The Shorter Logical Investigations
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The Shorter Logical Investigations .1)t< R m* m~ 1/ " } n +-R <;;) c::tt,. eft ~ -r-B..R ~.J(.r" LOfJ" (~ Edmund Husserl ~ Ii ~ StlJ wl-~ Translated by J. N. Findlay from the Second German edition of Logische Untersuchungen with a new Preface by Michael Dummett and edited and abridged with a new Introduction by ff- X X V - li"'i- V ,'j i Dermot Moran 00U'1'L.l?~Q ~ - ttl . - . .>, ,~ '!J./. 6"0 0,. 4- Fnl\ '\~ London and New York 20el X)(V Introduction The Shorter Logical Investigations The Shorter Logical Investigations is a selection of the key sections of Edmund Husserl's two-volume Logical Investigations, intended to complement the longer work, now available in a paperback edition for the first time. The current revival of interest in Husserl both in connection with the project to discover the origins of analytic philosophy and also in order to understand the origins of the century-old movement known as phenomenology has drawn attention to the Investigations. The aim of this abridged edition is to provide an accessible introduction for professional philosophers, students and gen eral readers alike, to a work which, although recognised as the most impor tant foundational text of the whole phenomenological movement and as a rich source of original ideas in the philosophy of logic and in semantics, has a not undeserved reputation as a difficult, dense, impenetrable and confus ing text. In fact, Husserl intended his Investigations to be an exhibition of his own thinking in progress, as he wrestled with difficult issues concerning logic, meaning and truth, and was always conscious that the work lacked both form and literary grace. He made several efforts to edit the book to accommodate his developing views, and even planned to replace it with something written more deliberately as an introductory text. As a result the Logical Investigations was progressively eclipsed by the appearance of Ideas J, the Cartesian Meditations and by the Crisis of European Sciences, as a basic introduction to Husserl's thought. Yet, Husserl always regarded the Investigations as his 'breakthrough work' and indeed his later positions are almost unintelligible unless understood in relation to his original formula tions in the Investigations. A more compact, user-friendly version of the text, then, has long been needed. I hope this Shorter Logical Investigations will anSwer this need, and provide a convenient entry to Husserl's thought. In the long run, I can hope no better than that it will also serve as a stimulus to read the Investigations in the full form. In selecting the texts, I have had to face difficult choices as Husserl's mode of writing (like Aristotle's) involves the complex dissection of prob- xxvi Introduction Introduction xxvii lems, the consideration of the prevailing views, and then the presentation of tive knowledge. Turning instead to an older tradition of logic stemming his own position, ahnost as a set of asides within the exposition of the from Leibniz, Kant, Bolzano and Lotze, Husser! defends a vision of logic as problem at hand. Nevertheless, I have attempted, within the confines of the a pure theory of science - in fact, the 'science of science', in the course of space available, to provide as comprehensive and representative selection as which he carefully elaborates the different senses in which this pure logic could be made, while still preserving the overall structure of the work. In can be transformed into a normative science or developed into a practical selecting passages, I have attempted to preserve the integrity of the indi discipline or 'technology' (Kunstlehre). vidual sections Husserl himself marked out, in order not to interfere with The second volume of the Investigations (1901) was published in two Husserl's reasoning. I have also sought advice from Husserl scholars (my parts: Part One contained the first Five Investigations and Part Two the thanks to David Carr, Kevin Mulligan, Harry Reeder, Donn Welton, among long and dense Sixth Investigation, the writing of which had considerably many others) as to the essential passages to include. For the fuller picture, delayed the appearance of the work as Husser! began to realise the depth of readers are urged to consult the reprint of Findlay's translation of the whole the phenomenological project he had uncovered. Whereas the Prolegomena two-volume Investigations. was particularly influential in turning the tide against psychologism (Frege's efforts in the same direction being in relative obscurity at the time), it was the second volume of the Investigations in particular that had a major The Logical Investigations (1900/1901) impact on philosophers interested in concrete analyses of problems of con Edmund Husser! (1859-1938) published his Logische Untersuchungen sciousness and meaning, leading to the development of phenomenology. (Logical Investigations) in two volumes in 1900 and 1901.' The first volume, Phenomenology, in line with a general turn away from idealism then Prolegomena zur reinen Logik (Prolegomena to Pure Logic) appeared from current, was to be a science of 'concrete' issues. According to Husserl's the publisher Max Niemeyer in July 1900 2 The second volume, subtitled Introduction, phenomenology aimed to avoid speculative constructions in Untersuchungen zur Phiinomenologie und Theorie der Erkenntnis ('Investiga philosophy (exemplified, in his view, by Hegel). The Investigations impressed tions in Phenomenology and the Theory of Knowledge'), containing six its early readers as exemplifying a radically new way of doing philosophy, long treatises or 'Investigations', appeared in two parts in 1901. This gar focusing directly on analysis of the things themselves - the matters at issue gantuan work - which Husser! insisted was not a 'systematic exposition of (die Sachen selbst) - without the usual detour through the history of philo logic' (eine systematische Darstellung der Logik, LI III, Findlay II: 3; Hua sophy, 'merely criticising traditional philosophemes' as Husserl put it (LI VI, XIX/I: 228),3 but an effort at epistemological clarification and critique of Intro., Findlay II: 187; Hua XIXI2: 543), or making partisan declarations in the basic concepts of logical knowledge - consisted of a series of analytical favour of some philosophical system (such as empiricism, positivism, ration inquiries (analytische Untersuchungen) into fundamental issues in epistemol alism, Hegelianism or Neo-Kantianism). ogy and the philosophy of logic, and also extensive, intricate philosophical Within a decade, as Husser!'s ground-breaking efforts came to be recog discussions of issues in semiotics, semantics, mereology (the study of wholes nised, the Investigations had established itself as the foundational text of the and parts), formal grammar (the a priori study of the parts of any language nascent 'phenomenological movement' (a term Husser! himself regularly whatsoever in regard to their coherent combination into meaningful unities), invoked) in Germany. The Investigations' influence subsequently spread and the nature of conscious acts, especially presentations and judgements. throughout Europe, from Russia and Poland to France and Spain, such In fact it was these latter detailed descriptive psychological analyses of the that eventually, it is no exaggeration to say that this work took on a status essential structures of consciousness, in terms of intentional acts, their con in twentieth-century European philosophy analogous to that of another tents, objects and truth-grasping character, especially in the last two Investi foundational text - this time in psychoanalysis - Die Traumdeutung (Inter gations, which set the agenda for the emerging discipline Husserl fostered pretation of Dreams),S published by Husser!'s contemporary Sigmund Freud under the name phenomenology. (1856-1939) in 1899. The Investigations continues to be a necessary starting The Prolegomena' appeared as a free-standing treatise dedicated to secur point for anyone wanting to understand the deVelopment of European ing the true meaning of logic as a pure, a priori, science of ideal meanings philosophy in the twentieth century, from Heidegger and Frege to Levinas, and of the formal laws regulating them, entirely distinct from all psycho Gadamer, Sartre or Derrida. logical acts, contents and procedures. The Prolegomena offered the strong Given that the Logical Investigations is such a pivotal text in twentieth est possible refutation to the then dominant psycho logistic interpretation of century philosophy, it remains something of a neglected masterpiece, re logic, propounded by John Stuart Mill and others, which Husser! viewed as markably little read, and where read, poorly understood. For some seventy leading to a sceptical relativism that threatened the very possibility of objec- years it remained untranslated into English. An American philosopher living xxviii Introduction Introduction xxix in Europe, William B. Pitkin sought Husser!'s permission to translate it into Iar!y that the task of phenomenology is to clarify the nature of logical English in 1905, but he abandoned the effort when he could not get a publisher concepts by tracing their origins in intuition: (see Hua XVIII: xxxvii; XIXI1: xxii). Seemingly, the philosopher William James, who was consulted on the project, advised the publisher not to pro Our great task is now to hring the Ideas of logic, the logical concepts and ceed - suggesting that the last thing the world needed was another German laws (die logischen