Alexei Krioukov

It was not until German Idealism that philosophy briefly regained the importance it had in antiquity. This is indicated precisely by the “peripeteia” in the concept of experience. When Kant and Hegel write about experience, they mean quite different things on the other. Kant’s concept of experience is law-like, invariant and rigid. Only for this reason can it form the basis for a critical reflection on the validity of knowledge. However, Hegel’s analysis of object experience “dynamises” Kant’s concept in various ways: firstly, he provides an interpretation of the process of how perception and its contents ultimately become the “play of forces” via the life of things. Secondly, Hegel works out the self-referentiality of the subject in this process of experience. Finally, Hegel shows how the experience of objects refers beyond itself to more complex forms of knowledge. In the chapter “Power and Understanding” of his Phenomenology of Spirit he undertakes a subtle differentiation of what Kant calls “objective cognition” and shows, on the one hand, which process is already necessary in order to grasp a thing even sensually. On the other hand, he analyses the different levels of experience that are already involved in the simple process of perception. The authors analyse this process as a silent dialogue between Kant and Hegel and show why Hegel’s concept of experience can claim to contribute more to the understanding of man than Kant’s.

This study aims, first, to delimit the seemingly synonymous concepts of “phenomenon” and “appearance” and second, to trace the functions of each in Kant’s philosophy and the phenomenological tradition. The analy­sis is based on Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason and the central works of Edmund Husserl and Eugen Fink. Kant does not explicitly distinguish the two terms and only speaks about phenomena when he deals with the categorial application of reason. With Husserl, appearance is linked with the area of the natural attitude while the phenomenon is absolute. Fink’s position is interesting in that it differs from the views of the main representatives of transcendental philosophy, Kant and Husserl. According to Fink, appearing is the foundation of the fact that what exists is and that appearing is being. Fink takes a different approach to the meanings of appearance as opposing the thing in itself which possesses true but unknowable being and appearance as taking place in the “relative” sphere of the natural attitude : with Fink, appearance turns out to be the condition of the existence of objects. Appearance, understood through the prism of the human being which perceives something as Vorschein, implies an inherently open world. Following Fink, I analyse these provisions and examine, first, light as the metaphysical source of cognition, second, the human being as a special kind of being, third, the pre-Socratic treatment of being and, fourth, the formation of a distinct phenomenological idiom. I come to the conclusion that the metaphysical-ontological method of phenomenological analysis of appearance proposed by Fink affords a new insight into the a priori principle and the nature of Kant’s “thing in itself” and proposes a new grounding of Husserl’s thesis which questions Kant’s agnosticism.

Alexei Krioukovs Studie widmet sich einem der sowohl interessantesten als auch in theoretischer Hinsicht schwierigsten Themen der zeitgenossischen Philosophie: dem Problem der Intersubjektivität. In praktischem Sinn handelt es sich dabei um die Beziehung zwischen Menschen (Subjekten). Was alltäglich nicht zu beweisen ist, bildet auf theoretischer Ebene ein grundsätzliches Problem: Wer sind die Subjekte der Intersubjektivität? Auf welche Weise, mit welchem Recht und mit welcher Methode kann man einen Bezug zwischen diesen Subjekten rechtfertigen? Alexei Krioukov geht detailliert auf diese Fragen ein und diskutiert sie ausführlich anhand der Theorien von Husserl und Sartre.

A genesis of the ideas concerning Husserl’s concepts of time and reflective structure of consciousness is analysed in this article. There will be taken into account in the article three main texts: ”Vorlesungenzur Phanomenologie des inneren Zeitbewusstseins”, ”Bernauer Manuskripte” and ”C-Manuskripte”. Next topics will be discussed: reflexive structure of consciousness as genetic problem, Ego as an emanate cen-ter of time construction, possibility of the achievement of hyletical, non-reflexive consciousness structure.