THE QUESTION OF OUR PLACE IN THE WORLD: A PHENOMENOLOGICAL CRITIQUE OF JEAN PIAGET'S GENETIC EPISTEMOLOGY

This thesis is a critique of the genetic epistemology of Jean Piaget from a phenomenological point of view. It contains a detailed examination of Piaget's psycho-biological model of development as a way of representing our place in the world, by means of the concepts, categories and methods of established science. It shows how genetic epistemology begins not only with the delimitations and specialized methods of objective science, but begins also with the presupposition that our place in the world is an object which can be captured by such methods.;Using the works of Martin Heidegger (coupled with those of Husserl) we maintain that the question of our place in the world emerges in the midst of everyday life and that it is in this context that we are compelled, for example, to call upon genetic epistemology as a possible way of addressing this question--a way which, in a particular situation, seems appropriate. A large portion of this thesis is concerned to show how Piaget calls upon but does not address everyday life as the context within which genetic epistemology moves and subsists. Piaget accounts for genetic epistemology's picture of ourselves by pointing back only to the concepts, categories and methods which produce that picture, but not by moving back to the practical and contextual understandings of everyday life which make genetic epistemology available as a possibility.;We maintain, against Piaget, that our place in the world is not an object which can be captured by this or that method but is precisely a contingent, situational and ongoing question that we face. The question of who I am, what I have and can become--as questions I must pose for myself--are not ones which scientific representation can replace, but are rather questions which displace science and make it visible as a possible way to proceed.;Our critique does not begin by disputing the legitimacy of Piagetean picture of ourselves and our place in the world. It does not quarrel directly with genetic epistemology's understanding of its topics. Rather, our critique is directed towards how, in understanding its topics, genetic epistemology self-reflectively accounts for and understands itself as a deliberate reconstruction of these topics.