both with Merleau-Ponty’s general (...) methodology and with the empirical case of Schneider as it was described by Gelb and Goldstein. (shrink)

Addressing Walter Hopp’s original application of the distinction between agent-fallibility and method-fallibility to phenomenological inquiry concerning epistemic justification, I question whether these are the only two forms of fallibility that are useful or whether there are not also others that are needed. In doing so, I draw my inspiration from Husserl, who in the beginnings of his phenomenological investigations struggled with the distinction between noetic and noematic analyses. For example, in the Preface to the Second Edition of the Logical Investigations (...) he criticizes the First Investigation as having been “one-sidedly” noetically directed and as having thus neglected the noematic aspects of meaning (XVIII 13–14). Also, in an addendum to the Fifth Investigation he notes that in the transition from the First Edition to the Second he has learned to broaden the concept of “phenomenological content” to include not only the “real” ( reell ) contents (noetic, subjective) of consciousness but also the “intentional” (noematic, objective) (XIX/1 411). The fact that, in gradually moving from consciousness (noesis) to what consciousness is of (noema), Husserl struggled with this distinction is an indication of the immensity of the perplexing problems and potential solutions that Hopp has led the phenomenology of knowledge into by introducing his useful notions of agent-fallibility and method-fallibility. Like Husserl, he has focused mainly and mostly on the noetic issues; like Husserl as well, I will try to move step by step from the noetic area into the noematic. I conclude that Hopp’s approach has the potential to become seminal. (shrink)

In this essay we critically evaluate the progress that has been made in solving the problem of meaning in artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics. We remain skeptical about solutions based on deep neural networks and cognitive robotics, which in our opinion do not fundamentally address the problem. We agree with the enactive approach to cognitive science that things appear as intrinsically meaningful for living beings because of their precarious existence as adaptive autopoietic individuals. But this approach inherits the problem of (...) failing to account for how meaning as such could make a difference for an agent’s behavior. In a nutshell, if life and mind are identified with physically deterministic phenomena, then there is no conceptual room for meaning to play a role in its own right. We argue that this impotence of meaning can be addressed by revising the concept of nature such that the macroscopic scale of the living can be characterized by physical indeterminacy. We consider the implications of this revision of the mind-body relationship for synthetic approaches. (shrink)

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)

Many have deemed ineluctable the tension between Husserl’s transcendental eidetics and his Crisis method of historical reflection. In this paper, I argue that this tension is an apparent one. I contend that dissolving this tension and showing not only the possibility, but also the necessity of the successful collaboration between these two apparently irreconcilable methods guarantees the very freedom of inquiry Husserl so emphatically stressed. To make this case, I draw from Husserl’s synthetic analyses of type and concept constitution as (...) well as his later work on sedimentation and streaming-in and develop a richer modal taxonomy than the one Husserl proposed. I employ this taxonomy in an examination of the structures and conditions for the possibility of transcendental eidetic variation in order to show this method’s reliance on historically sedimented epistemic and normative resources. This reliance brings to light the necessity for a methodological critique, which is precisely what I take to be the work of teleological–historical reflection as Husserl comes to conceive it in the Crisis. (shrink)

The article explores a gradual refinement of the notion of reflection in Husserlian phenomenology. In his early period, Husserl takes phenomenological reflection to attain adequate evidence, since its object is self-given in an absolute and complete manner. However, this conception of reflection does not remain unchanged. Husserl later realizes that immanent perception or phenomenological reflection also involves a certain horizonality and naivety that has to do with its temporal nature and must be queried in a further critical, apodictic reflection. Focusing (...) more on the notion of apodicticity than adequacy, Husserl subsequently ascribes a new methodological role to reflection: instead of a mere epistemic warrant that guarantees for us the ultimate truth of our experiential life once and for all, phenomenological reflection ensures the strictness of phenomenology insofar as it entails an ethical-existential dimension as the norm of a life-form where the subject pursues full self-understanding and self-justification. (shrink)

There is a long-standing tradition of questioning the viability and scientificity of first-person methods. Husserlian reflective methodology, in particular, has been challenged on the basis of its perceived inability to meet the standards of objectivity and reliability, leading to what has been called “phenomenological skepticism” ( Roy, 2007 ). In this article, I reassess this line of objection by outlining Daniel C. Dennett’s empirically driven skepticism and reconstructing his methodological arguments against Husserlian phenomenology. His ensuing phenomenological skepticism is divided into (...) strong skepticism and categorical and gradual versions of weak skepticism. Both strands of Dennett’s criticism are then countered by analyzing the key components of Husserl’s method of phenomenological reflection: epoché and transcendental reduction, intentional analysis, eidetic variation, and intersubjective validation. Laying out the basic features of phenomenological reflection serves two purposes. First, it undermines Dennett’s methodological arguments, which are based on the unfounded assumptions that Husserl is committed to introspection, methodological solipsism, the first-person-plural presumption, and the lone-wolf approach. Second, it shows how Husserl’s own methodology can alleviate the more justified empirical worries concerning overinterpretation, underdescription, and disagreement. Finally, I argue that gradual weak skepticism is the only plausible form of phenomenological skepticism and conclude that Husserlian methodology is well-equipped to combat it. (shrink)

In this paper, I shall show that for Husserl, (a) evidence determines epistemic justification and (b) evidence is linked to originary givenness in the sense that one's ultimate evidence consists of one's originary presentive intuitions. This means that in contemporary analytic terminology, Husserl is a proponent of evidentialism and mentalism. Evidentialism and mentalism have been introduced into current debates by Earl Conee and Richard Feldman. Finally, I shall highlight that there is one significant difference between Husserl and Earl Conee and (...) Richard Feldman. Although Conee and Feldman argue that the fundamental principles of epistemology are principles of best explanation, Husserl opts for phenomenological principles as the most fundamental epistemic principles. The main difference is that for Husserl, experiences gain their justificatory force by virtue of their phenomenal character, namely, their originary givenness. (shrink)

Foundationalism and coherentism are two fundamentally opposed basic epistemological views about the structure of justification. Interestingly enough, there is no consensus on how to interpret Husserl. While interpreting Husserl as a foundationalist was the standard view in early Husserl scholarship, things have changed considerably as prominent commentators like Christian Beyer, John Drummond, Dagfinn Føllesdal, and Dan Zahavi have challenged this foundationalist interpretation. These anti-foundationalist interpretations have again been challenged, for instance, by Walter Hopp and Christian Erhard. One might suspect that (...) inconsistencies in Husserl’s writings are the simple reason for this disagreement. I shall argue, however, that the real question is not so much how to read Husserl, but how to define foundationalism and that there is overwhelming textual evidence that Husserl championed the most tenable version of foundationalism: a moderate foundationalism that allows for incorporating coherentist elements. (shrink)

The invention of the computer has revolutionized science. With respect to finding the essential structures of life, for example, it has enabled scientists not only to investigate empirical examples, but also to create and study novel hypothetical variations by means of simulation: ‘life as it could be’. We argue that this kind of research in the field of artificial life, namely the specification, implementation and evaluation of artificial systems, is akin to Husserl’s method of free imaginative variation as applied to (...) the specific regional ontology of biology. Thus, at a time when the clarification of the essence of our biological embodiment is of growing interest for phenomenology, we suggest that artificial life should be seen as a method of externalizing some of the insurmountable complexity of imaginatively varying the phenomenon of life. (shrink)

In this article I address the idea that in Husserl’s eidetic ontology all possibilities are fixed ‘in advance’ so that actual objects and events—despite their contingency—can only ever unfold possibilities that are ‘permitted’ to them by their essences. I show how this view distorts Husserl’s ontology and argue that this distortion stems from a misconstrual of the relations between essences and facts, and between ideal and real possibilities. These ‘local’ misconstruals reflect, I contend, a ‘global’ misunderstanding that mistakes descriptive distinctions (...) for ‘real’ separations, and that remains indebted to a non-Husserlian understanding of the a priori–a posteriori-distinction. In support of this argument, I first lay out the relevant objection to Husserl’s eidetics as I understand it. Then, I clarify the relation between ideal and real possibilities in the context of Husserl’s eidetics as I see it. Finally, I make a general point about the status of Husserl’s ontological differentiations ‘in the midst of life,’ namely in how what they differentiate is effective and (tacitly) manifest ever only as one moment (amongst many) of the complex whole that is a concrete life of consciousness. I end with some remarks on what this might mean for future phenomenological research on the imagination. (shrink)

This paper aims at offering a concise, yet systematic, presentation of the Husserlian method of “self-variation” in connection to eidetic variation sic et simpliciter. After a brief review of the different meanings of this method in Husserl’s writings, I will focus on the way in which Husserl employs it to bring the eidos “ego” to the fore. To this end, I will take into account the specific subject matter of self-variation by resorting to a twofold concept of essence as well (...) as to the formal-ontological notion of τóδε τι. The present investigation will have an almost exclusively methodological character, its purpose being to clarify a specific, yet still quite unexplored, tool of Husserl’s phenomenology. (shrink)

_ Source: _Volume 46, Issue 2, pp 157 - 183 This paper suggests interpreting Husserl’s thesis of the “fictional destruction of the world” in the light of the eidetic method of variation. After having reconstructed Husserl’s argument and shown how it relies on the methodologically regimented joint venture of free fantasy and bounded concepts, the author concludes that the a priori of a world, namely its empirical style, is tantamount to the a priori of a world that can be possibly (...) experienced by some conceivable form of consciousness. If consciousness is a priori bound to transcendence, such transcendence is not necessarily supposed to be the transcendence of a world, for a non-world would be enough to entertain the intentional directedness. This twofold claim allows for a novel interpretation of Husserl’s principle of the asymmetry between world and consciousness. (shrink)

A point made repeatedly over the last few years is that the Locked-in Syndrome offers unique real-life material for revisiting and challenging certain ingrained philosophical assumptions about the nature of personhood and personal identity. Indeed, the claim has been made that a closer study of LIS will call into question some of the traditional conceptions of personhood that primarily highlight the significance of consciousness, self-consciousness and autonomy and suggest the need for a more interpersonal account of the person. I am (...) skeptical about these claims and will in the following argue that the theoretical relevance of LIS for an understanding of selfhood and personhood has been exaggerated. (shrink)

Memoirs and autobiographical accounts of mental illness have been widely utilized in phenomenological psychopathology and, in particular, in the investigation of depression (Fuchs 2013; Ratcliffe 2010; Ratcliffe 2015), mania (Binswanger 1960; Bowden 2013), schizophrenia (Binswanger 1957; Parnas and Henriksen 2016; Sass 1994), anorexia nervosa (Bowden 2012; Legrand 2010), and borderline personality disorder (Stanghellini and Rosfort 2013). In this article I will provide a critical illustration of the different ways in which self- narratives have been employed in this context and I (...) will advance some suggestions as to how the use of life stories could further enhance the phenomenological understanding of mental illness and the therapeutic process. (shrink)

In his reflections on inner time consciousness written in the years 1917–1918, Husserl makes use of an illustrative device he apparently developed in fits and starts between 1905–1911 2: the so-called “time-diagram.” It proves to be an important instrument for several of the texts published in Husserliana XXXIII, in particular Text Nr. 2: “Die Komplexion von Retention und Protention. Gradualitäten der Erfüllung und das Bewusstsein der Gegenwart. Graphische Darstellung des Urprozesses”. More, the diagram appears in these texts in a much (...) more refined and complete manner than anything found in Husserliana X, which in turn allows us to sharpen a number of questions that had already arisen with original 1928 publication of Husserl’s 1905 Zeitvorlesungen. (shrink)