Repository | Book | Chapter

Is the ground of the synthesis of one content of consciousness with another under a unifying interpretation located (a) in the categorial structures of the interpretation and/or in the universal classifications of the interpreted objects, or (b) in the power of singular presentations to pass over into one another andlor in the references implicit in each apprehension of an object backward and forward to others? The fact that meaning can only be fixed in the form of ideal units freed from intuitive content, suggests that synthesis is ultimately grounded on some kind of universals; that the fixing of meaning always takes place in the sphere of uncompletable webs and shifting horizons, suggests that synthesis is ultimately grounded in some kind of particulars. To answer such a question, we will have to sort out various features of universality and individuality in Husserl's text. And in the end, we may not be able to articulate the problem of the ground of synthesis in terms of the distinction between universal categories and individual intuitions. For one thing, the secondary literature contains process readings, some epistemological readings, dialectical readings, and "backward reference" readings which make use of rather sophisticated versions of the interpenetration of universals and particulars.

DOI: 10.1007/978-94-015-8443-2_3

Full citation: