The problem of practice in phenomenology including the political and ethical consequences of phenomenology has long been the focus of my personal interests and my philosophical, that is to say, phenomenological research. The guiding principle is that taking phenomenology as a description of the experiences of a subject rooted within experience is not only concerned with the theorisation of the experience but also necessary with the practices of the subject. In France, the “mainstream”-reading of a phenomenology which orientates itself towards (...) logic, mathematics and transcendental philosophy prevailed for far too long, with the result that the interest in social sciences, psychology and neurobiology (the so called “cognitive sciences”) is often still met with scepticism. Instead I want to understand phenomenology as a practice through exercise which as practice has political and ethical implications. (shrink)

La religion, cette névrose obsessionnelle universelle de l’humanité Freud, L’avenir d’une illusion (1927) Introduction « Sartre est … le théologien le plus important dont dispose la tradition philosophique de l’Occident ». C’est le philosophe et théologien Christos Yannaras qui s’exprime. Provocation? Plutôt : vertu de l’athéisme de l’auteur de L’être et le néant qui, bel héritier de Nietzsche et de Heidegger, produit un diagnostic au scalpel de la posture religieuse molle du piétisme du X...

Searches for the sources and means for a disciplined practical approach to exploring human experience.

le statut de l'intersubjectivité comme altérité à soi chez Husserl Natalie Depraz. REMERCIEMENTS À Jean-François Courtine tout d'abord, je tiens à exprimer ma très vive gratitude pour la confiance qu'il m'a témoignée en me donnant ...

Cardiophenomenology aims at refining the neuro-phenomenological approach created by F. Varela as a new paradigm, jointly based on Husserl’s a priori dynamics of the living present and an experiment on anticipatory time-dynamics of visual motor perception. In order to do so, we will situate the paradigm of neurophenomenology at the cardio-vascular level, focusing on the emotional dynamics of lived experience and thus refining the dialogue, more precisely, the generative mutual constraints between first- and third-person analysis. In this article we present (...) the theoretical hypothesis of cardiophenomenology, which places the bodily-emotional heartsystem at its core, as an intrinsic part of the cognitive system. The latter therefore needs to be enlarged in order to include an enactive embodied cardiac-affective dimension. Here we present five main arguments for the necessary inclusion of the bodily-emotional heartsystem in the cognitive system: first, two pragmatic operational arguments, then three theoretical ones. A direct methodological-pragmatic consequence is the actual operativity of the generative mutual constraints based on an experiential -experimental continuity of the embodied cardiac-affective fold inherent in the subject. (shrink)

’. . . through the epoche, the gaze of the philosopher in truth first becomes fully free. . . . [F]ree of the strongest and most universal, and at the same time most hidden, internal bond, namely, of the pre-givenness of the world.’ This paper is concerned with the method of phenomenological reduction understood as a disciplined embodied practice.

For the most part, attention occurs as a theme adjacent to much more topical and innovatingly operating acts: first, the intentional act, which represents a destitution of the abstract opposition between subject and object and which paves the way for a detailed analysis of our perceptive horizontal subjective life; second, the reductive act, specified in a psycho-phenomenological sense as a reflective conversion of the way I am looking at things; third, the genetic method understood as a genealogy of logic based (...) on our experiential affective pre-discursive world-life. In this respect, here are some of the leading questions of my investigation: What are the differences and the proximities between these methods and attentional activity? Why is the latter not put to the fore as a method? To what extent is this secondary part played by attention linked to the constitution of phenomenology as opposed to psychology (for which attention is a central theme), and what does it mean for the impossibility of phenomenology to freeing itself completely from psychology? (shrink)

In this paper, I have a twofold aim: First I wish to show to what extent the Husserlian Theory of Intersubjectivity can be relevant for contemporary empirical research and for ancestral wisdom traditions, both in their experiences and in their conceptual tools; and secondly I intend to rely on some empirical results and experiential mystical/practical reports in order to bring about some more refined phenomenological descriptions first provided by Husserl. The first aim will be the main concern here, while the (...) second will only be broached by way of initial steps towards further development. -/- I will proceed in two stages: in the first place I will give some evidence for Husserl's relevance by giving an account of his original conceptions of (a) egoic subjectivity, (b) genetic phenomenology, and (c) lived empathy. In the second place, my purpose is to indicate how much Husserl's view on infants/children, animals/ beasts, mad people/the insane and aliens/foreigners/strangers may be of some interest for scientific empirical conceptions and for practical paths of spiritual self-development. In so doing, I hope to be able (1) to confirm the accuracy of Husserl's own intuitions and analysis, and (2) to suggest some refinements in the way Husserl described such experiences. -/- Throughout this paper I will focus on two main Husserlian discoveries: (1) subjectivity is from the very start intersubjectivity; (2) infants, animals, the insane and aliens are subjects in a full sense, precisely because they are from the very beginning always already intersubjective subjects; besides, they are limit-subjectivities, who compel me in a kind of feedback to enlarge and to deepen my own subjectivity. (shrink)

How can phenomenology describe an object as "the political"? The article endeavours to show how it is possible to apprehend such a theme from a _transcendental<D> perspective. After going through the methodic difficulties of the Cartesian way, which involves an egology intersubjectively extended to the monadology, the essay analyzes the non-Cartesian ways. Indeed, both of them pave the way for a political based on a plural structure. The way through the life-world as well as the way through psychology succeed in (...) depicting the political, either as living sociality or as the play between ethical co-attitudes. In each case, the reduction operates in a specific manner, either as a pure Cartesian bracketing, as a retrocession to social originality or as a nonparticipating in the world-interests. Nevertheless, only the way through psychology reaches the political at a strict transcendental level, whereas the way through the life-world always runs the risk of falling back. (shrink)

Introduction Il y a de quoi être perplexe. Comment mettre en avant l’attention et la surprise à titre de vecteurs d’une métaphysique, d’une anthropologie, voire d’une phénoménologie? Ce ne sont pas en effet des concepts topiques thématisés dans l’histoire de la philosophie ni en phénoménologie. Husserl a promu une nouvelle conception de la conscience, Heidegger a repensé le temps, Merleau-Ponty mis en évidence une philosophe de la chair, Levinas l’altérité. Difficile d’en dire autant de la s...

En croisant l’interprétation d’enregistrements cardiovasculaires avec le recueil de l’expérience émotionnelle, au lieu de chercher les oscillations cérébrales corrélatives des illusions perceptives, on remédie à la différence d’échelle qui hypothéquait la méthode des contraintes mutuelles de Varela. La cardiophénoménologie propose un modèle dynamique de la surprise associant les variations d’indices physiologiques à une analyse husserlienne des phases du vécu. Une expérimentation avec des patientes dépressives soumises à une tâche émotionnelle combinée à l’entretien d’explicitation semble devoir valider une hypothèse d’hyporéactivité de (...) la dépression en réaction à la surprise. (shrink)

Given its transcendental impulse, Husserl's analysis of the lived body has been considered by many phenomenologists and by most Husserl scholars as unable to account for our everyday intimate relationship with our own embodied self and with other embodied selves. Contrary to such a widespread contention, the author sets out to show that Husserl's phenomenology contains unknown descriptive resources which provide a detailed account of our individual and communitarian lived body at a transcendental level proper.

This volume offers perspectives on the theme of surprise crossing philosophical, phenomenological, scientific, psycho-physiology, psychiatric, and linguistic boundaries. The main question it examines is whether surprise is an emotion. It uses two main theoretical frameworks to do so: psychology, in which surprise is commonly considered a primary emotion, and philosophy, in which surprise is related to passions as opposed to reason. The book explores whether these views on surprise are satisfying or sufficient. It looks at the extent to which surprise (...) is also a cognitive phenomenon and primitively embedded in language, and the way in which surprise is connected to personhood, the interpersonal, and moral emotions. Many philosophers of different traditions, a number of experimental studies conducted over the last decades, recent works in linguistics, and ancestral wisdom testimonies refer to surprise as a crucial experience of both rupture and openness in bodily and inner life. However, surprise is a theme that has not been dealt with directly and systematically in philosophy, in the sciences, in linguistics, or in spiritual traditions. This volume accomplishes just that. (shrink)

Porter son attention sur l'attention, voilà l'urgence de notre humanisation contemporaine. Les sciences l'ont compris, qui depuis plus d'un siècle multiplient les travaux en psychologie et en neurosciences sur cette fonction complexe et globale qui forme un réseau intégré transversal où jouent mémoire, perception, veille, émotion et décision ; les techniques méditatives ont aussi leur rôle à jouer, s'adressant moins à notre intellect, comme les sciences, qu'à l'attitude fondamentale face à la vie. Elles nous proposent une clé en matière de (...) pratique de la présence à soi. Devant l'impact croissant des sciences et la visibilité actuelle des techniques méditatives, quel rôle jouera la phénoménologie? Contrairement aux autres approches philosophiques, elle possède ce plus de tenir en un regard ouvert sur le monde : par son retour à l'expérience, elle fait alliance avec la visée expérimentale des sciences et, par sa méthode de suspension, elle entre en contact avec une quête contemplative qui est prise de recul. Elle joue ainsi un rôle-charnière pour repenser l'attention en en faisant une expérience d'ouverture au monde davantage qu'un état mental interne. La phénoménologie apporte quelque chose d'inédit : une éthique de l'attention, qui réforme celle-ci en " vigilance ". (shrink)

La surprise est une question qui n’a semble-t-il guère sollicité l’attention des philosophes. Trop ordinaire, trop anecdotique : minimale. À y regarder de plus près, on découvre qu’une foule d’auteurs issus de traditions philosophiques différentes voire opposées s’y sont intéressés, qu’il s’agisse d’Aristote, de Descartes, de Smith, de Peirce, Dewey, Heidegger, Ricœur ou Maldiney, sans compter certaines formules saisissantes des cognitivistes comme Davidson ou Dennett. Bref, il y a un problèm...

Context: The topic of my article, fragility, is a theme that has been little broached in philosophy and phenomenology, except by Ricœur, in the fifties, and recently Chrétien. I aim to bring it ….

Parole coupée, bouche bée, yeux grands ouverts, sourcils levés... Plutôt que langagière, l'expression de la surprise serait d'abord le fait du corps. On se propose dans cet ouvrage d'interroger de manière critique, voire de contrebalancer cette tendance habituelle à ranger l'expérience de la surprise du côté du silence et de l'indicible : au lieu de faire signe vers les éventuelles limites du langage et des différentes langues naturelles, la surprise ne fait-elle pas plutôt ressortir la richesse des ressources du langage (...) et la plasticité du fonctionnement des langues? Comment se dit donc la surprise? Dans quelle mesure son expression varie-t-elle d'une langue à l'autre? Le dire de la surprise est-il en lui-même un agir, à son tour producteur d'effets? Ces interrogations nous ont invités à réfléchir tant au lexique de la surprise qu'aux formes d'expression au moyen desquelles la surprise peut être non seulement exprimée mais aussi décrite, racontée, ou bien encore rationalisée, dans la langue courante, dans la logique comme dans la littérature. (shrink)

How the phenomenology of empathy in Husserl and beyond and the second-person approach of cognition are able to mutually enrich and constrain each other? Whereas the intersubjective empathy is limited to face-to-face inter-individual relational experiences or, when socially embedded, results a non-individualized understanding of others in general, the second person approach of cognition opens the way for a plural relational yet individualized understanding of the other. I would like to show in this paper how the integration of both phenomenological and (...) cognitive fields paves the way for the more encompassing description of intersubjective experience as a “relational multiplicity,” which I will ultimately describe through the empirical practice of an emergency psychiatric unit. (shrink)

From the contents: La fenetre sur l'absolu selon Fink (Laszlo Tengelyi).- Temps, espace et monde chez le jeune Fink (Marc Richir).- L'auto-reference de la phenomenologie (Bernhard Waldenfels).- Phenomenologie et critique chez Fink et Husserl (Ronald Bruzina).- Le spectateur phenomenologisant: au seuil du non-agir et du non-etre (Natalie Depraz).- Nouvelle determination de l'ideal (Hans Rainer Sepp).

Introduction Chez Husserl, la surprise est rare, tant est courante et insistante la concordance synonyme de désir de sens et d’identification de l’objet à connaître. C’est cette pulsion de connaissance que l’on retrouve dans la visée de « remplissement » du sens qu’est l’intentionnalité et la téléologie qui lui est inhérente. Elle manifeste à plein le souci du fondateur de faire droit sans équivoque à la primauté de la compréhension sur le non-sens, ou encore de la satisfaction sur la frustra...

Il y a un pari d'envergure, presque une provocation, à montrer l'ampleur et l'acuité des méthodes pratiques qui tissent le propos de Husserl dans un texte qui a été considéré par ses interprètes comme le livre le plus "métaphysique", à savoir celui où l'auteur prend parti pour une thèse philosophique souvent jugée éculée: l'idéalisme. Tout le destin de la phénoménologie s'est joué autour d'une prise de position contre son "tournant idéaliste" en 1913, Heidegger ayant ouvert les hostilités, suivi par Sartre, (...) Ricœur, Derrida et Levinas. A rebours de cette herméneutique constitutive de la critique philosophique, l'auteur cherche ici à faire voir un Husserl "praticien", "épistémologue", c'est-à-dire peu soucieux de défendre une position métaphysique. Cette épistémologie pratique de la phénoménologie peut être caractérisée comme un "empirisme transcendantal". Par là, un sens de la vérité émerge, qui puise sa validité dans l'expérience native du lecteur, c'est-à-dire dans son aptitude à vérifier par lui-même l'accord du concept en relation avec son vécu. La lecture expérientielle proposée prend alors un tour pragmatique, à l'horizon d'un renouvellement de la phénoménologie comme pratique. (shrink)

I would like to show here that Varela, besides being a scientist and a Buddhist practitioner, also has the stature of a philosopher. In order to do so, I chose to illuminate his thought in the light of a concept that he did not use much, at least at the beginning, but which constitutes the cornerstone of his philosophy. It is the concept of surprise. I will show first how surprise is at the core of what I call his 'Valence' (...) article; time, affect, and intersubjectivity being the main coordinates of surprise. Then I will prove how the structural concepts of autopoiesis, enaction, and co-generativity are all supported by surprise as a dynamic model. In parallel, I will indicate how some seemingly side concepts (I call 'operative'), such as creation, novelty, unpredictibility, openness, and otherness, are actually key candidates for demonstrating the relevance of Varela as a philosopher of surprise....the nature of the self is precisely its non-findability. There is nothing to grasp that would make persons and phenomena what they are (Sanscrit: anatman; Tibetan: bdag med gnyis)... The usual translation of anatman is 'non-self', or 'emptiness of self'. However, this is again too close to the original Buddhist language... For the practitioner, anatman is manifest, experienced as superabundant: it is a nonknowledge that holds a host of surprises. (Varela, 2000/2017, p. 134). (shrink)

I would like to propose an interpretation of Ricœur’s first phenomenological works in the light of what I call an “experiential phenomenology”, by answeringthree important questions. The first is a factual and historical interrogation: why has Ricœur abandoned his project of a descriptive phenomenology after publishing his first volume of the The Voluntary and the Involuntary and why did he afterwards direct his philosophical research towards the problem of interpretation? The second interrogation is an epistemological and a methodological one: in (...) what way is the Husserlian phenomenology a first-person approach and how does Ricœur’s phenomenology of the will lead us towards an experiential phenomenology in first person? The final question is heuristical: what criteria should we point out in order to establish a phenomenological science that is 1) descriptive and 2) approaching the experience in first-person? (shrink)

The goal of this article is to put to the fore the importance and the relevance of the “second persons” in the framework of the relational ethics where the person has being related as a primacy over the individual as an isolated subject. While using the psychiatric team of an emergency unit (E.R.I.C.) as a leading thread we seek to show the anthropology of being related, which underlines the practical ethics of such emergency team.

S'agissant de notre rapport à l'au-delà, nous sommes les jouets de nos images. Alors que l'on y croit, au fond, on finit par détruire cette " réalité " qu'est l'au-delà, en en faisant une réalité familière. Trop familière pour être encore l'au-delà. Mais il est possible de penser un rapport de l'homme à la mort qui n'abolisse ni la vie ni l'homme. Si tel est le cas, cela voudrait dire qu'il existe une possibilité inédite de vie, que nous ne soupçonnons (...) pas encore, donnant à penser l'au-delà au-delà de tout ce que nous pouvons penser encore à cet égard. (shrink)

The phenomenology of trauma is a historical, epistemological, and methodic inquiry that wishes to test the validity of an already settled dynamic model of surprise as shock-rupture based on its correlated inner structures of attention and emotion. Thanks to an integrative approach, crossing phenomenological subjective experiences and empirical data, we hope to renew the understanding of the blank lived experience of trauma and the passive preconscious dynamics of traumatism, as well as to generate possible therapeutic effects.