Mathesis Universalis and the Life-World: Finitude and Responsibility

Scientific philosophy may be objectively or subjectively oriented for HusserlHusserl, Edmund. As the former, it develops in a third-person perspective and employs deductive-explanatory methods. As the latter, and in a first-person perspective, it may become truly critical and radically foundational in character, its ultimate source of evidence being intuitive experiences belonging to self-responsible subjects. Formalism and the problems related to the mathesis universalis Mathesis universalis arise within the first sense of science, whereas transcendental phenomenology is, according to HusserlHusserl, Edmund, scientific philosophy in the second sense. This paper seeks to show that since human experiences (which are ultimately founding) are essentially ongoing, finite and uncompletable, scientific philosophy in both its senses can only claim partial and relative truths and validities. Thus the radical scientific philosopher as a transcendental phenomenologist is called upon to lay bare the ultimate, responsible causes for the meaning and validity of being, and the ‘ultimate foundations’ of philosophy.