Husserl's development of protention

pp. 133-160

in: Lanei Rodemeyer, Intersubjective temporality, Berlin, Springer, 2006

Abstract

Husserl's early works on time (1893-1917), published in Husserliana X, give relatively little attention to what we now call protention. For this reason, in our review of these early discussions of a consciousness of the "not-yet," we will find indications of what Husserl would accomplish more thoroughly in later writings. The notion of a consciousness of the "not-yet," in fact, is often only implicated through analyses of other concepts at this early stage. And sometimes the term "not-yet," is not even mentioned, and yet the discussion centers around the importance of consciousness of the "futural" aspect of a certain notion or relation. For example, we find that Husserl's early descriptions already show a "futural" aspect of consciousness to be fundamental to our intentional relation to objects. In a text written as early as 1893, Husserl says that temporalizing consciousness is directed forward, and that what comes before an intuition (in this case, "interest") influences what is actualized: