Phenomenology and the Metaphysics of Presence: An Essay in the Philosophy of Edmund Husserl (Phaenomenologica, 69)

trans-temporal, and therefore primarily present. That which is not in the present is not given as being in a primary mode of Being. That which was, for example, is given in the mode of having-been. That which is in the present is what is, that is, manifests Being through its presence in the present. 3. Being is absolute. Being is that other than which nothing is. The limit of Being is nonbeing; it is the ground of all mediation. N onbeing and absence are derivative, mediated categories. Beingin-the-mode-of-presence is absolute presence. 4. The notion of Being as absolute presence means that Being in itself, the eternal, immutable idea of Being, is the notion of absolute presence, and therefore the exclusion of the notions of the temporal, the incomplete, and the negative. The notion of Being, in its primordial manifestation is the exclusion of absence. These are the thoughts that are at the heart of that line of thinking in Western philosophy which is the metaphysics of presence. Already in Plato's analogy of the cave this metaphysical notion of Being is delimited and defined by contrast with the notion of absence. All persons, save only the philosopher, are doomed to be dealing only with shadows, the phantom, and to think that it is the real. But even those who see outside of the cave, through the exercise of reason, see only shadows at first. Of course they are the shadows of the real world, not of the cave, but they are shadows nonetheless. They are mere profiles; they have no depth, no substantial being. After some time, Plato tells us, it would be possible to look directly at the things of the world themselves, no longer being restricted to mere reflections. But even to see these beings as they are is not yet the exercise of the philosophical act, not yet the metaphysical moment. For what is not given in the vision of these things of the world is their source, the ground of their being. That is to say, Being qua Being has not yet been given -Being in the mode of absolute presence. The entities of the world are temporal, unstable, constantly changing, that is, not in absolute presence. The last thing to be perceived is the good itself, in the analogy of the cave, the sun. And this vision is given all at once; it is unchanging, unadumbrated, the eternal source and ground of all being and all change. For it to be grasped all at once, to be grasped in a single vision means that it is given as presence, absolute, 4 Ibid., p. 55. 5 Ibid., p. 136. In this text, the reader will find a well focused, clearly written, and concise review of major themes in the philosophy of Edmund Husserl. This work could well serve the beginning student to focus on the major problems in Husserlian thought. Fuchs argues that Husserl’s phenomenology is in conformity with and an outgrowth of the traditional orientation of Western philosophy called the metaphysics of presence. In separate discussions of evidence, temporality, and intersubjectivity, the author attempts to demonstrate both that Husserl is tied to this traditional metaphysical doctrine which grants primacy to presence over absence, and that he nonetheless laid the foundation for the overcoming of this metaphysic. Throughout, Husserl is portrayed as wrestling with the juxtaposition of presence and absence; and yet on each point, presence is said to remain of primary constitutive status: evidence is seen as "absolute presence," the presence of impression plays a stronger constitutive role than the absences of past and future, and knowledge of other human beings is secured on the ground of presence. In short, the author claims that Husserl provided the foundation for the overcoming of the prejudice of the metaphysics of presence, and yet did not succeed in fully extricating himself from the confusions of this tradition.Review of Metaphysics 30 (4):760-761. I. Phenomenology and the Beginning.- II. Epistemology and the Metaphysics of Presence.- A. The Metaphysics of Presence.- B. Positivism.- C. Intuition.- D. Fact and Essence.- E. Phenomenology as Science.- The Being of Consciousness.- F. Intentional Analysis.- III. Truth and Presence.- A. Expression and Meaning.- B. Meaning-Fulfillment.- C. Evidence and Truth.- D. Evidence and the Metaphysics of Presence.- E. Language and Consciousness.- IV. Temporality and Presence.- A. The Problematic of Time.- B. Time as a Phenomenological Datum.- C. The Now.- D. The Temporal Horizons.- V. Intersubjectivity and Epistemological Presence.- A. The Refutation of Solipsism.- B. The Presence of the Other.- C. The Being of the Other.- VI. Conclusion.- A. Review of Our Findings.- B. Phenomenology and the Possibility of History. Front Matter....Pages i-v Introduction: Phenomenology and the Beginning....Pages 1-5 Epistemology and the Metaphysics of Presence....Pages 6-36 Truth and Presence....Pages 37-57 Temporality and Presence....Pages 58-73 Intersubjectivity and Epistemological Presence....Pages 74-88 Conclusion....Pages 89-97 Back Matter....Pages 98-98