INTRODUCTION TO THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE HUMAN PERSON

Chapter 2: The Phenomenological Method in General

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A. THE MOVEMENT AND ITS ORIGINS

1. PHENOMENA IS COMMONLY UNDERSTOOD AS AN EVENT OR THAT WHICH “HAPPENS” SUCH AS

RELIGIOUS PHENOMENA, OR A NATURAL PHENOMENON. The subject maCer of phenomenology
is “phenomena.” (phenomena are the objects of the senses (e.g., sights and sounds) as contrasted
with what is apprehended(understood) by the intellect. THE WORD CAME FROM the Greek
verb phainesthai (which means “to seem,” or “to appear”) However, it does not indicate whether
the thing perceived is other than what it appears to be.)
2. Johann Heinrich Lambert, a contemporary of Immanuel Kant, first spoke of a discipline that he
called “phenomenology” is his Neues (Noes, “new”) Organon (Leipzig, 1764). For him,
“phenomenon” refer to the illusory features of human experience, hence defined
phenomenology as the “theory of illusion.” THERE IS AN ELEMENT OF DOUBT IN EVERY
EXPERIENCE. BECAUSE REALITY IS SO RICH AND INEXHAUSTIBLE, THINGS APPEAR TO US IN A
SEEMING FASHION, HINDI SIGURADO, MAPANLINLANG ANG REALIDAD
3. Immanuel Kant dis_nguished objects and events as they appear in our experience from objects
and events as they are in themselves (since experience cannot be duplicated), independently of
the forms imposed on them by our cogni_ve facul_es. The former he called “phenomena”; the
laCer, “noumena,” or “things-in-themselves.” All we can ever know, Kant thought, are
phenomena.
4. G.W.F. Hegel, was at great pains to show that this was a mistake. In his Phenomenology of the
Spirit (1807), he traced the development of Spirit (or Mind) through various stages, in which it
apprehends itself as phenomenon, to the point of full development, where it is aware of itself as
it is in itself- as noumenon. (Phenomenology is the science I which we come to know mind as it is
in itself through the study of the ways in which it appears to us.)
5. In the mid 19th century “phenomenon” became synonymous with “fact” or “whatever is observed
to be the case.” As a consequence, “phenomenology” acquired the meaning that is possesses
most frequently in contemporary uses- a purely descrip_ve study of any given subject maCer.
6. When the American philosopher C.S. Peirce used the term phenomenology, he had in mind not
only a descrip_ve study of all that is observed to be real but also of whatever is before the mind-
percep_ons of the real, illusory percep_ons, imagina_ons, or dreams.
B. OPPOSITION TO PSYCHOLOGISM

The arguments in Husserl’s Logical Inves_ga_ons (Halle, 1900-1901 Logische Untersuchugen) served
as a first rallying point for phenomenologists. It contains a cri_que of psychologism. (PSYCHOLOGISM,
THE VIEW THAT THE LAWS OF KNOWLEDGE CAN BE DERIVED FROM AN UNDERSTANDING OF THE
BASIC FACTS OF PSYCHIC LIFE, was a posiMon represented by J.S.Mill and which had been taken up by
such German predecessors of Husserl as Wundt, Sigwart and Lipps. Logicism, a posiMon assumed by
Natorp, Shröder, Voigt, and of course Frege, began as a reacMon to psychologism, a reacMon in which
Husserl thought of himself as parMcipaMng(FOUR PHENOMENOLOGICAL PHILOSOPHERS)

1. Husserl devoted an en_re book to the detailed examina_on and refuta_on of every variety of
psychologis_c doctrine, taking careful account of each view and trying to show its inadequacy.
Underlying all his arguments, however, were a few general principles to which he appealed again
and again in the course of his discussion:
a. Psychology deals with facts; therefore its statements are empirical. (it has not, un_l
now, produced any precise scien_fic laws, and its generalizaTons are vague. The rules
of logic, on the other hand, are precise. Hence, psychological generaliza_ons can
neither be iden_cal with logical laws nor be premises from which they may be derived.
b. Empirical statements are probable, and therefore falsifiable because there is always
a real possibility that further evidence will show them false. Whereas, logical truths
are necessary truths. (For examples, a logical principle such as modus ponens (“”Given
that ‘If p, then q’ is true and that ‘p’ is true, ‘q’ is true”, is not probable; it is necessary
valid.)
c. Empirical generalizaTons rest on inducTon; they are derived from a number of
individual cases. This is not true of logical rules. Both (a) and (b) are supported by
poin_ng out that where there is a conflict between a logical principle and an
empirical generalizaTon, the logical principle will always emerge victorious because
necessary truth is not to be refuted by a probable statement and logical truth cannot
be shown to be false by an induc_ve generaliza_on.
d. The empirical generalizaTons of psychology produce, at best, causal laws, and
logical principles are not causal laws.(TRY TO SOLVE A PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM)
(the rela_onship of the premises and conclusions are not causal. The premises of an
argument do not “happen”; they are either true or false.) In valid argument the truth
of the conclusion “follows” from the premises; it is not the effect of events called
premises.
e. Empirical laws imply maCers of fact; logical rules do not. Since empirical laws are,
presumably, derived from the observaTon of parTculars, the existence of such
parTculars in some place and at some Tme can be inferred from the truth of the
empirical law. Modus ponens, on the other hand, does not imply that there exists,
in a parTcular place and at a parTcular Tme, a pair of statements of the form “If p,
then q” and “p.” Nor are any corresponding facts implies by any other logical law.
(THE TRUTH OF A LOGICAL STATEMENT IS NOT DEPENDENT ON PHYSICAL
REALITY/EXISTENCE) This point is some_mes stated in a phrase, borrowed from
Gonried Wilhelm Leibniz, that empirical laws are true only for this actual world;
logical laws are true “for all possible worlds.”
C. CONCLUSION

1. As a conclusion to these arguments, logical and empirical statements differ in kind. Logical
statements are precise, necessarily true, and not derived inducTvely from parTculars. They are,
or give rise to, logical rules, not causal laws, and they do not imply maCers of fact.
2. Empirical statements, on the other hand, are vague, probably (but not necessarily) true, and
based on induc_ve generaliza_ons. They are, or give rise to, causal laws and imply the existence
of maCers of fact.
3. Quite clearly, in the refuta_on of psychologism, the decisive argument, for Husserl, consisted in
showing that there are two kinds of statements: empirical and nonempirical. Phenomenological
statements are to be nonempirical.
4. To deny that phenomenological statements are empirical is to deny that their truth or falsity
depends on sensory observa_on. But if not on sensory observa_on, on what does their truth
depend?
5. Some philosophers might be inclined to say that phenomenological statements are analy_c.
Insofar as only those statements are analy_c that are true by virtue of explicit defini_on of terms,
phenomenologists deny that their statements are analy_c. We shall have abundant evidence that
they are not right in this, for phenomenological statements are not true by virtue of s_pula_on of
meaning.
6. They introduced the term phenomenon by saying that phenomenological statements are true if
they accurately describe phenomena. This answer, however, remains merely a verbal maneuver
unless phenomenon can be shown to have a clear and definite meaning.