Do we need an existential philosophy of the railway? Why then a philosophy of sport?

A lively debate has arisen about the need and the character of phenomenology—of phenomenology in general and of sports phenomenology in particular. This paper responds to Irena Martínková and Jim Parry who ‘defended’ philosophical phenomenology against my critique of their book about phenomenological approaches to sport. Where the defense maintains the existence of one single and correct phenomenology, understood as a sort of existential philosophy, this paper argues for a diversity of different types of phenomenology and more concretely for a phenomenological method that goes ‘back to phenomena.’     

Back to The Phenomena (of Sport) – or Back to The Phenomenologists? Towards a Phenomenology of (Sports) Phenomenology

Is phenomenology a method or a philosophy (of ‘ontological’ character)? This question is discussed here with a recent philosophical collection of articles about the phenomenology of sport at hand. However, one finds very few concrete phenomena in this volume, but much abstract talk about the authoritative philosophers of ontology and existentialism. This gives the ‘phenomenological school’ a somewhat sectarian character, which is not typical in recent contributions of phenomenology. This review essay broadens out from the current volume under consideration towards a history of phenomenology and a differential phenomenology of phenomenology. It is not clear how much value the volume itself, however, has for the understanding of sport as well as for the understanding of phenomenology. Nevertheless, it documents how phenomenological scholastics approach sport, which may serve as a warning at a time when positivist reductionism seems to have also become mainstream in human and social sciences.     

Phenomenological Metaphysics as a Speculative Realism

The debate between speculative realism and phenomenology has become quite heated over the past years. The matter of contention is the possibility of a metaphysics that can provide knowledge of reality as it is in itself. The speculative realists accuse phenomenology of denying this possibility, confining knowledge to the sphere of subjectivity. What has been overlooked in this debate is the similarity between the speculative project of Quentin Meillassoux and a Husserlian metaphysics. This article looks at these positions from a reconciliatory point of view. After outlining the debate, conceding the problematic nature of realism for phenomenology to the speculative realists, it will be shown that there is a place for a realist metaphysics within phenomenology. After showing the similarities between Meillassoux’s philosophy and a phenomenological metaphysics, and the legitimacy of qualifying the latter as a speculative realism, the conclusion will reflect on the modal notions at play in them.     

Eichberg’s ‘Phenomenology’ of Sport: A Phenomenal Confusion

This paper defends philosophical phenomenology against a hostile review in the previous issue of this journal. It tries to explain what philosophical phenomenology is, and the possibilities for its empirical application; whilst also showing that Eichberg’s method is idiosyncratic, problematic and not interested in philosophical phenomenology at all. It presents the phenomenological concept of phenomenon, which is neither concrete nor abstract, and contrasts it to Eichberg’s understanding of empirical concrete phenomena. Finally, the paper scrutinises Eichberg’s empirical method, which has deep problems of its own, and in any case, finds unsuitable its characterisation as ‘phenomenology’     

Cognitive phenomenology and conscious thought

How does mental content feature in conscious thought? I first argue that for a thought to be conscious the content of that thought must conscious, and that one has to appeal to cognitive phenomenology to give an adequate account of what it is for the content of a thought to be conscious. Sensory phenomenology cannot do the job. If one claims that the content of a conscious thought is unconscious, one is really claiming that there is no such thing as conscious thought. So one must either accept that there is such a thing as cognitive phenomenology, or deny the existence of conscious thought. Once it is clear that conscious thought requires cognitive phenomenology, there is a pressing question about the exact relationship between a thought’s cognitive phenomenological properties and its content. I conclude with a discussion of the nature of this relationship.     

A phenomenology of gender

The article asks how phenomenology, understood as a philosophical method of investigation, can account for gender. Despite the fact that it has provided useful tools for feminist inquiry, the question remains how gender can be studied within the paradigm of a philosophy of a subject. The article explicates four different understandings of phenomenology and assesses their respective potential in terms of theorizing gender: a classical reading, a corporeal reading, an intersubjective reading and a post-phenomenological reading. It concludes by arguing that phenomenology can extend its analysis to the question of gender only if its method is radically revised.     

Phenomenology and the Poststructural Critique of Experience

Abstract

Phenomenology is considered a philosophy of experience. But in the wake of French post‐structuralism beginning in the 1970s, the concept of experience within phenomenology has fallen under heavy critique. Even today, in the context of feminist philosophy the phenomenological concept of experience has yet to recover from the poststructuralist critique.

In this article, I will closely examine the poststructuralist critique of the concept of experience within the context of feminist theory. I will thereby refer first and foremost to the poststructuralist theorist Joan Scott, and her influential text “‘Experience’”. In my examination of the poststructuralist critique of experience, the leading question will be whether or not this critique, down to its details, can in fact be applied to phenomenology. My thesis is that phenomenology is able to withstand the poststructuralist critique of experience. Further, I will argue that post‐structuralism and phenomenology have more in common as regards the concept of experience than is usually admitted. For several reasons, it seems – as I will maintain – that both poststructuralist feminism and phenomenology are equally interested in a strong concept of experience and thus do not promote doing away with the concept.     

Husserl and queer theory

In spite of a history wherein queer theory has openly rejected phenomenology, phenomenology has gained increasing interest amongst queer theorists. However, Husserl’s phenomenology is often marginalized in attempts to integrate queer theory with phenomenology, and when Husserl is addressed specifically, his work is often treated superficially or even misrepresented. Given this, my first goal is to demonstrate how Husserl’s work is already open to positions considered fundamental to queer theory, and that Husserl is often explicitly arguing for these positions himself. In doing so, I wish to show that Husserl’s phenomenology is well fitted for complementary engagement with queer theory. My second goal is to work through some ways in which Husserl’s phenomenology and queer theory can work together in detail to accomplish shared theoretical goals. Although this will not be a full-blown analysis—which would exceed the parameters of this article—my hope is to provide a certain amount of in depth work that can then assist further analyses that combine these methods.     

詹姆斯心理学的现象学转向及其理论意蕴

本文在阐明詹姆斯心理学的出发点、并考察其心理学思想的探索和突破的基础上指出,詹姆斯关于心理学的思想历程无疑经历了一个根本的转向;又结合与胡塞尔现象学的比较认为,转向之后的詹姆斯的心理学思想的潜在意义,只有借用胡塞尔现象学的思想框架和概念工具,才能得到有效的表达和进一步的发展。文章最后还暗示了詹姆斯心理学思想的现象学转向对于理解并构建心理学的学科同一性的潜在意义。     

Phenomenology as the Original Science of Life in Heidegger’s Early Freiburg Lectures

The aim of this essay is to introduce an original and radical phenomenology of life into Heidegger’s earliest lectures at Freiburg University that stands independently from and in contrast to fundamental ontology. The motivation behind this aim lies in the exclusion of life from the existential analytic of Dasein despite Heidegger’s preoccupation with the question of life during this very early period. Principally, the essay demonstrates how Husserl’s phenomenological insight into the intentionality of life has the potential to be transformed into a living aporia. Although this demonstration is set within the general context of obtaining knowledge in and of life, it is achieved via a reciprocal critique of both the possibility of a philosophy of life and Husserlian phenomenology that reveals the congruence life philosophy has with the project of phenomenology. The essay ends by exposing Heidegger’s own latent and inexplicit formulation of phenomenology as the original science of life in terms of a radical correlation that holds aporetically between living and unliving experience.     

Phenomenology as first philosophy

The paper interprets phenomenology as a mode of inquiry that addresses fundamental questions of first philosophy, beyond the limitation of the practice by its leading theorists to the study of mere appearances. I draw on Adorno's critique of phenomenology to show that it has typically functioned as a mode of first philosophy, but I part with Adorno to argue that it ought to be practiced as such, to address consciously a sceptical worry about the gap between appearance and reality that Husserl modestly claimed to have bracketed. Noting Husserl's and Adorno's shared worries about the project of first philosophy, to know the world beyond appearances, I draw on Nietzsche to argue phenomenology ought nonetheless to address real matters of concern.     

The Phenomenology of Near-Death Consciousness in Past-Life Regression Therapy: A Pilot Study

Although past-life regression therapy has not been shown to be the re-experiencing of a verifiable previous biological existence, therapists have noted similarities between the phenomenology of post-death awareness reported by regressed subjects and the phenomenology of near-death experiences (NDEs). This paper reports the results of a pilot study exploring those similarities as far as the therapeutic modality normally accommodates post-death phenomena. Similarities and differences between NDEs and post-death regression phenomena suggest new avenues of research.     

A POSITIVE PHENOMENOLOGY: THE STRUCTURE OF MAURICE BLONDEL'S EARLY PHILOSOPHY

Given recent developments in Franco‐German phenomenology with its so‐called ‘theological turn’, there has been a concomitant renewal of interest in Maurice Blondel's thought. In this paper I consider the phenomenological structure of Blondel's early philosophy. Blondel defended and published his controversial thesis in 1893 and with this work presented a highly original phenomenology that was deeply indebted to the positive tradition and yet went beyond this same tradition to include even religious practice as part of its inquiry. Keen to engage the rationalist philosophers of the French academy, Blondel proposed a phenomenological project that was geared to engage the critical spirit of an age that was already deemed to be post‐metaphysical. It is in clarifying the manner in which Blondel conceives such a positive phenomenology that I indicate how his thought may contribute to contemporary debates in the phenomenology of religion.     

The Invisible and the Secret: Of a Phenomenology of the Inapparent

I consider in this article Heidegger’s late characterization of phenomenology as a “phenomenology of the inapparent.” Phenomenology is traditionally considered to be a thought of presence, assigned to a phenomenon that is identified with the present being, or with an object for consciousness. The phenomenon would be synonymous with presence itself, with what manifests itself in a presence. However, I will suggest in the following pages that phenomenology is haunted by the presence of a certain unappearing dimension, a claim that was made by Heidegger in his last seminar in 1973, when he characterized the most proper sense of phenomenology as a “phenomenology of the inapparent.” I attempt to show in what sense for Heidegger the “inapparent” plays in phenomenality and in phenomenology, and to then consider (drawing from Levinas and Derrida) its ethical import.     

“The Postilion’s Horn Sounds”: A Complementarity Approach to the Phenomenology of Sound-Consciousness?

In the phenomenology of the consciousness of internal time, Edmund Husserl has frequent recourse to sound and melody as illustrations of the processes that give rise to immanent temporal objects. In Husserl’s analysis, there is a philosophically pregnant tension between the geometrical diagrams representing multiple dimensions of immanent time and his intuition that time-points might be no more than fictions leading to absurdities. In this paper, I will address this tension in order to motivate a complementarity approach to temporal objects such as sound and melody that might illuminate the phenomenology of sound-consciousness.     

Zur geschichtlichen Wende der genetischen Phänomenologie. Eine Interpretation der Beilage III der <Emphasis Type="Italic">Krisis</Emphasis>

The paper addresses the methodological tensions between Husserl’s phenomenology and history by reinterpreting the Addendum III of the Krisis-work in view of genetic phenomenology. Thus, the paper starts out by retracing the traditional criticism against the unhistorical character of Husserl’s phenomenology as voiced by Heidegger, Adorno and others. Afterwards, it moves on to analyse the troubled relationship between static and genetic phenomenology, on the one hand, and between genetic phenomenology and empirical genesis, on the other hand. Finally, it arrives at a step by step methodological reconstruction of Husserl’s considerations on the “origin of geometry”, which are regarded to be an application of the methods of genetic phenomenology to the field of history.     

On the “Theological Turn” in French henomenology

In this paper, I show that the claim for a “theological turn” in French phenomenology is not tenable by analyzing the relation between transcendencies and the modes of givenness in Husserl, the relation between the ethical transcendence and its mode of givenness in Levinas, and the question of the self of phenomenon and giveness in Marion. I argue that the inner motive of phenomenology requires it to go beyond the horizon of objectness and the question about God or theological issues are determined as part of its essential task in phenomenology. The principle of “go to the thing itself” does not predetermine or presuppose what phenomenology should deal with; it is always the thing itself that imposes itself on phenomenology.