Depression can appear to be a force restraining us, but it, too, may be more accurately described as an ineffective distribution of attention and effort.
— Possibility

Or perhaps it is better understood as a way in which the world appears relevant to us in our darkness. In other words, not some inner constraint on engagement with the world , but a way of being situated in the world that is neither simply due to inner nor outer causes. — Joshs

This works in psychology, sure - and without destroying any illusion of ‘individuality’. So yes, it is affectively ‘better understood’. I was going for accuracy.

Whether Husserl goes "beyond" Kant, is a matter of taste. — Manuel

Check out the new Lexus. Part of the warning system is....push this button, bells and whistles indicate oncoming complications to opening your door. So rather than tell yourself to just look in something so plain and simple as a mirror, you now have to tell yourself to push something so plain and simple as a button, that overcomplicates the human-kind of looking in mirrors, yet tells you exactly what you would have seen had you simply looked in the mirror.

Taste resides in which simple thing one wishes to indulge. Indulgence itself, then, must be the residence of complication. If Husserl went beyond Kant, who’s to say he didn’t accomplish anything for us as human rational intellects, that didn’t merely overcomplicate the simple.

Clearly "taste" is the wrong word, I'd have to say, it's a matter of one's own philosophy.

As to the Lexus example, and the bells and whistles, there's something to that in some phenomenology.

I tend to agree with your view and it's not many people who would claim that Husserl went beyond Kant.

Kant’s understanding of reason is logic relative to human experience. From our perspective, there’s no reason to consider logic beyond reason, and no real capacity to talk about it. But I would argue that an accurately practical understanding of reality is inclusive of unreasonable logic. It’s a further Copernican turn away from Kant. — Possibility

Here is what Eugene Fink (Husserl's protégé) had to say at the beginning of his 6th Cartesian Meditation:

.......instead of soaring up over the world "speculatively," we, in a truly "Copernican revolution," have broken through the confinement of the natural attitude, as the horizon of all our human possibilities for acting and theorizing, and have thrust forward into the dimension of origin for all being, into the constitutive source of the world, into the sphere of transcendental subjectivity. W e have, however, not yet exhibited the constitutive becoming of the world in the sense performances of transcendental life, both those that are presently actual and those that are sedimented,- we have not yet entered into constitutive disciplines and theories.

It is a radical thing to say. " Transcendental subjectivity" is an intuitively powerful concept. I don't agree with the attempt to "totalize" (Levinas) the world to make it make sense. One has to allow the world "its" freedom to present itself, and this requires a "turn" that radicalizes Kant's turn (noumena? what, I ask, is NOT noumenal?) Once the Cartesian turn has been examined for what it is, an attempt to discover an "absolute" ground in our existence and the world's, one is driven deeper into discovery on the interior side of the equation. "Absolute" deserves those inverted commas, of course. Language, the moment it is deployed, both cheapens and reveals.

there's something to that in some phenomenology. — Manuel

How so?

Just a general comment, when I was finishing my studies, a portion of my teachers were into phenomenology, often following the thought of some of the lesser well known figures.

In so far as I followed such arguments, I rarely found them convincing or persuasive. Parts of Husserl and Heidegger are good, but a lot of it looks to me to be what you mention, making obvious things really, really complicated.

I tend to agree with your view and it's not many people who would claim that Husserl went beyond Kant. — Manuel

Way beyond, really:

...an infinite realm of being of a new kind, and a sphere of a new kind of experience: transcendental experience......a universal apodictically experienceable structure of the ego (Cartesian Meditations)

Husserl thinks one can experience something transcendental, not merely postulate it. This is why there is so much interest in the his reduction in the recent French Theological turn, so called. Michel Henry puts it like this: "So much appearing, so much Being...... (but then) appearing is everything, being is nothing. Or rather, being only exists because appearing appears and only to the extent that it does."

Henry takes the phenomenological reduction where it leads, to the primacy of the given. What is there and what can only be (as Kant would agree) but what appears before us, and any claim about what might not BE this can only have its basis in what appears. It sounds a bit like transcendental idealism is now clarified to transcendence IN the ideal, but the 'ideal" as a concept is obviated, for there is nothing to play against it, there is no Cartesian res extensa, nor is there a noumenal Other. The Other is appearance itself.
This is the final and radical relief from those absurd dualisms that haunt ontology.

Parts of Husserl and Heidegger are good..... — Manuel

Sure, those guys and the rest are good, each in is own way, if only for examples of philosophical progress.

You mentioned the Prolegomena, in which the introductions states.....

“....Making plans is often the occupation of an opulent and boastful mind, which thus obtains the reputation of a creative genius, by demanding what it cannot itself supply; by censuring, what it cannot improve; and by proposing, what it knows not where to find....”

....and if making plans is overburdening an extant speculative metaphysics, than phenomenology perfectly exemplifies unconvincing and unpersuasive philosophical progress.

And to hide it behind Transcendental Idealism??? Robbery, I say. Sheer, abominable ROBBERY!!!
(Laughing maniacally)

Ah yes, Henry. I'm not a fan, nothing against him personally, but I really don't see what big contribution he made. One of my professors knew him personally, so he was frequently talked about in my program. Never managed to connect with his thought at all, but many others did, so, maybe I'm missing out.

As for the given, C.I. Lewis talks about it quite interestingly. As does Raymond Tallis.



These are reactions to Kantian conclusions. Or else going back to empiricism, of a kind Hume or Locke would likely not accept.

I wouldn't be as harsh, as it's not clear to me that phenomenology is metaphysics of the transcendental kind. But there's truth in what you say.

As for TI, I think the basic framework or outline, is rather clear. But if you say "things in themselves" are meaningless, or don't exist or are empty signifier, then you're borrowing a name which has little to do with the actual thought proposed.

Ah yes, Henry. I'm not a fan, nothing against him personally, but I really don't see what big contribution he made. One of my professors knew him personally, so he was frequently talked about in my program. Never managed to connect with his thought at all, but many others did, so, maybe I'm missing out. — Manuel

It really does depend on what a person is looking for at the outset. Phenomenology has this whole mysterious side that can be either be ignored or elaborated. It's not philosophical (wince!). Heidegger though Husserl was trying to walk on water (gotten from Caputo's Radical Hermeneutics).

I am guilty of this, too. I think being in the world rests of nothing but water, and we all are trying walk. (Wince, with emphasis!)

it's not clear to me that phenomenology is metaphysics of the transcendental kind. — Manuel

Yeah, I was being somewhat melodramatic. I trust your sense of clarity in this regard, insofar as my prejudices are too embedded.

Still, it shouldn’t be denied that Kantian transcendental idealism establishes sufficient ground for the validity of subsequent speculative philosophy, and if phenomenology is speculative philosophy, then.....you know.....walks like a duck, squawks like a duck.......
————

But if you say "things in themselves" are meaningless, or don't exist or are empty signifier, then you're borrowing a name which has little to do with the actual thought proposed. — Manuel

Absolutely. That and that stupid farging noumena. Christ-on-a-crutch, how people can convolute that damn thing....like Savery’s ca.1620 dodo bird painting representing something the guy never once laid eyes on.

So what else is new?

Decent article here:
https://ndpr.nd.edu/reviews/husserls-legacy-phenomenology-metaphysics-and-transcendental-philosophy/#:~:text=Husserl%27s%20transcendental%20idealism%2C%20according%20to%20Zahavi%2C%20then%20accounts,objects%20within%20the%20world%2C%20can%20appear%20to%20us.

Absolutely. That and that stupid farging noumena. Christ-on-a-crutch, how people can convolute that damn thing....like Savery’s ca.1620 dodo bird painting representing something the guy never once laid eyes on. — Mww

But the concept of noumena is not a fiction. But not Kant, rather Husserl et al.

And if I'm not mistaken, I believe Husserl thought something similar about Heidegger after Being and Time was published, in the sense that he thought Heidegger was kind of psychologizing phenomenology. I think they're focusing different aspects of a similar project.



Not bad prejudices to have, as far as I can see.

There is value to be found in prior-to-Kant speculative metaphysics and even in some post-Kantian speculative metaphysics, such as Whitehead. But they can always be charged with going beyond possible experience, and that's not so easy to refute.

Tough question. Adherents would say phenomenology is the most concrete philosophy, others may doubt this...

too. I think being in the world rests of nothing but water, and we all are trying walk. — Astrophel

Maybe we should follow Wittgenstein’s suggestion.

“We have got on to slippery ice where there is no friction and so in a certain sense the conditions are ideal, but also, just because of that, we are unable to walk. We want to walk; so we need friction. Back to the rough ground.”

And if I'm not mistaken, I believe Husserl thought something similar about Heidegger after Being and Time was published, in the sense that he thought Heidegger was kind of psychologizing phenomenology. I think they're focusing different aspects of a similar project. — Manuel

More specifically, he thought Heidegger was turning phenomenology into an anthropology, by which he meant that Heidegger was stuck in the natural attitude, rather than going all the way with the transcendental reduction.
I dont think Husserl understood what Heidegger was aiming at. Heidegger’s work was as transcendental as Husserl’s ( not in the Kantian sense) but more radically so.

I dont think Husserl understood what Heidegger was aiming at. Heidegger’s work was as transcendental as Husserl’s ( not in the Kantian sense) but more radically so. — Joshs

Heidegger more radical than Husserl? I wonder if you would say a few words about this.

But they can always be charged with going beyond possible experience, and that's not so easy to refute. — Manuel

I suppose not. Theory and all.

But the concept of noumena is not a fiction. — Astrophel

No, it isn’t.

Heidegger more radical than Husserl? I wonder if you would say a few words about this. — Astrophel

Husserl’s notion of intentionality fragments the holistic weave of our frame of intelligibility into separated elements.

“It could be shown from the phenomenon of care as the basic structure of Dasein that what phenomenology took to be intentionality and how it took it is fragmentary, a phenomenon regarded merely from the outside. But what is meant by intentionality-the bare and isolated directing-itself-towards-must still be set back into the unified basic structure of being-ahead-of-itself-in-already-being-involved-in. This alone is the authentic phenomenon which corresponds to what inauthentically and only in an isolated direction is meant by intentionality.”

Berkeley's idealism differs from Kant's in the same way that Fichte's idealism differs from Kant's. Ostensibly, both Berkeley and Fichte seemed to have successfully eliminated Kant's Thing-in-Itself as a material cause, but both ultimately were forced to reinstate it as an Absolute Mind.

You think Heidegger is more radical than Husserl? I don't know about this literature much, have read a few things though.

On the other hand, I've spoken to Husserlians who think Heidegger is basically being arbitrary in his choosing "dasein" as the main mode of being in the world.

In any case, I think it's a bit misleading to call Husserl's later philosophy "transcendental idealism", given that he denies "things in themselves", as I've understood the topic. But, feel free to correct it.

I think if someone borrows the term, the basic differences should be accepted, though of course they can be modified, as Schopenhauer and Mainlander did.

The conversation has moved on but I wanted to adress this question:

Plato gets awkward when you pull away from things like virtue, justice, the good; see the "third man" arguments, e.g. Is there an eternal form of a cow? A toaster? — Astrophel

The modes of necessity are interrelated with the modes of contingency, so that perfect necessity is contingent in relation to a priore necessity, a priore necessity is contingent in relation to logical necessity, and logical necessity is contingent in relation to an "ur-contingency" that would transcend non-contradiction. Each mode of contingency, in turn, represents the possibility of something different from what we see in each subsequent mode of necessity. The very possibility that, in time, we can open the window or make some other alteration in reality is a case where we deal with the contingency of present time and our ability to bring about some new possibility. What this adds up to for universals is that as forms of necessity they represent the rules and guideposts that limit and direct possibility: Universals represent all real possibilities. Thus, what Plato would have called the Form of the Bed, really just means that beds are possible. What would have seemed like a reductio ad absurdum of Plato's theory, that if there is the Form of the Bed, there must also be the Form of the Television (which is thus not an artifact and an invented object at all, but something that the inventor has just "remembered"), now must mean that the universal represents the possibility of the television, which is a possibility based on various necessities of physics (conditioned necessities) and facts (perfect necessities) of history. — Meaning and the Problem of Universals, Kelly Ross

Regard it as a footnote.

In any case, I think it's a bit misleading to call Husserl's later philosophy "transcendental idealism", given that he denies "things in themselves", as I've understood the topic. But, feel free to correct it. — Manuel

No transcendental idealism, transcendental subjectivity, which not an idealism.

You haven't addressed my points as far as I can tell. Doesn't the cat have its own life,nature and attributes, which contribute to constituting anyone's perception of it?

I can see how it would seem that way. But I would argue that ‘affect’ considered as something acting upon us is inaccurate. Affect is part of us, part of our awareness, connection and collaboration with the world. It refers to an ongoing distribution of attention and effort. When what we experience appears to be a ‘lack of affect’, it translates to insufficient attention and/or effort directed towards a particular aspect of experience, rather than a generalised lack. Depression can appear to be a force restraining us, but it, too, may be more accurately described as an ineffective distribution of attention and effort.

This is the problem with affect=energy that I think Astrophel was pointing out. Perhaps take a look at Lisa Feldman Barrett’s How Emotions Are Made. — Possibility

Don't you accept that we are affected by the world below the level of our conscious awareness? If you want to say that we construct the world, that each one of us constructs our own worlds, and that we are not affected by anything unconsciously or other than ourselves, that would be pure idealism and then we should know just how we construct the world. But we do not and the idea seems incoherent and absurd.

You say "collaboration with the world" which is pretty much what I've been saying, but then when you claim that we are not affected in the sense of being acted upon by things other than ourselves, you seem to be denying that very collaboration.

You say that depression may be "more accurately described as an ineffective distribution of attention and effort"; as though it all relies on the willing subject, and I can only say that if you had ever suffered from severe depression you would not say that. Depression can result from "abnormal" brain chemistry, and that fact is uncontroversial.

Also I haven't said that affect is nothing but energy. Everything is energy of one kind or another, but it doesn't follow that anything is nothing but energy.

What is the world? We certainly know it, but what is it that we can know it? — Astrophel

So you admit that we know the world and that we can say things about the world it seems. Is the question as to what the world is meaningful? If I say the world is X, are you not then going to ask "What is X"? The world is many things and everything, so how could it makes sense to ask what it is, as if you are seeking some kind of essence or ultimate definition? The world does not exist, as Markus Gabriel says, in the sense that it can never become an object of perception.

Yes, I think that's exactly right.

both Berkeley and Fichte seemed to have successfully eliminated Kant's Thing-in-Itself as a material cause, but both ultimately were forced to reinstate it as an Absolute Mind. — charles ferraro

Interesting - Bernardo Kastrup calls it Mind at Large. Inspired, it seems by "Will" from Schopenhauer.

What are real possibilities, as distinct from merely logical possibilities, other than actual potentials; things which, given the way things are, could possibly come to be?

Depression can result from "abnormal" brain chemistry, and that fact is uncontroversial. — Janus

But if we take the view that brain is simply what mind looks when seen form a certain perspective, then are we are faced with a chicken and egg question?

But if we take the view that brain is simply what mind looks when seen form a certain perspective, then are we are faced with a chicken and egg question? — Tom Storm

That's a good question: only if we want to think of one or the other as prior I guess, so the problem with what I said is that it should have been 'depression may be correlated with abnormal brain chemistry'. The question would be then whether there could be the kind of abnormal brain chemistry associated with severe depression, and yet no severe depression. Or whether there could be severe depression in the absence of abnormal brain chemistry.

Perhaps childhood psychological trauma could cause chemical imbalances in the brain. So some cases of depression may have purely physical causes and others may have emotional causes.

He’s going to have a long conversation with Sabine Hossenfelder this week in the Theories of Everything Podcast, which is, all in all, excellent.