VI. From Subjectivity to Intersubjectivity Philosophy 157 G. J. Mattey ©2002

The Problem of Other Minds How can one human mind know that another exists? Descartes (Meditation II): I judge there to be men when all I see are hats and coats that could conceal an automaton Naturalistic response: if there is a brain, there is a mind But what if bodies depend on minds?

Monadology Leibniz held that human minds are “monads,” simple substances Monads are “worlds unto themselves” Physical objects are harmoniously related perceptions The perceptions of monads proceed in synchrony with one another, so it is as if there were a common world of objects

Husserl’s Problem I am a monad, an “Ego” My world is “constituted” by the activity of the ego I cannot verify the existence of another ego through a constituting activity of my ego It seems that I cannot constitute another ego, which would constitute its own world

Phenomenological Solution We must not try to solve the problem metaphysically ( as did Leibniz) We must instead look to the synthesizing activities of our own ego The key is to discover the “sense” “other ego” which the ego intends

The Experienced Other There is a straightforward way that another mind is given Another organism is found in my world This organism is taken as being “governed psychically” by a mind The other mind experiences the same world as I do

The Noematic Other If I exclude actuality from my experience, I consider a “reduced” object that I synthesize The exclusion does not make the object something “private” for me I am there for the other This must be explained through a theory of “empathy”

Ownness The explanation of the other and a public world cannot suppose their existence So, their existence must be put aside I merely consider things as being “my own” But this requires a contrasting conception of an “alter-ego,” for whom things are not “my own” How does it make an appearance?

The Reduced World We must begin with a world which excludes everything mental that is not my own We have a “Nature” that is the most basic level of noema Nature contains my body, which I rule I have kinesthetic sensations of the actions of my body They reveal that I govern my body

The Pure Ego Myself and my body are given as united in the reduced world But I can make a further reduction, by putting aside the “physical world” I am left with a pure ego, which is the “pole” of my intentional activity The world is “inside” this ego, so how could the ego be in it?

Constituting Myself The pure ego is related to the ego found in the world by constituting it An analogy with the constitution of a “physical” object: most of it is not given We project more features in space and time So we project more features on ourselves as given, and we count them as our own

Transcendence The reduced world is constituted harmoniously by me That world is other than my self-in-the world (transcendent), but it constituted by myself (immanent): an “immanent transcendency” We are looking for an absolute transcendency: an ego not at all my own that constitutes its world

Objectivity The key is to recognize that the sense of the reduced world is that of an objective world An objective world is an inter-subjective world, accessible to other egos Each ego constitutes a world in a way that is harmonious with my constituting activity This is not a metaphysical hypothesis, but rather explains the sense of my world

Access to Other Minds Nothing belonging to the essence of the other is given in experience (or it would be of my essence) Instead, it is “appresented” as accompanying a perceived body An analogy: when an object is viewed from the front, the back is presumed to exist A disanalogy: the existence of the back can be verified, but that of an ego cannot

Pairing We pair up the perceived organism and a governing ego This is not an analogical inference Instead, it is a mental transfer of sense An analogy: we make sense of ourselves only by synthesizing a harmonious stream of recollections

Intersubjectivity My body is located at a central “here” I take the other body to have its own “here” I can think of myself in the other body’s “here,” which is now “there” for me So I can think of the other body as having a “here” such that my body’s position is a “there” for it

Community of Monads Monadic egos seem not to be capable of assimilation by reference to the organism The other monadic ego constitutes its world I can analogically give sense to that ego as constituting as I constitute It then constitutes what I perceive This yields an “objectivating equalization” and a community of monads