Notes
I discuss this and other construals of “phenomenal intentionality” in Kriegel (2011), Ch.1.
For some key texts in this burgeoning research program, see Loar (1987, 2003), McGinn (1988), Searle (1990, 1992), Strawson (1994, 2008), Horst (1996), Siewert (1998), Horgan and Tienson (2002), Kriegel (2003, 2011), Georgalis (2006), and Bourget (2010). I attempt to summarize the main strands in the research program in Kriegel forthcoming.
If so, phenomenal intentionality’s distinctiveness is acute as can be and its basicness important as can be. Hence “limit case”!
The co-extension of mentality, intentionality, and consciousness guarantees not only that all intentional states are conscious, but also that all mental states are consciously intentional, including nonperceptual, purely intellectual states, such as thoughts, judgments, suppositions, etc. These would be forms of what Anglo-American philosophers call “cognitive phenomenology.”
Chisholm was so impressed by Brentano as a philosopher that he translated a number of his works into English.
The reason for this is unclear to me, but my sense is that if we treat Twardowski’s account as targeting specifically phenomenal intentionality—which we must, since he recognized no other—the account would come across as much more compelling.
Brentano’s best-known student overall would have to be Freud. The exact relationship between the two is unclear, but in a 1932 letter to Theodore Gomperz, Freud asserts unequivocally that he was a student of Brentano’s (see Merlan 1945).
It is in Freiburg that Husserl met who was his assistant from 1919 to 1923.
There are of course exceptions to this rule, such as in the work of Jean-Toussaint Desanti (1914–2002)—see Desanti (1963).
It is a legitimate question which work does the better job of giving a compact sense of the entire enterprise, Levinas’ thesis or Husserl’s Cartesian Meditations—whose first translation into French is actually by Levinas himself (together with Gabrielle Peiffer).
References
Block, N. J. (1995). ‘On a confusion about the function of consciousness.’ Behavioral and Brain Sciences 18: 227–247. Reprinted in N. J. Block, O. Flanagan, and G. Guzeldere (eds.), The Nature of Consciousness. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Block, N. J. (1996). Mental paint and mental latex. Philosophical Issues, 7, 19–50.
Bourget, D. (2010). Consciousness is underived intentionality. Noûs, 44, 32–58.
Brentano, F. (1874). Psychology from empirical standpoint. Edited by O. Kraus. English edition: McAlister, L.L. (1973). (Translated by A. C. Rancurello, D. B. Terrell, and L. L. McAlister.). London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Brentano, F. (1889). The origin of our knowledge of right and wrong. In R. Chisholm & E. H. Schneewind (Eds.), Trans. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. 1969.
Chisholm, R. (1957). Perceiving: a philosophical study. Ithaca: Cornell UP.
Desanti, J.-T. (1963). Phénoménologie et praxis. Paris: Editions sociales.
Georgalis, N. (2006). The primacy of the subjective. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Harman, G. (1990). The intrinsic quality of experience. Philosophical Perspectives, 4, 31–52.
Horgan, T., & Tienson, J. (2002). The intentionality of phenomenology and the phenomenology of intentionality. In D. J. Chalmers (Ed.), Philosophy of mind: classical and contemporary readings. Oxford UP: Oxford.
Horst, S. (1996). Symbols, computation and intentionality. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Husserl, E. (1931). Cartesian meditations. Trans. D. Cairns. Dordrecht: Kluwer.
Kriegel, U. (2003). Is intentionality dependent upon consciousness? Philosophical Studies, 116, 271–307.
Kriegel, U. (2009). Subjective Consciousness: A Self-Representational Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Kriegel, U. (2011). The sources of intentionality. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Levinas, E. (1930). La théorie de l’intuition dans la phénoménologie de Husserl. Paris: Vrin.
Loar, B. (1987). Subjective intentionality. Philosophical Topics, 15, 89–124.
Loar, B. (2003). Phenomenal intentionality as the basis for mental content. In M. Hahn & B. Ramberg (Eds.), Reflections and replies: essays on the philosophy of Tyler Burge. Cambridge: MIT Press.
McGinn, C. (1988). ‘Consciousness and Content.’ Proceedings of the British Academy 76: 219–239. Reprinted in N. J. Block, O. Flanagan, and G. Güzeldere (eds.), The nature of consciousness: philosophical debates. Cambridge MA: MIT Press, 1997.
Meinong, A. (1904). On the theory of objects. In R. Chisholm (Ed.), Realism and the background of phenomenology. Glencoe: Free Press. 1960.
Merlan, P. (1945). Brentano and Freud. Journal of the History of Ideas, 6, 375–377.
Russell, B. (1905). Review of A. Meinong, Untersuchungen zur Gegenstandstheorie und Psychologie. Mind, 14, 530–538.
Sartre, J.-P. (1936). La Transcendance de l’ego. Paris: Vrin.
Sartre, J.-P. (1943). L’Etre et le néant. Paris: Gallimard.
Searle, J. R. (1990). Consciousness, explanatory inversion and cognitive science. The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 13, 585–642.
Searle, J. R. (1992). The rediscovery of mind. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Siewert, C. P. (1998). The significance of consciousness. Princeton: Princeton UP.
Strawson, G. (1994). Mental reality. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Strawson, G. (2008). In his Real Materialism and Other Essays. Oxford: Oxford UP. Real Intentionality 3: Why Intentionality Entails Consciousness.
Twardowski, K. (1894). On the content and object of presentations. Trans. R. Grossmann. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1977.
von Ehrenfels, C. (1890). ‘On Gestalt Qualities.’ Trans. B. Smith. In B. Smith (ed.), Foundation of Gestalt Theory. Munich and Vienna: Philosophia, 1988.
von Ehrenfels, C. (1897/8). System der Verttheorie. Leipzig: Reisland.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Kriegel, U. Phenomenal intentionality past and present: introductory. Phenom Cogn Sci 12, 437–444 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-013-9308-0
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-013-9308-0