225
See also: René Descartes 116–23 ■ Franz Brentano 336 ■ Martin Heidegger
252–55 ■ Emmanuel Levinas 273 ■ Maurice Merleau-Ponty 274–75
THE MODERN WORLD
Scientific theories are based on
experience. But Husserl believed
that experience alone did not add
up to science, because as any
scientist knows, experience is full
of all kinds of assumptions, biases,
and misconceptions. Husserl
wanted to drive out all of these
uncertainties to give science
absolutely certain foundations.
To do this, Husserl made use of
the philosophy of the 19th-century
philosopher René Descartes. Like
Husserl, Descartes wanted to free
philosophy from all assumptions,
biases, and doubts. Descartes wrote
that although almost everything
could be doubted, he could not
doubt that he was doubting.
Phenomenology
Husserl takes up a similar approach
to Descartes, but uses it differently.
He suggests that if we adopt a
scientific attitude to experience,
laying aside every single assumption
that we have (even including the
assumption that an external world
exists outside of us), then we can
start philosophy with a clean slate,
free of all assumptions. Husserl
calls this approach phenomenology:
a philosophical investigation of
the phenomena of experience. We
need to look at experience with a
scientific attitude, laying to one
side (or “bracketing out” as Husserl
calls it) every single one of our
assumptions. And if we look
carefully and patiently enough, we
can build a secure foundation of
knowledge that might help us deal
with the philosophical problems
that have been with us since the
very beginnings of philosophy.
However, different philosophers
following Husserl’s method came
to different results, and there was
little agreement as to what the
method actually was, or how one
carried it out. Toward the end of his
career, Husserl wrote that the
dream of putting the sciences on
firm foundations was over. But
although Husserl’s phenomenology
failed to provide philosophers with
a scientific approach to experience,
or to solve philosophy’s most
enduring problems, it nevertheless
gave birth to one of the richest
traditions in 20th-century thought. ■We entirely lack
a rational science
of man and of the
human community.
Edmund Husserl
Edmund HusserlHusserl was born in 1859
in Moravia, then a part of
the Austrian empire. He
started his career studying
mathematics and astronomy,
but after finishing his
doctorate in mathematics he
decided to take up philosophy.
In 1887 Husserl married
Malvine Steinschneider, with
whom he had three children.
He also became Privatdozent
(private lecturer) at Halle,
where he remained until 1901.
He then accepted an associate
professorship at the University
of Göttingen, before becoming
a professor of philosophy at
the University of Freiburg in
1916, where Martin Heidegger
was among his students. In
1933, Husserl was suspended
from the university on account
of his Jewish background, a
decision in which Heidegger
was implicated. Husserl
continued to write until his
death in 1938.Key works1901 Logical Investigations
1907 The Idea of
Phenomenology
1911 Philosophy as a
Rigorous Science
1913 Ideas toward a Pure
PhenomenologyMathematics does not rely on
empirical evidence, which is full of
assumptions, to reach its conclusions.
Husserl wanted to put all science (and
all knowledge) on a similar foundation.