hans bernhard schmidt-apodictic evidence

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Husserl Studies 17 : 217237, 2001. 2001 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.

Apodictic Evidence

HANS BERNHARD SCHMID 1 New School for Social Research, Graduate Faculty of Political and Social Science, Department of Philosophy, 65 Fifth Avenue, New York 10003, USA

In contemporary philosophy, Husserls transcendental phenomenology has been criticized for three principal reasons, its idealism, 2 its solipsism 3, and itsfoundationalism. Among these criticisms, the last one is probably the mostcommonly held and the most vague at the same time. It is still an open ques-tion whether Wilfrid Sellarss elaborate critique of foundationalism does ap-

ply to Husserl (as Richard Rorty seems to think). 4 What the critics seem tohave in mind is, however, a less sophisticated idea of foundationalism.Husserls foundationalism in this sense simply seems to consist in his claimto have discovered a type of experience that is not flawed by the fallibility of normal, nave experience a type of knowledge that therefore is not in needof confirmation in the course of further investigation and in the basic roleHusserl ascribes to this kind of knowledge in his theory. For following thisfoundationalist line of thought in transcendental phenomenology, our claims to rationality and the very idea of science depend on the existence of such unshakeable grounds, as Husserl makes clear in the opening paragraphsof his Cartesian Meditations .

Such foundational claims are generally considered as hopelessly outdated.To put it in the words of Wilfrid Sellars, we hold knowledge and science to berational not because it is based on indubitable foundations, but because it isa self-correcting enterprise, which can put any claim in jeopardy, though notall at once (Sellars 1997, p. 79). Since Husserls foundationalism is so muchat odds with our current thinking, it is all too understandable that there is atendency among those interpreters who are sympathetic to Husserl to simply

ignore, to suppress or even explicitly to contest Husserls foundationalism inorder to present Husserl as a thinker of relevance to current philosophy. Theeditors of the Cambridge Companion to Husserl are just one of many exam-

ples for this strategy. In their introduction, they simply claim that Husserl didnot seek foundations of knowledge. There is, as they continue, no indubi-table bedrock of a foundationalist edifice in Husserls theory. 5 And yet, itdoesnt take more than an hour of reading in Husserls works to stumble uponat least one formulation of this very foundational claim. Husserl portrays his


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philosophical venture time and time again as a science (. . .) based on solidfoundations (Hua XXV, p. 57) on an absolute justification (Hua VII, p. 36).Thus one of Husserls critics has even described a perfectly hard ground asthe one and only focal point of Husserls entire intellectual venture. 6

In most critical interpretations, Husserls quest for apodicticity andapodictic evidence is taken as an expression of this foundationalist searchof a solid ground in terms of a privileged mode of experience or field of knowledge that provides us with infallible insight. Thats why the concept of apodictic evidence is widely unpopular among phenomenologists. One of themost striking symptoms of this is the fact that the Encyclopedia of Phenom-enology does not even mention this concept a term Husserl not only coined,

but also regarded as so central and essential to his philosophy that he in timesused it on about every second page of his writings! 7

In this paper I will try to challenge this more or less silent understandingof apodictic evidence as a foundationalist concept. The first section of this

paper is concerned with a more detailed description of what is indeed foun-dationalist in Husserls philosophy: the dogma of self-transparency. Withsome remarks on the history of the concept of apodictic evidence in Husserls

phenomenology and some elements of a possible systematic reconstruction Iwill try to show that Husserl developed his concept of apodictic evidence inthe course of his move away from his earlier foundationalist dogma of self-transparency. It is of special importance for my argument to take a closer look at Husserls slow and complicated development from the earlier identifica-

tion to the later distinction of adequate and apodictic evidence. The third sec-tion deals with the criticism that accuses Husserl of ignoring and suppressinginternal otherness and the bearings of the phenomenon of internal othernesson the concept of apodicticity. In a short concluding remark, the results of thisinterpretation of apodictic evidence as a non-foundationalist concept shall begathered.

Husserls departure from the dogma of self-transparency

In his authoritative study of the concept of truth in Husserl and Heidegger, 8

Ernst Tugendhat has drawn a distinction that has been of lasting influence onmany interpretations down to the present day. 9 Tugendhat distinguishes whathe calls the critical motif in phenomenology from its dogmatic motif. Onthe one side he presents Husserl as a critically-minded thinker to whom allknowledge, including phenomenology itself, is fallible and might prove wrongat any point in the course of further critical investigation. On the other sideHusserl appears as a dogmatic, a Cartesian thinker 10 who doesnt contenthimself with that kind of soft knowledge and claims his venture to be infal-


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lible and ultimately justified. The main point is, that this is not merely an am- bivalence in Husserls thinking but a proper contradiction. 11 For Husserl, stillfollowing Tugendhats reading, thereby dogmatically limits the scope of criti-cal thinking.

A closer look at the reasons which led Husserl to this understanding of phenomenology makes Tugendhats conclusion even more convincing. Theargument Husserl comes up with to substantiate the absolute certainty of

phenomenological insights in his earlier works is as simple as it is unaccept-able. In Husserls words, unlike transcendent perception, immanent percep-tion is adequately evident and therefore indubitable. That means: the objectsin the outer world are never given to our intuition in all the concrete deter-mining parts our meaning them might assume. What is given is never fullycongruent with what is intended. There is a gap between what is present in

perception and the noematic sense of our intention, and this gap Husserl iden-tifies as all errors gateway to human knowledge. What was meant as greenall over might turn out to be yellow on the rear side. External experience gives

just presumptive evidence, not apodictic evidence. But, according to Husserl,the state of affairs in the case of immanent perception, i.e. if our perceiving isdirected to our own states of consciousness in phenomenological reflectionis completely different. Husserl identifies immanence in his Logical Investi-

gations as a sphere of adequate givenness (Hua XIX, p. 27f.). For as op- posed to objects in the external world, states of mind do not have back sidesnor hidden corners to be probed. What is given in immanent perception that

is in phenomenological reflection is congruent with what is meant. And thisadequacy is what makes phenomenological reflection, according to Husserl,ultimately justified knowledge. I can doubt the truth of an inadequate (. . .)

perception. (. . .) But I cannot doubt an adequate, purely immanent percep-tion, since there are no residual intentions in it that must yet achieve fulfil-ment. The whole intention, or the intention in all its aspects, is fulfilled. Or,as we also expressed it: the object in our percept is not merely believed to exist,

but is also itself truly given, and as what it is believed to be. It is of the es-sence of adequate perception that the intuited object itself really and trulydwells in it, which is merely another way of saying that only the perception of ones own actual experiences is indubitable and evident. 12 Husserl even in

his later works sometimes portrays immanent perception as evident, and evi-dence as a grasping of something in itself that is, or is thus, a grasping in themode it itself with full certainty of its being, a certainty that accordinglyexcludes every doubt. 13 Thats the reason why immanent perception is cer-tain whereas transcendent perception is fallible. This describes the main fea-ture of the basic distinction in Husserls transcendental phenomenology, of itsLeitdifferenz, to put it in a term used in systems theory. 14 Here in tran-scendent perception an adumbrated being, not capable of ever becoming


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given absolutely, merely accidental and relative; there in immanent percep-tion a necessary and absolute being, essentially incapable of becoming given

by virtue of adumbration. 15 This is the main feature of Husserls famous abyssthat yawns between consciousness and reality (Hua III, p. 105 [121]). 16

Thus Husserl describes the judgement external perception is deceptive,inner perception evident as a basic pillar of knowledge, which skepticismcannot shake (Hua XIX, p. 753 [853]). What makes the apodicticity of in-ner perception, its superior certainty, is its adequateness (up to the time of

First Philosophy Husserl regarded apodicticity as nothing but a special qual-ity of adequate evidence, its certainty). 17 But how could Husserl ever rely onsuch an obviously weak argument about inner perception? 18 Thus Husserl madeit easy for his critics, Gilbert Ryle among them, who very early depicted theabsolute certainty of immanent perception as a mere myth. Phenomenologicalreflection is, following Ryle, nothing else than remembrance controlled bya special interest, by no means more certain than any act of consciousness,for we often make mistakes about our mental condition. 19 Husserl just seemsto have taken it for granted that in contrast to the world outside we are com-

pletely transparent to ourselves. But in the meantime we have learned howunfathomable our own states of mind sometimes are. For as Freud has shownso convincingly, a desire for something may, depending on the circumstances,enter the inner stage disguised as, say, fear of something completely differ-ent. Without intending to replace a problematic theory of consciousness by atheory of the unconscious that is just as problematic: this fundamental psy-

choanalytic insight and its bearings not only on natural reflexion, but also onthe theory of the pure self-reference of the subject after the phenomenologicalreduction, cannot be escaped. Our self-understanding, as pure as it may be,tends to miss its object even more persistently than our knowledge of the thingsout there in the world and our knowledge of others. Did it escape Husserlsnotice how persistently subjectivity eludes the grasp of reflection?

However, in order to avoid the conclusion that Husserls idea of apodicticityis due to this unacceptable dogma of self-transparency, it is essential to con-sider his thought more completely. Husserl, in his later thought, moved awayfrom his earlier dogma of self-transparency. He himself later called the viewhe had endorsed earlier as simply nave (Hua XVII, p. 295). As early as the

Ideas he started to change his position: It is the case also of a mental processthat it is never perceived completely, that it cannot be adequately seized uponin its full unity (Hua III, p. 103 [97]). Just as the external objects of tran-scendent perception are given as located in horizons of possible modificationsof the apprehensional sense, our own states of mind are also given in a wider context, the stream of consciousness, and are therefore never given in adequateevidence. According to Husserls position in the Ideas , this however does notapply to the givenness of the pure ego: The ego (. . .) does not present itself


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merely from a side, (. . .). Instead, the pure Ego is given in absolute selfhoodand in a unity which does not present itself by way of adumbrations; it can begrasped adequately in the reflexive shift of focus (. . .). As pure ego it doesnot harbor any hidden inner richness; it is absolutely simple and it lies thereabsolutely clear. 20 But Husserl has further developed his egology in his later works. In the manuscripts leading to his Cartesian Meditations , Husserl ex-

pounded by far a more complex egology, picking up on the fundamental in-sight that the transcendental ego is inseparable from the processes makingup his life (Hua I, p. 99 [65]).

As such, it is not only an empty pole of identity (Hua I, p. 100 [66]), buttogether with its mental processes it has to be considered from a genetic or even historical perspective. 21 For as a substrate of habitualities it developscustoms and as personal ego (Hua I, p. 101 [67]) it commits itself to con-victions. But it is not until it is revealed in its monadic character that the ego

becomes visible in its full concreteness, in the flowing multiformity of hisintentional life, along with the objects intended (. . .) in that life (Hua I, p.102 [68]). In that perspective, the ego is by no means perfectly clear and freeof hidden characteristics, on the contrary: it has an abundance of concealedinner richness, and that means: it is not given in adequate evidence. WhenI am effecting transcendental reduction and reflecting on myself, the transcen-dental ego, I am given to myself (. . .) with an open infinite horizon of stillundiscovered internal features of my own (Hua I, p. 132 [101]). And it wasin fact in this context that Husserl finally came to reject the dogma of self-

transparency he formerly had endorsed. But if immanent perception does notgive adequate evidence, there is no absolute certainty either, for I then am asobscure to myself as is the external world. Husserl now sometimes goes asfar as to declare immanent perception, this former stronghold of certainty, anexperience like any other (Ms A I 31/11a). The field of immanent perceptiondoesnt appear as a privileged unshakable ground of knowledge any more. For immanent perception, too, is nothing more than fallible experience. Thats whythe term transcendental experience 22 (seemingly a contradictio in adjecto)comes into frequent use in Phenomenology from this moment on. Husserlchooses that term to do justice to the fact that phenomenology, too, is nothingelse then experiencing in open and endless horizons of possible confirmation

or disconfirmation. If phenomenological reflection is transcendental experi-ence, then phenomenology is in no way infallible and absolutely justifiedknowledge. Here Husserl himself states Gilbert Ryles objection against him:we may always be widely mistaken about ourselves (Hua XV, p. 450), andeven more: as far as the purport of phenomenological reflection is concerned,there is no limits (. . .) to self-deception (Hua XV, p. 401). It is not surpris-ing that Paul Ricoeur started his enterprise to bring Psychoanalysis and Phe-nomenology closer together from this very insight into the inadequate evidence


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of immanent perception.23

And insofar as Husserls claim to apodicticity isclosely connected to the misconception of immanent perception as a sphereof adequateness and Husserls indeed considered adequacy and apodicticityto be mutually defining concepts up to the time of First Philosophy (as weshall see in the next chapter) it seems, that the idea of apodictic evidenceshares the fate of the dogma of self-transparency.

Some remarks from the perspective of the development of Husserlsthinking and a step toward a systematic reconstruction

Many of Husserls interpreters and critics, among them some of the mostrenowned, reached this conclusion in their reading of Husserls theory of apodicticity. As Husserl explicitly rejected the dogma of self-transparency, theclaim to apodictic evidence of phenomenological knowledge, in this view,simply has lost its justification. 24 For as we have seen, phenomenological re-flection finally proved to be as fallible as any other kind of experience. Fol-lowing these critics, Husserl then should have dropped his foundational claimto apodicticity. For apodicticity seems to be, if anything, only an ideal or aregulative idea of transcendental experience. 25

Id like to start my defense of Husserls concept of apodictic evidence bychallenging the premiss of those critics: that apodicticity depends on the ad-equate givenness of processes of consciousness. Admittedly, this premiss as-

serts no more than Husserl himself says explicitly when he defines the termapodicticity as referring to a special quality of adequate evidence, namelyits indubitability, thus clearly interrelating, even identifying (Hua VIII, p. 35)adequacy and apodicticity. But this is not the ultimate truth about apodicticity,

but only one transitional stage on a long way of conceptual clarification inHusserls thinking. In contrast to what might be assumed, Husserl didnt aban-don his claim to apodicticity when he started to move away from the dogmaof self-transparency. On the contrary: it was only then that he started to usethis concept, and he never insisted more persistently on the idea of apodicticevidence than in the Cartesian Meditations , where he described the non-self-transparency of the subject more clearly than anywhere else. Id like to illus-

trate this with a simple set of statistics. The x-axis stands for the developmentof Husserls thought, scaled by five important stages from the Logical Inves-tigations from 1900 through the Crisis of European Sciences , Husserls lastwork from 1936. The y-axis measures Husserls use of three adjectives per

page in the Husserliana edition of the respective works. The graphs seem toindicate that Husserls concern with evidence remains more or less on thesame level of intensity throughout his work, whereas the motive of adequacycontinually loses its importance. Apodicticity, on the other hand, becomes


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more important in the course of the development of Husserls thought, itsgraph peaking on the Cartesian Meditations .

If apodicticity was dependent on adequacy, how, than, could Husserl em- phasize apodicticity without even mentioning adequate evidence anymore?And how could apodicticity play so dominant a role in the Cartesian Medita-tions of all of Husserls works, here, where Husserl was most aware of theessentially inadequate character of immanent perception? How does the riseof apodicticity and the decline in adequacy fit together? The thesis I shall ex-

pound here interprets this development as follows: even though he himself never really clarified this point, Husserls reflections on apodicticity led himgradually towards a conception that is independent of the foundationalistdogma of self-transparency.

As to the history of the concept of evidence, especially the relation of ad-equate and apodictic evidence, David Michael Levins monograph on Rea-

son and Evidence in Husserls Phenomenology still offers the most detailedaccount, even though limited to the few works Husserl published himself.The principal problem of this study, however, is that Levin, too, identifiesapodicticity with self-transparency. Thus Levin, like so many other critics,reacts with a mix of incomprehension and harsh refusal to the rise of the con-cept of apodicticity in Husserls later works. For after Husserls insight intothe essentially inadequate character of immanent perception, there was, ac-cording to Levin, no possible reason left for proclaiming any apodictic evi-dence. Following this reading, either a tremendous act of mere defiance to the

loss of his basis or just plain blind dogmatism seems to be the only possibleexplanation for the rise of the claim to apodicticity. Taking into considerationthe historic context of Husserls thinking especially around the time of the Car-tesian Meditations , the first explanation may sound partly convincing. Still itis, to say the least, somewhat unsatisfactory on an argumentative level.

Fig. 1 . Apodictic and adequate evidence. 26


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In trying to gather some elements of a different reading, I am not goinginto Husserls assertion of the apodicticity of intuiting essences made espe-cially in the Ideas .27 What I consider more important here are the changesin the relation between adequate und apodictic evidence especially between

First Philosophy and the Cartesian Meditations . In Paragraph 31 of the first part of First Philosophy , Husserl still endorses his earlier rules of relations,stating that adequate and apodictic evidence mutually define each other.Husserl here defines absolute justification by referring to two principalcharacteristics, evidence and conclusiveness, both converging in ad-equate evidence where no horizons of possible future cancellation of thecurrent apprehensional sense remain open. Apodicticity here still meansnothing else than an implicit characteristic of adequate evidence. Adequateevidence is called apodictic with regard to one of its main features, its in-dubitability. Husserl therefore concludes that both expressions, apodictic andadequate evidence, are equivalent (Hua VIII, p. 35) a line of thoughtHusserl continued in Formal and Transcendental Logic (when, as we shallsee, he already had reached a much clearer understanding of apodicticity inhis manuscripts). 28

If that were all there was to the relation between adequate and apodicticevidence, Husserls critics would be right. In First Philosophy at the latest,Husserl would have had to refrain from his claim to apodicticity. For Husserlhimself states clearly that adequacy is in principle unattainable. All evidenceis, as Husserl says here, relative. There is no such thing as an absolute evi-

dence, only a continuous (. . .) ascending process of relative evidence (HuaVIII, p. 34). In a very influential study on Husserls First Philosophy , LudwigLandgrebe, the last of Husserls assistants, has explicitly drawn this obviousconclusion under the title Husserls Departure from Cartesianism ,29 and manyscholars up to the present day followed Landgrebes interpretation. 30 But, asshown before: in spite of his acknowledgement of all evidence being deficientin adequacy, Husserl himself did not think of refraining from his claim toapodicticity, on the contrary. How is this to be taken as anything else than adogmatic act of defiance?

Already in First Philosophy , Husserl suggests a forward-looking distinc-tion. Even though all evidence is incomplete and inadequate, there is, follow-

ing Husserl, a distinction between deficiencies making an abrogation of thecognition possible, and deficiencies not allowing for that (Hua VIII, p. 32).Thus Husserl suggests that there are some examples of evidence that, thoughessentially inadequate, still meet the criterion of indubitability. That meansthat in the view Husserl expresses here, absolute justification is possible inspite of the essential fallibility of all evidence. But what else than a simplecontradiction can that be, asserting fallibility of all evidence and claiming someevidence ultimately justified at the same time? And on what ground if not


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on adequacy is this ultimate justification to be based? What else than adequacycould ever be a legitimizing source of evidence?

An important stage of Husserls development towards a new conceptionof apodicticity is embodied in an unedited manuscript, that was transcribed

just a few years ago and therefore has not been taken notice of as yet. In thismanuscript with the title On the Theory of Evidence. Absolute Justification of Cognition. Apodicticity and Adequacy ,31 Husserls struggle for a new under-standing of apodicticity in its relation to adequacy finds plain expression. Still,Husserl considers apodicticity to be dependent on adequacy in a twofold way:apodictic evidence, according to him, presupposes adequacy, and leads back to adequacy (loc. cit./11b).

In between those two occurrences of adequate evidence lies what makesapodictic evidence a matter in its own right. Apodictic evidence is a critical

performance (loc. cit./11b). An apodictic evidence (. . .) is not merely cer-tainty of the affairs (. . .) evident in it; rather it discloses itself (. . .) by meansof a critical reflection. Admittedly, Husserl here still doesnt come up with aclear answer to the question whether inadequate evidence can be of apodicticquality. It is not until the Cartesian Meditations that Husserl clearly states theindependence of apodicticity from adequacy. But already here, in the manu-script dating from about 1925, the difference between adequate evidence andapodictic evidence becomes clearer than it was in First Philosophy in onerespect. For apodicticity, as portrayed in this manuscript, is not the ideal,unattainable telos of an ascending process of relative, more or less adequate

evidence. It doesnt refer to a mode of givenness, for in a sense, apodicticevidence doesnt belong to the sphere of transcendental experience at all.Apodicticity discloses itself only in a critical reflection on transcendentalexperience, in a reflection on transcendental reflection. At the end of his Car-tesian Meditations , Husserl thus calls apodictic critique of phenomenologicalreflection the ultimate task of phenomenology.

However, the crucial question is still unanswered, for it is still unclear onwhat ground apodictic certainty is based if not on adequacy. But Husserl doescome up with an answer. As Husserl puts it in one of his late manuscripts: Anevidence is (. . .) apodictic, if it is established by insight that (. . .) the sup-

position of the non-being [of what is intended] in its possible fulfilment leads

to the being [of what is intended] and therefore to the insight into the impos-sibility of the non-being, i.e. to the insight into the negation of its possibility(Ms B I 22 II/Transscr. S. 8). Id like to advocate the following reading of thisand some other similarly complicated phrases that are scattered over Husserlslater works and manuscripts: something is evident in an apodictic sense if itcannot be imagined as nonexistent without being presupposed as existing inthe self-same act of thinking. Apodicticity thus isnt grounded in foundationsof adequate givenness or some other kind of originary presentive intuition.


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Apodicticity has a completely different structure: what is given to experiencein apodictic evidence is not any kind of matters themselves, but a contra-diction. It is the experiencing of a cogitatio contradicting itself, for it denieson the level of the cogitata what it presupposes as a cogitatio. The exampleHusserl sometimes gives to illustrate this structure is the contradiction betweenthe judgements I do not exist and I judge, that I do not exist (Ms B I 22 I/Transscr. S. 1). If this reading were to prove true, Husserls turn towardsapodicticity would mark a profound change in the basic structure of the

phenomenological venture: Phenomenology appears no longer as groundedin an only apparently solid foundation of immanent perception, but as orientedtowards the idea of self-referential consistency. 32

Self-referential reflection and internal otherness

Following this interpretation, apodictic critique can be understood as a vari-ation on the motif of self-referential justification, 33 a type of justification that isset forth in current philosophy by the advocates of Transcendental Pragmatism,

by philosophers like Karl-Otto Apel and Wolfgang Kuhlmann. In one crucialand problematic respect, the logic of reflection is the same in TranscendentalPragmatics and Phenomenology. That close kinship was quickly covered up bymost Transcendental Pragmatists due to their strong belief to have to leave be-hind the mentalistic paradigm of Phenomenology in order to take part in the

new linguistic and intersubjectivist paradigm. But in a sense, TranscendentalPragmatism depends on a concept of reflection that is just as highly strained asin Phenomenology. That problematic core assumption about reflection is the

premiss that an act of reflection can be strictly self-referential, i.e. an act of re-flection on this very act itself. Perhaps the problematic character of this assump-tion becomes clearer in the light of criticism. Gilbert Ryle puts his skepticismabout the phenomenological concept of reflection under the title The System-atic Elusiveness of I : To try (. . .) to describe what one (. . .) is now doing,is to comment upon a step which is not itself, save per accidens , one of com-menting. But the operation which is the commenting is not, and cannot be, thestep on which that commentary is being made. (. . .) A higher order action can-

not be the action upon which it is performed. So my commentary on my per-formances must always be silent about one performance, namely itself, and this performance can be the target only of another commentary. 34 Just as all speak-ing remains silent about itself, consciousness remains completely unconsciousof itself in its current acting. That the subject is oblivious of itself appears, inthis perspective, as an essential feature of subjectivity. The subject of reflectionthus never grasps itself in its very performing. In what follows I shall call this

position skepticism about reflection.


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Its not surprising that this skepticism is widespread among Husserls schol-ars and interpreters. For in spite of his claim to apodicticity, Husserl himself had extensively studied how the subject misses itself in the reflective grasp.The criticism of Husserls concept of apodicticity therefore can build onHusserls own theory of reflection.

The reflecting Ego and the Ego reflected upon are not identical. In its cur-rent performing subjectivity is anonymous and latent, different from the sub-

ject that appears as patent to reflection. 35 What is thematic in self-reflectionthus is never the ego performing this very act of reflection. What happens inreflection is: An essentially changed subjective process takes the place of theoriginal one; accordingly it must be said that this reflection alters the originalsubjective process. (. . .) reflection makes an object out of what was previ-ously a subjective process but not objective (Hua I, p. 72 [34]). Thus a split-ting of the Ego (Hua VIII, p. 89; Hua I, p. 73 [35]) occurs in self-reflection.Object-Ego and Subject-Ego step apart, and while grasping an objectifiedsubjectivity, the living and performing ego itself remains completely inacces-sible. 36 The subject therefore maintains, as it were, a primordial distance toitself (Held 1966, p. 81). And as the subject itself is, as Husserl says, in asense another, 37 the experience of the other is, following this view, prior tothe self-reference of the subject. Not identity, but difference therefore dwellsin the innermost of the subjects self-referential being, and reflection appearsnot as a monologue of the ego, but as a dialogue with another (cf. Hua VI,

p. 175 [172]). This is what the analysis of the temporal structure of reflection

points out. Reflection is not prsance soi. Husserl calls it quite correctlysubsequent awareness (Hua VIII, p. 89). The reflective act comes alwaystoo late to catch the subject in the act of performing. 38 Is navety oblivion of itself thus an essential feature of consciousness? Is the subject therefore notto be enlightened by self-referential reflection? What would the consequencesfor the whole phenomenological venture be? On account of this temporaldiastasis 39 the holy grail of the philosophy of the subject, its version of theGreek Know thyself! (Hua I, p. 183 [157]) seems to turn out to be nothingmore than a common act of remembrance (though guided by special interests),

just as Gilbert Ryle objected to Husserl.This skeptical objection also refers to the conception of reflection in Tran-

scendental Pragmatics . In this debate, the so-called transfer-argument statesthat Transcendental Pragmatists ignore a similar difference, the difference between the intuitive knowing how and the propositional level of explicitknowing that. 40 As making explicit our knowing how alters what it grasps,the subject here conceived as a competent linguistic practitioner appearsto be unable to reflect on her or his own competence. What the conditions of

possibility of meaningful speaking are, is never to be revealed in strictly self-referential reflection. Following this objection, reflection therefore is unable


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to bear the burden of proof for the possibility of ultimate justification. Reflec-tion gives no justification, but is, if anything, a mere means of interpretation. 41

And were Husserls concept of apodictic evidence also to presuppose such aoverstrained conception of reflection, we surely had to take it as a pathologicaldream of omnipotence (Waldenfels 1990, p. 78) as some critics have done.But does Husserls theory of apodictic evidence in fact involve such a con-cept of reflection? If, as we have seen, so much can be learned about inter-nal otherness from Husserl, why, then, would Husserl himself be falling avictim to this error?

Indisputably, Husserls concept of apodictic evidence as much as the con-cept of self-referential justification in Transcendental Pragmatics do in factinvolve an immediate self-reference within the living subjective performing.Wolfgang Kuhlmann speaks of strictly self-referential reflection, that ena-

bles the subject to do precisely what Gilbert Ryle considers impossible: toknow of our current performances and acts in an act of reflection that ena-

bles us to see beside what is thematic in that act also the thematizing activityitself, without having to give up the original position, without observing our own acting only subsequently and oblivious of ourselves from outside as adistant, external object. 42 Thus Kuhlmann sometimes speaks of a constitu-tive dimension of knowing-about-oneself that is missed by the skeptics, be-cause they take reflection solely to be an act of theoretic self-objectification. 43

The same seems to hold true for Husserls conception when he believes phen-omenological reflection capable of freeing the subject from its natural navety

without just shifting navety to a transcendental level. But what is that pecu-liar and mysterious knowing-about-oneself that is supposed to be not justmaking ones own part the object of theoretical consideration, but really get-ting into contact to ones current performing? Does it exist, or is it a mereassertion that reveals how the logic of reflection ignores the otherness, thedifference that dwells in the innermost of the subject, dissolving it with thedangerous illusion of identity?

Because of the problem of self-objectivation, the alternative, following thesceptical position, is either to ignore the difference between I and me, or to conceive of the self as a stranger. But maybe self-objectivation is not allthere is to subjective self-reference. In recent debates, such an immediate

being-to-oneself has been lit up by Dieter Henrich and Manfred Frank.Though far from endorsing any conception of ultimate justification, they pointout that subjective self-reference is never reflective self-objectivation alone.There is indeed an underlying immediate knowing-about-oneself. FollowingManfred Frank, this basic level of subjective self-reference even includes aCartesian certainty. Our self-awareness is infallible in the sense that it al-ways and necessarily establishes a contact with ourselves. 44 On a basic level,our self-awareness just cannot go wrong. Frank illustrates this with reference


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to Rimbauds well-famous dictum JE est un autre that has become somethinglike a confiteor among skeptics about reflection. This very claim to internalotherness presupposes that it is really I, who is an other, and not an other.The very establishment of internal otherness itself presupposes self-awareness.As far as skeptics about reflection object to this very basic level of being-to-wards-oneself in the name of internal otherness, they are caught in self-con-tradiction. If therefore some popular critics put expropriation of the subjectin the place of the reflective self-possession, it must be said that this expropria-tion is not the basic level of subjective self-reference, as already the metaphor expropriation makes clear. Similarly, the concept Husserl uses self-ob-

jectivation and splitting of the ego make clear that the difference theystate is not the very core of subjectivity, but a separation grounded in an un-derlying connection.

As Dieter Henrich pointed out, this basic level of identity gets out of sightwhere the structure of subjective self-reference is conceived in terms of anobjectifying, distant, theoretic act of self-observation.

It is not surprising that many Phenomenologists tend to conceive of subjective self-reference based on these terms ultimately leading to skepticismabout reflection. For in spite of his concept of apodictic critique, Husserl him-self sometimes felt inclined to this model of subjective self-reference, for example when he ascribed the establishment of the identity of the reflectingego and the ego reflected upon to a higher-order reflection (cf. Hua IV, p. 191f.;VIII, p. 90f.; IV, p. 101f.). If that were true, self-awareness would be based

on (and indeed produced by) self-reflection. In reality, of course, it goes theother way around: Im not aware of myself because of self-reflection, but Ican reflect upon myself because of self-awareness. The identity of the reflectedego and the ego reflected upon is not itself established within reflection, buta precondition of reflection. Because he sometimes tried to ground self-aware-ness in reflection, Henrich classes Husserls Phenomenology in general as

belonging to this wry type of theory. 45 But as some scholars have pointed outalready before Henrichs criticism, Husserl endorses not only this theory aboutthe relation between self-awareness and reflection, but also its much more

plausible opposite, thereby stating that we are not aware of ourselves becausewe can make ourselves an object of acts of observation, but that we can make

ourselves an object of our own acts of observations because we are aware of ourselves. 46 On the basic level, consciousness doesnt become an other to it-self, as the skeptical model of a primordially objectifying self-reference mis-takenly puts it. For the stream of consciousness is not doubled if consciousness

becomes a phenomenon to itself (Hua X, p. 83; 119).Rather, self-reference is one of the very primordial features of the streaming

consciousness. In contrast to the primordial distance of the reflecting ego andthe ego reflected upon in an act of objectifying self-observation one could there-fore speak of a primordial bend toward itself 47 on the level of self-awareness.


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Subjective self-reference thus is more than objectifying, distant, theoreti-cal self-observation. But even if there is an underlying level of immediateself-reference, this does by no means prove for the possibility of strictly self-referential reflection. For in contrast to the phenomenological concept of apodictic evidence and the concept of reflection in Transcendental Pragmat-ics , this basic level of knowing-about-oneself has a pre-reflective and pre-

propositional structure. Properly speaking, it isnt knowledge in the narrowsense of the word. Jean-Paul Sartre points at that when he speaks of conscience(de) soi, putting de in brackets. And Manfred Frank prefers speaking of being-acquainted-with-oneself to using the term knowledge. The crucial ques-tion therefore seems still to be unanswered: how can something pre-propositional

be made explicit, how can it be raised to the propositional level of knowledge?Still I shall proceed indirectly in trying to show that Husserls concept of

apodictic evidence doesnt depend on stronger assumptions about reflectionthan even the skeptic position itself does. As we have seen, apodictic evidencereveals itself only in the experience of a contradiction between the intuitive

performance and the explicit content of a reflective act of consciousness. Thusthe concept of apodictic evidence is not based in an futile attempt to wipe outthe difference between what is intuitively performed and what is explicit, asonly recently some critics have objected to Husserl. Quite on the contrary, it

presupposes this difference.Husserls concept of apodictic evidence does not navely overestimate the

power of reflection, believing it able to seize upon the latent act of reflection

itself. To put it metaphorically: the latent, performing subjectivity becomesvisible only in the flying sparks of a clash of the living, latent subjectivity withthe way the subject is made explicit in reflection, as in the statement I do notexist that serves Husserl as an example. 48 The experience of a contradictionis prior to the experience of evidence. This does not mean raising perform-ing subjectivity immediately to the light of objectifying reflection. And if the concept of apodictic evidence does entail a negative reachability of per-forming subjectivity, this to a certain extent holds also true for the skeptical

position. The skeptics about reflection similarly presuppose reachability of performing subjectivity insofar as stating the essential latency of subjectivityalso means making it patent in its latent quality. Gilbert Ryle, as mentioned

above, states that my commentary on my performances must always be si-lent about one performance, namely itself. What is at stake in the currentargument is, that this very statement does not keep silence, but comments onitself. It in fact does tell something about its current performing, namely thatit is latent. In this negative sense, the reachability of performing subjectivityis paradoxically presupposed also in skepticism about reflection. This argu-ment, by the way, comes close to what Husserl himself objects to contempo-rary critics of introspectionism in his Ideas (Hua III, p. 174).


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Apodictic evidence beyond foundationalism and suppression of internal otherness

Even though there seems to be something unconditional, infallible andabsolute about apodictic evidence it doesnt follow that a theory that isoriented on the idea of apodictic critique necessarily entails foundationalismand suppression of internal otherness. Instead, the interpretation being sug-gested here elicited some features characteristic of apodictic evidence pertain-ing to a modest and indeed non-foundationalist understanding of apodicticity.

Apodictic critique doesnt mean going down the stairs to the basis of thetower of our knowledge to secure it as a stronghold of certainty. On the con-trary, it means leaving our own in trying to confirm or disconfirm our opin-ions in a dialogue with differing views. It means, as Husserl says, goingthrough negation and doubt (Hua VIII, p. 35). Apodictic evidence has ex-

perimental character. It is, as Husserl sometimes calls it, a trial evidence (MsB I 22 II/Transscr. p. 8). The first non-foundationalist feature of apodicticevidence is its subsequency. Apodictic evidence doesnt provide a soundground to base our knowledge upon, but a subsequent test to our previouslyformed opinions. That explains why in the Cartesian Meditations apodicticcritique appears not as the first, but as the last task of phenomenologicalreflection.

Secondly, apodictic evidence is essentially of negative character as it con-sists in a negation of contradiction. Husserls concept of apodictic evidence

is elenctic in its structure. This might surprise on a terminological level, for Aristotle in his Metaphysics introduces the elenchos as a procedure of proof that is supposed to work where proper apodeixis fails. 49 This negativity of apodictic evidence also entails, thirdly, its partial character. To put it meta-

phorically: if the only light of apodictic critique is the flight of sparks of theclash of self-contradiction, the structures of living subjectivity are never plainlyvisible, but momentarily and in some parts only.

Moreover, what becomes visible in apodictic evidence is only the formof subjectivity. That once more shows the profound changes in the tenets of Phenomenology. At the beginning, Phenomenology was founded in immanent

perception of essences. What was certain was the what-content of essences,

their quiddity, whereas facticity was bracketed as dubitable. Switching over to apodictic evidence, it is now on the contrary the facticity of the ego, that iscertain, whereas its content, its quiddity is not to be made visible in that kindof reflection. What is evident, is merely the pure formal fact that I am leav-ing open the question who or what I am. Apodictic critique therefore cannotreplace (and should not be mistaken as) what certainly is more important atask: it cannot replace substantial reflection in terms of self-examination andself-clarification, leading to a self-understanding in a concrete historical andsituative context.


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A major problem of Husserls use of the term apodicticity seems to bethat it is flawed by this confusion. Thus Husserl writes in the manuscriptthat the editor of the Husserliana edition chose as the concluding paragraphof Husserls last work (Husserl is here commenting on the reappropriationof the Cartesian discovery, the fundamental demand of apodicticity): In this

beginning, through the changed historical situation (. . .), there arise forcesof motivation, a radical thinking-through of the genuine and imperishable senseof apodicticity (. . .), the exhibiting of the true method of an apodicticallygrounded and apodictically progressing philosophy. (. . .) It is precisely withthis that there begins a philosophy with the deepest and most universal self-understanding of the philosophizing ego as the bearer of absolute reason com-ing to itself (. . .) in his apodictic being-for-himself (. . .). What follows thisis the ultimate self-understanding of man as being responsible for his ownhuman being, his self-understanding as being in being called to a life of apodicticity , not only in abstractly practising apodictic science (. . .), but [as

being mankind] which realizes its whole concrete being in apodictic freedom by becoming apodictic mankind (. . .). (Hua VI, p. 386 [340]). Not only doesHusserls use of the term apodicticity show all signs of galloping concep-tual inflation. What is irritating is its sweeping use that ranges from the proper

place of apodicticity as a feature of the being-for-himself of the ego up tofreedom and mankind in a historic context. Husserl is mistaken in usinga formal, negative, partial and subsequent test of self-referential consistencyfor the purposes of a substantial self-understanding in a historical situation.

For this latter type of reflection of course never leads to an ultimate un-conditional and absolute self-understanding, because it always has to fol-low the changes in the political and social context.

Without doubt, Husserl still subscribed to a foundationalist self-understand-ing in his later years. Even then, he sometimes fell back into his earlier dog-matic position, as can be seen in his theory of intersubjectivity. Husserls conceptof apodictic evidence, however, is not to be interpreted as a consequence of hisearlier dogmatism about self-transparency. The interpretation given suggests thathowever gradually and incompletely Husserl developed it, this concept belongsto a line that led Husserl away from foundationalism. It also suggests that theconcept of apodictic evidence doesnt rely on repression of internal otherness

either. It seems that the logic of apodictic critique is much more subtle andcomplex than it may seem in the light of the interpretation and criticism thathas been shed on Husserls transcendental phenomenology until now.

Notes

1. I would like to thank the Swiss National Research Fund, the Max Geldner Foundationand the Freiwillige Akademische Gesellschaft der Universitt Basel for their generous


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financial support. I am also greatly indebted to the contributors to the discussion of this paper in the Departmental Workshop of the Philosophy Department at the GraduateFaculty of the New School for Social Research in New York, especially to Richard J.Bernstein. Bernhard Waldenfels brought to my notice Paul Ricoeurs early remarks onthe topic. Arnold G. Simmel and Lee J. Nelson helped me with their advice not only inmatters linguistic (I alone am responsible for the many remaining mistakes and peculi-arities). I would also like to express my gratitude to the director of Husserl Archives atthe Catholic University of Leuven, Professor Dr. Samuel Ijsseling, for the kind permis-sion to quote from Husserls unpublished manuscripts, and to an anonymous referee for Husserl Studies for his or her comments and suggestions.

2. Cf. Michael Dummetts criticism of Husserls Idealism in Origins of Analytical Philoso- phy (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1993).

3. Cf. among many others Jrgen Habermas, Vorstudien und Ergnzungen zur Theorie deskommunikativen Handelns (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1984), p. 50ff.

4. Cf. Richard Rorty, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature . (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Uni-versity Press, 1979); Richard Rorty, Consequences of Pragmatism. Essays 19721980(Brighton, 1982), p. 37f.; 40; 160. Without doubt, Rortys criticism is too simplistic. For even though Husserls philosophy seems to entail some transmission of authority fromunderlying spheres of self-authenticating non-verbal episodes to the conceptual level of knowledge proper (cf. Sellars description of the heart of the Myth of the Given inWilfrid Sellars, Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind (Cambridge, Mass.: HarvardUniversity Press, 1997), p. 77), Husserl doesnt reconstruct knowledge by starting outfrom our immediate knowledge of appearances and building up to our knowledge of how things really are (cf. concerning this feature of foundationalism Robert BrandomsCartesian reconstruction of Sellars argument in Sellars, 1997, p. 137), but only triesto clarify this very distinction between appearance and reality itself. In the opening para-graphs of the Cartesian Meditations however, Husserl explicitly endorses something

similar to what John L. Austin called the tower of knowledge model, describing hu-man knowledge and science as a structure with different storeys of positive knowledgerequiring Transcendental Phenomenology as an unshakeable foundation and a sound ba-sis for the whole structure).

5. Barry Smith, David Woodruff Smith (eds.), The Cambridge Companion to Husserl (Cambridge, 1995), p. 35f.; a continental example for the same strategy, which doesHusserls thinking a disservice, is Elisabeth Strker, Phnomenologische Studien (Frank-furt am Main: Klostermann, 1987), p. 66f.: Manchen von Husserl anfnglich allzuunbekmmert formulierten Behauptungen zum Trotz reklamiert seine Phnomenologiefr ihr Erkenntnisse unumstliche Geltung nicht so wenig, da sie vielmehr zeigt, daes und warum es fr ihre Einsichten unerschtterliche Wahrheit nicht geben kann. Dasverhindert bereits die prinzipielle Unabschliebarkeit, Korrekturbedrftigkeit undKorrekturfhigkeit phnomenologischer Analyse. Die Phnomenologie reklamiertfr ihre Aussagen, gngigen Fehlinterpretationen zum Trotz, so wenig unumstlicheWahrheit, da sie vielmehr zeigt, da es und warum es in der Phnomenologie un-umstliche Wahrheiten nicht geben kann (Elisabeth Strker, Zur Problematik der Letztbegrndung in Husserls Phnomenologie, in Wolfgang Marx (ed.), Zur Selbst-begrndung der Philosophie seit Kant (Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann, 1987), p.110.

6. Leszek Kolakowski, Husserl and the Search for Certitude (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1987), p. 4. Cf. Gary E. Overvold, The Foundationalist Conflict in

Husserls Rationalism , Analecta Husserliana Bd. XXXIV, (Dordrecht: Kluwer AcademicPublishers, 1991), pp. 441452.


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7. Cf. Lester Embree et al. (eds.), Encyclopedia of Phenomenology (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1997). There is no entry about apodicticity, and even ElisabethStrkers article on Evidence does not even mention Husserls concept of apodicticity!

8. Ernst Tugendhat, Der Wahrheitsbegriff bei Husserl und Heidegger (Berlin: De Gruyter,1970).

9. Cf. Karl Mertens, Zwischen Letztbegrndung und Skepsis (Freiburg: Alber, 1996).10. Cf. Tugendhat, p. 209. Among many other examples Klaus Held, Abschied vom Car-

tesianismus, Die Phnomenologie Edmund Husserls , Neue Zricher Zeitung, 3/26/96. Aninterpretation accusing Husserl of anti-Cartesian dogmatism cf. George Heffernan, AnEssay in Epistemic Kyklophobia: Husserls critique of Descartes Conception of Evi-dence, Husserl Studies 13, 1997, p. 89140.

11. Two quite incompatible lines of though in Husserls theory of evidence are also diag-nosed in V.J. McGill, Evidence in Husserls Phenomenology. F. Kersten, R. Zaner (eds.), Phenomenology: Continuation and Criticism. Essays in Memory of Dorion Cairns(Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 1973), pp. 146166, 155; cf. also loc. cit. 151: In so far as evidence is declared absolute, efforts at corroboration are cut off, search for more evi-dence ceases, and human error and humane correction become impossible.

12. Hua XIX, p. 770; Edmund Husserl, Logical Investigations , trans. by J.N. Findlay, vol. 2(London: Routledge, 1976), p. 866 (in the following, the reference to this translation isindicated in square brackets after the reference to the Husserliana Edition of the LogicalInvestigations); translation slightly corrected.

13. Hua I, p. 56; Edmund Husserl, Cartesian Meditations. An Introduction to Phenomenol-ogy, trans. by Dorion Cairns (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1997), p. 15 (inthe following, the reference to this translation is indicated in square brackets after thereference to Husserliana Edition of the Cartesian Meditations ).

14. Cf. Niklas Luhmann, Soziale Systeme. Grundri einer allgemeinen Theorie (Frankfurtam Main: Suhrkamp, 1984), p. 19.

15. Hua III, p. 93; Edmund Husserl, Ideas Pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology and to a Phenomenological Philosophy , first book, translated by F. Kersten (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1983), p. 111 (in the following, the reference to this translation isindicated in square brackets after the reference to the Husserliana Edition of the firstvolume of the Ideas ).

16. Cf. Klaus Hartmann, Self Evidence, Studies in Foundational Philosophy (Amsterdam,Wrzburg: Rodopoi, 1988), p. 27.

17. Hua VIII, p. 35; a detailed account of the development of the relation between adequacyand apodicticity in Husserls thought will be given in the following.

18. Husserl himself gives a hint. At one point Husserl states that this doctrine only recallsthe traditional estimate of the relative value for knowledge of the two forms of percep-tion (Hua XIX, p. 753 [853]). Does Husserl thus contravene his own methodologicalinstruction to put in brackets the philosophical tradition, being swayed by the latter rather than relying on his own rational insight? Was Husserl, despite all precautions,taken in by a traditional prejudice? Cf. Adrian Mirvish, The Presuppositions of HusserlsPresuppositionless Philosophy. Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology 26(1995), pp. 147170.

19. Gilbert Ryle, Phenomenology. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 11 (1932), pp. 68 83.

20. Hua IV, p. 105; Edmund Husserl, Ideas Pertaining to a pure Phenomenology and to a Phenomenological Philosophy , vol. II: Studies in the Phenomenology of Constitution ,trans. by R. Rojecwicz and A. Schuwer, (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1989),

p. 111.


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21. Cf. Iso Kern, Husserl and Kant. Eine Untersuchung ber Husserls Verhltnis zu Kant und zum Neukantianismus (Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 1964), S. 209.22. Cf. Tobias Trappe, Transzendentale Erfahrung. Vorstudien zu einer transzendentalen

Methodenlehre (Basel: Schwabe, 1996).23. Cf. Paul Ricoeur, Freud and Philosophy. An Essay on Interpretation , trans. by Denis

Savage, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1970), p. 377.24. Among many other examples (some of which will be mentioned in the following) of this

misinterpretation see Klaus Held: Abschied vom Cartesianismus. Die Phnomenologie Edmund Husserls , Neue Zrcher Zeitung 26/27 March 1996.

25. Cf. David Michael Levin, Reason and Evidence in Husserls Phenomenology (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1970); Tugendhat, cited above; Iso Kern, Die drei Wege zur transzendentalphnomenologischen Reduktion in der Philosophie Edmund Husserls .Tijdschrift voor Filosofie 24 (1962), pp. 303349; Mertens p. 218ff.; Alfred de Waelhens,Science, phnomnologie, et ontologie . Revue internationale de Philosophie VIII (1954),

pp. 254265.26. Data provided by The Husserl-Database (http://www.jpcs.shizuoka.ac.jp/~jsshama/

team.html).27. This not only because Husserls elaborate theory of essences and their being intended in

some special phenomenological kind of seeing, by means of eidetic variation, mightemerge as an admirable construction to grasp something that doesnt exist (ErnstTugendhat, Phnomenologie und Sprachanalyse . R. Bubner, K. Craner, R. Wiehl, Her-meneutik und Dialektik , Bd. II, Sprache und Logik, Theorie der Auslegung und Problemeder Einzelwissenschaften (Tbingen: J.C.B. Mohr, 1970), pp. 323, 15). Even if one wereto endorse Husserls essentialism as such, essences were still by no means apodicticallycertain, but a transitional product of an ongoing, open and endless process of varia-tion.

28. I decided against discussing Husserls concept of apodicticity in Formal and Transcen-

dental Logic and the often-cited assertion of the fallibility of any apodictic evidence to be found there (Hua XVII, p. 164f.) in the body of my text. Even though Husserls theoryof pure consciousness as a genetic whole that cannot be dissected in single, independ-ently evident moments, the dynamic picture of consciousness that he uses here to sub-stantiate his proposal of a fallibilistic reinterpretation of his concept of apodictic evidencehas an undeniable appeal, this fallibil istic interpretation belongs to a line of thoughtHusserl had already left behind in his manuscripts at that time. On that latter line, Husserlinsisted on the infallibility of apodictic evidence without however, as I will try to show,giving up the dynamic, holistic and genetic picture of consciousness. It is of course animportant rule in Husserl scholarship to grant Husserls published text more authoritythan his manuscripts. I hope to be able however to provide a systematic reconstructionof Husserls concept of apodictic evidence as expressed in his manuscripts (and later onin the Cartesian Meditations ) that is convincing enough to justify departure from thatrule in this particular case.

29. Ludwig Landgrebe, The Phenomenology of Edmund Husserl. Six Essays (Ithaca: CornellUniversity Press, 1981), pp. 66121.

30. In spite of Hans-Georg Gadamers early correction of a possible misreading of someHusserlian statements some interpreters persistently adhere to the misinterpretation thatHusserl himself gave up his idea of an absolute, ultimately justified rational foun-dation of science. As a recent example for that misinterpretation cf. Wolfgang Rd,

Metaphysik ohne Evidenz . Information Philosophie 5/1994, pp. 511, 11.31. Ms A I 31. In the following, I quote from the transcription that has not been corrected

and collated as yet.


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32. Even though Husserls concept of apodictic critique, following the interpretation givenabove, is nothing but an explication of an argumentation Husserl used at the very begin-ning of his venture. For it is its self-contradictory character that Husserl focuses on in hisrefutation of psychologism in the Prolegomena to a Pure Logic .

33. On various occasions, Husserl makes clear that what he has in mind is proper Selbst- begrndung. Thus he speaks of a sich selbst rechtfertigende Begrndung (Ms B I 10XII/Transcr. S. 7) or says that apodictic evidence rechtfertigt sicht selbst durch sichselbst (Ms A I 31/29a). All the more regrettable is the fact that Wolfgang Kuhlmanndidnt include Husserl in his history of the idea of Selbstbegrndung in philosophy(Wolfgang Kuhlmann, Reflexive Letztbegrndung. Untersuchungen zur Transzenden-talpragmatik (Freiburg i. Br.: Alber, 1985), p. 254ff.).

34. Gilbert Ryle, The Concept of Mind (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1984), p.195.

35. Husserl makes the distinction between patenter and latenter Subjektivitt in HuaVIII, p. 90f.

36. Landgrebe 1981, p. 115. Vgl. auch Thomas M. Seebohm, Die Bedingungen der Mglichkeit der Transzendental-Philosophie. Edmund Husserls transzendental-phnomenologischer

Ansatz, dargestellt im Anschlu an seine Kant-Kritik (Bonn: Bouvier, 1962), p. 161; cf.also loc. cit. 67; Seebohm 1989, p. 97; Klaus Held, Lebendige Gegenwart. Die Fragenach der Seinsweise des transzendentalen Ich bei Edmund Husserl, entwickelt am

Leitfaden der Zeitproblematik (Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 1966), p. 71f.37. Hua VI, p. 175; Edmund Husserl, The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental

Phenomenology. An Introduction to Phenomenological Philosophy , trans. by David Carr (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1970), p. 172; in the fol lowing, the referenceto this translation is indicated in square brackets after the reference to the HusserlianaEdition of the Crisis .

38. The nave perceiving of the ego that is oblivious about itself is already over when I bring

reflection into action (Hua VIII, p. 88). Under certain conditions however, compresenceof both egos seems to be possible: cf. Hua VIII, p. 89.39. Cf. Bernhard Waldenfels, Der Stachel des Fremden (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp,

1990), p. 77.40. Cf. E.G. Alfred Berlich, Elenkt ik des Diskurses. Karl-Otto Apels Ansatz einer tran-

szendentalpragmatischen Letztbegrndung . W. Kuhlmann, D. Bhler (eds.), Kommun-ikation und Reflextion. Zur Diskussion um die Transzendentalpragmatik (Frankfurt amMain: Suhrkamp, 1982), pp. 251287.

41. Cf. Gerhard Schnrich, Bei Gelegenheit Diskurs. Von den Grenzen der Diskursethik und dem Preis der Letztbegrndung (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1994), p. 162ff.

42. Wolfgang Kuhlmann, Reflexive Letztbegrndung. Zur These von der Unhintergehbarkeit der Argumentationssituation . Zeitschrift fr philosophische Forschung 35 (1981), pp. 3 31, 14.

43. Wolfgang Kuhlmann, Reflexion und kommunikative Erfahrung. Untersuchungen zur Stellung philosophischer Reflexion zwischen Theorie und Kritik (Frankfurt am Main:Suhrkamp, 1975), p. 144.

44. Manfred Frank, Selbstbewutsein und Selbsterkenntnis. Essays zur analytischen Phi-losophie der Subjektivitt (Stuttgart: Reclam, 1991), p. 413; Dieter Henrich, Identitt

Begri ffe, Probleme, Grenzen . O. Marquard, K. Stierle (eds.), Ident itt . Poetik undHermeneutik Bd. VIII (Mnchen, 1991), pp. 133186, p. 175ff.

45. Dieter Henrich, Fichtes ursprngliche Einsicht . D. Henrich et al. (eds.), Subjektivitt und Metaphysik (Frankfurt am Main, 1966), pp. 188232, 231.


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46. Ich bin mir (. . .) nur insofern Gegenstand, als ich Selbstbewutsein habe (. . .) Htteich es nicht, dann knnte ich auch nicht reflektieren (Hua IV, p. 318; cf. also Hua IV, p.252). Herman Ulrich Asemissen, Egologische Reflexion . Kant-Studien 50 (1958/59), pp.262272.

47. Cf. Antonio F. Aguirre, Die Phnomenologie Husserls im Licht ihrer gegenwrtigen In-terpretation und Kritik (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1982), p. 29.

48. Die Urteile: ich urteile, da ich nicht bin; ich bin nicht, stehen im Verhltnis desWiderstreites; ist das eine wahr, so ist das andere falsch, und umgekehrt (Ms B I 22 I/Transcr. S. 1).

49. Cf. Aristoteles, Metaphysics IV, 1005b/351006a/28; Prior Analytics II, 1114, 14/29;Gnther Patzig, Die aristotelische Syllogistik (Gttingen, 1963), pp. 153166.


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hans bernhard schmidt-apodictic evidence

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