An abstract consideration

de-ontologizing the noema

John Drummond

pp. 89-109

in: John Drummond, Lester Embree (eds), The phenomenology of the noema, Deventer, Kluwer, 1992

Abstract

I had first thought of entitling this paper—after the model of Jonathan Swift—"A Modest Proposal For Preventing the Noema From Becoming an Entity and thereby a Burden to Philosophical Reflection." The rhetorical purpose of such a title would be to encourage participants in this conference on Husserl's notion of the noema never to use the term "noema" again. The reason for such encouragement is that a technical term used by Husserl within a non-ordinary, philosophical attitude to denote an ordinary object abstractly considered has come to be used instead to denote a non-ordinary object. This mistaking of an ordinary thing specially considered for a special thing does in fact prove to be a burden to philosophical reflection, and to eliminate the term would contribute to eliminating the burden. Now while I knew in fact that this probably should not and certainly would not happen, I hoped at least to dispel the view that noemata are entities present (but hidden) in our ordinary experiences, awaiting only to be disclosed through the methodological technique of the phenomenological reduction.

Cited authors

Husserl Edmund

Swift Jonathan