Phenomenological method and Mach's conception of the psyche

Abstract

This article takes as its starting point Husserl's claim that he found his phenomenological method in the German Naturforscher of the 19th century (Mach, Hering). I examine in detail the nature of Mach's "physical" phenomenology, and identify possible points of rapprochement and divergence with Husserlian phenomenology. I show that it serves a very specific purpose, and cannot be understood as a general prerequisite for other sciences (notably psychology). It is not a theory of elements, contrary to what some commentators have claimed. Machian psychology cannot be descriptive or phenomenological, because its object (consciousness and its acts) is always conceived as a "piece" or "part" of nature. Machian psychology is physiological. While Husserl is right to see in it a form of naturalization of the mind, I nevertheless defend the idea that it is a soft or moderate naturalism: a non-reductionist physicalism that allows for the specificity of the mind.