Phenomenology (philosophy)

Phenomenology - By Branch / Doctrine - The Basics of Philosophy Introduction | History of Phenomenology | Types of Phenomenology Phenomenology is a broad discipline and method of inquiry in philosophy, developed largely by the German philosophers Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger, which is based on the premise that reality consists of objects and events ("phenomena") as they are perceived or understood in the human consciousness, and not of anything independent of human consciousness. It can be considered a branch of Metaphysics and of Philosophy of Mind, although many of its proponents claim that it is related to, but distinct from, the other key disciplines in philosophy (Metaphysics, Epistemology, Logic and Ethics), and that it represents more a distinct way of looking at philosophy which has repercussions on all of these other fields. It has been argued that it differs from other branches of philosophy in that it tends to be more descriptive than prescriptive. Phenomenology is the study of experience and how we experience.

Jean-Paul Sartre His work has also influenced sociology, critical theory, post-colonial theory, and literary studies, and continues to influence these disciplines. Sartre has also been noted for his open relationship with the prominent feminist theorist Simone de Beauvoir. He was awarded the 1964 Nobel Prize in Literature but refused it, saying that he always declined official honors and that "a writer should not allow himself to be turned into an institution".[2] Biography[edit] Early life[edit] Jean-Paul Sartre was born in Paris as the only child of Jean-Baptiste Sartre, an officer of the French Navy, and Anne-Marie Schweitzer.[3] His mother was of Alsatian origin and the first cousin of Nobel Prize laureate Albert Schweitzer. In 1929 at the École Normale, he met Simone de Beauvoir, who studied at the Sorbonne and later went on to become a noted philosopher, writer, and feminist. World War II[edit] French journalists visit General George C. Cold War politics and anticolonialism[edit]

Transcendence (religion) In religion, transcendence refers to the aspect of a god's nature and power which is wholly independent of the material universe, beyond all physical laws. This is contrasted with immanence, where a god is said to be fully present in the physical world and thus accessible to creatures in various ways. In religious experience transcendence is a state of being that has overcome the limitations of physical existence and by some definitions has also become independent of it. Although transcendence is defined as the opposite of immanence, the two are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Bahá'ís believe in a single, imperishable god, the creator of all things, including all the creatures and forces in the universe.[1] In the Bahá'í tradition, god is described as "a personal god, unknowable, inaccessible, the source of all Revelation, eternal, omniscient, omnipresent and almighty In Buddhism "transcendence", by definition, belongs to the mortal beings of the formless realms of existence.

Phenomenological description Early proponents[edit] Edmund Husserl[edit] However, although Husserl's descriptions may begin at this basic level, they are often considerably more lengthy, involved and complex. For example, they often range from descriptions of the singular and empirical to descriptions of the essential and universal. Husserlian descriptions often depict the essential or invariant structures of conscious experience. For example, immediately after he describes the singular example of naming his inkpot in Logical Investigations he proceeds to describe the phenomenon of naming at the more general, invariant and essential level.[4] Martin Heidegger[edit] Heidegger's explication of phenomenological description is sketched out in the Introduction to Being and Time.[5] There he argues that the way to best approach the question of the meaning of Being is to examine the concrete ways in which phenomena show themselves in themselves — as they seem in consciousness. Jean-Paul Sartre[edit] Later research[edit]

René Girard René Noël Théophile Girard (;[2] French: [ʒiʁaʁ]; 25 December 1923 – 4 November 2015) was a French historian, literary critic, and philosopher of social science whose work belongs to the tradition of anthropological philosophy. Girard was the author of nearly thirty books, with his writings spanning many academic domains. Although the reception of his work is different in each of these areas, there is a growing body of secondary literature on his work and his influence on disciplines such as literary criticism, critical theory, anthropology, theology, psychology, mythology, sociology, economics, cultural studies, and philosophy. Girard's main contribution to philosophy, and in turn to other disciplines, was in the field of epistemological and ethical systems of desire. For Girard, religion and mythology were therefore necessary steps in human evolution to control the violence that arises from mimetic rivalry and unequal distribution of desirable things. Biography[edit] Girard also says:

Phenomenology (philosophy) Phenomenology (from Greek: phainómenon "that which appears" and lógos "study") is the philosophical study of the structures of experience and consciousness. As a philosophical movement it was founded in the early years of the 20th century by Edmund Husserl and was later expanded upon by a circle of his followers at the universities of Göttingen and Munich in Germany. It then spread to France, the United States, and elsewhere, often in contexts far removed from Husserl's early work.[1] Phenomenology, in Husserl's conception, is primarily concerned with the systematic reflection on and study of the structures of consciousness and the phenomena that appear in acts of consciousness. Hicks writes, "In effect, the Structuralists were seeking subjective noumenal categories, and the Phenomenologists were content with describing the phenomena without asking what connection to an external reality those experiences might have

Communitarianism Political philosophy Two-axis political spectrum chart with an economic axis and a socio-cultural axis, and ideologically representative colors Communitarianism is a philosophy that emphasizes the connection between the individual and the community. Terminology[edit] The philosophy of communitarianism originated in the 20th century, but the term "communitarian" was coined in 1841, by John Goodwyn Barmby, a leader of the British Chartist movement, who used it in referring to utopian socialists and other idealists who experimented with communal styles of life. The term is primarily used in two senses: Philosophical communitarianism considers classical liberalism to be ontologically and epistemologically incoherent, and opposes it on those grounds. Origins[edit] While the term communitarian was coined only in the mid-nineteenth century, ideas that are communitarian in nature appear much earlier. More modern communities can take many different forms, but are often limited in scope and reach.

Robert C. Solomon American philosopher Robert C. Solomon (September 14, 1942 – January 2, 2007) was a philosopher and business ethicist, notable author, and "Distinguished Teaching Professor of Business and Philosophy" at the University of Texas at Austin, where he held a named chair and taught for more than 30 years, authoring The Passions: Emotions and the Meaning of Life (1976) and more than 45 other books and editions. Critical of the narrow focus of Anglo-American analytic philosophy, which he thought denied human nature and abdicated the important questions of life, he instead wrote analytically in response to the continental discourses of phenomenology and existentialism, on sex and love, on business ethics, and on other topics to which he brought an Aristotelian perspective on virtue ethics. He also wrote A Short History of Philosophy and others with his wife, Professor Kathleen Higgins. The passions: emotions and the meaning of life[edit] On sex, love, marriage, and children[edit] Early life[edit]

Ontology Philosophical study of being and existence When used as a countable noun, the words ontology and ontologies refer not to the science of being but to theories within the science of being. Ontological theories can be divided into various types according to their theoretical commitments. Monocategorical ontologies hold that there is only one basic category, but polycategorical ontologies rejected this view. Hierarchical ontologies assert that some entities exist on a more fundamental level and that other entities depend on them. Etymology[edit] onto- (Greek: ὄν, on;[note 1] GEN. ὄντος, ontos, 'being' or 'that which is') and -logia (-λογία, 'logical discourse').[2][3] While the etymology is Greek, the oldest extant records of the word itself is a Neo-Latin form ontologia, which appeared in 1606 in the Ogdoas Scholastica by Jacob Lorhard (Lorhardus), and in 1613 in the Lexicon philosophicum by Rudolf Göckel (Goclenius). Overview[edit] Particulars and universals[edit] Abstract and concrete[edit] D.

Existential phenomenology Overview[edit] In contrast with his former mentor Edmund Husserl, Heidegger (in his Being and Time) put ontology before epistemology and thought that phenomenology would have to be based on an observation and analysis of Dasein ("being-there"), human being, investigating the fundamental ontology of the Lebenswelt (lifeworld, Husserl's term) underlying all so-called regional ontologies of the special sciences. In Heidegger's philosophy, people are thrown into the world in a given situation, but they are also a project towards the future, possibility, freedom, wait, hope, anguish.[2] In contrast with the philosopher Kierkegaard, Heidegger wanted to explore the problem of Dasein existentially (existenzial), rather than existentielly (existenziell) because Heidegger argued Kierkegaard had already described the latter with "penetrating fashion".[citation needed] Development[edit] Other disciplines[edit] Existential phenomenology extends also to other disciplines. See also[edit] Notes[edit]