Reflections on the Problem of Intersubjectivity and the Social Group

Abstract

Having now completed a general program for any future analysis of the problem of intersubjectivity, in this chapter a number of initial reflections and analyses, which are intended to serve as the first execution of such a program, are put forth. As initial reflections, they, of course, obtain only a provisionary status and, in this one chapter, can obviously only be stated in the briefest form. Clearly, these reflections will take on, then, the mere form of a general sketch or outline of the phenomenon of intersubjectivity. Nevertheless, it should be clearly understood that they constitute the first proper concrete reflections of the renewed analysis of the problem of intersubjectivity. Guided by our general program, these reflective analyses shall clearly designate the first fundamental concepts and units required for any clarification of the phenomenon of intersubjectivity, and shall, moreover, at least attempt to work towards indicating some possible relationships between these units. Perhaps, it should be mentioned that it is, of course, precisely at this point in our investigations, where we turn to begin an explicit and direct analysis of the Sachverhalt of intersubjectivity itself, that our reliance upon and use of the, at times mimetic, term ‘intersubjectivity’ shall recede into the background of our discussions.