In reworking his Logical Investigations Husserl adopts two positions that were not actually incorporated into later editions of the Investigations but do appear in other writings: (1) a new distinction between signitive and significative intentions, and (2) the claim that even naming and perceiving acts are categorially formed. This paper investigates Husserl's notion of noematic sense and the pure grammatical '<span class='Hi'>categories</span>' intimated therein in order to shed light on these new positions. The paper argues that the development of the (...) theories of the noema and of pure grammar allows us to recognize how even merely perceived or named things have a certain categoriality belonging to them, but that this development also requires us to distinguish between an anticipatory categoriality and an articulated categoriality. (shrink)

The article is a comparative critical discussion of the views of Brentano and Husserl on intentional objects and on perception. Brentano's views on intentional objects are first discussed, with special attention to the problems connected with the status of the intentional objects. It is then argued that Husserl overcomes these problems by help of his notion of noema. Similarly, in the case of perception, Brentano's notion of physical phenomena is argued to be less satisfactory than Husserl's notion of hyle, whose (...) role in Husserl's theory of perception is briefly sketched. (shrink)

The Snark is an intentional object. I examine the general philosophical characteristics of thoughts of objects from the perspective of Husserl's, hyle, noesis, and noema and show how this meets constraints of opacity, normativity, and possible existence as generated by a sensitive theory of intentionality. Husserl introduces terms which indicate the normative features of intentional content and attempts to forge a direct relationship between the norms he generates and the actual world object which a thought intends. I then attempt to (...) relate Husserl's account to Fregean insights about the sense and reference of a term. Neither Husserl nor Frege suggest plausible routes to a naturalistic account of intentionality and I turn to Wittgenstein to provide a naturalistic reading of the crucial terms involved in the analysis of intentional content. His account is normative in a way required by both Husserl and Frege and yet manages a kind of Aristotelian naturalism which avoids crude biologism. (shrink)

The subject of the present work is noema and its structure in various stages of the objectivating process. Despite its great importance, this issue has never been adequately explained, neither by Husserl nor by his followers. The main objective is to provide the theory that would describe the structure of noema and its function without simplifying the case or appealing to non-phenomenological data. This has been achieved by way of analysis divided into four sections. The first provides an overview of (...) noema. The second section is devoted to analysis of the process of objectivation, i.e., how an active awareness of the object in a logical sense is constituted by a series of passive experiences. The third section refers to a noema as found at different stages of objectivation. It explains how the increasing level of activity, which turns out to be a noetic function, causes changes to the structure of a noema. The last section summarises the results and stresses the advantages of the developed theory in comparison with other interpretations, especially those offered by Drummond, Smith and McIntyre. (shrink)

The present paper is guided by the belief that Edmund Husserl’s concept of noema can be significantly enriched when considered in light of extreme epistemological instances. These include the phenomena of the absurd and nonsense, but also intentional conflict and cases of consciousness directed to contradictory objects. The paper shows that the noema, when experienced in such a context, exhibits interesting characteristics that are rather difficult to note in other circumstances. The paper consists of five sections. The first interprets and (...) relates concepts from Logical Investigations to those from Ideas I. The second section discloses the noematic ability to assemble senses for which there is no corresponding object. The third section stresses that the noema must, in some instances, be able to comprise two separate structures of senses through which two different objects are meant. In the fourth section, all of these characteristics are shown to be restricted by the concept of nonsense and the laws of meaning-compounding. In this way, the noema is clarified as “possibly thinkable content.” Finally, in Sect. 5, this idea is brought into dialogue with the most significant interpretations of the noema. (shrink)

The presentation of the formal conception of noemata is the main aim of the article. In the first section, three informal approaches to noemata are discussed. The goal of this chapter is specifying main controversies and their sources concerned with different ways of the understanding of noemata. In the second section, basic assumptions determining the proposed way of understanding noemata are presented. The third section is devoted to the formal set-theoretic construction needed for the formal comprehension of noemata. In the (...) fourth section, definitions of noemata and their various kinds, as well as definitions of other phenomenological notions are formulated. In the last section, possibilities of further developing the proposed formal conception are indicated. (shrink)

An influential interpretation of phenomenology construes Husserl's project as an attempt to generalize the Fregean notion of sense- an attempt to extend Frege's analysis of the structure of meaningful expressions to a more general account of the structure of meaning in experience . Michael Dummett has articulated a broadly Fregean critique of this Husserlian program, arguing that the project is misguided and retrograde-a relapse into the psychologism and idealism that Frege sought to avoid. A defense of Husserl is offered, based (...) in part on key elements of the theory of meaning articulated in his Logical Investigations . But the main aim is neither to acquit nor to convict Husserl of Dummett's charges; rather it is to use the exchange to investigate some of the philosophical commitments of a broadly Husserlian phenomenology. If we are to understand how Husserl avoids psychologism then we must come to terms with the paradoxical idea of an anti-psychologistic investigation of consciousness (an anti-psychologistic psychology). If we are to understand his complex stance toward idealism then we must not only understand the grounds for his rejection of subjective idealism but also be attuned to the other forms of idealism to which his project is committed. In the course of investigating these matters the author considers how Husserl can reply to the charge of explanatory vacuity, and shows that Frege himself recognizes the legitimacy of something like the Husserlian project. (shrink)

Husserl has finally begun to be recognized as the precursor of current interest in intentionality — the first to have a general theory of the role of mental representations in the philosophy of language and mind. As the first thinker to put directedness of mental representations at the center of his philosophy, he is also beginning to emerge as the father of current research in cognitive psychology and artificial intelligence.

§1. Intentionality; §2. Husserl's Phenomenological Conception of Intentionality; §3. The Distinction between Content and Object; §4. Husserl's Theory of Content: Noesis and Noema; §5. Noema and Object; §6. The Sensory Content of Perception; §7. The Internal Structure of Noematic Sinne; §8. Noema and Horizon; §9. Horizon and Background Beliefs.

[...] This paper aims, first of all, to recall the main features of hyle in Ideas I, both in its relation to the noema and as critical correction of the concept of sensation. It deals, secondly, with some conflicts arising from Husserl’s parallel characterizations of temporal datum, sensation fields, and hyletic background. In third place, it outlines two central directions in genetic analysis, which allow the hyle to expand to a more complex notion involving temporal- material syntheses whose flow is (...) governed by kinaesthesis (Genesis I), all of which shows a sedimented history due to the institution of habitualities (Genesis II). Finally, the conclusions advance some topics that should be considered in this connection from the standpoint of genetic phenomenology. (shrink)

Edmund Husserl (1859-1938) was one of the most influential philosophers of the Twentieth Century. Founder of the phenomenology movement, his thinking influenced Heidegger, Sartre, Merleau-Ponty and Derrida. In this stimulating introduction, David Woodruff Smith introduces the whole of Husserl's thought, demonstrating his influence on philosophy of mind and language, on ontology and epistemology, and on philosophy of logic, mathematics and science. Starting with an overview of Husserl's life and works, and his place in Twentieth century philosophy and in Western philosophy (...) as a whole, David Woodruff Smith introduces Husserl's concept of phenomenology, explaining his influential theories of intentionality, objectivity and subjectivity. In subsequent chapters he covers Husserl's logic, metaphysics, realism and transcendental idealism, and epistemology. Finally, he assesses the significance and implications of Husserl's work for contemporary philosophy of mind and cognitive science. Including a timeline, glossary and extensive suggestions for further reading, Husserl will be essential reading for anyone interested in Husserl, phenomenology and Twentieth century philosophy. (shrink)

This collection explores the structure of consciousness and its place in the world, or inversely the structure of the world and the place of consciousness in it. Amongst the topics covered are: the phenomenological aspects of experience (inner awareness, self-awareness), dependencies between experience and the world (the role of the body in experience, the role of culturally formed background ideas) and the basic ontological categories found in the world at large (unity, state-of-affairs, connectedness, dependence and intentionality). Developing ideas drawn from (...) historical figures such as Descartes, Husserl, Aristotle, and Whitehead, the essays together demonstrate the interdependence of ontology and phenomenology and its significance for the philosophy of mind. (shrink)

Edmund Husserl (1859—1938) was an influential thinker of the first half of the twentieth century. His philosophy was heavily influenced by the works of Franz Brentano and Bernard Bolzano, and was also influenced in various ways by interaction with contemporaries such as Alexius Meinong, Kasimir Twardowski, and Gottlob Frege. In his own right, Husserl is considered the founder of twentieth century Phenomenology with influence extending to thinkers such as Martin Heidegger, Jean-Paul Sartre, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, and to contemporary continental philosophy generally. (...) Husserl’s philosophy is also being discussed in connection with contemporary research in the cognitive sciences, logic, the philosophy of language, and the philosophy of mind, as well as in discussions of collective intentionality. At the center of Husserl’s philosophical investigations is the notion of the intentionality of consciousness and the related notion of intentional content (what Husserl first called ‘act-matter’ and then the intentional ‘noema’). To say that thought is “intentional” is to say that it is of the nature of thought to be directed toward or about objects. To speak of the “intentional content” of a thought is to speak of the mode or way in which a thought is about an object. Different thoughts present objects in different ways (from different perspectives or under different descriptions) and one way of doing justice to this fact is to speak of these thoughts as having different intentional contents. For Husserl, intentionality includes a wide range of phenomena, from perceptions, judgments, and memories to the experience of other conscious subjects as subjects (inter-subjective experience) and aesthetic experience, just to name a few. Given the pervasive role he takes intentionality to play in all thought and experience, Husserl believes that a systematic theory of intentionality has a role to play in clarifying and founding most other areas of philosophical concern, such as the theory of consciousness, the philosophy of language, the philosophy of logic, epistemology, and the philosophies of action and value. This article presents the key elements of Husserl’s understanding of intentionality and intentional content, specifically as these are developed in his works Logical Investigations and Ideas Pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology and to a Phenomenological Philosophy. (shrink)

My aim in this paper is to examine two related issues in the debate surrounding the work of Edmund Husserl. I wish to clarify his theories of meaning and noema, and also to challenge the assumption that Husserl's Logical Investigations is inconsistent with the first book of his Ideas with respect to meaning. I also suggest that misunderstandings in these areas are in part responsible for a misunderstanding of the relationship between Husserl and Frege. Commentators have noted Husserl's claim that (...) meaning is a universal which is instantiated by particular acts of meaning, yet characteristically they fail to provide any account of what Husserl takes a universal to be. Here I will provide such an account which will allow me to clarify the relevant issues. (shrink)

What we normally think of as the “physical world” is also the world as experienced, that is, a world of appearances. Given this, what is the reality behind the appearances, and what might its relation be to consciousness and to constructive processes in the mind? According to Kant, the thing itself that brings about and supports these appearances is unknowable and we can never gain any understanding of how it brings such appearances about. Reflexive monism argues the opposite: the thing (...) itself is knowable as are the processes that construct conscious appearances. Conscious appearances (empirical evidence) and the theories derived from them can represent what the world is really like, even though such empirical knowledge is partial, approximate and uncertain, and conscious appearances are species-specific constructions of the human mind. Drawing on the writings of Husserl, Hoche suggests that problems of knowledge, mind and consciousness are better understood in terms of a “pure noematic” phenomenology that avoids any reference to a “thing itself”. I argue that avoiding reference to a knowable reality (behind appearances) leads to more complex explanations with less explanatory value and counterintuitive conclusions—for example Hoche’s conclusion that consciousness is not part of nature. The critical realism adopted by reflexive monism appears to be more useful, as well as being consistent with science and common sense. (shrink)

In a number of papers, Hubert Dreyfus and Ronald McIntyre have claimed that Husserl is an internalist. In this paper, it is argued that their interpretation is based on two questionable assumptions: (1) that Husserl's noema should be interpreted along Fregean lines, and (2) that Husserl's transcendental methodology commits him to some form of methodological solipsism. Both of these assumptions are criticized on the basis of the most recent Husserl-research. It is shown that Husserl's concept of noema can be interpreted (...) in a manner that makes his theory far more congenial to a certain type of externalism, but ultimately it is argued that his phenomenological analysis of intentionality entails such a fundamental rethinking of the very relation between subjectivity and world that it hardly makes sense to designate it as being either internalist or externalist. (shrink)

In this paper, the author compares passages from two philosophically important texts and concludes that they have fundamental ideas in common. What makes this comparison and conclusion interesting is that the texts come from two different traditions in philosophy, the analytic and the phenomenological. In 1912, Ernst Mally published *Gegenstandstheoretische Grundlagen der Logik und Logistik*, an analytic work containing a combination of formal logic and metaphysics. In 1913, Edmund Husserl published *Ideen zu einer reinen Phänomenologie und phänomenologischen Philosophie*, a seminal (...) work in phenomenology in which noemata are defined and given a crucial role in directing our mental states. In the passages from these two texts reproduced below, the author shows that the abstract `determinates' postulated by Mally in 1912 are assigned much the same role that Husserl assigned to noemata in 1913. Though Mally's determinates are not as highly structured as Husserl's noemata, they have a feature that explains how they manage to play the role assigned to them. The corresponding feature is missing, or at least, not emphasized in Husserl's account of noemata. Therefore, insights from both philosophers, and thus from both the analytic and phenomenological traditions, are needed to give a more complete account of directed mental states. (shrink)