NOEMAYA

The question that initiated Edmund Husserl into phenomenological philosophy was the question of the possibility of objectivity: how is it possible, and how is it achieved?

Given the plurality of subjects and particular subjectivities, how is that there is one and the same world before all of us? How do objects, in spite of their subjective appearances, are one and the same objects for all of us? We are all sitting around the same dining table even though none of us is experiencing it in the same way? Where is this the same if all we perceive is a stream of our own subjectivity?

Surely, objectivity must be an achievement of subjectivity. The proposition that things exist independently of us rests on the necessary being of us in order to make that proposition possible, and that it is in reference to our independent existence that such an observation, i.e. the independent existence of others, is even made possible. Thus, it must be a structural feature of subjectivity to constitute objectivity.

Prior to a certain point in the development of philosophy, the plurality and relativity of subjects pointed to the idea that objectivity is independence from the subject; there must be an independently existing world with its own fixed qualities and attributes.

Therefore, one had to justify objectivity in either of the following ways: either the world has qualities independent of the subjects or else there must be a unity of subjectivity, that is, there is ultimately one stream of consciousness that constitutes objectivity transcendentally. 

Reflecting on the former, that objects have independent existence and qualities, there’s no doubt that objects, as in the example of perceptual experience, are given in manifolds of appearances, always with particular profiles and sides who show themselves only to subjects, hence their relativity; there’s no lived aspect of the perceptual object that is the same in different subjects. However, we all agree that we are viewing the same object, let’s say a cup, even though no one is seeing exactly the same thing.

The question here is this: if nothing of the cup is ever presented except manifolds of appearance which themselves depend entirely on the subject, then what is it we are referring to when we say it’s the same object? That identity itself, the cup itself, which is no doubt the object of consciousness here (or else the manifolds wouldn’t hold their meaning as pertaining to one and the same object) is not itself presented in manifolds. The meaning, the cup itself, is seen through the manifold of appearances but itself is never found perceptually in the world. Along with this transcendent identity is the Being and actuality that we assign to objects; they are not phenomena that appear to us in manifolds but directly intended through them.  

The spatiotemporal world cannot possibly host meanings and essences, no more than a tone can lend itself to the possibility of being seen. Meaning is not a thing susceptible to extension and duration; it has nothing to do with this spatiotemporal world of science. 

The follow up question from the naturalists is this: so where are meanings and ideas? In the mind? 

I will ask a similar question from a physicist: Where is the wave function of a quantum mechanical system? Certainly not in the same spatiotemporal stage of the particle; we say it is a thing in the abstract Hilbert Space. The physicist has no problem with this situation, for he’s trained enough to think beyond naturalistic habits of the mind. 

When looking for a place to put/situate meanings and ideas, the naturalist has failed to think beyond  the categories of space and time; they confuse categories here, trying to place something essentially non-spatial into some sort of a place. At best, they say ideas are in the mind, and the mind is in the brain! As long as they cannot let go of forcing supra-spatial realities into the confines of extension and duration, the ensuing worldview would remain incoherent and contradictory. 

Going back to our initial thought: we must drop this impulse to force things into a place, into the world, a universe, some sort of enclosure or encompassing. Why? Because upon further reflection, one can see that the very notion of world, worldliness, enclosure, space or time, encompassing, etc., are themselves intended objects of a consciousness, objects (or rather horizons) that are not presented in a manifold of appearances but rather are the very conditions or horizon of such appearings. In other words, the stage (ideal essences) precede the play (the appearances.) The consciousness of a horizon precedes, not in a temporal way, the consciousness of content. Therefore, it would be absurd to consider the horizon as just another content; horizon is not something itself perceived but rather a formal condition for the appearance of content. 

The spatiotemporal construct in which we find ourselves, along with consciousness, is something always already intended by consciousness, not the particular consciousness of the individual but rather something inherent in the nature of subjectivity regardless of the locus of its manifestation. 

All this is food for thought; after all, we must reflect on things and see for ourselves and verify things within ourselves. 

The idea here is that objectivity is the mark of subjectivity. It means being is only being for a consciousness; things exist only for a subjectivity or else it’s meaningless to attribute to them existence. Same goes with other qualities we attribute to the objects of the world: contour, shape, size, etc.. Everything depends on the subject, not the particular but rather the one, unique, transcendental Subject.

The world is a world of appearances; there is nothing out there behind appearances; all Being and actuality and reality is on the Subject side of experience and not on the object side. The Being and reality of the world is the reality of the Subject that is falsely attributed to a thing out there, a logically meaningless notion upon reflection. Out where? Are not out and there both meanings experienced and made sense within consciousness! 

Of course, here we are not just throwing another doctrine out there to please the idealists and piss off the naturalists. What’s said is simply a pure description of experience that can be verified by any subject, both logically and eventually in a transcendental experience. Surely I am not interested in fancy ideas and doctrines that can never gain the status of truths. What would be the point of holding opinions that weigh one down rather than liberate!