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27Santalka. Filosofja, 2008, t. 16, nr. 3. ISSN 1822-430X print/1822-4318 online

Introduction

he ollowing inquiry aims to establish twoseemingly irreconcilable claims. Te frst is o Hegelian origin: there is a need to admit thatat the most rudimentary levels o sel-consci-ousness, subjectivity is intersubjective throughand through. he second claim, despite theresistance on Hegel’s side, ollows Husserl’s

lead: one needs to recognize the irreducibledistance that separates the Other rom the sel and thus the impossibility to surpass plurality towards totality. Not only are these claims ully compatible with each other; more importantly,they place a signifcant demand on subsequentphenomenologies o intersubjectivity.

While a number o post-Husserlian phe-nomenologists agree with these claims ull-heartedly, they routinely establish them on

the basis o a critique directed against Husserl,or Hegel, or both. My task is that o demon-

SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS AND OTHERNESS:HEGEL AND HUSSERL

Saulius Geniušas

218 Sheldon Hall, James Madison University, Department o Philosophy and Religion,MSC 7504 James Madison University, Harrisonburg, VA 22807

Countless dierences between Hegel and Husserl notwithstanding, there is a common element in both o their

accounts o the genesis o otherness. According to both, only i one delves into the interiority o sel-conscious-

ness, can one account or the rudimentary appearance o the Other. Following the Hegelian and Husserlian

variants o such a strategy, this paper argues that: (1) at the primitive levels o sel-consciousness, subjectivity

is intersubjective through and through; (2) an irreducible distance separates the Other rom the sel, due to

which plurality cannot be surpassed by totality. In contrast to the view which sees these claims as though they

were irreconcilable with each other, this paper shows how each o them calls or its apparent opposite. Whileit is common to establish the unanimity o these claims in opposition to Hegel, or Husserl, or both, this paper

shows how such a concordance itsel emerges rom an Auseinandersetzung between them.

Keywords: body, desire, intersubjectivity, otherness, sel-consciousness.

DOI: 10.3846/1822-430X.2008.16.3.27-36

strating how these claims emerge rom the Auseinandersetzung between Hegel and Husserl.Only so can one see how Hegel and Husserl,despite the numerous dierences between them,could have been the fgures that remain unpar-alleled in terms o the inuence exerted on thesubsequent Continental tradition.

1.

Both or Hegel and Husserl the emergence o the Other takes on a paradoxical orm: Oneneeds to delve into the interiority o sel-cons-ciousness so as to account or the most rudi-mentary appearance o the Other. Yet or Hegelthis means something altogether dierent than

it does or Husserl. While in the latter’s accounto intersubjectivity in the Fih Meditation, a

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28 Saulius Geniušas Sel-consciousness and otherness: Hegel and Husserl

phenomenologically secured sphere o Ownnessprovides the ground or the constitution o theOther, or Hegel a phenomenological return tosel-consciousness culminates in the recogniti-

on that sel-consciousness itsel is possible only in the midst o other sel-consciousnesses. Letme start with the Husserlian position.

I one were to measure texts in terms o the intensity o criticisms they receive, onewould have to admit that the Fih CartesianMeditation has no parallels in the whole cor-pus o Husserl’s works. Tis text has been de-nounced by distant philosophical traditions aswell as by Husserl’s students; Husserl repeatedly

criticized it himsel, seeing its chie limitationin that it was limited to the methodologicalguidelines o static phenomenology 1. Te pro-undity and severity o these criticisms remainsso devastating that an attempt to uncover whatis still phenomenologically signifcant in thisMeditation aces almost insurmountable di-fculties. While it may not be too hard to pointout its shortcomings, it is a true challenge togain the necessary distance rom the multi-

aceted critiques so as to extract what remainssignifcant within it.

Having presented phenomenology as tran-scendental idealism at the end o the FourthMeditation, Husserl turns in the beginning o the Fih one to what might appear as a graveobjection – the charge o solipsism. Te emer-gence o this charge gives rise to the impressionthat Husserl here will deal with the same seto problems and thus run into the same dead-

ends as Descartes has in his Meditations. Yet acloser look reveals that this is not the case atall: (1) When Husserl raises this charge, he iswell aware that his previous Meditations havealready answered it. his is so, because thesolipsistic charge is made rom the standpointo the natural attitude which underwent sus-

1 “Here it is not a matter o uncovering a genesis goingon in time, but a matter o “static analysis” (CM 1960:

108). See Ludwig Landgrebe’s “Phenomenology asranscendental Teory o History,” in Husserl. 1977.Expositions and Appraisals. Ed. by F. Elliston andP. McCormick. Indiana: Notre Dame, 101–114.

pension already in the First Meditation. (2)Yet phenomenology itsel does not emerge ina historical vacuum and it thereore aces theproblems that the philosophical community

has inherited rom the philosophical tradition.Each and every turn to the subjective meets thecharge o solipsism and phenomenology has noright to assume immunity rom it.

Hence the problem: How can phenom-enology address a charge which it has already answered? How is one to experience the ullweight o the problem o solipsism when thenatural ground has been removed rom undersubjectivity’s eet? Te charge o solipsism needs

to be thoroughly transormed so as to constitutea genuine problem or phenomenology. For thispurpose Husserl in §44 institutes a return to thequestion o the reduction and introduces its new variant, “the reduction o transcendental experi-ence to the sphere o ownness.”

Here we encounter Husserl’s paradoxicaldemand to turn to the deepest levels o theinteriority o consciousness so as to clariy therudimentary maniestation o otherness. Tis

paradoxical demand appears to be unavoidable:i phenomenology’s task is that o clariying thesense o otherness, the being o the Other canno longer be taken at its ace value. Te robust-ness o the paradox in question indicates thesuccess o phenomenology: the success o thephenomenological account o the emergence o the Other goes hand-in-hand with the patency o this paradox.

However, the phenomenological require-

ment to delve into the interiority o conscious-ness by way o suspending the constitutiveeects o intersubjective intentionality proves tobe dangerously ambiguous. “I I ‘abstract’ (in theusual sense) rom others, I ‘alone’ remain. Butsuch abstraction is not radical; such alonenessin no respect alters the natural world-sense,‘experienceable by everyone,’ which attaches tothe naturally understood Ego and would notbe lost, even i a universal plague had le only

me” (CM 1960: 95). Te ego that the reductionleaves unaected is not I, this person, but rather

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29

the transcendental ego. Likewise, the questiono the emergence o the Other is the questiono the emergence o another transcendental egowithin my own transcendental space, emerging

as precisely something other .Abstracting rom all that is not peculiarly

my own, one still retains “a unitarily coherent stratum o the phenomenon world ” (CM 1960:99). Husserl designates this stratum as the

ounding one. It is nothing less than “Nature”included in my ownness, within which my body occupies a unique position. My body isuniquely singled out because, besides being abody (Körper ), it is also an animate organism, or

esh (Leib), to which I ascribe felds o sensation and which maniests a reexive sel-relation.Here we are on the verge o Husserl’s essentially anti-Cartesian answer to the solipsistic charge:phenomenology can account or the constitu-tion o an alter ego due to the act that thetranscendental ego has a body .

Reducing others to my sphere o ownness, Isee them as bodies (Körper ) that maniest a sur-prising similarity to my own. Tis means that I

constitute mysel as a human Ego, as a membero the “world” within a multiplicity o otherbodies. Yet I am simultaneously aware that it isI, the transcendental ego, who constitutes thismultiplicity. Te “paradox o subjectivity” liesat the bottom o Husserl’s notions o “analogicalapperception” and “pairing.” Yet beore address-ing these themes directly, a ew remarks needto be made concerning the dierent senses o transcendence operative in these Husserlian

meditations.In §47 Husserl shows that the intentional

object belongs to the ull concretion o thesphere o ownness. Tis means that transcen-dence does not lie outside the domain o tran-scendental immanence, but rather plays a rolewithin it. Yet what kind o transcendence is inquestion here? I the term is not stripped o its equivocations, one would have to concludeat this point that the Other is not genuinely

transcendent to the transcendental I, i.e. thathe or she is not truly the Other. Hence the

necessity to distinguish between “primordial”transcendence, made up o that “Nature” romwhich the transcendental ego is inseparable,and the secondary Objective transcendence.

Since the Other is not to be ound in “immanenttranscendence”, Husserl writes: “not all my ownmodes o consciousness are modes o my sel-con-sciousness” (CM 1960: 107). Te question o theOther lies at the rontier between the sphere o ownness and genuine transcendence: Te alterego is the frst orm o that transcendence whichis excluded rom my own concrete “primordial”ego. Or as Husserl himsel has it, “the intrinsi-cally frst other (the frst ‘non-Ego’) is the other

Ego” (CM 1960: 109).What happens when the Other intrudes

upon the feld o my vision? I I remain withinthe sphere o my ownness, I speak o the Otherin terms o “immanent transcendence.” I ac-count or this givenness by saying: the Other ishersel there beore me in person. Yet I am alsoaware that what belongs to the Other’s essence isprecisely what alls outside my own and is thusnot experienced by me directly. I must thereore

speak o the Other the way I speak o mysel, viz., as both Leib and Körper . I must speak o the Other through mediated intentionality whichgoes out rom the “primordial world and makespresent to consciousness a ‘there too,’ which nev-ertheless is not itsel there and can never becomean ‘itsel-there.’” (CM 1960: 112). Here lies theground o Husserl’s contention that secondary transcendence emerges only on the ground o

primordial transcendence , or the Other ac-

quires the sense o an alter ego by means o anapperceptive transer o sense. With this, the key move o the Fih Meditation has been reached:we have delimited the sphere o ownness whichin its very dierence rom the Other makes theOther possible.

While objects maniest themselves in virtueo what Husserl terms the passive synthesis o identifcation, the Other makes her appearancedue to the passive synthesis o association, whose

primal orm is Paarung . Te distinctive eatureo the latter type o passive synthesis is that two

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data are given to intuition (i.e. mysel and theOther) and ound a unity o similarity. Tus they are always constituted as a pair. On the basis o this similarity, given in pure passivity, a transer

o sense takes place. When the Other entersmy perceptual ield, her body is experiencedas “similar” to mine and it thus enters into aPaarung with mine, thereby appropriating thesense o an animate organism.

For Husserl, the analysis o sel-objectifca-tion is inseparable rom the inquiry into thepotentialities that pertain to my primordialsphere. Te Other is appresentatively consti-tuted in mine as a “modifcation” o my own

ego, which frst must itsel be objectivated. Te very act that the ego as an animate organismis capable o transorming any “there” into a“here” gives rise to my apperception o the otherego as having similar modes o spatial appear-ance that I would have “i I should go over thereand be where he is” (CM 1960: 120). In thismanner, the sphere o my ownness motivates theappearance o the Other as an alter ego. Withthis, Husserl contends, the phenomenological

approach has made it clear how the constitutiono the Other takes place.

2.

Let me single out three diiculties that theaccount o the constitution o the Other in theFih Meditation aces:

(1) It is surprising that in this phenomenol-

ogy o the Other, communication, or more gen-erally, genuine interaction plays no constitutiverole. Te most primitive encounter o the Othertakes place in radical silence. I within this care-ully secured methodological space my seeing o the Other “over there,” as i I mysel where there,constitutes the basis o intersubjectivity, then theOther is appresented as another transcendental monologue. Let us thereore ask together withA. Steinbock: “Is the monological ‘solitary lie o

the soul’ still a transcendental phenomenologicalpossibility or a philosophy that has purportedly

opened up an intersubjective sphere o experi-ence?” (Steinbock 1995: 74).

(2) Is there a phenomenological necessity that governs the appearance o the Other as the

appearance o another transcendental individual on the basis o the already constituted selood?Does the characterization o intersubjectivity in terms o, and parallel to, the multiplicity o human subjectivities, i.e. individuals, not contra-dict the very message o the phenomenologicalreduction, which calls or the abandonment o tacit presuppositions, which one would wishto transer rom the natural attitude to theproper phenomenological domain? One fnds

Eugene Fink raising these questions in the SixthCartesian Meditation; one also inds Husserlhimsel preoccupied with these questions inhis analyses o primordial temporality and themetaphysics o individuation. Could it be so that,at the level o its rudimentary maniestation, theOther pierces through my very ownness andeven makes the latter possible?

(3) Have the most signifcant consequenceso the decisive distinction between Körper and

Leib been accounted or in this Meditation?Tere are good reasons to suggest that my ownanimate organism cannot serve as the frst anal-ogon or the analogical transer o sense i it is notalready experienced as a body among bodies. AsPaul Ricoeur has argued, “Making into a worldconsists in an authentic intertwining by whichI perceive mysel as a thing in the world. Giventhis, has the die not ‘already been cast” (Ricoeur1992: 333)? In order to speak o my own animate

organism as a body among bodies presupposesthat I mysel am an Other among Others. Only an animate organism which already is a body or others can justiy the notion o the analogical transerring . But i so, then the sense o other-ness must be more rudimentary than the FihMeditation contends. With these questions inmind, let me turn to Hegel’s position.

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31Santalka. Filosofja, 2008, 16(3): 27–36

3.

Te question how consciousness becomes sel-consciousness dominates the irst section o

Hegel’s Phenomenology . At its initial stage, thistransition is the movement which removes thedierence between consciousness and its objectby rendering the identity between them explicit.Tis movement is accomplished with the reali-zation that the initial supposition, according towhich the appearing object is an object in itsel,is a pretense o the naively objective stance. Tetruth o the object is in act a truth or another.Holding on to this realization, consciousness

makes a distinction between itsel and its objectwhile being aware that this distinction is notactual. he transition to sel-consciousnessamounts to the realization that the object’sbeing-in-itsel is its being-or-another.

Tis is an unprecedented achievement. Inthe realm o consciousness, truth, estrangedrom itsel, resided in a oreign land. Atermaking the transition into sel-consciousness, it“returns” to its native land and soil: “With sel-

consciousness we have entered the native realmo truth” (PhS 1977: 104). Or as Heidegger hasit, “one can speak o truth only when certainty is no longer merely the certainty o the sensible,but when it turns back onto itsel and thereby becomes the certainty o itsel” (Heidegger1980: 129).

Yet does sel-consciousness, as the motion-less tautology “I am I,” not equal the impossibil-ity o sel-consciousness? Sel-consciousness is

possible only i interpreted as “internal unrest.”Only in this way can it both distinguish itsel rom its object and announce its own identity with it. Yet i sel-consciousness is conceivableonly as motion, then the distance which sepa-rates the object rom consciousness needs to besimultaneously overcome and preserved. Tissimultaneous opposition to and overarchingo the Other is possible only i sel-conscious-ness both identifes itsel with consciousness

and recognizes the emptiness o consciousness’certainty. We thereby witness the emergence

o two moments o sel-consciousness: (1)Sel-consciousness preserves the moments o consciousness, although in a transormed way:Te sensuous world is its frst object, although

preserved as mere appearance. (2) Sel-con-sciousness realizes that this dierence is nodierence and thus aces a second object, viz.itsel. Due to the dierentiation o its moments,consciousness obtains a dynamism withoutwhich it could never be sel-conscious. Can weidentiy a orm o sel-consciousness that wouldpossess such a structure? Hegel’s answer pointsin the direction o desire.

Why desire? Hegel’s analysis o conscious-

ness culminates in the realization that thesupersensible world is the world o sel-con-sciousness. One tests this hypothesis by way o turning to the most rudimentary levels o sel-consciousness so as to show how the primitiveorms o sel-relation underlie and determineour conceptions o objectivity. Tus we turn todesire – a mere sentiment o the sel. Te impli-cations o such a turn are ar-reaching: I we areto encounter the Other at this primitive level,

then the maniestation o the Other is morerudimentary than the Husserlian constitutivelevels admit. As Kojeve has argued, “the analysiso ‘thought,’ ‘reason,’ ‘understanding’, and soon – in general, o the cognitive, contempla-tive, passive behavior o a being or a ‘knowingsubject’ – never reveals the why or the how o the birth o the word ‘I,’ and consequently o sel-consciousness” (Kojeve 1969: 3). heanalysis o these terms cannot reveal the origin

o “the Other” either.Although at the initial stage desire appears

as the destruction o all otherness, precisely asar as this destruction is complete and immedi-ate, one cannot sensu stricto speak o desire asa orm o sel-consciousness. o use Gadamer’sapt example, it is not by coincidence that wespeak o being hungry as a bear or a wol. Whenhunger predominates to the extent that nothingills one besides the single dimension o the

instinctual drive, one does not possess sel-con-sciousness. Even though the condition o animal

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desire consists in knowing nothing other thanonesel, the satisaction o desire cancels itsel and simultaneously cancels sel-consciousness.Tus “in order that desire might attain true sel-

consciousness, the object o desire must, in allo its ‘nothingness o the other,’ still not ceaseto exist. It must be living sel-consciousness inthe ‘particularity o its distinctness’” (Gadamer1976: 61).

Tis realization inverses the initial truth thatdesire holds. Now one sees that i desire is to be aorm o sel-consciousness, it can be such only i its object does not cease to exist. Te object o de-sire must be reproduced again and again i desire

is to be sel-conscious. Desire is dependent uponthose very objects whose destruction constitutesits being and truth.

For Husserl the sense o existence is the mo-tivating orce which calls or the transcendentalclarifcation o otherness. For Hegel the notiono lie plays a similar role in the developmento sel-consciousness. It maniests a similardialectic to the one encountered in desire. Lieundergoes a threeold modifcation. (1) It is an

immediate unity which supersedes all distinc-tions, or an absolutely restless ininity intowhich all movement is resolved. At this level,the shapes o lie have no enduring existence.(2) his ininite lie splits into independentshapes. Its shapes appear determinate: they do not dissolve into the universal element butpreserve themselves in themselves. As a passiveseparation o shapes, lie, having divorced itsel rom its inorganic nature, becomes a process.

Tis second level is an inversion o the frst one:While earlier the shapes o lie counted as ines-sential and were dissolved into the infnite, now the universal medium proves to be inessentialand lie appears to be a living thing . (3) In theindependent shapes, lie preserves itsel only asthe uidity o dierences and as their dissolu-tion. Lie splits into a multiplicity o new shapes,continuously orming new members and dis-solving them in its own unity. Te immediate

continuity with which the analysis o Lie beganloses its immediate character and becomes a

process which dissolves its development and inthis very movement preserves itsel. We thereby reach Lie as a reected unity which proves to bea genus, and as such it points to consciousess to

which this unity itsel appears.Hegel calls sel-consciousness “this other

Lie.” One needs to take this expression in itsull orce. It means that sel-consciousness itsel maniests the same structure that we have wit-nessed in the dialectic o Lie. Yet there is an im-portant dierence: this “other Lie” is conscious,it is that Lie or which lie itsel appears as agenus. (1) Just as lie in its initial orm appearsto be an immediate unity which dissolves all

distinctions, so sel-consciousness too appearsas the pure undierentiated “I” by means o dissolving all otherness. (2) Yet just as in thesecond determination o lie we witnessed aninversion, so sel-consciousness also calls or asimilar deepening o its own certainty. Te very act that desire eeds on the destruction o theOther means that sel-consciousness is depen-dent upon otherness. Te Other thereby makesthe frst appearance as Lie which lies concealed

behind annihilation.How can sel-consciousness remain cer-

tain o being or itsel while recognizing thatthis certainty relies on the “supersession o the Other”? wo conditions that need to bemet: the object o desire must be independentand it must itsel eect negation within itsel.Only a living being that is conscious o itsel,only sel-consciousness, can meet these twoconditions. (3) hus just as lie, having lost

its universal character, regains it through themediacy o its own dierentiation, so sel-consciousness too, having lost its certainty o itsel, regains it through the mediacy o another sel-consciousness. Even though sel-consciousness’ certainty o itsel is annulledby the recognition o its dependence upon theobject o desire, it is regained by the discovery that its truth relies upon the conirmationI receive rom another sel-consciousness.

Te realization that the very existence o sel-consciousness is dependent upon another

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sel-consciousness constitutes the necessity orthe dialectic o desire to lead to the dialectic o recognition. I sel-consciousness is to be ree, itsreedom must be ound upon its more rudimen-

tary dependence upon others. Genuine reedomcan only be universal.

Sel-consciousness can exist only in themidst o other sel-consciousnesses, or “only so it is in act sel-consciousness; or only inthis way does the unity o itsel in its other-ness become explicit or it” (PhS 1977: 110).As Hegel sees it, rom now on no analysis o sel-consciousness can be unolded in egologi-cal terms. Even the journey we have taken so

ar needs to be re-evaluated in the ace o therealization that sel-consciousness is intersubjective through and through. Tus even thoughthe movement o sel-consciousness has beenrepresented in terms o one sel-consciousness,“this action o the one has itsel the double sig-nifcance o being both its own action and theaction o the other” (PhS 1977: 111–112). Tisdoubling o sel-consciousness is inevitable, oronly by means o others can sel-consciousness

acquire a rmation o its own certainty: “Actionby one side only would be useless” (PhS 1977:112). Tus the being-or-itsel o sel-conscious-ness is possible only as the being-or-sel o theOther.

Having discovered its dependence upon theOther, sel-consciousness abandons its initialhypothesis which doomed the Other inessential.“Each is or the other the middle term, throughwhich each mediates itsel with itsel and unites

with itsel; and each is or itsel, and or theother, an immediate being on its own account,which at the same time is such only through thismediation. Tey recognize themselves as mutu-ally recognizing each other” (PhS 1977: 112).Tis is, to use Robert Williams’ expression, the“syllogism o recognition”, in which each termis both extreme and mean2. While serving asa mediator or another and while receivingmediation rom the Other, sel-consciousness

2 Williams, R. 1997. Hegel’s Ethics o Recognition.University o Caliornia Press.

is truly sel-conscious. Te stage is thereby setor the dialectic o Lordship and Bondage whichollows Hegel’s portrayal o the maniestationo the Other at the very heart o sel-conscious-

ness’ being.

4.

A Hegelian critique o Husserl’s account o otherness consists in showing that the FithMeditation ails to provide a ull account o theSein o Selbst-Bewußtsein. Husserl provides arich description o the dierent ways consci-

ousness intends dierent types o objectivities,yet or this very reason the most rudimenta-ry maniestation o the Other escapes him.Objectiying the Other already presupposes amore originary encounter o otherness at the very heart o the existence o sel-consciousness.

In Husserl otherness intrudes upon thesphere o ownness as an appearance which es-capes the confnes o my “primordial Nature”.It is a phenomenon which cannot be reduced

to “primary transcendence”. It is the inevitableailure to turn all orms o consciousness intosel-consciousness that opens the space orthe appearance o the Other. Tus the Otherappears as a unique phenomenon. Here we en-counter Hegel’s resistance: Beore I direct my gaze upon the Other, the Other reveals himsel to me in a pre-phenomenal mode. My being issuch that it is inseparable rom the existenceo Others. Tis calls or a reassessment o the

pre-social and pre-interactive aspects o thesphere o ownness. Can this Hegelian insightbe translated into Husserlian terms, or are weacing two incompatible accounts o the genesiso intersubjectivity?

In Ricoeur’s inquiry into the consequenceso the relation between Leib and Körper we en-counter a compelling presentation o the tensionwhich separates the intersubjective charactero the sel rom the Husserlian problematic o

the ego3. Ricoeur dissociates “Husserl’s great

3 See the enth Study o Onesel as Another .

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discovery” o the distinction between leshand body rom the strategic role it plays in the

Meditations. According to Ricoeur, the FithMeditation maniests a threeold dependence o

the ego upon the Other, despite Husserl arguingto the contrary.

(1) Tere is a tenor o meaning which pre-cedes the reduction to ownness: I have alwaysknown that the Other is not an object but a subject o thought and o perception, a co-subjecto the constitution o the world as a commonnature. (2) Tere is a concealed presuppositiono the Other in the ormation o the sphere o ownness. Te hypothesis that I am alone could

never have been totalized without the help o the Other. Tus what Husserl terms “primordialworld” would lack comprehensibility withoutpresupposing the constitution o the commonNature. (3) My body as an animate organismcan be the basis o the “analogical transerenceo sense” only i it is already understood as abody among bodies4.

Does this mean that the most primor-dial maniestation o the Other escapes the

Husserlian domain? So as to engage in thisquestion, I turn to another French phenom-enologist, whose works articulate the insepara-bility o the Hegelian intuition concerning theintersubjective character o sel-consciousnessrom the Husserlian notion o the esh.

According to Sartre, the undamental ailureo the customary analyses o the Other consistsin the tendency to treat object-ness as the pri-mary relation between the Other and mysel.

Object-ness is only one o the modalities o theOther’s presence; it does not as such constitutethe undamental relation between the Otherand mysel. Such is the case not only becauseconsidering this modality as undamentalamounts to admitting that the Other’s existenceis destined orever to remain conjectural. Moreimportantly, although it justifes the appearanceo the Other-as-object, the maniestation o theOther-as-subject escapes it. Within this rame-

work, nothing “enables us to leave the level on

4 See Onesel as Another , 332–333.

which the Other is an object . At most we aredealing with a particular type o objectivity akinto that which Husserl designates by the termabsence (Sartre 1956: 344).

Yet the phenomenon o “being-seen-by-an-other” is an irreducible act which cannot be de-duced rom the essence o the Other-as-object.Tis phenomenon is the undamental relationbetween the Other and mysel. “I the concepto the Other-as-object is to have any meaning,this can be only as the result o the conversionand the degradation o that original relation”(Sartre 1956: 345). How are we to understandthis Hegelian claim: being-seen-by-the-Other is

the truth o seeing-the-Other?It irst and oremost means that my own

sel-objectifcation is a derivative orm o my more originary being-as-object. Having beenseen by the Other, I am now not merely con-sciousness, but also a sel; not merely a beingwhich “is what it is not and which is not whatit is,” i.e. absolute nothingness, but rather a sel as an object o consciousness. I am or mysel only in virtue o the reerence to the Other.

Having been seen by the Other, I am capableo making mysel into my own object. Due tothe intrusion o the Other which brought meout o nothingness into being, I have become asel-conscious sel.

Let me turn back to where Ricoeur had leus: How can I, this esh, see mysel as a body?Now we are in the position to answer this ques-tion. On the one hand, I must be both body and esh i I am to be sel-conscious. On the

other hand, my being as a body is possible only because my very esh had been subject to thegaze o another. Only because my very being orthe world is also a being in the world can I be asel-conscious being. Hence the very existenceo sel-consciousness is dependent upon theexistence o the Other. Te very act that my body is both Leib and Körper leads to a Hegelianconclusion: each one is both the middle term,through which the Other relates to himsel, and

each is a being-or-onesel, which is such only

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due to this mediation. I can be both body andesh only i the Other pierces through the hearto my being.

Conclusion

So as to bring this analysis to completion, aew words need to be said about the Husserliancritique o the Hegelian standpoint. When weare dealing with the Other and mysel as themediating term and an immediate being, arewe not acing two undamentally dierent kindso beings? It becomes plain once the Hegelian

insight is seen in terms o Leib and Körper thatno transition rom the Other and the I to the Weis possible, since to be a body is precisely not tobe esh. Just as my or-itsel cannot be knownby the Other, so the Other’s or-itsel cannotbe known by me. Since there is no commonmeasure between being an object and beinga subject, the transition rom the “I” and the“Other” to the “We” is hardly likely. It is by arnot clear how Hegel can overcome this orm o

“unhappy consciousness” which is maniest inthe duality o being both esh and body, beingboth or the world and in the world, in thedescribed transition rom sel-consciousness toReason, and, ultimately, to Spirit.

Having accounted or the transition romSel-consciousness to Reason as the certainty o consciousness that it is all reality, Hegel turns tothe theme o orgetulness. “Te consciousnesswhich is this truth has this path behind it and

has orgotten it…. It merely asserts that it is allreality, but does not itsel comprehend this; orit is along that orgotten path that this imme-diately expressed assertion is comprehended(PhS 1977: 141). From a Husserlian perspec-tive, the emergence o orgetulness at thisparticular point is a mark o genuine intellectualintegrity. Yet the reason or this orgetulnessescapes Hegel’s grasp. Te path that is troddenis orgotten not because o certain limitations

which pertain to Reason at its initial orm, butrather because the transition itsel is question-

able rom the perspective o the relation o sel-consciousness to otherness. At least such wouldbe the Husserlian view. Tis is so, because I cannever, in ull philosophical responsibility, speak

in the name o a totality and not a plurality. AHusserl might have learned the lesson rom aHegel that starting rom my ownness, I discoverthe Other as an existence which conditions my very interiority. Yet this does not amount to anacknowledgment that the Other can no longerbe questioned rom the perspective o my ownrudimentary orms o existence. In act, it isonly rom this perspective that the question o the primitive orms o the maniestation o the

Other can be broached. Even though my ownbody can be both Leib and Körper because it hascome under the Other’s gaze, I remain certain o the Other as a middle term and as an immediateexistence only i I retain this paradox that lies atthe heart o my own bodily existence. Yet Hegeleects a complete abstraction rom the stand-point o the cogito and instead o inquiring intothe relation between the I and the Other, studiesthe relation between consciousnesses o others.

Only because o this methodological abstractioncan he speak o truth being the Whole.

I leave the last word to Sartre: “No logical orepistemological optimism can cover the scandalo the plurality o consciousness…. So long asconsciousnesses exist, the separation and con-ict o consciousnesses will remain; we shallsimply have discovered their oundation andtheir true terrain” (Sartre 1956: 329).

References

Gadamer, H. G. 1976. Hegel’s Dialectic: Five Herme-neutical Studies. rans. by C. Smith, Yale U.P.

Hegel, G. W. F. 1977. Phenomenology o Spirit (PhS). rans. by A. V. Miller. Oxord U.P.

Heidegger, M. 1980. Hegel’s Phenomenology o Spi-rit . rans. by P. Emad and K. Maly. Indiana U.P.

Husserl, E. 1960. Cartesian Meditations: An Intro-duction to Phenomenology (CM). rans. by D. Cairns. Te Hague: Martinus Nijho.

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Kojeve, A. 1969. Introduction to the Reading o He- gel . rans. by J. Nichols. Basic Books.

Landgrebe, L. 1977. “Phenomenology as ranscen-dental Teory o History,” in Husserl: Expositionsand Appraisals, Ed. by F. Elliston and P. McCor-

mick. Indiana: Notre Dame, 101–114.

Ricoeur, P. 1992. Onesel As Another . rans. by K. Blamey. Te University o Chicago Press.

SAVIMONĖ IR KITONIŠKUMAS:HEGELIS IR HUSSERLIS

Saulius Geniušas

Nepaisant begalinių skirtumų tarp Hegelio ir Husserlio, bendras elementas sieja jų abiejų aprašomą kito-

niškumo genezę. Pasak abiejų, tik pasinėrus į savimonės gelmes galima identifkuoti elementariausią Kito

pasireiškimą. Remiantis hegeliškais ir huserliškais šios strategijos variantais, šiame straipsnyje siekiama

parodyti, kad: 1) elementariais savimonės lygiais subjektyvumas yra absoliučiai intersubjektyvus; 2) pliura-

liškumo negali nurungti totališkumas, nes neįveikiamas atstumas skiria Kitą nuo manęs. Bet ar šie teiginiai

nėra vienas su kitu nesuderinami? Priešingai tokiai pozicijai, šiame straipsnyje parodoma, kaip kiekvienas

iš šių teiginių šaukiasi savo tariamos priešybės. Nors šių teiginių vientisumas dažnai remiasi argumentais,

nukreiptais prieš Hegelį, Husserlį arba juos abu, straipsnyje parodoma, kaip Hegelio ir Husserlio koniktas

yra šių teiginių harmonijos priežastis.

Reikšminiai žodžiai: kūnas, intersubjektyvumas, kitoniškumas, savimonė, troškimas.

Į teikta 2008-04-15, priimta 2008-05-13

Sartre, J. P. 1956. Being and Nothingness. rans. by H. E. Barnes. Washington Square Press.

Steinbock, A. 1995. Home and Beyond: GenerativePhenomenology aer Husserl . Northwestern U.P.

Williams, R. 1997. Hegel’s Ethics o Recognition.University o Caliornia Press.

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