Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2006
Abstract
Plotinus’ doctrine that intelligible reality is in and thus one with intellect bears close affinities to certain features of Husserlian phenomenology. For Husserl, consciousness is the immediate apprehension of being, and being is immediately given to consciousness. Within this unity, we find a “seeing” and a “seen,” an intentional grasp and that which is grasped. Thus there is neither mere identity nor extrinsic duality, but an irreducible polarity or togetherness of consciousness and being. For Plotinus, intellect, as the thinking of being, possesses being, and being is in intellect, as that of which it is the thinking. Therefore, intellect and being are one. Otherwise, what intellect knows would be images of being rather than being itself, which would leave being itself unknowable. Hence being must be given to intellect as its content. Intellect and being coincide, or are together, as two moments of a single reality. Since intellect is paradigmatic consciousness, this togetherness obtains, in diminishing degrees, for all levels of consciousness. The subjectobject dualism which both Plotinus and Husserl oppose is one aspect of the modern, nihilistic alienation between consciousness and being. A recovery of Plotinus’ insight, in phenomenological terms, can therefore make a fruitful contribution to contemporary philosophy.
Original Publication Citation
Perl, E. (2007). The Togetherness of Thought and Being: A Phenomenological Reading of Plotinus? Doctrine ?That the Intelligibles Are Not Outside the Intellect? Proceedings of the Boston Area Colloquium of Ancient Philosophy, 22(1), 1–40. https://doi.org/10.1163/22134417-90000079
Digital Commons @ LMU & LLS Citation
Perl, Eric, "The Togetherness of Thought and Being: A Phenomenological Reading of Plotinus’ Doctrine ‘That the Intelligibles Are Not outside the Intellect" (2006). Philosophy Faculty Works. 257.
https://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/phil_fac/257
