Meaning And Intuitive Act In The Logical Investigations

Husserl Stud (2011) 27:125–142 DOI 10.1007/s10743-010-9086-2

Meaning and Intuitive Act in the Logical Investigations Ka-Wing Leung

Published online: 14 December 2010  Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2010

Abstract This essay attempts to approach the dispute over the conceptualist or non-conceptualist interpretation of Husserl’s conception of intentional experience from a specific question: Is the intuitive act essentially a carrier of meaning? In the sixth Investigation, Husserl apparently tries to show that intuition is no carrier of meaning and therefore must be unified with a meaning-conferring act in order to be meaningful. But it seems to me that the brief arguments given by Husserl here are far from conclusive and that there are passages in the Logical Investigations which suggest otherwise. I will try to demonstrate that the sense conferred by the interpretation in perception is not different from linguistic meaning, and therefore perception is actually a synthetic act of fulfillment and is always meaningful. The conceptualist reading is no less convincing and no less susceptible to objections than the non-conceptualist one.

Dagfinn Føllesdal, and Ronald McIntyre and David Woodruff Smith following him, have tried to argue ‘‘that, for Husserl, linguistic meaning and noematic Sinn are one and the same’’.1 If ‘‘every intentional experience has a noema and therein a Sinn, through which it is related to the object’’,2 and if this noematic Sinn is not different from linguistic meaning, it follows that linguistic meaning underlies every intentional experience. While Føllesdal and McIntyre and Smith’s arguments are mainly based upon Ideen I, there is also evidence in the Logical Investigations that can be used to support this kind of ‘‘conceptualist’’ reading of Husserl’s conception

1

McIntyre and Smith (2005, p. 221). See also Føllesdal (2005, pp. 161–168).

2

Hua III/1, p. 310. English translation quoted from McIntyre and Smith (2005, p. 221).

K.-W. Leung (&) Department of Philosophy, Tongji University, 1239 Si Ping Road, Shanghai 200092, China e-mail: [email protected]

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of intentional experience. In the following essay I will try to approach this problem from a specific question: Is the intuitive act essentially a carrier of meaning? The main battlefield of the dispute over the conceptualist or non-conceptualist interpretation of intentional experience is whether there is simple perception, or simple seeing, which does not involve linguistic meaning.3 In the sixth Investigation, Husserl apparently tries to show that intuition, which includes both perception and imagination, is no carrier of meaning and therefore must be unified with a meaning-conferring act in order to be meaningful. Husserl poses the question at the very beginning of the sixth Investigation of ‘‘whether every type of mental act, or only certain types, can function as carriers of meaning’’.4 After showing that ‘‘the expressibility of all acts is without relevance to the question whether all acts can function in sense-giving fashion, so far, that is, as such ‘expressibility’ means no more than the possibility of making certain statements about such acts’’ (LU II/2, pp. 11–12/678), and distinguishing several senses of the term ‘‘expressed act’’ (ausgedru¨ckter Akt), Husserl directs focus to ‘‘the whole relation between meaning and expressed intuition’’ (LU II/2, p. 13/679). He raises the question of ‘‘whether such an intuition may not itself be the act constitutive of meaning, or if this is not the case, how the relation between them may be best understood and systematically classified’’ (LU II/2, p. 13/679). This question is supposed to be resolved in the following two sections, in which Husserl tries to demonstrate that meaning does not lie in perception or other intuitive acts. This prepares for the introduction of the main theme of the first chapter of the sixth Investigation, that is, how the meaningconferring act is united with the intuitive act in the synthetic act of fulfillment, which, insofar as the intuitive act is not in itself a carrier of meaning, would be the condition for any intuitive act to be meaningful. But it seems to me that the brief arguments given by Husserl here are far from conclusive and that there are passages in the Logical Investigations which suggest otherwise. Let us start the discussion from the very beginning, then, and first clarify Husserl’s conception of the phenomenon of expression to which linguistic meaning is essentially related.

1 Husserl begins the first Investigation with a distinction between two senses of ‘‘sign’’ (Zeichen). According to Husserl, ‘‘sign’’ can mean either expression (Ausdruck) or indication (Anzeichen). The former Husserl also calls ‘‘meaningful sign’’ (bedeutsames Zeichen) and the latter ‘‘indicative sign’’ (anzeigendes Zeichen) (LU II/1, p. 30/275). ‘‘Every sign is a sign for something, but not every sign has ‘meaning’ [Bedeutung], a ‘sense’ [Sinn] that the sign ‘expresses’’’ (LU II/1, p. 23/ 269). What characterizes an expression is that it always expresses a sense or meaning. In contrast, the common characteristic of all indications is that ‘‘certain objects or states of affairs of whose reality someone has actual knowledge indicate 3

For a recent discussion, see Mooney (2010).

4

Husserl (1993, p. 8) II/2; English translation (1970, p. 675). Henceforth cited in the text as LU followed by German and English page number s respectively.

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to him the reality of certain other objects or state of affairs, in the sense that his belief in the reality of the one is experienced as motivating a belief or surmise in the reality of the other’’ (LU II/1, p. 25/270). Despite his somewhat unusual choice of terms, Husserl makes it clear enough that he uses the term ‘‘expression’’ in ‘‘a restricted sense’’—merely in the sense of ‘‘speech’’—and excludes other things, such as facial expression, that usually go with this term (LU II/1, p. 30/275). As Derrida (1973, p. 18) says: ‘‘An expression is a purely linguistic sign, and it is precisely this that in the first analysis distinguishes it from an indicative sign.’’ Accordingly, what Husserl means by ‘‘meaning’’ (Bedeutung) is in the first place linguistic meaning. And it is precisely in this sense that we use the term ‘‘meaning’’ in this essay. Several things are said to be related to the phenomenon of expression, of which some are essential and constitutive, some are not, and some are acts or intentional experiences, some are not. Husserl says in §9 of the first Investigation: If we seek a foothold in pure description, the concrete phenomenon of the sense-informed expression breaks up, on the one hand, into the physical phenomenon forming the physical side of the expression, and, on the other hand, into the acts which give it meaning and possibly also intuitive fullness, in which its relation to an unexpressed object is constituted. In virtue of such acts, the expression is more than a merely sounded word. It means something, and in so far as it means something, it relates to what is objective (LU II/1, p. 37/280). This paragraph requires some clarification. First, according to Husserl’s own statements put forth elsewhere in the Logical Investigations, the presence of something physical is not always needed for something to be a phenomenon of expression. It is true that a phenomenon of expression always needs some sort of ‘‘intuitive support’’ (Stu¨tze or Anhalt),5 but that intuitive support need not be a physical phenomenon correlative to a sensuous act, such as a spoken sound or a written mark. An intuitive support is needed since ‘‘meaning cannot, as it were, hang in the air’’ (LU II/2, p. 92/741). The intuitive support actually serves in the phenomenon of expression as the expression itself, i.e., as that upon which a meaning is conferred by the meaning-conferring act. Usually the expression itself is something physical, such as an actually spoken sound, but it need not be. Something imaginative or something not real can also do the job, as Husserl says in the first Investigation, in regard to the ‘‘expressions used in soliloquy’’: What we are to use as an indication, must be perceived by us as existent. This holds also of expressions used in communication, but not for expressions used in soliloquy, where we are in general content with imagined rather than actual words. In imagination a spoken word or printed word floats before us, though in reality it has no existence. We should not, however, confuse imaginative presentations, and the image-contents they rest on, with their imagined objects. The imagined verbal sound, or the imagined printed word, does not 5 LU II/1, p. 41/283; LU II/2, p. 53/710. Both Stu¨tze and Anhalt are translated with ‘‘support’’ in the English translation.

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exist, only its imaginative presentation does so. The difference is the difference between imagined centaurs and the imagination of such beings. The word’s non-existence neither disturbs nor interests us, since it leaves the word’s expressive function unaffected (LU II/1, p. 36/279). An imagined word, verbal or printed, is of course not a physical phenomenon. It is not real in the sense of physical existence and does not exist in the physical world. If an imagined word can also function as an expression in the phenomenon of expression without having the expressive function affected, then it is clear that the phenomenon of expression need not contain a physical component. What it actually needs is rather an intuitive component, which may be physical or not. Secondly, the division into the physical phenomenon and the act is not as neat as it seems to be, even if we refine it, according to what we have just pointed out, into a division between the intuitive support and the act. For the intuitive support has to appear or be constituted in an act of intuition, which will be a sensuous act if the expression is real, or will be an imaginative act if the expression is an imagined word. Here the question arises: Into which side of the division should this very act of intuition be put? If it is put together with the intuitive support, then on the one hand there will be the intuitive support and the act of which it is the intentional correlate, and on the other hand the other acts. If it is put alongside with the other acts, then Husserl here seems to have neglected to mention one kind of act which is essential to the phenomenon of expression. Thirdly, on the side of acts, Husserl mentions two kinds, i.e., ‘‘the acts which give it meaning and possibly also intuitive fullness.’’ The act which gives meaning to the expression is called ‘‘the meaning-conferring act’’ (bedeutungverleihender Akt), and the one which gives it ‘‘intuitive fullness’’ is called ‘‘the meaning-fulfilling act’’ (bedeutungerfu¨llender Akt). Husserl introduces these terms in §9 of the first Investigation: If we leave side the sensuous acts in which the expression, qua mere sound of words, makes its appearance, we shall have to distinguish between two acts or sets of acts. We shall, on the one hand, have acts essential to the expression if it is to be an expression at all, i.e. a verbal sound infused with sense. These acts we shall call the meaning-conferring acts or the meaning-intentions [Bedeutungsintention]. But we shall, on the other hand, have acts, not essential to the expression as such, which stand to it in the logically basic relation of fulfilling (confirming, illustrating) it more or less adequately, and so actualizing its relation to its object. These acts, which become fused with the meaningconferring acts in the unity of knowledge or fulfillment [Erfu¨llung], we call the meaning-fulfilling acts. The briefer expression ‘‘meaning-fulfillment’’ [Bedeutungserfu¨llung] can only be used in cases where there is no risk of the ready confusion with the whole experience in which a meaning-intention finds fulfillment in its correlated intuition (LU II/1, p. 38/281). We have already showed that the sensuous act in which the real expression appears is not essential to the phenomenon of expression. What is needed is instead an intuitive act, which may be sensuous or not. Besides the intuitive act in which the

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expression itself appears, another kind of act is also essential to the phenomenon of expression. This is the meaning-conferring act. This is the very act in virtue of which ‘‘the expression is more than a merely sounded word’’, and becomes a ‘‘sense-informed expression’’. As for the meaning-fulfilling act, it is not essential to the phenomenon of expression. In other words, an expression will still be a senseinformed expression even if this kind of act is not present. Its function is not to make an expression meaningful but to ‘‘actualiz[e] its relation to its object.’’ There is an apparent contradiction in Husserl’s account as to whether a relation to an object is essential to the expression, about which more will be said in the following sections.

2 Apart from the intuitive support and three kinds of acts mentioned above, three other sorts of things seem also to be always related to the phenomenon of expression. Husserl says in §14 of the first Investigation: Relational talk of ‘‘intimation’’ [Kundgabe], ‘‘meaning’’ and ‘‘object’’ belongs essentially to every expression. Every expression intimates something, means something and names or otherwise designates something. In each case, talk of ‘‘expression’’ is equivocal. As said above, relation to an actually given objective correlate, which fulfills the meaning-intention, is not essential to an expression (LU II/1, p. 50/290). Here, Husserl seems to assert that the three things mentioned above—intimation, meaning, and objects—are all essential to the phenomenon of expression, or, to put it another way, that all these things essentially belong to every expression, insofar as it is an expression. This assertion is problematic, given what Husserl says elsewhere in the Logical Investigations. Let us clarify their relationship with the phenomenon of expression one by one. In raising the question of whether these three things are essential to the phenomenon of expression, the least problematic is meaning. For expression, according to Husserl’s definition, is meaningful sign. In other words, a sign will only be an expression if it has meaning.6 Thus meaning is essential to every expression. But we should still say a few words about Husserl’s conception of meaning. In Husserl’s opinion, the relation of meaning to expression is established by the meaning-conferring act. A sign becomes an expression when a meaning is conferred upon it by the meaning-conferring act. But the nature of meaning is different from that of both. Meaning is neither an act, nor of the nature of the intuitive support upon which the meaning ‘‘hangs’’, no matter whether the intuitive support is a physical thing or an imagined thing. Husserl characterizes meaning as ‘‘ideal unity’’ (ideale Einheit)7 in contradistinction with the ‘‘multiplicity of possible 6

‘‘Zum Begriff des Ausdrucks geho¨rt es, eine Bedeutung zu haben… Ein bedeutungsloser Ansdruck ist also, eigentlich zu reden, u¨berhaupt kein Ausdruck’’ (LU II/1, p. 54).

7

For example: ‘‘unsere Auffassung der Bedeutungen als idealer (und somit starrer) Einheit’’; ‘‘unter Bedeutungen ideale Einheiten zu verstehen’’; ‘‘idealen Einheit, die wir hier Bedeutungen nennen’’ (LU II/1, pp. 89, 91, 92).

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acts’’,8 wherein the term ‘‘ideal’’ should not be understood as something subjective or psychological but rather in the sense of the Platonic idea as something objective and independent of the mind. ‘‘An objective unity of meaning …: this is whatever it is, whether anyone realizes this in thought or not’’ (LU II/1, p. 94/325). Meaning is neither something inside an act or other kinds of mental experiences, nor something created by an act or by the mind which performs the act. We do not make the ideal unities; we only see and discover them. They are a certain kind of being, but no real being or subjective being. As Husserl says in §29 of the first Investigation: Though the scientific investigator may have no reason to draw express distinctions between words and symbols, on the one hand, and the meaningful thought-objects, on the other, he well knows that expressions are contingent, and that the thought, the ideally selfsame meaning, is what is essential. He knows, too, that he does not make the objective validity of thoughts and thought-connections, of concepts and truths, as if he were concerned with contingencies of his own or of the general human mind, but that he sees them, discovers them. He knows that their ideal being [ideales Sein] does not amount to a psychological ‘‘being in the mind’’: the authentic objectivity of the true, and of the ideal in general, suspends all reality [reales Sein], including such as is subjective [subjektives Sein] (LU II/1, p. 94/325).

3 As for the relationship of intimation to the phenomenon of expression, it is more problematic whether it is essential. Husserl thinks that expression, being a meaningful sign, can also function as an indication, intimating to the hearer the inner experiences of the speaker. He says in §7 of the first Investigation: If one surveys these interconnections, one sees at once that all expressions in communicative speech function as indications. They serve the hearer as signs of the ‘‘thoughts’’ of the speaker, i.e., of his sense-giving inner experiences, as well as of the other inner experiences which are part of his communicative intention. This function of verbal expressions we shall call their intimating function [kundgegebende Funktion] (LU II/1, p. 33/277). When Husserl says in §14 of the first Investigation that ‘‘every expression intimates something’’, that ‘‘something’’ refer precisely to ‘‘the ‘thoughts’ of the speaker, i.e., of his sense-giving inner experiences, as well as of the other inner experiences which are part of his communicative intention.’’ In discharging this ‘‘intimating function’’, expression is not only an expression, but also an indication.9 We have pointed out above that, according to Husserl, it is the common characteristic of indication that the reality of certain things indicates the reality of 8

‘‘die Bedeutung selbst, die ideale Einheit gegenu¨ber der Mannigfaltigkeit mo¨glicher Akten’’ (LU II/1, p. 77/312).

9

We have to be careful not to regard the expressive sign as one kind of indicative sign, or as Derrida (1973, p. 21) says, ‘‘make the expressive sign a species of the genus ‘indication’.’’ See LU II/1, p. 23/269.

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certain other things. Now, in the case of expression as an indication, what is indicated is the reality of the inner experience of the speaker and what indicates is the reality of the expression spoken. It won’t be denied that expressions do sometimes, or even for the most part, perform this function, but it is questionable whether it holds good in every instance of expression. It should be noticed that while Husserl speaks of ‘‘every expression’’ in §14, he speaks merely of ‘‘all expressions in communicative speech’’ in §7. In fact, Husserl himself admits elsewhere that in monologue expression does not indicate anything and it performs no function of intimating: Expressions function meaningfully even in isolated mental life, where they no longer serve to indicate anything (LU II/1, p. 24/269). In a monologue words can perform no function of indicating the existence of mental acts, since such indication would be there be quite purposeless (LU II/1, pp. 36–37/280).

4 Of the three things mentioned above, the relation of the last to the phenomenon of expression is the subtlest. In the statement ‘‘every expression intimates something, means something and names or otherwise designates something’’, the first ‘‘something’’ refers to the inner experiences of the speaker, the second to meaning, and the last to the object.10 Meaning obviously is essential to the expression, inasmuch as expression per definitionem is a sign that has meaning, whereas there is a case in which expression does not intimate the inner experiences of the speaker. But whether there is always an object which an expression designates in each case is not so obvious. Before we deal with this question, we must remark on the use of the term ‘‘object’’ in Husserl. This term is ambiguous. On the one hand, generally every intentional correlate is called ‘‘object’’ by Husserl.11 Meaning is also an object in this sense, insofar as it is an intentional correlate.12 On the other hand, Husserl also uses the term ‘‘object’’ particularly to refer to what can be given by the intuitive act, especially when it is contrasted with ‘‘meaning’’, as in most of the cases in the first Investigation. Meaning is not an object in this sense. When Husserl says in §14 that ‘‘relational talk of ‘intimation’, ‘meaning’ and ‘object’ belongs essentially to every expression’’, it is specifically to what can be given by the intuitive act that the term ‘‘object’’ here refers. 10 See also: ‘‘Man hat bei jedem Namen zwischen dem, was er ‘kundgibt’ (d. i. jenen psychischen Erlebnissen), und dem, was er bedeutet, unterschieden. Und abermals zwischen dem, was er bedeutet (dem Sinn, dem ‘Inhalt’ der nominalen Vorstellung) und dem, was er nennt (dem Gegenstand der Vorstellung)’’ (LU II/1, p. 32). 11

For instance, ‘‘Die intentionalen Erlebnisse haben das Eigentu¨mliche, sich auf vorgestellte Gegensta¨nde in verschiedener Weise zu beziehen’’ (LU II/1, p. 372). 12 ‘‘Das Wort intentional la¨ßt, seiner Bildung gema¨ß, sowohl Anwendung auf die Bedeutung, als auf den Gegenstand, der intentio zu. Intentionale Einheit bedeutet also nicht notwendig die intendierte Enheit, die des Gegenstandes’’ (LU II/1, p. 97, no. 1) See also Dreyfus (2001, p. 200f).

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It seems that Husserl contradicts himself when he says in §14 on the one hand, that ‘‘relational talk of ‘intimation’, ‘meaning’ and ‘object’ belongs essentially to every expression’’, ‘‘every expression … names or otherwise designates something’’, and on the other hand, that ‘‘relation to an actually given objective correlate, which fulfills the meaning-intention, is not essential to an expression.’’ Although it is not rare to find contradictory statements within the Logical Investigations as a whole, it is still very unlikely that Husserl would contradict himself within just one paragraph. Actually, upon closer scrutiny, it can be seen that the objects, or objective correlates, referred to in the two sides of the seemingly contradictory statements quoted above are not the same. What is spoken of is, on the one hand, ‘‘object’’ without qualification, and on the other, ‘‘actually given object’’. The term ‘‘actually given’’ (aktuell gegeben) is important, as well as its cognate ‘‘actualize’’. We have pointed out in Section One above that the meaning-fulfilling act is not essential to the phenomenon of expression. And in the passage from §9 of the first Investigation quoted there, Husserl says that the function of the meaning-fulfilling act consists in ‘‘actualizing its relation to its object’’. Also closely related to these is the term ‘‘realized.’’ Husserl says in §9 of the first Investigation: It [viz. expression] means something, and in so far as it means something, it relates to what is objective. This objective somewhat can either be actually present through accompanying intuitions, or may at least appear in representation, e.g. in a mental image, and where this happens the relation to an object is realized. Alternatively this need not occur: the expression functions significantly, it remains more than mere sound of works, but it lacks any basic intuition that will give it its object. The relation of expression to object is now unrealized as being confined to mere meaning-intention. A name, e.g., names its object whatever the circumstances, in so far as it means that object. But if the object is not intuitively before one, and so not before one as a named or meant object, mere meaning is all there is to it. If the originally empty meaning-intention is now fulfilled, the relation to an object is realized, the naming becomes an actual, conscious relation between name and object named (LU II/1, pp. 37–38/280–281). This passage is very important for our purpose, though the meanings of some statements within it are not very clear. The gist of it can be summarized with the following points: (1)

An expression is related to an object through the meaning it has. Husserl says in the above passage that ‘‘in so far as [indem] it means something, it relates to what is objective’’. More frequently, Husserl uses the term ‘‘mittels’’ (through), when he speaks of the relation between the expression’s meaning and its connection with an object.13 For example, in §13 of the first Investigation Husserl says: ‘‘An expression only refers to an objective

13

Some instances: ‘‘dem mittels der Bedeutung ausgedru¨ckten (genannten) Gegenstand’’; ‘‘deren Gegenstand als derjenige erschient, welcher in der Bedeutung bedeutet, bzw. welcher mittels der Bedeutung genannt ist’’; ‘‘die in der Bedeutung gemeinte und mittels ihrer ausgedru¨ckte Gegensta¨ndlichkeit’’ (LU II/1, p. 39, 41, 46).

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(2)

(3)

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correlate because [dadurch, daß] it means something, it can be rightly said to signify or name the object through [mittels] its meaning’’ (LU II/1, p. 49/289). For Husserl, the expression’s meaning is the medium through which the expression is related to an object. Relation to an object belongs essentially to the expression. We have shown that for Husserl expression always has meaning, and expression is related to an object through its meaning. But from the truth of these it does not necessarily follow that expression is always related to an object. Husserl nonetheless asserts that it is when he says that ‘‘a name, e.g., names its object whatever the circumstances, in so far as [sofern] it means that object’’. And only because Husserl thinks that relation to an object belongs essentially to the expression can he say that ‘‘in meaning, a relation to an object is constituted. To use an expression significantly, and to refer expressively to an object, are one and the same’’ (LU II/1, p. 54/293). The expression’s relation to an object can either be realized or unrealized. Now, it seems odd that Husserl would think that relation to an object is essential to the expression, while at the time thinking that the meaningfulfilling act, in which the object is given, is not essential to the expression. This oddity will vanish if it is noticed that for Husserl the meaning-fulfilling act which gives the expression intuitive fullness does not bring about its relation to an object. We have shown above that Husserl thinks that an expression is related to an object through the meaning it has. In other words, it is not the corresponding meaning-fulfilling act, but the meaning which the expression essentially has, that is responsible for its relation to its object. What the corresponding meaning-fulfilling act does, when it is also enacted, is not to bring about the expression’s relation to its object but rather to ‘‘actualize’’ or ‘‘realize’’ this relation. When the corresponding meaning-fulfilling act is enacted—be it a perception or imagination—‘‘the relation to an object is realized’’ and its object is ‘‘actually present’’ or ‘‘actually given’’; there is ‘‘an actual, conscious relation between name and object named.’’ But as the meaning-fulfilling act is not essential to the expression, ‘‘this [viz. a realized relation to an object] need not occur.’’ Yet, in this case, the expression still ‘‘names its object’’, that is to say, there is still a relation of the expression to its object by virtue of the meaning that the expression has, although now this relation is ‘‘unrealized’’, which means that the object related to the expression is not actually given by the intuitive act.14

5 In the above sections we have shown that amongst those things which are said to be related to the phenomenon of expression—the intuitive support, meaning, object, and two kinds of act—the intuitive act that provides the intuitive support and the 14

Cf. Tugendhat (1970, pp. 48–49).

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meaning-conferring act are essential, whereas the meaning-fulfilling act and intimation are not. Apart from these there is actually one more act, also related to the phenomenon of expression in a non-essential way, that we have already come across. In the passage from §9 of the first Investigation quoted in Section One above in connection with our discussion of the meaning-conferring act and meaningfulfilling act, Husserl mentions a further act—in addition to the sensuous act, the meaning-conferring and the meaning-fulfilling acts that we have discussed—though he does not refer to it with the term ‘‘act.’’ This is what Husserl in this passage calls ‘‘whole experience.’’ He says: These acts, which become fused with the meaning-conferring acts in the unity of knowledge or fulfillment [Erfu¨llung], we call the meaning-fulfilling acts. The briefer expression ‘‘meaning-fulfillment’’ can only be used in cases where is no risk of the ready confusion with the whole experience in which a meaning-intention finds fulfillment in its correlated intuition (LU II/1, p. 38/281). This ‘‘whole experience’’ is also an act or intentional experience.15 It is an act in which the meaning-intention or meaning-conferring act is fulfilled by the corresponding intuition. Husserl calls this kind of act ‘‘fulfillment’’. He says in §8 of the sixth Investigation: From the tranquil, as it were static coincidence of meaning and intuition, we now turn to that dynamic coincidence where an expression first functions in merely symbolic fashion, and then is accompanied by a ‘‘more or less’’ corresponding intuition. Where this happens, we experience a descriptively peculiar consciousness of fulfillment: the act of pure meaning, like a goalseeking intention, finds its fulfillment in the act which renders the matter intuitive. In this transitional experience, the mutual belongingness of the two acts, the act of meaning, on the one hand, and the intuition which more or less corresponds to it, on the other, reveals its phenomenological roots. We experience how the same objective item which was ‘‘merely thought of’’ in symbol is now presented in intuition, and that it is intuited as being precisely the determinate so-and-so that it was at first merely thought or meant to be (LU II/2, p. 32/694). The terms ‘‘fulfillment’’ and ‘‘the meaning-fulfilling act’’ can easily lead to confusion. Despite the fact that both of them are composed of words deriving from the verb ‘‘fulfill’’, they actually refer to different kinds of act—though Husserl himself seems not to be very careful about words and sometimes uses the term ‘‘fulfillment’’ to refer to the latter act.16 It is clear from the above quoted passages that the unifying act is called ‘‘knowledge or fulfillment’’ by Husserl, and what are united in such unifying act are called ‘‘meaning-conferring acts’’ and ‘‘meaning15

‘‘Eben darum du¨rfen wir nicht bloß die Signifikation und Intuition, sondern auch die Ada¨quation, d.i. die Erfu¨llungseinheit, als einen Akt bezeichen…’’ (LU II/2, p. 35).

16

For instance: ‘‘Was die Intention zwar meint, … das stellt die Erfu¨llung, d.h. der sich in der Erfu¨llungssynthesis anschmiegende, der Intention seine ‘Fu¨lle’ bietende Akt, direkt vor uns hin’’ (LU II/2, p. 65).

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fulfilling acts’’, the latter of which Husserl emphatically warns against confusing with the ‘‘whole experience.’’ Strictly speaking, ‘‘fulfillment’’ refers to the whole experience—that is, those unifying or synthetic acts in which the meaning-conferring acts are united with the corresponding intuitions—while ‘‘the meaning-fulfilling act’’ refers to the intuitive acts which give fulfillment to the meaning-conferring acts in the synthetic act of fulfillment. In other words, the meaning-fulfilling act is actually an intuitive act, and it is called ‘‘the meaning-fulfilling act’’, insofar as it is that ‘‘whose role it is to fulfill other intentions in knowledge.’’17 Husserl says in §13 of the sixth Investigation: All intentions have corresponding possibilities of fulfillment (or of opposed frustration): these themselves are peculiar transitional experiences, characterizable as acts, which permit each act to ‘‘reach its goal’’ in an act specially correlated with it. These latter acts, inasmuch as they fulfill intentions, may be called ‘‘fulfilling acts’’, but they are called so only on account of the synthetic act of fulfillment, or rather of self-fulfillment (LU II/2, p. 49/707). Husserl also uses the terms ‘‘recognition’’ (Erkenntnis) and ‘‘calling’’ (or ‘‘naming’’, Nennung) to designate the act of fulfillment. He says in the sixth Investigation: Talk about recognizing objects, and talk about fulfilling a meaning-intention, therefore express the same fact, merely from differing standpoints (LU II/33, p. 695). And To ‘‘call something red’’ [Rot Nennen]—in the fully actual sense of ‘‘calling’’ which presupposes an underlying intuition of the thing so called—and to ‘‘recognize something as red’’, are in reality synonymous expressions: they only differ in so far as the latter brings out more clearly that we have here no mere duality, but a unity engineered by a single act-character (LU II/2, p. 28/691). The term ‘‘naming’’ can also easily lead to confusion. As we saw, Husserl states that ‘‘a name, e.g., names its object whatever the circumstances, in so far as it means that object,’’ which means that an expression, insofar as it has meaning, can always be said to ‘‘name’’ its object, no matter whether the relation to its object is realized by the corresponding intuition or not. In other words, both the realized and the unrealized relation of the expression to its object are called ‘‘naming.’’ Now, when Husserl says that to name something red is equivalent to recognizing something as red, it is merely the realized relation of the expression to its object that is meant. Therefore, in the above passage, Husserl has to add the remark that here ‘‘naming’’ (or ‘‘calling’’) is used in ‘‘the fully actual sense’’, which ‘‘presupposes an underlying intuition of the thing so called.’’

17

LU II/2, p. 39/699. The English translation mistakenly has ‘‘intuition’’ for ‘‘intention’’ in this passage.

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6 Now we can return to our original question: whether the intuitive act is essentially a carrier of meaning, or in other words, whether the intuitive act is also ‘‘sensegiving’’ (sinngebend) (LU II/2, p. 8/675). As we remarked above, Husserl in §3 of the first chapter of the sixth Investigation focuses on the relation between meaning and intuition and tries to resolve the problem of ‘‘whether such an intuition may not itself be the act constitutive of meaning’’ by demonstrating that meaning does not lie in perception or any other intuitive. But the arguments given by Husserl in §4 and §5 in the first chapter of the sixth Investigation are not very convincing. The arguments given by Husserl concerning the relation between the intuitive act and the expression in general are found in §4, whereas in §5 Husserl deals with the relation between the intuitive act and one particular kind of expression, i.e., what Husserl calls ‘‘the essentially occasional expression’’, a more specific question that we shall not take up here. The arguments given by Husserl in §4 can be separated into two stages. The first is that ‘‘we could base different statements on the same percept [Wahrnehmung], and thereby unfold quite different senses,’’ and ‘‘conversely, the sound of my words and their sense might have remained the same, though my percept varied in a number of ways’’ (LU II/2, p. 14/680). And the second is that ‘‘percepts may not only vary, but may also vanish altogether, without causing an expression to lose all its meaning’’ (LU II/2, p. 15/680). Husserl seems readily to admit that the first stage is not conclusive and agree with the objection that it ‘‘only showed meaning to be unaffected by such differences in individual percepts: it might be held to reside in something common to the whole multitude of perceptual acts which centre in a single object’’ (LU II/2, p. 15/680). The second stage is Husserl’s reply to this objection, and it seems to Husserl to be conclusive enough to remove any further doubt that meaning does not lie in the perceptive act itself. But it seems to me that this second argument is also far from sufficient to achieve Husserl’s overall purpose, which is to prove that the intuitive act is not sense-giving. What it can accomplish is only the assurance that the intuitive act is not essential to the phenomenon of meaning and that expression is still meaningful even without the corresponding intuition. But it is not enough to exclude the possibility that the intuitive act is also meaningful even without uniting with the meaning-conferring act in the synthetic act of fulfillment; thus it might still be sense-giving in itself. More importantly, there are some passages in the Logical Investigations that seem to support this possibility. Additionally, Husserl seems to have neglected to consider the possibility that intuition is essentially sense-giving, in the sense that it has always already been united with a meaning-conferring act insofar as it is an intuition, that is, insofar as it is an intuitively intentional act. There is evidence in the Logical Investigations that suggests that the intuitive act is meaningful in itself. For example, Husserl says in §6 of the sixth Investigation: The relation between name and thing named, has, in this state of union, a certain descriptive character, that we previously noticed: the name ‘‘my inkpot’’ seems to overlay the perceived object, to belong sensibly to it … If we

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turn to the experiences involved, we have, on the one hand, as said before, the acts in which the words appear, on the other hand the acts in which the things appear. As regards the latter, the inkpot confronts us in perception. Following our repeated demonstration of the descriptive essence of perception, this means no more phenomenologically than that we undergo a certain sequence of experiences of the class of sensation, sensuously unified in a peculiar serial pattern, and informed by a certain act-character of ‘‘interpretation’’ [Auffassung], which confers it with an objective sense (LU II/2, p. 24–25/688; translation modified). Although the context of this passage is the union of name and thing named in the synthetic act of fulfillment, what Husserl says here about perception is by no means restricted to this context and is supposed to be valid for perception generally. He himself speaks here about the ‘‘essence’’ of perception—that is, about perception qua perception and not only qua perception as united with the meaning-conferring act—and further, the words ‘‘repeated demonstration’’ show that Husserl here refers to a view that he has put forth in other contexts, even when the union of name and thing named is not in question. This is confirmed by Husserl’s description of the essence of perception in other places in the Logical Investigations. What interests us most in this description of the essence of perception is the assertion that in the course of perception, the sensation is ‘‘informed by a certain act-character of ‘interpretation’, which confers it with an objective sense.’’ This act of interpretation, which here is said to be the very thing that confers the sensation with an ‘‘objective sense,’’ is regarded by Husserl as the sine qua non for the appearance of a perceptual object. Husserl says in §23 of the first Investigation: The perceptual presentation arises in so far as an experienced complex of sensations gets informed by a certain act-character, one of interpreting [Auffassen] or meaning [Meinen]. To the extent that this happens, the perceived object appears, while the sensational complex is as little perceived as is the act in which the perceived object is as such constituted (LU II/1, p. 75/310; translation modified). If interpretation (Auffassung) is also an act which is sense-conferring (sinnverleihend), and if it is at the same time a condition of possibility for the appearance of a perceptual object, no matter whether the perception in which it appears is united with the meaning-conferring act or not, then it is obvious that perception is in itself sense-giving in a certain sense, or that it is an act in which there is always an element which is sense-giving in a certain sense. Therefore, if we stick to Husserl’s description of perception quoted above and admit that the act of interpretation is essential to Husserl’s conception of perception, then there is no question that perception is sense-giving for Husserl. The only question that remains is whether the Auffassungssinn—i.e., the sense that is at issue here—is the same with linguistic meaning, i.e., the meaning or sense that is essential to the phenomenon of expression.18 It seems to me that this is the critical question for the conceptualist or 18

This is precisely what Kevin Mulligen argues against. See Mooney (2010, p. 31).

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non-conceptualist reading of Husserl’s conception of perception and of intentional experience in general. If the Auffassungssinn is not the same as linguistic meaning, then even though it can still be said that for Husserl perception is sense-conferring or sense-giving in a certain sense, one cannot say that perception is always meaningful and that it is a carrier of linguistic meaning as the conceptualist understands this; thus, the conceptualist view is not warranted. But if, on the contrary, the Auffassungssinn is the same with linguistic meaning, then, because perception is sense-conferring, it is always meaningful, and the conceptualist reading is warranted.

7 There are some scholars who observe that ‘‘throughout Logical Investigations, Husserl works with a distinction between meaning as conceptual or logical signification [Bedeutung] and as non-conceptual interpreting sense or apprehending sense [Sinn or Auffassungssinn].’’19 I disagree with this observation, for the following reasons: First, Husserl states explicitly that he uses the terms ‘‘meaning’’ (Bedeutung) and ‘‘sense’’ (Sinn) synonymously. He says in the first Investigation: ‘‘Meaning’’ is further used by us as synonymous with ‘‘sense’’. It is agreeable to have parallel, interchangeable terms in the case of this concept … A further consideration is our ingrained tendency to use the two words as synonymous, a circumstance which makes it seem rather a dubious step if their meanings are differentiated … To this we may add that both terms are exposed to the same equivocations (LU II/1, p. 52/292). Accordingly, Husserl also uses the term ‘‘meaning-conferring’’ interchangeably with ‘‘sense-conferring’’ and with ‘‘sense-giving’’. I don’t see why we should take this explicit statement of Husserl as being restricted to his treatment of expression only rather than covering all the Investigations.20 One reason that Husserl brings forth in support of his using the two words synonymously is that it is ‘‘our ingrained tendency’’. In other words, it is in complete accord with the ordinary usage of German to use the two words synonymously.21 Therefore, even without Husserl’s explicit statement, it would only be natural to assume that the two words are used interchangeably unless stated otherwise, as in the case of Frege. But nowhere in the Logical Investigations do we find Husserl making the ‘‘dubious step’’ of explicitly differentiating the two words and defining what the difference amounts to. And the evidence pointed out by scholars for Husserl’s supposed distinction between ‘‘meaning’’ and ‘‘sense’’ is all contextual rather direct, which means that, in the absence of Husserl’s direct statement that he uses the two words differently, this sort of evidence, which is often drawn from contexts that deal with issues other than the 19

Mooney (2010, p. 20).

20

Ibid.

21

Cf. McIntyre and Smith (2005, p. 222).

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distinction in question, only becomes evidence through the scholarly interpretation itself. Therefore, I think that the burden of proof should lie with the nonconceptualist reading rather than the conceptualist reading. Secondly, Husserl also uses the term ‘‘interpretation’’ (Auffassung) to designate the act in which the expression becomes meaningful, and states that this kind of interpretation is ‘‘akin’’ (verwandt) to that in which the intuitive object arises. He says in §23 of the first Investigation: The understanding interpretation [verstehende Auffassung], in which the meaning of a word becomes effective, is, in so far as any interpreting is in a sense an understanding [Verstehen] and a rendering [Deuten], akin to the divergently carried out objective interpretation [objektivierende Auffassung] in which, by way of an experienced sense-complex, the intuitive presentation, whether percept, imagination, representation etc., of an object, e.g. an external thing, arises (LU II/1, p. 74/309; translation altered). The kind of interpretation pertaining to the phenomenon of expression Husserl calls ‘‘the understanding interpretation,’’ and the kind of interpretation pertaining to the appearance of the object in intuition he calls ‘‘objective interpretation’’. Now, if both kinds of interpretation are akin in the sense that Verstehen or Deuten is involved in both of them, wouldn’t it be more likely that the sense that each of them confers is also one and the same kind of thing? Thirdly, Husserl states that sign and meaning are also involved in our perception. While on the one hand Husserl states that the understanding interpretation is akin to the objective interpretation, on the other hand he also thinks that they have different ‘‘phenomenological structure.’’ He continues in §23 of the first Investigation: The phenomenological structure of the two sorts of interpretation is, however, somewhat different. If we imagine a consciousness prior to all experience, it may very well have the same sensations as we have. But it will intuit no things, and no events pertaining to things, it will perceive no trees and no houses, no flight of birds nor any barking of dogs. One is at once tempted to express the situation by saying that its sensations mean nothing to such a consciousness, that they do not count as signs of the properties of an object, that their combination does not count as a sign of the object itself. They are merely lived through, without an objectifying rendering derived from experience. Here, therefore, we talk of signs and meanings [Bedeutung] just as we do in the case of expressions and cognate signs (LU II/1, p. 75/309; translation altered). Of the most interest to us in this paragraph is the way Husserl talks about ‘‘sign’’. As we remarked earlier, Husserl begins the first Investigation by distinguishing two kinds of sign: the meaningful sign and the indicative sign. The former Husserl calls ‘‘expression’’ and the latter ‘‘indication’’, each of which discharges a very distinct function. Now, which sign is meant by Husserl here? Sign in general? Expression? Indication? And more specifically, what does the term ‘‘cognate signs’’ at the end of the passage mean? In the Logical Investigations, Husserl only distinguishes two kinds of sign. He never indicates that there are other kinds of sign beside these two.

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If there are only two kinds of sign, then the term ‘‘cognate signs,’’ which is put in contrast with ‘‘expression’’ in the above passage, can mean nothing but the indications. However, if we take the term ‘‘cognate signs’’ as referring to the indications, then it is simply not true to say that we can talk of meanings here. For, according to Husserl himself, in the case of indication we can talk of sign but we cannot talk of meaning, since the expression is the only kind of sign that has meaning. So, granted that we can talk of both signs and meanings in the context of perception—which in contrast to ‘‘a consciousness prior to all experience’’ contains ‘‘an objectifying rendering’’—then the ‘‘sign’’ referred to here cannot be the indication, and that leaves expression as the only possible candidate. There are no ‘‘cognate signs’’. If sign and meaning are involved in our perception, it is the expression and the meaning proper to it that is involved.

8 If the sign involved in our perception is the expression, then how can there be any difference between the phenomenological structure of the understanding interpretation and the objective interpretation? Indeed, it makes sense to say that they are in fact one and the same kind of interpretation. If sign is involved in every perception, and if the sign involved is the expression, then all the things essential to the phenomenon of expression must also be present. According to our discussion above, this includes the expression itself, meaning, relation to object, the act in which the expression itself appears, and the meaning-conferring act. Certainly, we usually do not utter anything in perception, but (as pointed out before) the expression itself in the phenomenon of expression need not be a real word. A silent and imaginative word can also do the job. It seems to be me that it is this kind of silent and imaginative word that is the sign involved in perception. And accordingly, the meaning of the word is what is meant by the expression, and the perceptual object what is actually designated by it. But if all these components are there, doesn’t the act of perception become the synthetic act of fulfillment? I believe that this is the unavoidable outcome, if the above interpretation of ours is acceptable. Provided that we can, as Husserl believes, talk about sign and meaning in perception, and the expression is the only kind of sign that has meaning, then all perceptions are actually synthetic acts of fulfillment, and the objective interpretation which is supposed to confer the sensation with an objective sense is nothing other than the understanding interpretation which confers meaning on a word. We are talking about the same kind of sign, the same kind of meaning or sense, and the same kind of interpretation in both cases. One may object that there are some experiences in which we cannot make sense of what we perceive and express what it is, but it surely will not affect the fact that they are perceptions. To this we can reply that even in such experiences there is always something that we can express and have already expressed. For example, now we perceive a colorful object and we cannot tell what this is. Isn’t this an example of perception without expression? I don’t think so. In fact, even if we don’t know what this colorful object is, something has already been expressed, some

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meaning already meant, and some object already actually designated, when we say, whether with real or imaginative words, that this is a ‘‘colorful object.’’ For, ‘‘colorful object’’ is also an expression, and in so far as it is an expression, it has meaning and relation to an object. I believe that other cases of the experience in which we seem to be unable to express what it is that we perceive are also like this. There is always something that has already been expressed at the moment when we are conscious of the perceptual object—for example, that it is of a certain color, a certain size, or a certain shape. As long as perception is always accompanied by these kinds of expression and meaning, it is actually a synthetic act of fulfillment and is always meaningful. The above argument can also be applied to other intuitive acts. And so it can be said that all intuitive acts are synthetic acts of fulfillment, always including the meaning-conferring act as one component. In other words, all intuitive acts are meaningful. If this is the case, then the scope of acts or intentional experiences which involve the meaning-conferring act can be enlarged still further. Husserl thinks that ‘‘each intentional experience is either an objectifying act or has its basis in such an act’’ (LU II/1, p. 493/648). And he divides objectifying acts into two kinds, the signitive act and the intuitive act (LU II/2, p. 67). The former amounts to the meaning-conferring act, and the latter—according to our demonstration above— amounts to the meaning-conferring act plus the corresponding intuition. The meaning-conferring act is present in both. If every intentional experience, as Husserl believes, involves the objectifying act (either being an objectifying act itself or having one as its basis), and if the meaning-conferring act, as we believe, is always present in the objectifying act, then the meaning-conferring act is involved in every intentional experience. In short, all our intentional experiences are meaningful. I am not making the claim that our interpretation is the only possible one. As we have already pointed out, it is not rare to find contradictory statements within the Logical Investigations as a whole. Conflicting interpretations can easily arise out of these contradictory statements.22 The conceptualist interpretation is no less convincing and no less susceptible to objections than the non-conceptualist one. But the conceptualist interpretation that we present above does have the advantage that, if it is correct, many insights in the Logical Investigations gain a clearer explanation. For example, those hidden aspects of the perceptual object which are ‘‘subsidiarily meant’’ (mitgemeint) can be better explained by reference to meaning. Those aspects of a perceptual object which come into view can mean nothing in themselves. For example, when I see a part of an unknown animal, I will have no expectation as to what I will see when the other part of it is revealed. Only when, based upon the part I see, I interpret this animal as a cat according to the meaning of the expression ‘‘cat’’ as it is known to me, will I expect to see a tail when its hinder part is revealed to me. This sort of expectation—which is a very common characteristic in perception—can hardly be sufficiently explained if we don’t suppose that perception always contains the meaning-conferring act and is always meaningful.23 22 Cf. Mooney (2010, p. 34). But I disagree that ‘‘the weight of argument seems to point in the nonconceptualist direction.’’ 23

I would like to thank the two anonymous referees and Prof. Steven Crowell for their valuable opinions.

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