The twentieth century German philosophers Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger posit phenomenology as a central theme to their philosophy. Husserl is considered the father of phenomenology, where he aimed to find a science of beginning. While Heidegger is concerned with what it means to be, and how can one be. First, I show that Husserl describes descriptive phenomenology concerned with a presupposition-less beginning, while Heidegger describes an interpretive phenomenology that questions the ontology of being. Then, I show how both theories require the subject has to be active in its pursuit of becoming a conscious Being.
Husserl begins by describing how traditional philosophy started with the ‘natural attitude.’ This attitude posits consciousness as one thing among many in the real world, and attempts to relate consciousness with objects in space. Descartes is especially concerned with this subject, where he attempted to ground the existence of objects in the real world. Husserl believes that people ‘generally posits’ that there is a natural world continuously ‘on hand.’ A world where objects exists in a defined spatial and temporal order, where each individual exists. However, under the Cartesian view, the world consists of ‘I think, I am.’
Husserl considers the implication of the Cartesian scientific method. This implication indicates that the only thing of which I can be conscious, aware, or certain of is myself; my own Being, and my own ideas. One is limited to a reality of what is inside their head. From this confined view of reality arises the egocentric predicament. If the only thing we can be certain of is what is in our minds, how can we know there is anything outside of us? Husserl argues that if we accept the egocentric predicament will spend an extraordinary amount of time trying to construct a connection between our selves or the world with no guarantee of its certainty.
Husserl suggests that we operate on another assumption; that awareness is always awareness of things outside ourselves. Rather than assuming that awareness is awareness only of interior mental neurological states. Husserl believed that phenomenology was based on the meaning of the individual’s experience. The experience of perception, memory, and emotion, involve what Husserl called “intentionality”, which is one’s directed awareness or consciousness of an object or event. Intentionality shifts one from the non-action unawareness to the action form of conception. As in, we become aware of the thing. Rather than have the thing in the background, it becomes in the foreground of our consciousness. We actively gain consciousness.
When a physical object comes into one’s consciousness it does not present itself all at once. Instead, the individual sees it in perspective. If the person moves around a chair, they would still perceive the chair as one whole entity, not disjointed images of an object. The thing is the same in all of the reference angles one sees it from. You see the chair and recognize it in one go. You reach the essence of a chair in one go. But consciousness, the third sphere is always in context. You always observe the object in respect to you and your understanding of the object. To get to the sphere of absolute consciousness, one that is unmarred by individual context, you have to let the worldly go away. To let go of the worldly you need the phenomenological method of reduction.
Phenomenological reduction is also called bracketing away, or the suspension of worldly judgment regarding the true nature of reality. Husserl uses the term epoche (cessation) to describe the suspension of judgement. Bracketed judgment is an epoche or suspension of inquiry, which places in brackets whatever facts belong to essential thing one is observing. It seeks to momentarily reduce the object to its base qualities to effectively erase the world of speculation. This reduction returns the observer to their primordial experience of the matter. One of uncorrupted assumptions.
Bracketing is the act of suspending judgment about the natural world. In other words, it is the systematic removal of the symbolic meaning, preconceived notions, and emotions. This is all in an effort to get to the core of a thing. This core contains only the essence that constitutes the thing. Thus, one’s subjective perception is the truest form of an experience one can have. This allows one to examine phenomena as they are originally given to consciousness. It involves setting aside the question of real existence, as well as questions about its physical nature, and focusing only on the subjective nature of a thing. These questions of physical qualities should be left to the natural science, not to philosophy. For example, the experience of seeing a tree qualifies as an experience, whether the tree appears in reality, in a dream or in a hallucination. The experience is the same for all, but what is the essence of the tree. That one can only arrive to through the phenomenological reduction. We must suspend belief in what we ordinarily take for granted, to reach a world without preconceived judgment. This is descriptive phenomenology, where every day conscious experiences were described while preconceived opinions were set aside or bracketed. Therefore, consciousness in to actively become aware of things with no preconceived notions.
Husserl’s student, Heidegger focused on Being, what it means to be and how does one be. He took on metaphysical ontology. He emphasizes in his book being and time, how being is the proper and sole theme of philosophy which has been ignored for too long, and that philosophy must be a science of being. Being is the starting point for philosophy rather than consciousness. He asserts that phenomena are ‘that which shows itself in itself, and does not deem it necessary to dive into their perception or to bracket them from preconceived notions. Phenomena are not the foundation of being. While the method of bracketing is too idealistic, one will never truly reduce their conceptions of a thing.
Instead Heidegger develops interpretive phenomenology rather than descriptive one. It relies on the science of hermeneutics, as in, the science of interpretation. For him, hermeneutics did not mean simply knowing the world, but rather, how does being get interpreted in the world. Meaning is present in everyday encounters that truly describe what it is to be, mere descriptions of experiences do not have a true value of meaning, unless the person comes into their being in these experiences. This is exemplified by Heidegger valuing the work of the poets which described the meaning of their worldly experiences. He warned against the use of technology that distorted what it is like to be and detached the person from the world around them.
Therefore, Heidegger is not interested in viewing a thing without context or emotion, such is the case with bracketing, but rather you must experience each emotion embedded in everyday occurrences. Being cannot be found by bracketing away, for Being is found in these human experiences. Heidegger coins the term ‘daseinsanalyse,’ the analysis of human way of being, to understand how humans ‘gain access’ into their being. This access is achieved when humans realize their finite-ness, or their death. This comes from the conception that you realize what a thing is when you are lacking the said thing. As in, when one ceases to be, or if confronted by the possibility of ceasing to be, they realize their being-ness.
It is interesting to note that both philosophers stressed the need of a ‘push’ to make an individual arrive at the core of a thing. Husserl implements intentionality as the essence of consciousness. One is forced to become aware of the thing through their actions- it is an active interaction with the world. Once one interacts with an object, the objects inters their consciousness. Heidegger implements a similar strategy when he postulates the finitude of being. As soon as one realizes their ultimate end, they become aware of their being. Again, we see this inescapable concept of realization that is needed for one to understand the teachings of each philosopher. Phenomenology, for both, requires the subject to come into awareness of the world they live within by force.
In other words, Heidegger talks about the Ontic and Ontological ways of life. Heidegger believes that people far too often get stuck in the ontic way of life as part of their humanness. Both the ontic an ontological represent ‘modes of being,’ but the ontological can only be reached by daseinsanalyse. In this case, the finitude of being pushes one into realizing their Being-ness. While Husserl talks about intentionality as the directed awareness of an object, thing or emotion. For Husserl, the subject is required to actively process and bracket the thing. For Heidegger, the subject is again, required to perform ‘daseinsanalyse’ to gain the ontological Being. In both cases, the subject has to be active in its pursuit of becoming a conscious Being.
Thus, it becomes clear that Husserl was concerned with the question of what one can know as a person. This question is tied to the three spheres of the world, and how one can interpret knowledge from one to the other. Husserl phenomenological reduction was the way to arrive at absolute consciousness, where intentionality served as the drive toward realizing consciousness. Heidegger, on the other hand, set forth interpretive phenomenology. He stressed the importance of the science of hermeneutics, where interpretations held as much importance as the word itself. He is concerned with answering the question of what it is to be, and one’s realization of their finite is what pushes them into realizing their being. This being is then willing to experience the world truthfully, without corrupted notions of meaning.