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Will Emmons
Moderator
47 Posts |
 Posted - Sep 19 2008 : 11:05:44 AM
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I spoke with Tom after class on Wednesday and we came to something that seemed to me very interesting, which I feel is important to discuss as it has showed up in the text already, and is likely to continue to make itself known throughout the work. Let us say that I am looking at a pot, noticing a feature such as its shape, and say something like "wow, the pot!" We can say that I was "intending the pot." This "intending" is a first-order intending. Intending an object in the ways described in chapter 2, by way of the sides, aspects, and profiles seems to me to be a fair candidate for being termed "first-order" intending. A second-order "intending" may take the form of intending my act of "intending" the pot, i.e., the form of intending an intending. Intending our methods of intending may be close to the core of phenomenological inquiry; this is conciousness of how we are conscious, or the ways in which we are conscious. I would really like to sort through some of these things here on the forum, but I fear that I like clarity when I discuss this material.
[Very lightly edited to enhance readability -TT] |
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Tom Trelogan
Forum Admin
1368 Posts |
Posted - Sep 20 2008 : 11:05:52 AM
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The only thing I have any reservations about at all in what you've said here, Will, is your use of the word "methods" in the phrase "our methods of intending." I can't think of any intending we do that we use a method to do. We use methods to do a huge variety of things, but intending? I don't think so. I wouldn't object to your speaking of how we intend things or of the ways in which we intend things -- just as you've spoken here of how we are conscious and of the ways we are conscious, but "methods of intending" strikes me as every bit as strange as "methods of being conscious." There might be methods that can be used to become conscious of certain things, and therefore methods that can be used to arrive at the point at which certain intentions occur. Those who speak of the method of phenomenological reduction are certainly committed to thinking that there are. But think about the difference between these two ways of speaking. There are obviously various methods that can be used to get from here to New York (though those who travel from here to there don't always use anything that could properly be called a method), but methods of being in New York? I don't think so.
The word "method" is also haunting us right now in PHIL 260. Maybe it would pay us, not only because of what we're doing right here, but also because of what we're thinking of doing in that class with our first paper, to spend a moment or two thinking about the word in what might be called a Heideggerian way. "Method" comes from the Greek word "methodos," which in turn is formed from the prepositional prefix "meta" (the very same word we find at the beginning of the Greek roots of the words "metaphysics" and "metaphor") and the noun "hodos" -- the Greeks' word for what we call "a way." So a method is a certain kind of way. What's distinctive about methods is that they involve something like rules or recipes -- they're procedures. Not only that. A good method is a procedure that either guarantees or makes extremely likely the attainment of one's goal, whatever that might be. How does the addition of the prefix "meta" to the Greek word for a way manage to yield a name for this specific sort of thing? Answer: "meta" means various things depending on the case of the noun that follows it; in "methodos" it means "after" (take a look at -- and reflect upon -- the definitions of "methodos" and "meta" in the LSJ, the Liddell-Scott-Jones Greek-English Lexicon, at the Perseus Project). The way after something is the way one takes when one is following it, on its track, pursuing it. In Greek, "methodos" therefore means first and foremost the pursuit of something, and in the cognitive sphere, this was already thought of as a hunt that is to culminate in knowledge, an investigation, as we might say. By a natural extension, the word came to mean the way of conducting such a hunt, the way of conducting or prosecuting such an investigation, and since the way to conduct or prosecute such an investigation is to do it in an orderly (step-by-step), regular (rule-governed) way, that, by yet another perfectly natural process of generalization, is what the word "method" has come to mean first and foremost for us English-speakers today. To put this in the terms used in the 1913 edition of Webster's: a method is "[a]n orderly procedure or process; a regular [way] of doing anything."
Now, to return to my initial point: not every way is an orderly, regular way -- a way that involves steps that must be taken in a certain order (an order that can be specified in a set of directions) and that's therefore regular in the sense of being described (or of being capable of being described) by a set of rules. And so there's my reason in a nutshell for thinking that it makes little if any sense to speak of methods of intending or being conscious. There might, as I've said, be methods we could use to become conscious of something, but once we are, we've arrived at our destination. The pursuit is over and we no longer need anything like a "method" to be there, i.e., to remain there -- to stay there -- at least for a while.
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David Dodds
Apprentice
31 Posts |
Posted - Sep 21 2008 : 11:33:29 PM
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Will, I like this idea of second-order intending although I’m having trouble thinking about what a second-order intention would be exactly. When you say,quote:
A second-order "intending" may take the form of intending my act of "intending" the pot, i.e., the form of intending an intending
I’m wondering if we aren’t thinking about a second-order intention as intending an idea. For example, if I am intending intentionality, or memory, or an individual, or the crowd, etc. these are not necessarily objects like the cube or Candelaria Hall are, or first-order intentions; but they are still consciousness of something or an intention nonetheless. In second-order intending the objects seem to be ideas or concepts. I think the question is: from the phenomenological perspective can we interpret any truth from a second-order intention? This is very confusing but also extremely interesting. It’s at least better than beating our head against the damn cube over and over.
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Edited by - David Dodds on Sep 21 2008 11:34:00 PM |
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David Dodds
Apprentice
31 Posts |
Posted - Sep 22 2008 : 4:57:59 PM
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Today in class the notion of ideas was bashed on pretty harshly, and so I think I should add a comment to what I have said to Will here. I understand that the word “idea” has a bad reputation in the history of philosophy, I suppose all due to Descartes, so maybe I should scratch out the word “idea” and stick to something like “concept” instead, but I’m not sure if this would be any better at all. Right now as I’m trying to think this through, I am getting a bit stuck, but would I be completely crazy to say, after having read Will’s post and my response to him, you get the idea? We can have ideas, get ideas, and discuss ideas, and it seems that we do this all the time. Could we not describe the basic idea of existentialism if we were considering it from Sartre’s Existentialism is a Humanism; Or the idea of Nietzsche’s Übermensch; Or the concept of dread from the excerpt we read by Kiekegaard? I don’t think I am too far off. But I’m wondering if someone doesn’t want to say to me, ‘You are living in a world that is not reality or actuality. There is really no such thing as an idea, and what you are calling “ideas” are really many other things,’ in which case I would like to say in reference to Will’s post, ‘Then what about “second-order” intendings of those?’
[Very lightly edited to enhance readability -TT] |
Edited by - David Dodds on Sep 22 2008 4:59:40 PM |
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Tom Trelogan
Forum Admin
1368 Posts |
Posted - Sep 22 2008 : 9:08:56 PM
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| Since I was the harsh basher today, I should step up to the plate and say that there's nothing obviously wrong with using the word "idea" in any of the ordinary, non-philosophical senses you mention in this post, and the same thing goes for the word "concept." It's the philosophical uses of the word that are parasitic on the conviction that all awareness must be awareness of mental representations that's philosophically questionable. Just one question about what you've written here (this has to do with the first message you posted in this thread): what are you asking exactly when you pose the question, "can we interpret any truth from a second-order intention"? For the rest, I'll let Will respond. |
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David Dodds
Apprentice
31 Posts |
Posted - Sep 25 2008 : 11:07:57 AM
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I suppose with second-order intentions I am referring to things we encounter in life which are nevertheless non-physical. When we begin in phenomenology we start by looking at physical objects and this helps to build a foundation and assumes the ability to find truth about things, but as far as actual philosophizing goes this is minimal if anything at all. For example, if we mention a cube or Candeleria Hall we can say all that can be said about it according to the various sides, aspects, and profiles, and this I understand would be building up the truth of the things. But to what extent could we apply phenomenology to non-physical things that philosophy has typically concerned itself with. Say, for example, I mention wisdom, or truth, or knowledge; could these be intentions of a second-order that we could perceive in the phenomenological attitude and then find truth about these? I’m not sure if this is going in the direction Will wants to go with the “second-order” idea.
But I’m starting to see how what I’m saying may fall into the Cartesian predicament. I am treating these ideas as though they are real things. So it begs the question as to whether “truth” or “knowledge” or such “ideas” could not exist independently or if it just seems absurd from our human position since what is is presented to us physically. If phenomenology can show what these things really are then it would really require this “shift in consciousness” that we have talked about. One must have gone through it as well as be in it to understand and even talk about anything that goes beyond physical objects, i.e. beyond its foundation or higher in it. This brings to my mind Heidegger and his crazy way of talking about things. When he does that is he even saying anything about anything? Is he really revealing the truth of things? Or is he simply talking like a crazy asshole and not getting anywhere with it?
We have noted how there is really no argument to get us to do the conscious shift or the phenomenological reduction. Usually in arguments you have premises that one can examine and check for validity but here it seems that we are dealing with a premise that no one can examine but which one must actually do. Now I can’t tell if phenomenology is a bunch of hocus-pocus or if it actually has anything to offer. If I want to put forth something like wisdom as what is being intended then am I simply confusing the natural and phenomenological attitude? Does the phenomenological reduction ground us in reality or does it simply restrict us to what can be examined in life? This is all reasonably strange. I admit my confusion, and I have wandered very far from where I originally started.
[Very lightly edited to enhance readability -TT] |
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Tom Trelogan
Forum Admin
1368 Posts |
Posted - Sep 25 2008 : 4:58:39 PM
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What Will means by "second-order intentions" is not simply intentions that have non-physical things as their objects. What he means is, as he has said, intentions that have intentions as their objects: acts of consciousness whose objects are themselves acts of consciousness.
Since wisdom is not an act of consciousness (it makes no sense to speak of a wisdom of anything in the way in which it does make sense to speak of such things as a perception of something, a memory of something, or an anticipation of something), wisdom can't be classified as an intention of any sort whatsoever. Similarly, truth—if "truth" means correctness—isn't itself an act of consciousness. But if by "knowledge" we mean knowing in the sense of seeing that something is the case, then knowledge is an intention, but it isn't a second-order intention, because the known (that which is being seen to be the case) is always some state of affairs, and states of affairs aren't intentions.
Hope this helps. |
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Will Emmons
Moderator
47 Posts |
Posted - Oct 08 2008 : 09:09:41 AM
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David, as you and I have been saying to one another before and after class, it is difficult to see just how to use the phenomenological attitude. It seems obvious that Sokolowski spends each chapter describing what is offered by phenomenology, but I myself still get the sense that I cannot actually use the transcendental attitude for any investigation in particular. Would you care to begin with an object and see what phenomenology offers us in virtue of itself? If you like, we could begin with a cube, as Sokolowki has, or we could start with an object that is less tidy in terms of the structures of the consciousness of this object such as, say, a tree. I think that if we do this and proceed as Sokolowski suggests, we will get a better idea of whether there is something like an argument -- and if there isn't, we will surely anticipate one -- for getting us into the phenomenological attitude.
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David Dodds
Apprentice
31 Posts |
Posted - Oct 09 2008 : 6:15:15 PM
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Will, I think the reason it seems so difficult to use the transcendental attitude has a lot to do with the way the material has been presented to us. Sokolowski has spent the entire time telling us about phenomenology, and while it’s nice to get such an easy overview of such a crazy thing, we are left without any real idea of how to get involved. It’s very easy to follow blindly as though what is given to us is simple and obvious, and it's mind numbing to try to dissect phenomenology from the outside. So while I want to put the blame on Sokolowski for trying to do what one can’t or shouldn’t do with phenomenology, i.e., write an introduction in the form of a textbook, I realize the blame can equally be put on my shoulders, and all of our shoulders, for not going very deep into such a crazy endeavor as phenomenology. We have a pretty basic foundation thanks to Sokolowski, and it couldn’t hurt to try to see what we can do with it.
So I do like where you’re going with trying to use the transcendental attitude, but I do not want to try this with a physical object. I think using physical objects is a great way to get the point of sides, aspects, and profiles across, but I don’t see anything philosophical about such knowledge of a cube or any other object. Unless we are going to talk about the essences of certain things, which I think would be interesting but a different topic, I beg that we don’t use a physical object. However, if you really want to, I suggest that you start it off and I will join in as best I can. Otherwise I want to suggest something a little different. I want to throw in my usual David-obscurities and see if we can’t do something else with phenomenology -- or if I really just don’t get it.
What if we turned this back on existentialism and tried to use the transcendental attitude to analyze a statement or two from some of the writers we have already looked at? There is something Sokolowski says in the “Categorial Intentions and Objects” chapter on page 100 that makes me think this might be possible. He says:
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Instead of postulating judgments, propositions, and senses as mediating entities, phenomenology sees them as correlated to a propositional attitude and propositional reflection. They arise in response to our taking a state of affairs as being merely proposed by someone. In this analysis, not only is a state of affairs “in the world”; even a proposition is “in the world,” but in the world only as being projected by someone. It is how the world is being projected as being, through what someone is saying.
Obviously analyzing what someone says is completely different from analyzing an object, but maybe we could get closer to the heart of what phenomenology is philosophically by doing so. By analyzing objects we were able to see how phenomenology provides a foundation for bringing out the truth of things, but I want to try to build on the foundation rather than simply analyzing it alone. I’ll list some quotes from the Kaufman book just as suggestions for what I am thinking of here.
On page 123 with Nietzsche:
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Alas, I can see that you do not know what it means to be alone. Wherever there have been powerful societies, governments, religions, or public opinions –- in short, wherever there was any kind of tyranny, it has hated the lonely philosopher; for philosophy opens up the refuge for man where no tyranny can reach: the cave of inwardness, the labyrinth of the breast; and that annoys all tyrants. That is where the lonely hide; but there too they encounter their greatest danger…
At the bottom of page 136 with Rilke:
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I see myself lying in my little crib, not sleeping, and somehow foreseeing vaguely that life would be this way: full of special things which are meant for one only and which are unutterable.
In the middle of 155 with Ortega:
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But man must not only make himself: the weightiest thing he has to do is to determine what he is going to be. He is causa sui to the second power. By a coincidence that is not casual, the doctrine of the living being, when it seeks in tradition for concepts that are still more or less valid, finds only those which the doctrine of the divine being tried to formulate.
Or at the end of the page on 118 with Kierkegaard:
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Anything that is almost probable, or probable, or extremely and emphatically probable, is something he can almost know, or as good as know, or extremely and emphatically almost know –- but it is impossible to believe. For the absurd is the object of faith, and the only object that can be believed…
So what do you think?
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Will Emmons
Moderator
47 Posts |
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First and Second Order Intentions
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