Intersubjectivity and naturalism - Husserl's fifth Cartesian Meditation revisited

Husserl Studies

Volumn 17, Issue 3, 2001, Pages 207-216

  Reynaert, Peter ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF ANTWERP   (Belgium)

Author keywords

Attitude; Expressive unity; Fifth Cartesian meditation; Intersubjectivity; Naturalism

Indexed keywords

EID: 52549103597     PISSN: 01679848     EISSN: 15728501     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1023/A:1010744200494     Document Type: Review

References (26)

1. As Husserl remarks in a critical note with regard to Hua I, p. 124, lines 27-33, the question is how the transcendental ego constitutes in itself the difference between I and other I. (Hua I, p. 244) So the other is not another worldly person. (Hua I, p. 124, lines 24-25)
2. The translators of Ideas II render Leib as Body and Körper as body. Husserl, E., Ideas pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology and to a Phenomenological Philosophy, second Book. Trans. by R. Rojcewicz and A. Schuwer, Collected Works III (Dordrecht, Boston, London): Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1989. References to and citations of Husserl's work will be identified by the page number(s) following the German Husserliana volume number.
3. These texts were published in Husserliana XIII, XIV and XV. Others before have criticized the similarity-premise. See J. Ortega y Gasset, "El hombre y la Gente," in: Obras completas, vol. 7 (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 1983), pp. 160-166.
4. A. Schütz, "Das Problem der transzendentalen Intersubjektivität bei Husserl," in: Philosophische Rundschau, 5, 1957, pp. 81-107. I want to show Husserl was the first to be dissatisfied with the approach presented in the fifth Meditation.
5. This theory has been analysed in the excellent book of G. Römpp, Husserls Phänomenologie der Intersubjektivität, Phaenomenologica 123 (Dordrecht, Boston, London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1992).
6. Since my contribution is not meant as a criticism of Husserlian transcendental idealism, I don't want to discuss Husserl's alleged solipsism. Husserl-scholars have convincingly shown that this charge is misguided. See e.g. G. Römpp, cited above, and D. Zahavi, Husserl und die transzendentale Intersubjektivität, Phaenomenologica 135 (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1996),
7. which refer to older studies like the one by P. Ricoeur, "Etudes sur les Méditations Cartésiennes de Husserl," in: Revue philosophique de Louvain, 52, 1954, pp. 75-109.
8. See the first section of Ideas II: The Constitution of Material Nature. This experience is called "naturale Erfahrung", Hua IV, pp. 2 and 125. Also Hua VIII, p. 315. I propose to call it experience of nature or physical experience.
9. Hua IV, p. 183 on the naturalness of this more fundamental experience and the abstractiveness of the naturalistic attitude.
10. See Hua I, § 43, also pp. 140 and 244, remark cone. p. 124.
11. The objectivation of my Body centers on these three elements, for which Husserl repeatedly tried to argue: (a) arbitrary position: Hua XIII, pp. 281, 294 and 330; Hua XV, pp. 264-265;
12. (b) objective movement: Hua XIII, pp. 262-264, 278, 280-281 and 330; Hua XIV, pp. 76, 240 and 543; Hua XV, pp. 248, 265, 270 and 281;
13. (c) external appearances: Hua XIII, pp. 255-256, 264-268, 271, 276, 333 and 344; Hua XIV, pp. 376, 416-417 and 515, note 1.
14. About this appearance qua spatial object or so-called "Phantom", see Hua IV, pp. 158-159; Hua XIII, pp. 239-240 and 249; Hua XIV, p. 57.
15. I only have a Nullerscheinung and no external appearances (äussere Erscheinungen) of my Body. Hua XIII, pp. 344 and 416; Hua XIV, pp. 483 and 511-512; Hua XV, pp. 268-270.
16. Even when fancying myself being somewhere else, I, i.e. my fancied self, am here, i.e. at the centre of this fantasy-world. Hua XIII, pp. 275, 290-293 and 299.
17. The intersubjective nature of (a) my Body as abody: Hua XIV, pp. 64,237-238,414 and 508; Hua XV, pp. 246, 272, 310 and 655, note 1;
18. (b) the Body's movement as objective: Hua XIII, pp. 261-262; Hua XIV, p. 514;
19. (c) its external appearances: Hua XIII, p. 420; Hua XIV, p. 510. Although I can to some extent objectivate parts of my Body, this is not possible with regard to my Body as a whole.
20. Although he repeatedly understood Ausdruck in a naturalistic fashion as induction (Hua IX, pp. 136-137; Hua XIV, pp. 377, 421, 455 and 483), Husserl finally rejected this. (Hua XIII, p. 467, note 2 where he says induction is a dangerous and dubious expression) Naturalism with regard to the other is secondary to a more fundamental mode of empathy.
21. See also Erfahrung und Urteil (Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 1985), p. 55.
22. So it is not correct that the expressive nature of the other person's Body is dependent upon an association with mine, as says Dodd, J., Idealism and Corporeity, Phaenomenologica 140, (Boston, Dordrecht, London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1997), p. 29.
23. In this sense my interpretation differs from the many very critical ones, like for example those of T. Adorno, Zur Metakritik der Erkenntnistheorie, Studien über Husserl und die Phänomenologischen Antinomien, in: Ges. Schriften, Bd 5 (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1970),
24. of M. Theunissen, Der Andere (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1965),
25. and of K. Held, "Das Problem der Intersubjektivität und die Idee einer phänomenologischen Transzendentalphilosophie," in: Claesges, U. und Held, K., Perspektiven transzendentalphänomenologischer Forschung, Phaenomenologica 49 (Den Haag, Martinus Nijhoff, 1972), pp. 3-60.
26. The fundamental text Grundprobleme der Phänomenologie of 1911 opened this Cartesian line. (Hua XIII, pp. 111-193