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ON FILOZOFÓWNA’S CRITICISM OF BLAUSTEIN’S PHENOMENOLOGY OF AESTHETIC EXPERIENCE

Abstract
Phenomenology originates in a critical assessment of descriptive psychology. In this regard, scholars emphasize mainly the problem of psychologism. Yet, the question of a methodological divide between both approaches is rather at the margins of contemporary scholarship. In the present paper, I analyze and discuss the 1931–32 debate held by Irena Filozofówna and Leopold Blaustein as a case study of the phenomenology-psychology divide. The debate addresses the structure of aesthetic experience, as well as a methodological background for describing psychic life. My main task is to present arguments, concepts, and methodologies of the opposing positions. To do so, in Sect. (1) I outline biographical sketches of Filozofówna and Blaustein. They were members of the Lvov-Warsaw School, but they presented different approaches: whereas Filozofówna advocated descriptive and experimental psychology, Blaustein—educated not only by Twardowski, but also by Ingarden, and Husserl—referred to the phenomenological tradition too. Sect. (2) summarizes Blaustein’s phenomenological aesthetics. His approach consists in analyzing aesthetic experience as a combination of nonreducible presentations. His key observation is that different types of art require different presentations, say, imaginative, schematic, or symbolic. In Sect. (3), I analyze Filozofówna’s criticism of this approach. Her main argument consists in emphasizing judgments as a necessary element of every lived experience. She claims that Blaustein comprehends acts as intentional, i.e., as presenting their objects as “such and such,” but by doing so, he confuses presentations with judgments. In this section I follow Blaustein’s replies to Filozofówna’s criticism. In Sect. (4), I analyze Filozofówna’s argument that Blaustein adopted an ineffective method, since he was too hasty in accepting unjustified hypotheses. In Sect. (5), I ask about a theoretical background of Filozofówna’s criticism, and I juxtapose both positions.

Keywords
descriptive psychology, phenomenological method, aesthetic experience, hypothesis, description, theory of presentations, Filozofówna, Blaustein.

References

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IN-BETWEEN MIND, SPIRIT, AND BEING: A CRITICAL APPRECIATION OF GERDA WALTHER’S PHENOMENOLOGY OF MYSTICISM WITH PARTICULAR REFERENCE TO CORRESPONDENCES TO POST-MATERIALIST NOTIONS OF REALITY

Abstract
In her main work, Walther exposes the unio mystica as meta-transcendental constitution of (fundamental) spiritual being (the bracketing indicates that this demonstration can be read in a metaphysical, i.e., strong, as well as in a secular, i.e., weak, version). While reflecting her approach theoretically and methodologically by drawing on Husserl, Landmann, Stein, just as on Pfänder and Conrad-Martius, Walther proposes a genuine approach that pushes the transcendental idealistic paradigm further. Its crucial claim is (imperfect) perceptibility and experientiality of (fundamental) spiritual being (labeled “God” by Walther). It is based on a substantially and ontologically differentiating—though integrative—notion of the conditio humana: entanglement of ego-center (both belonging to the transcendental realm and transgressing it meta-transcendentally), self (belonging to psychophysical being), and soulspiritual implications of personal basic essence (belonging to spiritual being) with its “metaphysical-real core” (belonging to fundamental spiritual being). By the help of mystical vision, (fundamental) spiritual being is not only (though imperfectly) perceived and experienced; rather, according to Walther, human ego-consciousness also communicates with God as a spiritual person. However, the latter cannot be supported by Walther’s analysis. In other words, a critical distinction must be made between the—phenomenologically demonstrable—philosophical content of Walther’s investigation and its theologically motivated readings. Accordingly, the present article can appreciate the philosophical significance of her Phenomenology of Mysticism without thereby being committed to its theological interpretations. Walther’s main work, in summary, is a substantial—if not consistently concise—contribution to the philosophy of mind/spirit and being, which, moreover, is able to act as a bridge between philosophical phenomenology and theology. Additionally, in the weak reading, Walther’s integrative concept of mind/spirit and being is connectable to postmaterialist notions of reality.

Keywords
Walther, early phenomenological movement, mystical experience, mind/spirit, being, anthropology, theological turn, post-materialism.

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THE CHALLENGES OF I-SPLITTING OR ICHSPALTUNG FOR THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF EDITH STEIN AND GERDA WALTHER

Abstract
The phenomenon of I-splitting or Ichspaltung poses many challenges for phenomenology. In particular, one wonders how one and the same I can perform different acts while preserving its disinterested autonomy and identity. Moreover, as the I moves from the natural attitude to the phenomenological one, phenomenologists like Husserl defend the purity of the transcendental I to grasp the sense of what its lives. How can the I move from one attitude to the next without being affected or conditioned by the acts carried out and content seized by the I in both attitudes? For example, one wonders how trauma or intense emotional experiences may affect the transcendental or phenomenological I, if at all. Edith Stein and Gerda Walther are read here as deepening the problem of I-splitting, for they introduce a form of it that is not merely defined by the undertaking of different acts of consciousness, for example, the move from the natural to the phenomenological attitude; rather, they describe lived experiences in which the very fundamental unity of the individual, personal I is challenged or negated through intense forms of sociality and intersubjectivity achieved in community and telepathy as well as ruptures in the constitutive unity of persons through soullessness. I argue here that these phenomena seriously challenge not only the unity of I experience but also phenomenology’s claim of the capacity of a pure and absolute ego to grasp philosophically and scientifically the objective sense of its investigations.

Keywords
I-splitting, Ichspaltung, unity of consciousness, fragmentation of the I, identity, person and personhood, soullessness.

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PHENOMENOLOGY WITHOUT EGOLOGY: EDITH STEIN AS AN ORIGINAL PHENOMENOLOGICAL THINKER

Abstract
Edith Stein is considered a leading figure in the early phenomenological movement and the disciple who performed in the best way the phenomenological method proposed by Husserl, and yet her relationship to phenomenology remains unclear in the literature. This article seeks to add clarity to her relationship to phenomenology while considering three inescapably related questions. (1) What did Stein conceive phenomenology to be? (2) How should we understand Husserl’s influence on Stein? (3) Was Stein an original phenomenological thinker? I argue that Stein conceives of phenomenology as an epistemological critique that aims to clarify the essential foundations of knowledge. It involves intentional analysis that proceeds by way of essential-seeing (Wesensschau), which can be brought about through the method of free imaginative variation, and its intentional analysis involves close attention to the relationship between meaning-intention and meaning-fulfillment. I argue that the primary influence Husserl exerts on Stein is in the development of phenomenology as conceived in his Logical Investigations. Finally, I offer an understanding of how Stein conceived of her differences with Husserl on the issue of idealism in order to argue that Stein’s phenomenological writings in On the Problem of Empathy and “Sentient Causality” offer us a novel phenomenological account of the human being that begins with the ego but escapes being a mere egology. Edith Stein’s phenomenology of the human person begins with the ego and its experiences, and yet, she identifies within those experiences a certain kind of extra-egoic content, viz. experiences of my sentient states.

Keywords
Edith Stein, Edmund Husserl, Phenomenology, Realist Phenomenology, Göttingen Circle, Early Phenomenology, Sentience, Lifepower.

References

• Ales Bello, A. (2002). Edith Stein’s Contribution to Phenomenology. In A. Tymieniecka (Ed.), Phenomenology World-Wide: Foundations—Expanding Dynamics—Life Engagements. A Guide for Research and Study (232-240). Dordrecht & London: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
• Collins, J. (1942). Edith Stein and the Advance of Phenomenology. Thought: Fordham University Quarterly, 17 (4), 685-708.
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• Ingarden, R. (1962). Edith Stein on Her Activity as an Assistant of Edmund Husserl. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 23 (2), 155-175.
• Luft, S. (2005). Husserl’s Concept of the “Transcendental Person”: Another Look at the Husserl-Heidegger Relationship. International Journal of Philosophical Studies, 13 (2), 141-177.
• Moran, D. (2005). The Meaning of Phenomenology in Husserl’s Logical Investigations. In G. Banham (Ed.), Husserl and the Logic of Experience (8-37). London: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Moran, D. (2018). What is the Phenomenological Approach? Revisiting Intentional Explication. Phenomenology and Mind, 15, 72-90.
• Ricoeur, P. (1967). Husserl: An Analysis of His Phenomenology (E. G. Ballard & L. E. Embree, Trans.). Evanston: Northwestern University Press.
• Spiegelberg, H. (1994). The Phenomenological Movement. Dordrecht & London: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
• Stein, E. (1986). Life in a Jewish Family: Her Unfinished Autobiographical Account (L. Gelber & R. Leuven, Eds.; J. Koeppel, Trans.). Washington D.C.: ICS Publications.
• Stein, E. (1989). On the Problem of Empathy (W. Stein, Trans.). Washington D.C.: ICS Publications.
• Stein, E. (2000). Philosophy of Psychology and the Humanities (M. C. Baseheart & M. Sawicki, Trans.). Washington D.C.: ICS Publications.
• Stein, E. (2014). Edith Stein Self Portrait in Letters: Letters to Roman Ingarden (M. A. Neyer OCD, Ed.; H. C. Hunt, Trans.). Washington D.C.: ICS Publications.

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CORE OF THE ESSENCE AND CORE OF THE PERSON: JEAN HERING AND A HIDDEN SOURCE OF EDITH STEIN’S EARLY ONTOLOGY

Abstract
The present paper makes the case for considering Jean Hering the source from which Edith Stein first borrowed the concept of “core,” notably, “core of the person.” In particular, we maintain that the background of Stein’s decision is represented by the original version of Hering’s famous booklet Bemerkungen über das Wesen, die Wesenheit und die Idee, namely, the Appendix (Fragmente zur Vorbereitung einer künftigen Lehre vom Apriori) to his still unpublished dissertation on Lotze. Nevertheless, whereas Hering introduces the concept of “core” to merely discriminate between different types of essences within the framework of a general attempt at determining the structure of individual essences, Stein takes it to characterize always and exclusively the structure of the person, notably, its mode of being, thereby paving the way for her future personalistic ontology. The paper will be divided into three parts. In § 2 evidence will be produced to support the thesis that Stein had direct knowledge of Hering’s dissertation. § 3 will analyze Hering’s notions of essence and “core of the essence” (in both versions of the text and in relation to the example of the “essence” of Caesar). Finally, § 4 will tackle the “core” in Stein’s early works, in particular in the book on empathy, and in comparison with Hering’s understanding of it. The paper intends to pursue a double goal: it aims at emphasizing the novelty of Stein’s conception of the essence, notably, core of the (individual) essence while at the same time reconstructing the wider framework to which it belongs.

Keywords
Edith Stein, Jean Hering, essence, individuum, philosophy of the person, eidetic phenomenology, ontology.

References

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