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EXCERPT FROM THE AFTERWORD On the relationship between Husserl's phenomenology and the phenomenology of the nature-philosophy In this afterword, we will discuss some fundamental similarities and differences between the... more

EXCERPT FROM THE AFTERWORD

On the relationship between Husserl's phenomenology and the phenomenology of the nature-philosophy

In this afterword, we will discuss some fundamental similarities and differences between the phenomenological method of the nature-philosophy, which the author used to obtain the insights presented in the essay, as well as Edmund Husserl’s phenomenology as a method and the most prominent direction of contemporary philosophy.

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However, as the author convincingly describes in the book, thinking alone does not have an unconditional authority in relation to external reality. Phenomena should be observed, and one should refrain from judging for as long as possible. As long as we do not assert anything and do not take a position, we cannot make an error because truth and falsity are categories that concern judgment as a thinking process. We should stick to the phenomena and let them “talk” to us. It is up to us to absorb the images of reality conveyed by our senses as vividly, clearly, and faithfully as possible. In this way, if we have enough authentic and vivid observations, things will appear to us as they are. Thinking thereby gains structure. It also gains quality material with which it can continue to work, revealing the truth of being.
Summarising what has been written here, I can say that both the phenomenology of nature-philosophy and Husserl’s phenomenology proceed from appearances or phenomena, as their names suggest. For every genuine phenomenology (i.e. scientific phenomenology that understands itself), Hegel’s demand applies:

“Scientific knowledge requires, on the contrary, to surrender to the life of the object or, what is the same, to have it before oneself and express its inner necessity.”
(Hegel, “Phenomenology of Spirit”, p. 37)

The ultimate demand of both nature-philosophy and transcendental phenomenology is that they should initially be free of theories (i.e. that they surrender to the phenomena themselves), which is fully in line with Hegel’s demand. However, what fundamentally makes them different is that the term “appearance” or “phenomenon” implies completely different things. For the phenomenology of nature-philosophy, phenomena are simply what appears, the experiential world of the everyday, given as such. In the sense of transcendental phenomenology, an appearance is the result of a carefully prepared and implemented methodological procedure, epoche, and phenomenological reductions, which appears within a very specific (before Husserl, the “unconscious region of being”) – the transcendental field of pure consciousness. These are “things” or transcendental phenomena in the sense of Husserl’s phenomenology.

It is important to emphasise that both the phenomenology of nature-philosophy and transcendental phenomenology inaugurate the possibility of research in philosophy. Hence, they open endless horizons of potential advancement and improvement of one’s knowledge, which also provides them with a powerful stamp of scientificity, as opposed to philosophies as worldviews. They assume generations of diligent scientific workers are continuing where their phenomenological predecessors left off.

Finally, I would like to single out another very important similarity between the phenomenologies we are talking about here. The central motif that the author develops in this book is the anthropocentric model, which proves to be the key to understanding nature. For Husserl, the transcendental subject cannot be identified with the worldly Self (it is the result of phenomenological reductions). However, this is not about two different subjects but different functions and different aspects of the same subject. Therefore, we can say that, for Husserl, man is also the key to understanding the world. Understanding man means understanding the intelligible spiritual primordial active in man. If we want solid cognitive ground under our feet, we must start from man, and we must dive into ourselves and follow the path of universal self-knowledge. Man cannot be explained by nature, but nature can be truly understood and explained only from the understanding of man himself.

PhD ABD Mihovil Mlikotić
October 2023,
Split, Croatia