Symposium

Volume 13, Issue 1, Spring/Printemps 2009

Adolf Reinach is not a Platonist

Contemporary scholars have generally labelled Adolf Reinach, a founding member of early phenomenology’s Göttingen Circle, a Platonist. Because Reinach conceives of states of affairs as neither real nor ideal, as involved with timeless essences and necessary logical laws, many have hastily concluded that states of affairs are Platonic entities. In this essay, I analyse Barry Smith’s argument that Reinach is a Platonist. Smith’s widely accepted argument often becomes utilised to show that Reinach and other phenomenologists, including Husserl, are Platonic realists (or, simply, Platonists). A closer look at Reinach’s text indicates, however, that he is not committed to Platonic realism.