The Austro-German philosopher Edmund Husserl (born in Proßnitz, today Prostějov in 1859, died in Freiburg in 1938) remains one of the most influential philosophers of our time. He is considered the founder of phenomenology, which became one of the most significant origins of what has come to be called ‘continental philosophy’.
An astonishingly diverse range of philosophers have been directly influenced by Husserl’s works. The phenomenological method continues to be one of the richest methodological resources for philosophical thinking and scientific research, also in interdisciplinary settings and in other sciences but philosophy, such as psychology, cognitive science, sociology, etc. At its heart lies the insight that a proper understanding of the lifeworld, including a proper understanding of the objects and methods of scientific research, requires an analysis of how matters are constituted as what they are (as objects, subjects, events, significations, etc.) in correlations of object experiences (Erfahrungen) as well as lived experiences (Erlebnisse). This analysis requires a systematic description of the general structures of those correlations understood by Husserl as structures of intentionality, or consciousness.
Here at KU Leuven we have been working on a project to organize, digitize and transcribe Husserl’s achive, and we are happy to announce that digitalHusserl is now online!