Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-tf8b9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T03:08:32.031Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

6 - The lives of Others

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2010

Nicolas de Warren
Affiliation:
Wellesley College, Massachusetts
Get access

Summary

The mystery of the Other is nothing but the mystery of myself.

— Merleau-Ponty

The specter of solipsism

A specter of solipsism haunts transcendental phenomenology. From its methodological inception with the suspension of the natural attitude and the ensuing reduction to the field of pure consciousness, the descriptive science of transcendental phenomenology invokes a first-person point of view that might easily be seen as inviting the objection of solipsism. This vantage-point of transcendental self-explication is more than simply a stylistic device or a matter of descriptive convenience; it reflects the essential egological form of subjectivity in its singular accomplishment of transcendental constitution. As Husserl states, the epoché “affects the intramundane existence of all other egos, such that we should no longer rightly speak in the communicative plural” (Hua I, 58 [19]). Such a methodological commitment to the suspension of the natural attitude and the disclosure of transcendental experience do not look promising for avoiding what seems inescapable: the solipsism of transcendental subjectivity. If the transcendental reduction is ipso facto a reduction to the solus ipse of pure consciousness, how can such solitude render intelligible the transcendence of a world open to any possible experience, including the lives of Others? Must we conclude that “le solipsisme n'est ni une aberration, ni un sophisme: c'est la structure même de la raison”?

Ironically, this fate appears to be confirmed by Husserl's account of the Other in the context of presenting phenomenology as the proof of transcendental idealism.

Type
Chapter
Information
Husserl and the Promise of Time
Subjectivity in Transcendental Phenomenology
, pp. 209 - 249
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • The lives of Others
  • Nicolas de Warren, Wellesley College, Massachusetts
  • Book: Husserl and the Promise of Time
  • Online publication: 20 January 2010
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511657412.007
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • The lives of Others
  • Nicolas de Warren, Wellesley College, Massachusetts
  • Book: Husserl and the Promise of Time
  • Online publication: 20 January 2010
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511657412.007
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • The lives of Others
  • Nicolas de Warren, Wellesley College, Massachusetts
  • Book: Husserl and the Promise of Time
  • Online publication: 20 January 2010
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511657412.007
Available formats
×