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Single Idea 7113

[filed under theme 1. Philosophy / H. Continental Philosophy / 2. Phenomenology ]

Full Idea

The essential principle of phenomenology is that 'all consciousness is consciousness of something'.

Gist of Idea

Phenomenology assumes that all consciousness is of something

Source

Jean-Paul Sartre (Transcendence of the Ego [1937], I (B))

Book Ref

Sartre,Jean-Paul: 'The Transcendence of the Ego' [Routledge 2004], p.10

A Reaction

This idea is found well before Husserl, in Schopenhauer (Idea 4166). It seems to contradict a thought such as Locke's (Idea 1202), that self-awareness is a separate and distinct criterion for personal identity. Sartre gives a nice account.

Related Ideas

Idea 4166 A consciousness without an object is no consciousness [Schopenhauer]

Idea 1202 A person is intelligent, rational, self-aware, continuous, conscious [Locke]

The 23 ideas with the same theme [approaching wisdom by examining human experience]:

22218 There can only be a science of fluctuating consciousness if it focuses on stable essences [Husserl, by Bernet]
22217 Phenomenology aims to validate objects, on the basis of intentional intuitive experience [Husserl, by Bernet]
22219 Husserl saw transcendental phenomenology as idealist, in its construction of objects [Husserl, by Bernet]
22216 Phenomenology studies different types of correlation between consciousness and its objects [Husserl, by Bernet]
22204 Start philosophising with no preconceptions, from the intuitively non-theoretical self-given [Husserl]
22207 Epoché or 'bracketing' is refraining from judgement, even when some truths are certain [Husserl]
22208 'Bracketing' means no judgements at all about spatio-temporal existence [Husserl]
22210 After everything is bracketed, consciousness still has a unique being of its own [Husserl]
22215 Phenomenology describes consciousness, in the light of pure experiences [Husserl]
21217 Phenomenology needs absolute reflection, without presuppositions [Husserl]
15570 Phenomenology is the science of essences - necessary universal structures for art, representation etc. [Husserl, by Polt]
7614 Bracketing subtracts entailments about external reality from beliefs [Husserl, by Putnam]
6893 Phenomenology aims to describe experience directly, rather than by its origins or causes [Husserl, by Mautner]
3348 If phenomenology is deprived of the synthetic a priori, it is reduced to literature [Benardete,JA on Husserl]
22223 Being-in-the-world is projection to possibilities, thrownness among them, and fallenness within them [Heidegger, by Caputo]
22158 Pheomenology seeks things themselves, without empty theories, problems and concepts [Heidegger]
7113 Phenomenology assumes that all consciousness is of something [Sartre]
8247 Phenomenology needs art as logic needs science [Deleuze/Guattari]
20448 Phenomenology uncovers and redescribes the pre-theoretical layer of life [Critchley]
6846 Phenomenology is a technique of redescription which clarifies our social world [Critchley]
20744 Phenomenologists say all experience is about something and is directed [Aho]
21237 Phenomenology begins from the immediate, rather than from axioms and theories [Bakewell]
21238 Later phenomenologists tried hard to incorporate social relationships [Bakewell]