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Key Contemporary Thinkers (Polity)
Edmund Husserl: Founder of Phenomenology
* Written by an authority on Husserl and phenomenology. Dermot Moran's 'Introduction to Phenomenology' published by Routledge has been incredibly successful. * This will be the most comprehensive, high quality volume on Husserl available.
- GenresPhilosophy
256 pages, Hardcover
First published May 10, 2005
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92 people want to read
About the author
Dermot Moran
42 books14 followersDermot Moran is currently the inaugural holder of the Joseph Chair in Catholic Philosophy at Boston College and he also served as Chair of the Philosophy Department until June 2023. Previously, he held the full Professorship of Philosophy (Chair of Metaphysics and Logic) at University College Dublin, from 1989 to his retirement. At its General Assembly in Athens, Greece, on 9th August 2013, Professor Dermot Moran was elected President of the International Federation of Philosophical Societies/ Fédération Internationale des Sociétés de Philosophie (FISP), for a five-year period from 2013 to 2018. As President of FISP, he also presided over the 24th World Congress of Philosophy held in Beijing, China, 13-20 August 2018. He is now Past President of FISP (2018 to 2024) involved in organizing the 25th World Congress of Philosophy, Rome, Italy, 1-8 August 2024.
In 2003 Dermot Moran was elected Member of the Royal Irish Academy and in 2016 he was elected to the Institut International de Philosophie. Professor Moran was awarded the Royal Irish Academy Gold Medal in the Humanities in 2012. He was awarded the higher doctorate, DLitt Degree, on the basis of published works by the National University of Ireland in 2013.
He previously lectured in the Department of Scholastic Philosophy at Queen’s University Belfast (1979-1982) and in the Department of Philosophy at St Patrick’s College, Maynooth (1982-1989), then a Recognized College of the National University of Ireland, and now Maynooth University. He has held Visiting Professorships in the USA, including at Yale University (1986-1987), Connecticut College (1992-1993), Rice University (Fall 2003 and Spring 2006), Northwestern University (2007), and internationally the Chinese University of Hong Kong (Summer 2010). He was Gadamer Visiting Professor at Boston College (Spring 2015). He also served as Walter Murdoch Adjunct Professor in the Humanities, Murdoch University, Perth, Australia (2012-2015).
Dermot Moran was Director of the International Centre of Newman Studies in UCD promoting the legacy of John Henry Cardinal Newman, first Rector of the Catholic University, Dublin, 1954-1858. He is now Chairperson of the Board of the UCD Newman Centre for the Study of Religions.
Dermot Moran was an elected member of the Executive of the Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy (2013-2016).
On 26 October 2015 Professor Dermot Moran was awarded an Honorary Doctoral Degree in Philosophy by the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens “for his contribution to the promotion of Philosophy in general and with regard to his field of research in particular”. In December 2016, he was awarded an Honorary Professorship in the Department of Philosophy, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China. He was awarded an Honorary Professorship, School of Philosophy, Nankai University, Tienjen, People’s Republic of China. 17 October 2019; and Honorary Professorship, Philosophy, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, People’s Republic of China. July 2019.
In 2003 Dermot Moran was elected Member of the Royal Irish Academy and in 2016 he was elected to the Institut International de Philosophie. Professor Moran was awarded the Royal Irish Academy Gold Medal in the Humanities in 2012. He was awarded the higher doctorate, DLitt Degree, on the basis of published works by the National University of Ireland in 2013.
He previously lectured in the Department of Scholastic Philosophy at Queen’s University Belfast (1979-1982) and in the Department of Philosophy at St Patrick’s College, Maynooth (1982-1989), then a Recognized College of the National University of Ireland, and now Maynooth University. He has held Visiting Professorships in the USA, including at Yale University (1986-1987), Connecticut College (1992-1993), Rice University (Fall 2003 and Spring 2006), Northwestern University (2007), and internationally the Chinese University of Hong Kong (Summer 2010). He was Gadamer Visiting Professor at Boston College (Spring 2015). He also served as Walter Murdoch Adjunct Professor in the Humanities, Murdoch University, Perth, Australia (2012-2015).
Dermot Moran was Director of the International Centre of Newman Studies in UCD promoting the legacy of John Henry Cardinal Newman, first Rector of the Catholic University, Dublin, 1954-1858. He is now Chairperson of the Board of the UCD Newman Centre for the Study of Religions.
Dermot Moran was an elected member of the Executive of the Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy (2013-2016).
On 26 October 2015 Professor Dermot Moran was awarded an Honorary Doctoral Degree in Philosophy by the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens “for his contribution to the promotion of Philosophy in general and with regard to his field of research in particular”. In December 2016, he was awarded an Honorary Professorship in the Department of Philosophy, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China. He was awarded an Honorary Professorship, School of Philosophy, Nankai University, Tienjen, People’s Republic of China. 17 October 2019; and Honorary Professorship, Philosophy, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, People’s Republic of China. July 2019.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
September 27, 2021
291013: did i think it would get easier? well, i hoped so, after reading about and by him, about phenomenology, about and by certain followers eg. Sartre, de Beauvoir, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty. read this several chapters some months past, got distracted, so read it again. interesting to read again, to follow his thoughts not in a narrative but contemplating manner. this is not where best to start, not best to read his thought, perhaps because to certify the author's interpretations of husserl he quotes him often, but only thematically, and the man is not a fluid writer. much of the great innovation of the reduction, the eidetic intuitions, the ultimate idealism of the transcendental reduction, are buried in too many words, too much disclosure of husserl's logic. great logic yes, and if no more, the extensive description is exact, but not very interesting to me...
there are some explorations of how husserl came to found phenomenology, in ways i can appreciate, as the 'things themselves', how this focus on the perceived, the given, overcomes kantian 'mythology' of the inaccessible 'thing in itself'. how he recuperates idealism, how he envisages the creation and logic of math. this is a section that does not inspire in me any more look at math, though it does intrigue and shows how these purely rational, idealistic, forms of thought, are mostly based on perceived reality. the problem of imaginary numbers, the problem of complex abstraction of math beyond what we can perceive, the way we create sets, the way we can bracket this or that action. it is clear husserl trained first as a mathematician. it is clear husserl saw the necessity to make philosophy into a science and not science into a philosophy...
scientific 'positivism' is not sufficiently without presuppositions, indeed sciences do not investigate themselves, question themselves, but approach the world 'naively', thinking their subjects somehow 'originary' when in fact they are already weighed down in the realm of predetermined logical forms. here, always, the scientist is adopting the 'natural attitude'- that the world is an object independent of subject, the object is 'real' and not partly constructed- in phenomenological terms 'constituted', not invented, but not before sensed. for husserl this dualism is mistaken, how the world precedes the universe, how objectivity is an accomplishment rather than primordial real, which is always subjective. husserl also insists on the intersubjective aspect of the world, of 'monads' and the 'community of monads' together striving towards 'absolute spirit' in an almost Hegelian manner. and here is the difference between 'a priori' and 'eidetic', and here husserl can insist on the overwhelming power of logic...
and in some ways it is very good, though he takes an early detour from explicating husserl's thought chronologically, instead trying to unify husserl's thought dispersed through many fragments or shorter works. husserl wrote a lot. but this makes resumption of yearly progress sometimes hard to follow. of course, finding references to ideas of perception that will inspire m-p, are great but brief. author does preface by noting this book will be on husserl, and not on the many philosophers stimulated by him, by phenomenology- but then the last few sections of the final chapter raises up many questions but no answers. this is an introductory text. best to read in class or with a prof or others. hard to feel i understood it all, but sometimes great, sometimes good, always fun...
did i say 'fun'? well i have a different idea of 'fun'. i am also always already predisposed to enjoy anything on phenomenology, even when full comprehension is elusive, so do not really know if this is a three or a four. this is probably not the first work on Husserl to read...
more
Husserl
Husserl's Phenomenology
Edmund Husserl: Philosopher of Infinite Tasks
Edmund Husserl: Founder of Phenomenology
Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology
there are some explorations of how husserl came to found phenomenology, in ways i can appreciate, as the 'things themselves', how this focus on the perceived, the given, overcomes kantian 'mythology' of the inaccessible 'thing in itself'. how he recuperates idealism, how he envisages the creation and logic of math. this is a section that does not inspire in me any more look at math, though it does intrigue and shows how these purely rational, idealistic, forms of thought, are mostly based on perceived reality. the problem of imaginary numbers, the problem of complex abstraction of math beyond what we can perceive, the way we create sets, the way we can bracket this or that action. it is clear husserl trained first as a mathematician. it is clear husserl saw the necessity to make philosophy into a science and not science into a philosophy...
scientific 'positivism' is not sufficiently without presuppositions, indeed sciences do not investigate themselves, question themselves, but approach the world 'naively', thinking their subjects somehow 'originary' when in fact they are already weighed down in the realm of predetermined logical forms. here, always, the scientist is adopting the 'natural attitude'- that the world is an object independent of subject, the object is 'real' and not partly constructed- in phenomenological terms 'constituted', not invented, but not before sensed. for husserl this dualism is mistaken, how the world precedes the universe, how objectivity is an accomplishment rather than primordial real, which is always subjective. husserl also insists on the intersubjective aspect of the world, of 'monads' and the 'community of monads' together striving towards 'absolute spirit' in an almost Hegelian manner. and here is the difference between 'a priori' and 'eidetic', and here husserl can insist on the overwhelming power of logic...
and in some ways it is very good, though he takes an early detour from explicating husserl's thought chronologically, instead trying to unify husserl's thought dispersed through many fragments or shorter works. husserl wrote a lot. but this makes resumption of yearly progress sometimes hard to follow. of course, finding references to ideas of perception that will inspire m-p, are great but brief. author does preface by noting this book will be on husserl, and not on the many philosophers stimulated by him, by phenomenology- but then the last few sections of the final chapter raises up many questions but no answers. this is an introductory text. best to read in class or with a prof or others. hard to feel i understood it all, but sometimes great, sometimes good, always fun...
did i say 'fun'? well i have a different idea of 'fun'. i am also always already predisposed to enjoy anything on phenomenology, even when full comprehension is elusive, so do not really know if this is a three or a four. this is probably not the first work on Husserl to read...
more
Husserl
Husserl's Phenomenology
Edmund Husserl: Philosopher of Infinite Tasks
Edmund Husserl: Founder of Phenomenology
Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology
December 16, 2008
This is a lovely little book and a nice introduction to Husserl. I highly recommend reading a book like this before tackling Husserl. In fact, I don't really recommend tackling Husserl unless you're into masochism. Perhaps read this and read Ideen Vol 1 or Philosophical Investigations or, as I plan on doing, Crisis in the European Sciences.
Husserl is pretty key to understanding a lot of 20th C. Continental Philosophy, so it's pretty crucial to get a good grip on his thought. After reading this, if the idea of reading Husserl strikes you as a joyous affair, then go right ahead. Expect it to sap your libido though.
Husserl is pretty key to understanding a lot of 20th C. Continental Philosophy, so it's pretty crucial to get a good grip on his thought. After reading this, if the idea of reading Husserl strikes you as a joyous affair, then go right ahead. Expect it to sap your libido though.
May 17, 2012
this is mostly about his life, but there is one chapter with information about his life; if you are interested in consciousness, there is information in this book that you need to know
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews