The "founded act" and the apperception of others

André De Muralt

pp. 123-141

in: Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka (ed), The self and the other, Dordrecht, Reidel, 1977

Abstract

The problem of others poses formidable difficulties in Husserlian phenomenology.1 How can the ego, which constitutes the object in any possible sense within its own transcendental self-consciousness, really posit the autonomy of the other, which is both transcendent and constitutive? How can the thesis that every objectivity requires justification (Rechtfertigung) in an originary and specific sense-giving (Sinngebung), a thesis that Husserl consistently affirms,2 be reconciled with the nonconstituted character of others I can know and love, with their freedom? The doctrine of transcendental intersubjectivity clearly does not suffice to overcome this apparent contradiction.

Cited authors

Husserl Edmund