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Phenomenalism tries to understand experience in the form it appears in
consciousness. Existentialism sharpens within this experience questions
of freedom, choice, death, anxiety, futility, responsibility, and authentic
life. The two traditions are not to be confused, but there is a deep
dialogue between them in many twentieth-century thinkers.
34.1 Return to the experience.
Husserl 's famous exhortation to return to the facts does not mean
accepting ordinary experience without examination; rather, it means
putting theoretical presuppositions into brackets and describing how
experience manifests itself. Consciousness is always oriented towards
something, this quality is called intentionality. Observe, remember,
hope, and fear as the consciousness is oriented towards an object, event,
or possibility.
34.2 The World of Life
Scientific abstraction is important, but human experience is not the only
scientific measure. I live first in the world, I walk the streets, I make
connections, I use objects, I speak the language, then I describe the
scientific. The idea of a world of life shows the importance of this
prescient experience. Parallel philosophy sees here the philosophical
significance of folk wisdom, language, and everyday experience without
scientific criterion.
34.3 Heidegger: In the world - will be
It is insufficient to understand human existence from a different brain-
body. I am already inside the world, the tools and relationships, the
history and possibilities. Mortality and timeliness change the meaning of
a person 's existence. But while acknowledging the philosophical
importance of Heidegger, critical discussion of his political history
cannot be suppressed. Ethical review is necessary even if the idea and
life history are separate questions.
34.4 Sartre: Freedom and Responsibility
Sartre 's famous idea that humans first come into existence and then
make meaning out of their choices is read as a declaration of
independence against predestined anthropocentrism. The excuse may be
an attempt to escape one 's freedom through selfishness and immorality.
But parallel philosophies question the freedom of speech. Hunger, caste,
patriarchy, poverty, war, disability, imprisonment and state violence
limit real possibilities.
34.5 The Body and the Experience
Later developments of the phenomenological tradition, particularly
Merlo-Ponty, regard the body as a medium for experiencing the world
and not just objects. I am not just a body. I am a physical being. Sickness,
disability, gender, labour and place change the structure of experience.
Body experience is important to the dignity-based ethics of Parallel
Philosophy.
34.6 The other person
Other people are not just objects of my experience. Its vision is one of
desire and freedom. Love, conflict, shame, belief, and violence are all
created by the presence of other self-consciousnesses. The question of
social justice finds empirical depth here: humiliation is not merely a lack
of resources; it is connected to how one is seen and perceived in the
public world.
34.7 Existentialism and social justice
A criticism of existentialism has been that it is sometimes overly
personal. Parallel philosophy improves on this premise. The advice to
choose is hollow when the person 's real options are closed. Freedom
does not merely require the lifting of legal restrictions; it also requires
education, food, health and safety, social respect, and a minimum level
of political voice.
34.8 Mithila - The Parallel Experience
Regional languages, migration, floods, agriculture, women 's domestic
labour, caste practices, festivals, and folkloric memories make up the
world of these experiences. To place this experience in philosophy is not
to romanticize public life; it is to structure and describe pain, meaning,
and the relationship of being.
34.9 Intentionality: Consciousness is always the consciousness of
something
According to the basic axiom of phenomenology, consciousness is not an
empty vessel; it is always oriented towards something, whether seen or
remembered, feared or imagined. Objects are not found complete in
consciousness at once; their meaning is formed by perception, memory,
and possible further experience.
Intellectualism is not necessarily a denial of the existence of external
things. The question is first how the object manifests itself in experience.
Parallel realism describes the structure of experience while holding that
objects resist our expectations and allow for cross-examination.
34.10 Categorization and description
Phenomenological bracketing is not permanently denying natural
beliefs; it is stopping to question whether things really are for a moment
and see how they are given in experience. These pauses make the hidden
structure of the familiar object appear closer to the body than it does to
the background.
It is disputed whether a complete anachronistic description is possible.
The language and selection already gives the meaning. Therefore,
bracketing should be considered a self-aware discipline rather than an
assertion of absolute fairness. The researcher will compare their vision
to that of the writing and alternative descriptions.
34.11 Heidegger: To be in the world
Humans are not at first isolated, but later on connected to the outside
world. They exist in a world made up of language, tools, and other people
and possibilities, working from scratch. A hammer is generally
understood as a tool for work rather than an object of observation; its
physical properties are apparent when broken.
This analysis shows a preference for behaviour, but does not destroy the
objective study of natural science. The instrumental world and the
scientific description are levels with different purposes. To regard any
one as the whole of reality would produce incompleteness.
34.12 Sartre: Liberty and Misandry
Sartre considers man to be a creature made by his own choosing, without
a predetermined essence. Circumstances give boundaries, but
individuals are responsible for their own interpretation and response to
situations. Misandry is when one avoids responsibility by thinking of
oneself as a mere object or a completely limitless freedom.
Extreme poverty, violence, or being told to choose between social bonds
can lead to victim blaming. Independence is always a matter of position.
Parallelism also measures the actual availability of alternatives, risks,
and institutional constraints while acknowledging individual choices.
34.13 The body and the penis and the other
The body is not just the external object of consciousness. we live the
world through the body. The capabilities of the body, pain, vision and
social meaning form the domain of experience. Social expectations and
roles imposed on the gendered body can lead to negative experiences.
Biological facts and social meanings need to be separated out and
reconnected. It is not right to deny the reality of the body, but it is also
wrong to extract a stable social destiny from the body. Phenomenological
descriptions provide personal experience; broader claims require
multiple experiences and institutional evidence.
Chapter Conclusion
Phenomenalism explains the structure of experience; existentialism
sharpens freedom and responsibility. Parallel philosophies accept the
power of both, but do not see freedom as separate from social conditions.
The individual chooses, but the electoral field is shaped unevenly by
history and power.
Chapter Bibliography
Edmund Husserl — Ideas Pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology.
Martin Heidegger — Being and Time.
Jean-Paul Sartre — Being and Nothingness.
Jean-Paul Sartre — Existentialism Is a Humanism.
Maurice Merleau-Ponty — Phenomenology of Perception.
Simone de Beauvoir — The Ethics of Ambiguity.