Husserl’s Late Concept of Primal PassivityBence Marosan

Budapest, HUNGARY

IntroductionOne of the most important characteristics of phenomenology

after Husserl and in Husserl’s own contemporaries was its anti-Cartesianism, its radical criticism against the traditionalCartesian paradigm; which was based upon the rigid separationof mind and world, of individual mind from each other, andwhich emphasized the completely transparent nature of mind toitself. Anti-Cartesian authors of phenomenological movement(such as Scheler, Patočka and most importantly Heidegger) oftensaw and interpreted Husserl as a characteristic and committedrepresentative of the traditional Cartesian paradigm. Theircriticism against Husserl was meant to be a criticism ofCartesianism at the same time as well.

Many authors of French phenomenology had an explicitlypositive view of Descartes. Sartre admittedly meant hisphilosophy to be a phenomenologically founded Cartesianmetaphysics in the very traditional sense of the word.1 Lévinashad Descartes’ notion of the Idea of Infinity as a point ofdeparture in the elaboration of his own account concerning thetranscendency of the Other. Marion also had an essentiallypositive interpretation concerning the role of Descartes. Butthe sympathy of some authors of French phenomenology must notmislead us; we should not forget the very fact that theseauthors were deeply influenced by Heidegger’s critique ofCartesianism, and they had an essentially transformedinterpretation of Descartes’ main ideas, which they positivelyadopted. The most Cartesian thinker of French phenomenology,Sartre, implicitly had the three most important topics, whichcatalyzed the phenomenological transformation of Cartesianideas in French phenomenology; a transformation which we shouldrather call the blow-up of the Cartesian paradigm. These three

1 Cf. e.g. Dermot Moran, Introduction to Phenomenology, London & New York, Routledge, 2002: 358f.

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fundamental topics in Sartre were: passivity, the corporealnature of subjectivity and the role of the Other. These threetopics were the central, most fundamental themes in the historyof French phenomenology.

In my interpretation the late philosophy of Edmund Husserlcould already be charac-terized as a sort of anti-Cartesianism,as a breaking-off with Descartes, (with adopting and fruitfullytransforming some of Descartes’ basic motifs at the same timetoo). It could be shown that Husserl (in his researchmanuscripts and partly in some of his plans of publication oralready published works) transformed or plainly abandoned themost important elements of Cartesian paradigm, thus rendering amore accurate, more sophisticated account of human subjectivityand of our relation to the world. In this present lecture Iwould only highlight one of these anti-Cartesian motifs inHusserl: Husserl’s late notion of passivity.

The late Husserl, in my opinion, clearly refused the ideathat subjectivity is a completely transparent sphere of being,or that it could make itself completely transparent via self-reflection. In Husserl’ view there is always an opaque,irreflexiv, dark layer in subjectivity, which could never bemade fully transparent. Moreover: the most fundamental layer insubjectivity is something completely passive, which precedesevery activity.

In this present lecture I would like to interpretHusserl’s late account of passivity as an essentially anti-Cartesian theory. This lecture has a negative and a positivepart. In the negative part I would like to mainly criticizeToine Kortooms’s2 account of Husserl’s view on passivity in theC-Manuscripts. According to Kortooms, the passive layer ofconsciousness is something completely dead, automatic,mechanical process. In Kortoom’s interpretation everythingwhich is living is egoic or egological (“ichliche”) in Husserl,and everything which is not egoic, which is egoless (“ichlose”)

2 Toine Kortooms, Phenomenology of Time, Phae 161, 2002: 227-288.2

is something dead. In my view this interpretation is simply notcorrect if we have an accurate, attentive reading of Husserl’sown writings. I would also like to add some critical remarks onKlaus Held’s and on Ichiro Yamaguchi’s view of Husserl’s notionof primal or original passivity, (“Urpassivität”).

According to Held every layer of subjectivity is somehowinfluenced by the activity of ego. For a certain degree thisinterpretation also considers Husserl as a Cartesian thinker:every living (“lebendige”) process must be egoic or egological(“ichliche”).3 Thirdly: in Yamaguchi’s opinion “Husserl doesnot recognize that activity emerges from passivity”.4 In brief:I think Husserl does recognize that. Yamaguchi, in thiscontext, I think, failed to see that Husserl embedded his wholetheory of the foundation of egoic activity by egoless passivityinto his view concerning the onto- and phylogenetic developmentof monadic subjectivity. Passivity and activity are bothrelative terms in regard of the evolvement of the ego, andYamaguchi left out of consideration this very fact.

The positive part of my paper would suggest the followinginterpretation: Husserl’s late concept of passivity could beinterpreted as a radical criticism of the Cartesian view of anentirely transparent, fully active consciousness, in relationof which everything else is dead and mechanic. It is not acorrect consideration of consciousness according to which wecould divide it to two clearly separate layer: to the level ofegoic activity, which is entirely living, and to the levelhyletic flowing which is something completely dead, mechanicand automatic. Instead: there is the one, unified stream ofconsciousness, which is fully living, and which has severalcomponents, each of which founds the other; which componentsare on different level of passivity and activity. In short:according to the late Husserl there is egoic and non-egoic life

3 Klaus Held, Lebendige Gegenwart, Phae 23, 1966: 97ff.4 Ichiro Yamaguchi, „Intermonadic Temporalization in Simultaneous ReciprocalAwakening”, in Dieter Lohmar-Ichiro Yamaguchi, On Time. New Contributions to theHusserlian Phenomenology of Time, Phae 197, 2010: 312.

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or “vitality” (“Lebendigkeit”), on different levels of activityand passivity.

In my interpretation the late Husserl transformed entirelyhis earlier view of the hyle in Ideas I, according to whichhyle is a merely “dead matter”, something which is a purelyinanimate subject of the animating noeses, (Hua 3/1: 196). Thisis certainly not the case in Husserl’s late manuscripts, in the1930s, (in his late B-, C- and E-Manuscripts). The hyle in thelate Husserl became a living entity, something which has itsown life. Every interpretation which do not take this fact intoaccount do not do justice to Husserl’s most important effortsin his late period, according to which “phenomenology isscientific philosophy of life”, (“Der Grundcharakter derPhänomenologie ist wissenschaftliche Lebensphilosophie”, Hua32: 240; from 1927).

The lecture consists of the following parts: I. Thedevelopment of Husserl’s notion of passivity. II. Criticalremarks on Husserl’s account of passivity. III. The structureof primal passivity in the late Husserl. I will consider theproblem of passivity mainly from the view-point of Husserl’snotion of the hyle or sensation-data.

I. Development of Husserl’s notion of passivityHusserl’s concern of passivity could be found as early as

his Philosophy of Arithmetic (Hua 12, 1890). The standard model is:sensations (which are completely passive moments ofconsciousness) are animated by the apprehensive acts(Auffassung) of the mind, (op. cit. 204ff., 211, 216, etc.).The intentional act consists of unanimated sensations andanimating apprehensions, as (inanimate, dead) matter and(living) interpretative, apprehensive acts. This view issystematically elaborated in Logical Investigation (1900/1901), asits standard view-point concerning the relationship betweensensation and apprehension. In his 1907 summer semesterlectures “Thing and Space” (“Ding und Raum”, Hua 16) Husserlcarried out detailed analyses about the synthesis of thing and

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space through synthesis of sensations, which latter he callsthere “hyle”. The “Thing and Space” lectures are Husserl’sfirst detailed investi-gations concerning the concrete modesand ways of hyletic syntheses. In his Ideas I (1913) Husserldistinguishes between three levels of phenomenologicalanalysis: hyletic, noetic and noemetic. In Ideas I Husserlsays: “The stream of phenomenological being has a stuff-stratum and a noeticstartum” and adds: “The incomparably more important and richeranalyses are found on the side of the noetic”, (Hua 3/1: 196).The hyle in Ideas is something completely inactive, dead,passive, which only had there and then a subordinated role.

This is the standing-point of the static phenomenology. Thisinterpretation of hyle began to change only when Husserl startsto elaborate his so-called genetic phenomenology, from about1916. The static phenomenology considers only already formed,articulated, finished objects. The genetic phenomenologyresearches the a priori structures of temporal formation ofobjects. The proper field of genetic phenomenology is a priori,transcendental genesis. This way of approach could disclose thepeculiar life of hyle in the depths of subjectivity. One couldfind the first systematic elaboration of genetic phenomenologyin the so-called Bernau Manuscripts, (Hua 33, L-Manuscripts).Husserl clearly separates in these investigations (in theBernau Manuscripts) the egoic and the egoless layer ofconsciousness, (Hua 33: texts Nr. 14 and 15). However the hylehere is not something entirely passive and dead: it draws toitself the attention of the ego. The hyle affects the ego, ithas an affective power on the ego, due to which it could drawthe attention of the I to itself. Affectivity is the hyle’speculiar power or capacity to affect the ego, (or, just theother way round, the ego’s capacity of being affected by thehyle).

Husserl elaborates in a systematic way his ideasconcerning the peculiar life of hyle mainly in the lectures of

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the 1920s concerning genetic logic.5 In the analyses ofconcerning passive synthesis of this period the particularmodes and ways of hyletic syntheses motivates the modes andways of formation of sense (Sinnbildung). The concreteprocesses of hyletic geneses (via different modes ofassociation) forms the latitude or frames of noetic andnoematic formations. In Husserl’s genetic phenomenology thehyle ceased to be a merely passive, dead stuff and becamesomething preeminently living, something which has an utmostimportance in regard of understanding of higher layers andprocesses of subjectivity.

In the 1930s Husserl made even more radical efforts tounfold the deepest layers, the ultimate components ofsubjectivity. On the one hand this was a methodologicalquestion, to dismantle the higher layers of subjectivity, inorder to reach the core of the living present (“lebendigeGegenwart”). This methodological way aimed to unfold thestructure of the fully developed, matured, actual subjectivity.On the other hand it was a question of genetic pheno-menology,which sought to reconstruct the state of the early childhood(“Urkindheit”) in a phenomenological way. In this late periodHusserl embedded his account of primal passivity into histheory of the phenomenology of the instincts. The deepest hyleticsyntheses in the flow of primal passivity were directed andgoverned by the transcendental instinct of the consciousness,(Hua Mab 8: 260). 6

II. Critical Remarks on Husserl’s Account of Passivity

5 Amongst others: 1919/20, “Genetische Logik”, 1920/21, “Logik”, 1923,“Ausgewählte Phänomenologische Probleme”, 1925/1926, “Grundprobleme derLogik”. Published mainly in Hua 11 and 30, pieces from these texts wereincorporated by Ludwig Landgrebe into Experience and Judgment.6 The methodological considerations of the problem could be mainly found inthe late B-Manuscripts, and partly in C-Manuscripts. These considerationsconcern the problem of phenomenological reduction, the reduction to theoriginal present (“urtümliche Gegenwart”). The genetic phenomenologicalapproach could be found in the relevant analyses of C-Manuscripts, and thetreatment of problem in the context of the phenomenology of instincts couldbe found partly in C-Manuscripts and partly in E-Manuscripts.

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I would like to treat in this section three partlycritical assessment of Husserl’s late notion of passivity:assessments by Klaus Held, Toine Kortooms and Ichiro Yamaguchi.I think that Held’s and Yamaguchi’s reading of Husserl isbasically correct. Concerning them I would like only to offersome different possible ways of interpretation, based entirelyon Husserl’s late investigations of passivity. I would like tooffer such an interpretation which emphasizes the anti-Cartesian motifs in Husserl’s late philosophy. I mainly have adebate with Kortooms, who, I think, renders such an explanationof Husserl’s C-Manuscripts, which I consider to be dangerouslymisleading at certain points.

A. I would like to emphasize that Kortooms’ monograph onHusserl’s philosophy of time has enormous, invaluable merits.7

Notwithstanding I also think that there are seriouslyproblematic considerations in his book also. The main points ofKortooms’ interpretations are the followings. 1) Though Husserlearlier (in the 1920s)8 believed in a two-layered model ofintentionality, according to which there is a passiveintentionality as a foundation for every active intentionalact, he abandoned this conception later (in the 1930s, in theC-Manuscripts), and taught that there is only oneintentionality, namely the egoic and active intentional act.Kortooms first of all refers to manuscript C17 as a clearevidence for this interpretation, (published in Hua 34: 179-184, text Nr. 10). This is one of Kortooms’ most importanttheses, which he emphasizes and repeats over and over again inhis book.9 2) Moreover: Husserl represented a so-to-sayvertical (or multilayered) model of time-consciousness inBernau (or L-)Manuscripts. This means: in L-Manuscripts thereare three layers of consciousness, each of which founds the

7 Especially in unfolding the historical roots and the details ofdevelopment of Husserl’s theory of time, and analyzing the specific modelsof time-consciousness that could be found in Husserl’s manuscriptsconcerning the problem of time.8 Mostly in the writings of Hua 11.9 Kortooms, 2002: xviii f., 39, 211, 235-288.

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other:10 a) external transcendent time with transcendentobjects, b) internal immanent time, with immanent objects (thatis to say: with the acts of consciousness), c) originallyconstituting process (Urprozeß). According to Kortooms Husserlchanged this view in his late period, in the C-Manuscripts, fora horizontal model of time and temporalization. There are noseveral layers, each of which founds the other, there is only ahorizontal flowing of time: a dialogue between the egoic andthe non-egoic, two mutually connected processes of passivematerial-hyletic temporalization and active egoictemporalization.11 3) Thirdly the material, hyletictemporalization is something non-intentional, somethingcompletely dead, passive, automatic, and mechanical process.The egoic temporalization is living, active, non-mechanical,non-automatic, etc process.12

As a matter of fact I consider the debate concerningpassive intentionality in Husserl as a rather terminologicalquestion. We could define intentionality as a merely activeego-act of the consciousness, if we like. Husserl always spokeabout that intentionality has some non-intentional components.Whether we define the substructure of active intentionality interms of (passive) intentionality, as something which has thecharacter of intentionality itself too, or not – it’s rather aquestion of point of view. Husserl was not very consistent inthis question either. The very question is whether thesubintentional components of active intentionality aresomething living or not. The very question is whether thehyletic layer has its own life or not. Kortooms denies that,and in this way – in my opinion – he tries to “read back” thelate Husserl into the Cartesian paradigm, which I consider tobe fundamentally false in this particular context. 10 Just as in the first period of Husserl’s philosophy of time, so in his“Lectures on Phenomenology of Internal Time-Consciousness”, between 1904-1917, Hua 10. According to which: a) objective time, b) subjective time, c)internal time-consciousness. 11 Kortooms, 2002: xviii f., 235-288.12 Op. cit, 213, 218, 232, 246. Sometimes he adds: „more or lessmechanical”, (op. cit. 218).

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What is important in Husserl’s late account ofintentionality (in this context) is the fact, that Husserlinterprets intentionality as an essentially teleologicalstructure. In Husserl’s view the subjectivity (andintersubjectivity) is made up of different level ofteleological structures, each of which founds and alsogenerates13 the other. If we want to keep the term“intentionality” for active intentionality, for the level ofactive consciousness, we could do it; but we should also keepit in mind that the processes of lower levels of consciousnesshave the directedness of their own. Husserl’s theory ofintentionality is embedded his more general theory of universalteleology of consciousness, and it is perhaps the mostimportant point concerning this question.

I shall argue for my thesis that the hyletic layer has itsown, peculiar life in Husserl’s late account of subjectivity inthe third (last) section of this lecture. As for the secondpoint, whether Husserl changed the vertical (multilayered)model of time-consciousness of L-Manuscripts for a horizontalmodel in the C-Manuscripts, I think that this interpretation isalso very problematic in Kortooms. Most of the relevant textsin archiving group C show the three fundamental layers ofconsciousness, such three-level model of consciousness that onecould find in Husserl’s first and second period ofinvestigations concerning the nature of time. The three layersin C-Manuscripts: a) the pre-temporal (vorzeitliche) flow ofexperiences, b) the flow of hyletic unities and acts in theimmanent time, c) the objective time of world (Weltzeit). Thisthree-layer model is a very clear tendency in Husserl’s latewritings on the structure of time-consciousness.14

13 The more fundamental teleological structure generates the teleology ofthe higher level. Versus Yamaguchi, who thinks that Husserl did not realizethe emergence of activity from passivity. Yamaguchi, 2010: 312.14 Cf. e.g. John Brough, „Notes on the Absolute Time-Constituting Flow ofConsciousness”, in Yamaguchi-Lohmar, 2010: 21-49. Inga Römer, Das Zeitdenkenbei Husserl, Heidegger und Ricoeur, Phae 196, 2010: 86-112.

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Moreover I think that Kortooms is not even entirelyconsistent in representing his own interpretation. On the onehand he separates rigidly the passive, “automatic”,“mechanical”, non-intentional domain of consciousness. He saysthat there is nothing intentional in this domain. Not evenintentionality of instinct.15 This domain is completely non-intentional in every respect.16 On the other hand he speaks inlong details about the primal associative (“urassoziative”)syntheses which take place in this non-egoic domain of hyleticpassivity.17 He says that we could call these primal ororiginally associative syntheses in the hyletic domain“operative intetionality”, in the manner Merleau-Pontyinterpreted in his philosophy Husserl’s term of operativeintentionality (“fungierende Intentionalität”).18 But if wecall the associative syntheses of the hyle in any sense, anymanner “intentional”, how could we assert in the same time thatthe hyletic domain is not intentional in any sense of the word?

B. Klaus Held analyzed in great details the problem oforiginal or primal passivity in Husserl, and in certain mainpoints I would like to follow his interpretation.19 Heldreflects on Husserl’s hesitation concerning the two layers ofintentionality in C17, (so that manuscript upon which Kortoomessentially bases his argumentation). But Held also emphasizesthat Husserl in the end does not reject the thought of pre-being, pre-temporalization, pre-ego pre-intentionality whichprecedes and founds every active achievement of the ego.20 Heldhighlights that Husserl realized the fact that if everyintentionality and temporalization is an active, reflexiveachievement of the ego then this conception would necessarilylead to an infinite regress.21 According to Held the lateHusserl chose the following solution to avoid this danger of15 Kortoom, 2002: 288.16 Op. cit. 287f.17 Op. cit. 271-281. Especially: 277f.18 Op. cit. 278f. also: xviii f.19 Mainly: Held, 1966: 94-122, especially: 97-112.20 Held. Op. cit. 102ff.21 Op. cit. 102.

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infinite regress in temporalization: the primal ego (Ur-Ich)performs the pre-temporalization of the original flowing, in apre-temporal (“vorzeitliche”), pre-immanent, pre-ontic, pre-intentional, etc. way. Husserl’s ultimate solution, in Held’sreading, is the model of pre-reflective syntheses in originalflowing (urtümliche Strömen, Urströmen).22 I can fully agreewith this solution with only one restraint, which I think Heldmissed to add: these pre-reflective syntheses are not fullyegoic or egological acts or pre-active performances, butinstead they are motivated by the inner, inherent life of thehyle, of hyletic processes.

C. Ichiro Yamaguchi criticizes Kortooms’ account ofpassivity in his study published in 2010.23 According toYamaguchi Kortooms’ rejection of the notion of passiveintentio-nality is based upon an improper characterization ofintentionality as such.24 In Yamaguchi’s view there is passiveand active, egoic and egoless or non-egoic intentionality too.The whole consciousness is made up of different layers andlevels of intentionality. The components and processes of thelower levels of intentionality (such as retentional,associative processes) have definitely intentionalcharacteristics. Retentionality, in the end, is a form ofassociation or associative synthesis, (Hua 11: 176).25

Association has the fundamental feature of non-egoic, purelypassive intentionality.

Yamaguchi criticizes Husserl’s own notion ofintentionality and Husserl’s account of the relationshipbetween activity and passivity. According to Yamaguchi inHusserl passive intentionality founds the active intentionalacts, and passivity founds the activity in general. Husserldoes not say, says Yamaguchi, that the higher level ofintentionality emerges from the lower level; Husserl fails to22 Op. cit. 104ff.23 Yamaguchi, „Intermonadic Temporalization in Simultaneous Reciprocal Awakening”, in Lohmar-Yamaguchi, 2010: 295-317.24 Op. cit. 304.25 Cf. also: Yamaguchi, op. cit. 303-306.

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see, Yamaguchi thinks, that activity emerges from passivity.26

However I think that Yamaguchi’s criticism misses the verypoint in Husserl: namely that Husserl embeds his theory ofintentionality into his wider theory concerning universal teleology.The most general framework of Husserl’s phenomenologicalphilosophy is his theory of universal teleology. The concreteevents in the stream of consciousness, as well as the wholeindividual history of one’s life, as well as the entire historyof mankind and of biosphere are governed by different levelsand structures of teleology. In the end: every intentional actis nothing else than a teleological process. In this universalteleology the more primitive structure not only founds the moredeveloped one, but the more developed teleological structuresare in fact emerges from the more primitive ones. Without thisthought nobody could understand the core of Husserl’s theory ofthe individual and collective evolution of monads.

Universal teleology in the late Husserl was a continuousevolution of monadological subjectivity, in which the universalframework contained the most primitive and most complexteleological structures and levels as potentialities and asmotors of concrete subjective life. The actualization andfulfillment of one structural level automatically activates andgenerates the next, more complex level. The more complex levelsand structures of teleology are generated by the more primitiveones; the more complex levels in a way emerge from the moreprimitive ones. This teleologically governed monadologicaldevelopment and evolution is a kind of play between continuityand discontinuity. It is the case in Husserl’s late C- and E-Manuscripts, as well as in his relatively early B II 2 (1908)manuscript.

D. Both Held and Yamaguchi warn that the idea thattemporalization is an entirely, exclusively active, egological,moreover reflective achievement, leads to infinite regress inthe explanation of subjectivity. Husserl realized that danger

26 Op. cit. 311f.12

in his additional notes to C17 himself too, (cf. Hua 34: 184,Zusatz von 1932), and also in elsewhere.

My critical remarks concerning Held’s and Yamaguchi’saccount of primal passivity are based on the fact that Held, inmy view, does not emphasize enough the autonomous, independent,non-egologic life of the hyle, and – on the other hand –Yamaguchi, if I don’t misunderstand him, does not realize theintimate, inherent connection between intentionality andteleology in Husserl, in such a way that intentionality fitsinto the overall framework of Husserl’s theory of universalteleology.

III. Husserl’s Late Conception of Primal PassivityA. The interesting fact is that those interpretations

which emphasize the Cartesian motifs in Husserl’s late (andearlier) philosophy have their own relevant textual basis inthe Nachlaß. These texts and text places could not be left outof consideration; they demand an adequate and properinterpretation. The Cartesian motifs in question could be foundin the late Husserl, and any honest reading must emphasizethem. However I would also like to stress that there are alsosome very strong anti-Cartesian moments in Husserl’sphilosophy, which could not be avoided either, and I would likearticulate such a model of subjectivity which is based uponthese motifs and textual places in Husserl.

The answer (whether the late Husserl was a Cartesian, orhe said “farewell to Cartesianism” as Landgrebe,27 and even thelate Heidegger28 stated that) partly could be found in thenature of Husserl’s way of thinking and writing, that is tosay: in the nature of his so-called “research manuscripts”. Thefact is that Husserl did not have firmly articulated, finishedand cleared-up theories and standing-points in thosemanuscripts. He was thinking in writing. He tried out several

27 Ludwig Landgrebe, „Husserls Abschied von Cartesianismus”, in PhilosophischeRundschau 9/2-3 (1962): 133-177.28 Heidegger, Zollikoner Seminare, GA89: 187.

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ways and possibilities in his writings; he performed thought-experiments in those materials. One could find radicallydifferent ways to approach and solve the same problem. There isa wide range to reconstruct drastically different view-pointson strictly textual basis, if we stick to only the materialsthat could be found in the Husserlian Nachlaß. Notwithstandingthere are clearly distinguishable trends, very strong generaltendencies in those manuscripts also. In my opinion, if we areto reconstruct Husserl’s opinion in different philosophicalquestions, leaning mainly on the writings and fragments of theresearch manuscripts, first and foremost we must trace, unfold,fix and follow these general tendencies. In brief: in myopinion we rather ought not to base a general interpretation ofHusserl’s philosophy upon isolated textual places, or texts ofa very limited number.

B. The overall picture concerning Husserl’s latephilosophy of passivity is quite interesting: between 1929 andearly 1932 the general tendency is very clear: there is a pre-reflective region of original, primordial or primal passivity,which is a region of pre-ontic, pre-immanent, pre-reflective,pre-temporal, pre-affective, pre-egoic (etc.) pre-entities, thedomain of the primal or original hyle (Urhyle), which has itsown life. Husserl sometimes characterizes this region with theterm passive intentionality.29 It is a term to denote thepassive aspect of intentionality as well as to denote thepassively intentional feature of this domain. Passiveintentionality sometimes also appears in Husserl as “pre-intentionality” (which is by its very nature somethingpassive), to express such a level of subjectivity which onlyfounds and prepares the emergence of active intentionality,which could be characterized with a “pre”-structure, but whichshows already the feature of intentionality.30 This passive29 Cf. Hua Mab 8: 112, (Text Nr. 24, C 6/6, August, 1930.), 202f (Text Nr.49, C10, September, 1931), passive Ur-Intentionalität, op. cit. 335 (TextNr. 74, C16, 5. March, 1932 ), assoziative Intentionalität, op. cit. 400,(Text Nr. 90, C17, December, 1930). Hua 34: 179-181, (Text Nr. 10. C17,Summer, 1930). Hua 15: 184 (Beilage 10, C11, July or August, 1934).30 Vor-Intentionalität, Hua 34: 180, Hua 42: 127 (1934!).

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intentionality, or this passive substructure, underground layerof subjectivity articulates and organizes its processes, itsown life in its own, autonomous, independent way.

The general model in this period: from this original, pre-immanent, pre-reflective, pre-immanent sphere emerges theeminent form of time. Time derives from the play of original,primal ego (Ur-Ich) and primal hyle (Ur-hyle) in the pre-reflective sphere. The primal ego turns with an instinctive,primordially kinesthetic (Urkinästhese) movement towards theprimal hyle, which draws to itself the attention of the primalego, (Hua Mab 8: 225f). The constitution of the primal hyleticunities and the eminent, proper form of time is performedthrough the achievement of the instinct- (or instinctive)intentionality.

The situation is even more complicated than this, becausewe have to make a difference – as Nam-In Lee and ShigeruTaguchi correctly warned to that31 – between genetic andmethodological foundation. The primal ego (Ur-Ich) isfundamentally a methodological foundation,32 a pre-reflective,ultimately concrete, final function-centre, into which allegoic and egological moments and structures are integrated. Theprimal ego already contains all moments, events, structures ofthe entire history of the person in question. The reduction tothe living present, the methodological, “archeological”dismantling of the concrete, reflective, present moment, of theactual, fully developed subjectivity leads back to this pre-reflective, but fully developed, fully concrete function-centre. The genetic foundation is the pre-ego (Vor-Ich) or theinstinct-ego, the ultimately passive ego, the affective ego,the egological layer and centre of instinct-acts, of entirelypassive events in the subjective life. On its own turn theprimal ego (Ur-Ich) functions passively and actively also,which is really important in regard of the fact that it is a

31 Nam-In Lee, Edmund Husserls Phänomenologie der Instinkte, Phae 128, 1993: 214ff,Shigeru Taguchi, Das Problem des Ur-Ich bei Edmund Husserl, Phae 178, 2006: 116-122.32 Lee, ibid., Taguchi, ibid.

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dark, opaque, pre-reflective, but concrete aspect ofsubjectivity.

The genetic phenomenology could work in two ways. We couldeither reconstruct the original state of the entire developmentof the ego (thus we could so to say “excavate” the very earlystage of childhood or infancy, a stage which was called byHusserl “primal childhood”, “Urkind”, Hua Mab 8: 104, Hua 15:184, 583, 608), or we could attempt to unfold the geneticfoundations of the actual, fully developed subjectivity, thepre-ego or instinct ego of our present, matured stage (which –on its own turn – has all the structural development on whichwe went through during our entire individual history of life,since our early infancy, moreover: since we were awakened as asubject in the womb of our mother). The reconstruction ofprimal childhood (Urkindheit, Urkindlichkeit) presupposes thegenetic disclosing of the pre-ego or instinct-ego of ouractual, present subjectivity.

In brief: in this period (C- and B-Manuscripts between1929 and 1932) there is a pre-reflective primal sphere ofpassivity. In this sphere there is a completely instinctivemovement of the primal ego, as function-centre, towards theprimal hyle. The primal hyle is also some-thing entirely pre-reflective, and it is before every noeses, every interpretationor apprehend-sion. The primal hyle precedes the noetic-noematiccorrelation. The most original, the most primordial relation inthis context is the correlation between the primal ego and theprimal hyle. The affection of primal hyle to primal ego, or theaffectedness of primal ego by primal hyle is called either pre-affection or primal affection. The first, pre-reflectiveaffectedness of primal ego by primal hyle is the primalaffectivity or pre-affectivity (Uraffektivität,Voraffektivität) of the ego. In my interpretation in thiscontext (in the context of the genetic primal sphere ofpassivity) these two terms – primal affectivity and pre-affectivity – refers to the same phenomenon. Both refer to theoriginal affectedness of the primal ego by the primal hyle. The

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fundamental thesis of genetic phenomenology is that everyactivity presupposes passivity and is based upon and founded bypassivity.33 The activity of ego, every egological performanceis founded and prepared by the peculiar life of the hyle. Itensures the latitude for activity. The primal ego’s turningtoward the primal hyle is an instinctive movement which iscalled primal kinesthesia, (Hua Mab 8: 225f). The instinctivemovements of the primal ego in relation of the primal hyle aregoverned by primal instincts, by instinctive intentionality,(Instinktintentionalität, instinktive Intentionalität,Triebintentionalität).

Husserl emphasizes that the term “instinct” inphenomenological context should not to be taken in anypsychological, biological or naturalistic meaning of the word.This term refers only the teleologically governed, “blind”,unreflected striving of the ego, a merely instinctive“overreach” (“übegreifen”, “Mehrmeinung”) towards somethingabsent; to the instinctive tendencies in the perception, whichmake the latter to mean the absent, that which cannot beimmediately seen (“Trieb der Wahrnehmung”,“Triebintentionalität der Wahrnehmung”, “Wahrnehmungstrieb”).34

In this primordial sphere the primitive hyletic unities aresynthesized by the processes of primal association(Urassoziation) into more concrete, more articulated hyleticobjects. The processes of primal association are forms ofmanifestation of the universal instinctive teleology. Theprimal association is a completely passive (but not automatic!)process also. So: the complete structure of primal passivity inlate Husserl is the following: egological aspect: primal ego(functions completely instinctively), objective side: primalhyle. Relation between primal ego and primal hyle: primalassociation, primal or original affection (also: pre-affection), instinctive intentionality. This relationrepresents the “dialogue” of primal ego and primal hyle.33 Cf. Yamaguchi, 2010: 310.34 Cf. Lee, 1993: 89f, 109f. The instinct of perception is already a higherform of instinct, an objectivating instinct.

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The actions of the ego in a certain regard are alwaysreactions, in that sense that these actions are founded by theprocesses of primal hyle. In what regard and in what mannerfound the hyletic processes the higher level activity of theego? These processes motivate the sense-giving and practicalactivities of the subject. The instinctive, primordiallyassociative (urassoziative), passively living fusions of theprimal hyle founds and articulates the latitude for everyegological activities, whether they are purely perceptional,sense-bestowing or sense-giving achievements, or even higherlevel practical and theoretical performances.

Husserl in this later period transformed entirely theearlier notion of hyle which could be found in Ideas I. InIdeas I the hyle is something completely dead “stuff”. In the1930s (and one could trace back the roots of thistransformation till the time of Bernau Manuscripts, in 1917/18)the hyle forms an autonomous sphere, which has its own life andmotivates every sense-giving acts and egological performances.Moreover: in the manuscripts of the 1930s the primal hyle isthe entity (more precisely: pre-entitiy) which connects us withthe world, which makes up the original core of world-experience.

C. My main disagreement with Kortooms is that he foundsthe core of his arguments (concerning the entirely mechanical,automatic, “dead” nature) almost exclusively on the trains ofthought that could be found in dossier C17. As I mentionedbefore: it is not a very fortunate procedure to build up ageneral interpretation on only one (or a few) textual places.It is the place where Husserls wrote: “After laterinvestigations (in 1932) I changed my mind, and now I thinkthat there is no two sorts of intentionality35 in the propersense of the word, and thus there is no pre-temporalization inthe proper sense either. The only real temporalization […] is

35 Namely: passive and active intentionality, so there is only active intentionality. – BPM.

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that of the transcendental-phenomenologizing ego’s”, (Hua 34:181).

But Held already warns us in 1963 [1966], that Husserlrealizes the danger of infinite regress if one attributes everytemporalization and every ontification to the active,reflective performances of the ego; as Husserl did in the abovecited manuscript.36 Husserl himself became uncertain concerningthe correctness of the alteration of his former understandingof passive intentionality and passivity in general. “In regardof description of the flow we have the problem of pre-intentionality and pre-temporalization as self-temporalizationof the standing flow to the proper flow of experiences”, (Hua34: 182) he says on the next page in the very same manuscript.The former statement expressed a very limited point of view ofthe self-reflective phenomenologizing ego. The radicalizationof the reflection to the primal flow (Urströmen) discloses thefact that the original sphere of subjectivity cannot beexplained in terms of active egological (moreover: reflective!)performances. Held shows us that in a very clear way: the pre-reflective syntheses of primal passivity found every higherlevel egological activity and performances.37

But it is also true that we could observe some stronglyidealistic tendency in this period. Kortooms is absolutelyright to emphasize it. I think the emergence and intensifyingof these tendencies could be attributed to the influence ofEugen Fink; who was an assistant of Husserl since August, 1928till the end of Husserl’s life. Fink had a strong sympathytowards the classical German Idealism, especially with lateGerman Idealism, and tried implant some affinity toward GermanIdealism in Husserl. For a certain degree he was successful.Some of Husserl’s students and followers (such as Edith Stein,Jan Patočka and Emmanuel Lévinas) tried to warn Husserl to theinfluence of Fink. These thinkers tried to caution Husserlagainst these foreign motifs Fink attempted to plant into the

36 Held, 1966: 102ff.37 Held, pp. cit. 104ff.

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philosophy of his master. Husserl harshly rejected thesewarnings and declared his entire confidence and loyalty inFink; and he expressed that he absolutely agrees with everysingle word and statement of his assistant.38

In my interpretation the cooperation of Husserl and Finkwas in certain respect definitely fruitful, and Fink in facthelped to Husserl to solve some problems with which Husserlearlier was not able to get along. Fink’s idealistic sympathiesinfluenced Husserl in real. In some of Husserl’s manuscripts inthis period the transcendental-phenomenologizing ego that had acentral role in Fink’s Sixth Cartesian Meditation, got into thecentre of Husserl’s investigations. That was the case in theabove analyzed C17 folder from 1932. In my opinion howeverHusserl could keep the general autonomy of his thinking. Hecould emancipate himself from the influence of Fink, when itwas really important. In my reading the non-idealistic,realistic tendencies in Husserl’s late investigationsconcerning passivity were prevalent and decisive.

It was the case also in the last relevant groups of C-Manuscripts (and also in E-Manuscripts, concerningmonadological subjectivity and instinct-intentionality) between1933 and 1935. The realistic and functional interpretation ofthe hyle and passivity was dominant in these late writings.39

Husserl embedded his theory of the hyletic life in themonadological intersubjective constitution of the world. Thethought of intersubjective, monadic constitution was present inHusserl as a central motive in earlier writings also (since1908). But the connection between hyletic and monadicconstitution became even more emphatic in the late Husserl;especially in late writings concerning world-constitution.

The hyletic constitution is integrated into the universalmonadological constitution of the world. The instinctive

38 Vorwort zu Finks “Die phänomenologische Philosophie Edmund Husserls inder gegenwärtigen Kritik”, in Kant Studien, 1933. Cf. also: BW 7: 89.39 Hua Mab 8: texts Nr. 60 and 62 (C13), Hua 15: texts Nr. 34 (EIII5) and 38(C1), Hua 42: text Nr. 8 (EIII9).

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associative syntheses of the primal hyle represent the mostprimitive, the lowest layer in the self- and world-constitutingprocess of the monadic subjectivity. The syntheses of theprimal hyle found every more complicated synthesis on thehigher levels of phenomenological monadology. The primordialsphere of the primal ego with its primordially passive(urpassive) syntheses represents the lowest level of universalmonadology, of monadological subjectivity as such. Thus securesthe late Husserl the overall systematic coherency of his theoryof monadological self- and world-constitution through theprimal passivity of consciousness.

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