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hberg95's review against another edition
challenging
hopeful
informative
reflective
medium-paced
4.0
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4.0
Since this book is essential for understanding phenomenology, and the price on Amazon is astronomical for a <100 page book, I'll post my summary here;
Introduction - George Nakhnikian introduces Husserl's work as a revolutionary and novel method of philosophy, which will seem strange to those trained in the typical Western-analytic tradition. However, Husserl's novelty has not prevented his work from influencing a great range of philosopher's and schools of philosophy. Husserl rejects psychologism, and aims to explore consciousness without solipsism and extreme scepticism, which Cartesian doubt highlights.
These notes were written after Husserl's lectures, and many have slight alterations from what Husserl originally said. We assume he added things he missed out.
The Train of Thoughts in the Lectures - This is a method of cognition, which is a movement largely influenced by Descartes. We use eidetic abstraction (mental thought removed from any sense experience) to reach 'clear and distinct' perceptions (see Descartes' Meditations), through the indubitable cogitatio. Phenomenological reduction is used, but it doesn't prove things like inductive or deductively reasoning, which is just phenomena. Self-givenness only extends as far as the phenomenal field. A sound for example is heard, retained and recalled in the mind. This yields absolute data - appearance, and that which appears. Together, they're constituted in the mental processes. Husserl also rejects Descartes' semi-Platonism (Cartesian theory of ideas), instead claiming we don't know if things send 'representatives' to our consciousness. Husserl wants t understand constitution (how perceptions become mental images) and the essence and objectivity of perception. "...the common element is then in the methodology of the analysis of essences within the sphere of immediate evidence." (12).
Lecture 1 - Husserl contrasts natural thinking with philosophical thinking, as natural thinking takes cognition for granted. "Cognition is a fact of nature. It is the experience of a cognising organic being. It is a psychological fact. As any psychological fact, it can be described according to its kind and internatal connections, and its genetic relations can be investigated. On the other hand, cognition is essentially cognition of what objectively is; and it is cognition through the meaning which is intrinsic to it; by thinking is also already active in this relating" (15). Husserl explains that phenomenology is a critique of naturalistic cognition, it tries to get at the essence of things. He rejects scientific idealism (a la Hume). He invokes the spectre of contradictions, and sees scientific logic as failing. The philosopher must not take scientific discovery for granted, as he is critiquing cognition, and on a different path, using a different methodology.
Lecture 2 -Husserl questions how we can critique cognition, but rely undoubtedly on it. "Every intellectual process and indeed every mental process whatever, while being enacted, can be made the object of a pure 'seeing' and understanding, and is something absolutely given in this 'seeing'" (24). In other words, Husserl gives a Thomas Reid-like account of realism, or an atheistic Cartesian view. Our perceptions are a 'given', we can inspect and ponder them. "Without some cognition given at the outset, there is also no advancement of cognition. The critique of cognition cannot therefore begin. There can be no such science at all." (25-26). The problem is that cognition can transcend the 'givenness' of the senses. Transcendence is the 'riddle' of cognition. Therefore, Husserl is demonstrating that science cannot be the source of epistemology.
Lecture 3 - "Thus to each psychic lived process there corresponds through the device of phenomenological reduction a pure phenomenon, which exhibits its intrinsic (immanent) essence (taken individually) as an absolute datum." (35). Rather than jump to Descartes' proof of God, Husserl declares the "givenness of any reduced phenomenon is an absolute and indubitable givenness" (40). The principles of logic, ethics, and theories of value are dispensed with cognition being a priori self given. This is a critique of reason.
Lecture 4 - "We must clarify the teleological interconnections with cognition,/ which amount to certain essential types of intellectual forms" (46). We use phenomenological reduction to build, but rejects Humean empiricism. "The basic point is that one must not overlook the fact that evidence is the consciousness which is truly [a]' seeing' [consciousness] and which has a direct and adequate grasp of itself and that signifies nothing other than adequate self-givenness." (47). Phenomenological reduction removes loose evidence and 'mediate evidence', it entails no limitation to the cogito, but places limits on that which is 'self given'. "There are many sorts of objectivity and, correlatively, many sorts of so-called givenness. Perhaps the givenness of the existents in the sense of the so-called 'inner-perception', and again the givenness of the existents in the natural 'objectivising' sciences, is only one sort of givenness; while the others, although labeled as nonexistent, are still types of givenness. And it is only because they are, that they can be set over against the other sorts and distinguished from them in evidence." (51).
Lecture 5 - Husserl begins by looking at the complexity of memory, and the universality of the cogitatio. "Perception posits existence but it also has an essence which as content posited as existing can also be the same in representation." (55). "Thus a mode of givenness is displayed in the intuitions in imagination and the evident judgements which are grounded on them." (55). For Husserl we rely on consciousness and must use a kind of common sense realism to critique and build knowledge. We can, for example, look at a house and infer that it is made of bricks, from the basis of appearance. If we hallucinate or fantasise we only see an aspect of the object, but it is not there "'as a datum' of a sort of proper to experience." (57). We must consider essences and accept contradiction, change and predicates as a 'given'. "In givenness we see that the object is constituted in cognition." (59). There are forms of objectivity and consciousness is intentional. Cognition has 'teleological coherence', from here we corroborate and verify (60).
Please excuse any spelling mistakes, and comment if I've made any mistakes.
Introduction - George Nakhnikian introduces Husserl's work as a revolutionary and novel method of philosophy, which will seem strange to those trained in the typical Western-analytic tradition. However, Husserl's novelty has not prevented his work from influencing a great range of philosopher's and schools of philosophy. Husserl rejects psychologism, and aims to explore consciousness without solipsism and extreme scepticism, which Cartesian doubt highlights.
These notes were written after Husserl's lectures, and many have slight alterations from what Husserl originally said. We assume he added things he missed out.
The Train of Thoughts in the Lectures - This is a method of cognition, which is a movement largely influenced by Descartes. We use eidetic abstraction (mental thought removed from any sense experience) to reach 'clear and distinct' perceptions (see Descartes' Meditations), through the indubitable cogitatio. Phenomenological reduction is used, but it doesn't prove things like inductive or deductively reasoning, which is just phenomena. Self-givenness only extends as far as the phenomenal field. A sound for example is heard, retained and recalled in the mind. This yields absolute data - appearance, and that which appears. Together, they're constituted in the mental processes. Husserl also rejects Descartes' semi-Platonism (Cartesian theory of ideas), instead claiming we don't know if things send 'representatives' to our consciousness. Husserl wants t understand constitution (how perceptions become mental images) and the essence and objectivity of perception. "...the common element is then in the methodology of the analysis of essences within the sphere of immediate evidence." (12).
Lecture 1 - Husserl contrasts natural thinking with philosophical thinking, as natural thinking takes cognition for granted. "Cognition is a fact of nature. It is the experience of a cognising organic being. It is a psychological fact. As any psychological fact, it can be described according to its kind and internatal connections, and its genetic relations can be investigated. On the other hand, cognition is essentially cognition of what objectively is; and it is cognition through the meaning which is intrinsic to it; by thinking is also already active in this relating" (15). Husserl explains that phenomenology is a critique of naturalistic cognition, it tries to get at the essence of things. He rejects scientific idealism (a la Hume). He invokes the spectre of contradictions, and sees scientific logic as failing. The philosopher must not take scientific discovery for granted, as he is critiquing cognition, and on a different path, using a different methodology.
Lecture 2 -Husserl questions how we can critique cognition, but rely undoubtedly on it. "Every intellectual process and indeed every mental process whatever, while being enacted, can be made the object of a pure 'seeing' and understanding, and is something absolutely given in this 'seeing'" (24). In other words, Husserl gives a Thomas Reid-like account of realism, or an atheistic Cartesian view. Our perceptions are a 'given', we can inspect and ponder them. "Without some cognition given at the outset, there is also no advancement of cognition. The critique of cognition cannot therefore begin. There can be no such science at all." (25-26). The problem is that cognition can transcend the 'givenness' of the senses. Transcendence is the 'riddle' of cognition. Therefore, Husserl is demonstrating that science cannot be the source of epistemology.
Lecture 3 - "Thus to each psychic lived process there corresponds through the device of phenomenological reduction a pure phenomenon, which exhibits its intrinsic (immanent) essence (taken individually) as an absolute datum." (35). Rather than jump to Descartes' proof of God, Husserl declares the "givenness of any reduced phenomenon is an absolute and indubitable givenness" (40). The principles of logic, ethics, and theories of value are dispensed with cognition being a priori self given. This is a critique of reason.
Lecture 4 - "We must clarify the teleological interconnections with cognition,/ which amount to certain essential types of intellectual forms" (46). We use phenomenological reduction to build, but rejects Humean empiricism. "The basic point is that one must not overlook the fact that evidence is the consciousness which is truly [a]' seeing' [consciousness] and which has a direct and adequate grasp of itself and that signifies nothing other than adequate self-givenness." (47). Phenomenological reduction removes loose evidence and 'mediate evidence', it entails no limitation to the cogito, but places limits on that which is 'self given'. "There are many sorts of objectivity and, correlatively, many sorts of so-called givenness. Perhaps the givenness of the existents in the sense of the so-called 'inner-perception', and again the givenness of the existents in the natural 'objectivising' sciences, is only one sort of givenness; while the others, although labeled as nonexistent, are still types of givenness. And it is only because they are, that they can be set over against the other sorts and distinguished from them in evidence." (51).
Lecture 5 - Husserl begins by looking at the complexity of memory, and the universality of the cogitatio. "Perception posits existence but it also has an essence which as content posited as existing can also be the same in representation." (55). "Thus a mode of givenness is displayed in the intuitions in imagination and the evident judgements which are grounded on them." (55). For Husserl we rely on consciousness and must use a kind of common sense realism to critique and build knowledge. We can, for example, look at a house and infer that it is made of bricks, from the basis of appearance. If we hallucinate or fantasise we only see an aspect of the object, but it is not there "'as a datum' of a sort of proper to experience." (57). We must consider essences and accept contradiction, change and predicates as a 'given'. "In givenness we see that the object is constituted in cognition." (59). There are forms of objectivity and consciousness is intentional. Cognition has 'teleological coherence', from here we corroborate and verify (60).
Please excuse any spelling mistakes, and comment if I've made any mistakes.
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