Phenomenology and Mind (Mar 2019)

What is the Phenomenological Approach? Revisiting Intentional Explication

  • Dermot Moran

DOI
https://doi.org/10.13128/Phe_Mi-24973
Journal volume & issue
no. 15

Abstract

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In this paper I outline the main features of the phenomenological approach, focusing on the central themes of intentionality, embodiment, empathy, intersubjectivity, sociality and the life-world. I argue that phenomenology is primarily a philosophy of intentional explication that identifies the a priori, structural correlations between subjectivity and all forms of constituted objectivities apprehended in their horizonal contexts. Intentional description reveals the structurally necessary, meaning-informing interactions between embodied subjectivity (already caught in the nexus of intersubjectivity) in the context of embeddedness in the temporal, historical, and cultural life-world. I shall defend phenomenology as a holistic approach that rightfully defends the role of subjectivity in the constitution of objectivity and recognizes the inherent limitations of all forms of naturalism, objectivism and scientism.

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