Introduction: Themes and Issues
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 July 2009
Summary
This volume is a collection of fifteen of my thematically related papers on phenomenology, logic, and the philosophy of mathematics. All of the essays are concerned with the interpretation, analysis, and development of ideas in Husserlian phenomenology in connection with recent and historical issues in the philosophy of mathematics and philosophy of logic.
Many of the interesting questions about phenomenology and the exact sciences that engaged such thinkers as Frege, Carnap, Schlick, and Weyl with the early phenomenologists have unfortunately been neglected in more recent times. One could speculate on why this has happened. On the one hand, it no doubt resulted from the development of certain trends in what has since been called ‘analytic’ philosophy. On the other hand, it resulted from the particular trajectory of Continental philosophy after Husserl. Husserl's emphasis on science and the analysis of essence gave way almost immediately on the Continent to various philosophies of human existence under the influence of Husserl's student Heidegger. In addition, there were long delays in the English translation of many of Husserl's writings, and to complicate matters further, philosophy curricula at many universities came to be organized around the division between analytic and Continental philosophy.
In my view, this general division between the analytic and Continental traditions has not always been good for philosophy. Least of all should it be maintained in the case of philosophers such as Brentano, Husserl, and some others in the early phases of the phenomenological movement, for here there is still direct engagement with major figures in Anglo-American philosophy.
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- Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2005