Phenomenology: reality is not some objective thing distinct from experience; rather, it is what appears to us as “phen

1. Phenomenology: reality is not some objective thing distinct from experience; rather, it is what appears to us as “phenomena” in experience • Instead of assuming that the world is as it appears (the natural standpoint), we should “bracket” all that can be doubted in order to be certain about reality as (1) the act of consciousness and (2) the objects of consciousness as experienced (Husserl) • Being (reality) is not a being, a thing that can be thought; rather, it is what is common to all beings, intentionality itself (Heidegger)

2. Existentialism: existence/reality is significant only as subjective, personal, and passionate • To exist is to be a self committed to action though a “leap of faith” (Kierkegaard) • For consciousness, reality is the product of our choice to give meaning to brute facts. For us, “existence precedes essence”: we create reality through our actions, thinking of things in terms of what they are not/negation (Sartre) • Despite social institutions and constraints (e.g., gender discrimination), we are free and responsible for ourselves: reality is what we make of it (de Beauvoir)

3. Objections to Phenomenology and Existentialism • It is difficult to eliminate our prejudices; in the case of language, it is perhaps impossible • Because the choice to think of reality as open-ended is itself open-ended, it can never be the basis for a determinate metaphysics • Phenomenological/Existentialist reply: the possibility of thinking otherwise reveals how reality or being is tied to consciousness