THE CONTEMPORARY PHILOSOPHY

Phenomenology &

Existentialism

Phenomenology is a philosophy or method of inquiry based on the premise that reality consists of objects and events as they are

perceived or understood in human consciousness and not of anything independent of human

consciousness. It was founded about 1905 by

Edmund Husserl.

According to Husserl, the goal of philosophy was to describe the data of

consciousness without bias or prejudice, ignoring all metaphysical

and scientific theories in order to accurately describe and analyze the data gathered by human senses and the mind. The students of Husserl

summarized phenomenology as the study of “the things themselves.”The pursuit of essences was to be

accomplished in phenomenology via three techniques: phenomenological

reduction, eidetic reduction, and cognition analysis.

EXISTENTIALISM(1905-1980)

The question central to existentialism is “What does it mean to exist as

a human being, and what are its implications

on life?”

Prominent existentialists include Søren Kierkegaard

(1813-1855), Martin Heidegger (1889-1976), Karl

Jaspers (1883-1969), Jean Paul Sartre (1905-1980), Simone de

Beauvoir (1908-1986) and Albert Camus (1913-1960). Existentialists have been

divided into two groups: the religious or Christian

existentialists and the atheist existentialists.

Existentialism attempts to describe our desire for

rational decisions despite living in an irrational

world. To be born in this world is to find one

abandoned and responsible for one’s existence, and to realize with anguish that the reality is devoid of

meaning.

The starting point for Kierkegaard is an old problem posed by Socrates in a dialogue of Plato, Meno. Socrates

raised the question: can we learn what we do not know? He argued that if we really did not know it, we would not be able to recognize the knowledge when it is learned. If a person does not know

that 3 times 9 is 27, how does he recognize 27 as the true answer when

he learns it. The conclusion which Socrates had derived from it was that

we do not learn anything new, but what is thought to be ‘learning’ is

merely a ‘recollection’ of all the true knowledge that is already present

inside us.

Kierkegaard accepts that the question raised by Socrates is a valid one, but

doesn’t accept the solution. He presents his own answer. He says that learning is possible, but in learning, a

strange miraculous thing occurs. There is a moment of enlightenment which

changes the person, makes him different in such a way that he is now able to recognize a truth, of which he was ignorant previously. Kierkegaard calls the source of this enlightenment as God. It is only God’s involvement into human life that makes learning

possible.

He says that if this moment of enlightenment has to be effective,

man has to desire it, but since he is ignorant, he must desire it without

knowing at all what it entails, or what would it be like. He gives an example. Suppose a mighty king

wants to marry a girl, but can only marry her if the girl loves him for himself, and not because of any

other reason like money or power. Now, to make sure that the girl does not fall in love with him because of

his wealth or power, he has to conceal these things from the girl.

Similarly, to make the moment of enlightenment effective for

us, God has to conceal the benefits of enlightenment

from the people so that the person would not desire it

because of its potential benefits, but desire it for the sake of enlightenment itself.

The French philosopher Jean- Paul Sartre is certainly the most famous and stimulating figure of

Existentialism, and it is primarily to him that

Existentialism owes its fame.Sartre wrote not only philosophical works but also short stories, novels and plays. He refused to accept the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1964, believing

that Nobel Prize is a bourgeoisie institution and accepting it would

compromise his integrity as a socialist thinker. Sartre’s most important philosophical work is Being and

Nothingness.

The first and most necessary fact of existentialism is that for

humans, existence precedes essence. Consider any article of manufacture, say a paper knife.

It was made by a worker who had a conception of it in his mind. It was made to serve a definite purpose, which was

already present before the knife was created. No person would

make a paper knife without knowing what it is for. That is,

the essence of paper knife comes before its existence.

Since Sartre was an atheist, he rejected the notion of a God creating man like an artisan creates a paper knife. There is no abstract human essence or human nature because

there is no creator; humans are not carefully designed artifacts made by a

God. Man’s existence comes before his essence. A man first exists and

finds himself in this world without any pre-determined purpose. He defines

himself; he determines his own purpose of life. He constructs his own

essence. Each individual simply is; what he will be, he decides himself.

Man is nothing else but that which he makes of himself.