THE PROBLEM OF INTERSUBJECTIVITY IN HUSSERLIAN PHENOMENOLOGY

The problem of the Other remains a source of conflict and confusion in phenomenology. Edmund Husserl's project for a phenomenology which functions as a transcendental philosophy has been persistently haunted by the suspicion that his methodological commitment to the conscious life of the transcendental ego confines his procedure to the immanent processes of a solus ipse and thus prevents transcendental phenomenology from presenting a legitimate account of the objective world as an intersubjectively available world.;Once the function of inner time-consciousness in the life of the ego is correctly understood, the ego is seen as an intentional matrix transcending itself toward the world. This conception of the ego redirects the meaning of the problem of the Other. Husserl does not need to demonstrate the existence of other egos on the basis of the transcendental ego. As the ego is its intentional life, it lives with Others in an intentional relationship--the relationship which founds objective knowledge. Accordingly, what Husserl needs to do is to intentionally explicate the coming to presence of one ego for another. Via the transcendental epoche the positive givenness of empathy becomes a thing of wonder and I am able to ask about the how of this givenness, i.e., I undertake a transcendental analysis with respect to the conditions of possibility for such an experience. Three conclusions are reached: (1) the transcendental ego is not only a legitimate phenomenological discovery but its structural dynamics show it to be an open field of intentionality transcending itself toward the Other; (2) this transcendental field is intersubjective in nature; and (3) Husserl's commitment to transcendental egology is a result of his phenomenological description of transcendental empathy.;A clear presentation of what Husserl is doing when he tackles the problem of the Other is lacking in Husserlian scholarship. This study seeks to fill this gap by examining Husserl's account of the intersubjectivity issue, especially in terms of the Fifth Cartesian Meditation. The result, in accord with Husserl's direction to provide a presuppositionless description of the "things themselves," is a faithful exposition of this crucial aspect of Husserl's transcendental phenomenological project.