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This volume presents, for the first time in English, Husserl's seminal 1923/24 lecture course First Philosophy (Erste Philosophie) together with a selection of material from the famous research manuscripts of the same time period.  The lecture course is divided into two systematic, yet interrelated parts ("Critical History of Ideas" and "Theory of the Phenomenological Reduction").  It has long been recognized by scholars as among the most important of the many lecture courses he taught in his career.  Indeed it wasdeemed as crucially important by Husserl himself, who composed it with a view toward eventual publication.  It is unsurprising, then, that First Philosophy is the only lecture course that is consistently counted among his major works.  In addition to furnishing valuable insights into Husserl's understanding of the history of philosophy, First Philosophy is his most sustained treatment of the phenomenological reduction, the central concept of his philosophical methodology.  The selection of supplemental texts expands on the topics treated in the lectures, but also add other themes from Husserl's vast oeuvre.  The manuscript material is especially worthwhile, because in it, Husserl offers candid self-criticisms of his publicly enunciated words, and also makes forays into areas of his philosophy that he was loath to publicize, lest his words be misunderstood.
As Husserl's position as a key contributor to contemporary thought has, with the passage of time, become increasingly clear, the demand for access to his writings in English has steadily grown.  This translation strives to meet this demand by providing English-speaking readers access to this central Husserlian text.  It will be of interest to scholars of Husserl's work, non-specialists, and students of phenomenology.

DOI: 10.1007/978-94-024-1597-1

Full citation:

The idea of philosophy and its historical origin

Husserl Edmund

1-17

The grounding of logic and the limits of formal-apophantic analytics

Husserl Edmund

18-32

First reflections on cognizing subjectivity, motivated by sophistic skepticism

Husserl Edmund

33-53

The historical beginnings of the science of subjectivity

Husserl Edmund

54-79

The fundamental limitation of Locke's sphere of vision and its reasons

Husserl Edmund

80-104

Critical disclosure of the genuine and enduring problematic concealed in locke's investigations

Husserl Edmund

105-129

Empiricism's theory of abstraction as an index of how it falls short of the idea of an eidetic science of pure consciousness

Husserl Edmund

130-144

From Locke to the radical consequence of Berkeley's purely immanent philosophy

Husserl Edmund

145-161

Hume's positivism

Husserl Edmund

162-187

The rationalism and metaphysics of the modern period

Husserl Edmund

188-205

Introduction

Husserl Edmund

207-230

The idea of apodictic evidence and the problematic of the beginning

Husserl Edmund

231-247

World-perception and world-belief

Husserl Edmund

248-262

Supplementations and clarifications in connection with the "objection of insanity"

Husserl Edmund

263-273

Opening up the field of transcendental experience transcendental, phenomenological and apodictic reduction

Husserl Edmund

274-285

The transcendental temporal form of subjectivity's transcendental stream of life

Husserl Edmund

286-295

On the theory of the theoretical attitude of the phenomenologist

Husserl Edmund

296-315

The conscious activity of natural egoic life and the reduction to pure subjectivity

Husserl Edmund

316-333

The accomplishment and problematic of a phenomenological-psychological reduction

Husserl Edmund

334-346

The opening of the realm of transcendental experience following the second path

Husserl Edmund

347-364

The philosophical significance of the transcendental-phenomenological reduction

Husserl Edmund

365-390

Supplemental texts

Husserl Edmund

391-633