O artigo apresenta a explicação fenomenológica da dimensão afetiva da pessoa humana e da sua relação com os valores, no pensamento da Edith Stein. O que diferencia a abordagem deste tema segundo a autora é precisamente a orientação para a explicação da pessoa humana: os diferentes tipos de vivências afetivas, conforme a sua origem em diferentes estratos da alma, constituem a pessoa, que se faz conhecer pela sua abertura aos valores que nas vivências de sentimentos são apreendidos.

This article provides an analysis of the phenomenology of affectivity underlying the work of Edith Stein. Taking as point of departure two of her works, The problem of Empathy (1917) and Philosophy of Psychology and the Humanities (1922), the paper focuses on the idea that emotions fulfil a cognitive function: they make us accessible the realm of values. The argument of the paper is developed in two sections. The first section offers an overview of Stein’s main theses about (...) emotions, feelings, moods and sentiments and places them within the larger framework of the early phenomenological accounts on affectivity. The second section examines the claim that emotions are responsible for grasping values concentrating on two facets of this thesis: the first regards the epistemological question according to which values are grasped by affective phenomena, while the second regards the ontological question about the nature of these grasped values. (shrink)

According to Brentano and his followers, there is a genuine affective mode of intentional reference which consists in presenting the targeted objects imbued with value as being good or bad, and as inviting us to adopt a pro- or contra-attitude toward them. Let us call this view “the affective intentionality thesis”. In Brentano’s version of this thesis, not only do strictly affective phenomena such as feelings and emotions exhibit a sui generis affective intentionality, but so do conative ones, such as (...) wishes, desires, and acts of the will. However, in the version defended by the majority of his early phenomenological followers, this thesis applies only to affective phenomena in the narrow sense. This paper analyzes the reception of this later version of “the affective intentionality thesis” in Edith Stein’s early works, arguing that a further transformation of the thesis took place within her work. It argues that, for Stein, the intentionality exhibited by affective phenomena comes in different forms. According to this reading, the mode in which states that are affective in the strictest sense present their object as imbued with value admits variations. As I will demonstrate, a close analysis of her views on the stratification of the affective life and the different types of affective phenomena (general feelings, moods, emotions, and sentiments) suggests that at least three different forms of affective intentionality can be identified. I call them object intentionality, horizon intentionality, and personal intentionality. Since similar views can be found in other early phenomenologists, I suggest that Stein’s views can be taken as representative of a transformation that took place within this movement. -/- . (shrink)

My aim in this paper is to make use of Edith Stein’s phenomenological analyses of empathy, emotion, and personhood to clarify and critically assess the recent suggestion by Axel Honneth that a basic form of recognition is affective in nature. I will begin by considering Honneth’s own presentation of this claim in his discussion of the role of affect in recognitive gestures, as well as in his notion of ‘elementary recognition,’ arguing that while his account contains much of value (...) it also generates problems. On the basis of this analysis, I will try to show that Stein’s account of empathy demarcates an elementary form of recognition in a less problematic fashion than does Honneth’s own treatment of this issue. I will then spell out the consequences of this move for the emotional recognition thesis, arguing that Stein’s treatment lends it further credence, before ending with some remarks on the connection between recognition and emotional personality. (shrink)

This paper is devoted to the study of the emotions in Edith Stein’s early work On the Problem of Empathy. After presenting her work embedded in the tradition of the early phenomenology of the emotions, I shall elaborate the four dimensions of the emotional experience according to this authoress, the link between emotions and values and the phenomenon of the living body. I argue that Stein’s account on empathy remains incomplete as long as we ignore the complex phenomenology (...) of emotions underlying her work. (shrink)

Recent epistemology and value theory have become more open to the role played by affectivity in the constitution of human knowledge of value. In this paper, two figures important to the phenomenological and personalistic traditions are retrieved as precedents for this contemporary development: Edith Stein and Dietrich von Hildebrand. In the first part of the paper, Stein’s phenomenology of affective acts is adapted as an account of the structure of “value-grasping acts.” The second part of the paper identifies two (...) difficulties that arise on the basis of Stein’s account: how do we know that an emotion constitutes a response to intrinsic value, and how do we know an emotional response to value is most attuned to its object? The remainder of the paper responds to these difficulties, thereby legitimating the account as a viable moral epistemology. These responses draw inspiration from von Hildebrand’s phenomenological accounts of value-response and freedom. (shrink)

One defining claim that critical phenomenologists make of the critical phenomenological method is that description no longer simply plays the role of detailing the world around the describing phenomenologist, but rather has the potential to transform worlds and persons. The transformative potential of the critical phenomenological enterprise is motivated by aspirations of social and political transformation. Critical phenomenology accordingly takes, as its starting point, descriptions of the oppressive historical social structures and contexts that have shaped our experience and shows how (...) these produce inequitable ways of being in the world (Guenther 2020, 12). For example, critical phenomenologists have provided rich descriptions of marginalized lived experience, particularly racialized experience (Ngo, 2017; Yancy, 2017), dis-abled experience and experiences of illness (Lajoie and Douglas, 2020; Toombs, 1993), gendered experience (Beauvoir, 2009; Salamon, 2010), and so forth. What is common across these accounts is the assumption that these descriptions provide means of enacting political change. First, they illuminate the existence of oppressive structures and their effects upon us, our possibilities, and our relations. Second, through increasing awareness they begin to denaturalize the oppressive historical structures that “privilege, naturalize, and normalize certain experiences of the world while marginalizing, pathologizing, and discrediting others” (Guenther 2020, 15). Third, through strategic responses (e.g., hesitation in Alia Al-Saji’s work), they produce new possibilities of action and experience, which initiates the process of creating different ways of being in the world (Al-Saji 2014).2. (shrink)

While Edith Stein never developed an ethics of her own, her work is nonetheless suggestive of an “ethics of renewal,” which appears in nuce in various moments of her corpus. First, in her phenomenological treatises, Stein analyzes the ethical development of personality in the unfolding of the personal “core” as responding to ever higher value domains. During the 1930s, this becomes a project of living out a moral vocation bestowed by God. In Endliches und ewiges Sein, the moral life (...) becomes a work of renewal in connection with the Teresian metaphor of the “interior castle.” Morality, for Stein, emerges from out of an inner, personal work of the soul’s conscious refurbishment according to its essential structure by coming to terms with the value-world and with God. This paper will attempt to develop Stein’s account of the nature of the moral task as renewal and some implications for moral theory. (shrink)

This paper presents and explicates the theory of empathy found in Edith Stein’s early philosophy, notably in the book On the Problem of Empathy, published in 1917, but also by proceeding from complementary thoughts on bodily intentionality and intersubjectivity found in Philosophy of Psychology and the Humanities published in 1922. In these works Stein puts forward an innovative and detailed theory of empathy, which is developed in the framework of a philosophical anthropology involving questions of psychophysical causality, social ontology (...) and moral philosophy. Empathy, according to Stein, is a feeling-based experience of another person’s feeling that develops throughout three successive steps on two interrelated levels. The key to understanding the empathy process á la Stein is to explicate how the steps of empathy are attuned in nature, since the affective qualities provide the energy and logic by way of which the empathy process is not only inaugurated but also proceeds through the three steps and carries meaning on two different levels corresponding to two different types of empathy: sensual and emotional empathy. Stein’s theory has great potential for better understanding and moving beyond some major disagreements found in the contemporary empathy debate regarding, for instance, the relation between perception and simulation, the distinction between what is called low-level and high-level empathy, and the issue of how and in what sense it may be possible to share feelings in the empathy process. (shrink)

The uniqueness of Edith Stein’s approach to lived experience emerges only in light of intentionality as reasonableness. The “personal touch” or authentic affectivity means in this context one’s own “living body” in regard to a threefold dimension of the human experiencing: the personal, the humanistic, and the spiritual, and seems to echo those of Immanuel Kant’s, i.e., the soul, the world and God. Consequently, not whatever kind of own’s commitment is at stake. Moreover, no less important is the role (...) of community and its various types. For sure, Stein’s genuine account is found in dialogue with the phenomenologists of her time. It paves the way toward a community of life and life itself. Therefore, it seems to be possible to some extend to accord Stein’s account with contemporary discussions of the meaning of life and “a fundamental transformation of human existence.”. (shrink)

The thought of Edith Stein on woman brings out the fuller sense of the metaphysical notion of the being of woman. Stein’s position is that woman’s nature as biological mother affects her whole being. Woman has two essential characteristics: attraction to the personal and attraction to wholeness. It is woman’s emotions that account for these distinctly feminine traits. Woman is distinguished by her empathetic perception of persons, an intuitive grasp of a person’s being and value as “person”. Stein describes (...) empathy as a clear awareness of another person, not simply of the content of his experience, but of his experience of that content. In empathy, one takes the place of the other without becoming strictly identical to him. One does not just understand the experiences of the other, but takes them on as one’s own. Stein reinterprets traditional readings of woman, challenging claims to the woman as the “weaker sex” and to the emotions as inferior to reason. (shrink)

The personalist ethics of Edith Stein and her feminist thought are intrinsically interrelated. This unique connection constitutes perhaps the main novelty of Stein’s ethical thought that makes her a forerunner of some recent developments in feminist ethics, particularly ethics of care. A few scholars have noticed the resemblance between Stein’s feminist personalism and care ethics, yet none of them have properly explored it. This paper offers an in-depth discussion of the overlaps and differences between Stein’s ethical insights and the (...) core ideas of care ethics. It argues that both Stein and care ethicists relocate a certain set of practices, values and attitudes from the periphery to the center of ethical reflection. This includes relationality, emotionality and care. The paper finally argues that it is plausible and fruitful to read Stein’s advocacy of ‘woman’s values and attitudes’ in a critical feminist way, rather than as an instance of essentialist difference feminism. (shrink)

In this paper, I shall investigate Edith Stein’s account of empathic subjectivity in light of the “affective turn” that characterises the current literature on Stein’s phenomenology. I shall argue that Stein develops an original approach to empathy that is not restricted to the model of “direct access” to others. I shall claim that, for Stein, empathy is an attitude that shares significant similarities with retention and imagining-how. More precisely, I shall show that the significance of empathy lies in striving (...) to respond appropriately to the other through the constitution of types or examples that involve features inherent in personality and values. (shrink)

In ihrem Beitrag: „Poisoning the well, or how economic theory damages moral imagination" (Nelson 2016) fragt Julie Nelson -/- "What if people might act out of social and other-regarding concerns, as well as reasonable self-interest in their economic lives, but are pushed by the economic theory of self-interested utility maximization to believe that it is permissible – and perhaps even appropriate – to be irresponsible, opportunistic, and selfish when participating in markets? What if business leaders might pay attention to the (...) implications of their decisions for workers, communities, the environment, and others who are affected by their firm's actions, but economic theory encourages them to believe that they should – and in fact must – focus on getting every last dollar of profit possible?" (Nelson 2016: 184) -/- Ich lese diese Fragen von Nelson als einen Appell, die Theorie der Ökonomie umfassend auf ihre Tauglichkeit für unsere Lebenswirklichkeit zu hinterfragen. Die Theorien der Ökonomie mögen Disziplinen-intern funktional sein, sie sind damit noch lange nicht lebenstauglich. Im Gegenteil, sie erweisen sich als Überlebens-avers, im schlimmsten Falle, Leben-zerstörend. Die Aufgabe, das Wozu der Wirtschaftsphilosophie lässt sich von hier aus schon trefflich bestimmen. Die Herausforderung jedoch bleibt, Umfang und Perspektive, von wo aus die Kritik und auch die In-Blicknahme des Ganzen geschehen kann, zu verorten, und genau dieses Anliegen ist im Beitrag von Ingo Pies und Marc Hübscher zentral: Aus welcher Perspektive kann diese Frage beantwortet werden, wenn diese Bestimmung als denkerische Selbstaufklärung realisiert werden soll? (shrink)

This book explores the phenomenological investigations of Edith Stein by critically contextualising her role within the phenomenological movement and assessing her accounts of empathy, sociality, and personhood. Despite the growing interest that surrounds contemporary research on empathy, Edith Stein’s phenomenological investigations have been largely neglected due to a historical tradition that tends to consider her either as Husserl’s assistant or as a martyr. However, in her phenomenological research, Edith Stein pursued critically the relation between phenomenology and psychology, (...) focusing on the relation between affectivity, subjectivity, and personhood. Alongside phenomenologists like Max Scheler, Kurt Stavenhagen, and Hedwig Conrad-Martius, Stein developed Husserl’s method, incorporating several original modifications that are relevant for philosophy, phenomenology, and ethics. Drawing on recent debates on empathy, emotions, and collective intentionality as well as on original inquiries and interpretations, the collection articulates and develops new perspectives regarding Edith Stein’s phenomenology. The volume includes an appraisal of Stein’s philosophical relation to Edmund Husserl and Max Scheler, and develops further the concepts of empathy, sociality, and personhood. These essays demonstrate the significance of Stein’s phenomenology for contemporary research on intentionality, emotions, and ethics. Gathering together contributions from young researchers and leading scholars in the fields of phenomenology, social ontology, and history of philosophy, this collection provides original views and critical discussions that will be of interest also for social philosophers and moral psychologists. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy, Psychiatry, & Psychology 12.3 (2005) 261-263 [Access article in PDF] The Philosophy of Evil Dan J. Stein Keywords philosophy, evil, self-deception, psychopathy, narcissism, sadism Kubarych (2005) first draws on Peck (1983) to suggest a distinction between psychopaths who have no conscience and therefore no need for self-deception, and evil narcissists who use self-deception to keep the emotional consequences of their crimes out of awareness. He then draws on (...) Davidson (1985) to emphasize a parallel between self-deception (or weakness of the warrant) where an irrational belief conflicts with the evidence, and akrasia (or weakness of the will) where an irrational intention is in conflict with one's values.Although self-deception has long been de-scribed and debated (Fingarette 2000; McLaughlin and Rorty 1988; Mele 2001), a cognitive-affective neuroscience of self-deception has become possible only recently. Such an approach includes several strands. First, contemporary information processing constructs (e.g., schemas) have been used to reframe the early insights of writers like Freud and James, and to emphasize how inattention to painful truths provide a shield against anxiety (Goleman 1997). Second, the theoretical framework of evolutionary psychology has been used to emphasize the adaptive advantages of self-deception (Lockard and Delroy 1988). Third, functional brain imaging studies have noted increased activity in executive regions (e.g., prefrontal and anterior cingulate cortices) during attempted deception but not during truthful responding, suggesting that the former requires active effort (Spence et al. 2004). The functional imaging of memory suppression suggests similar processes (Anderson et al. 2004). To date, however, there has been little functional imaging work on self-deception.Similarly, although evil has always been a key concern of philosophical thought, a cognitive-affective neuroscience of evil has emerged only in recent years (Stein 2000). Evil actions are not homogenous, and this area of research again comprises a number of different strands. First, there are actions where the primary aim is not necessarily to hurt, but where harm is in fact inflicted. (A contested, but perhaps useful example, is the battery-raising of animals for human consumption [Singer 2001]). Second, there are actions where the aim is to hurt, and where harm to the other may even be enjoyed. (During normal altruistic punishment, for example, reward circuitry is activated [de Quervain et al. 2004]). Third, there are actions characterized by impulsive aggression, and a relative absence of executive control. (There may be psychobiological distinctions between reactive aggression in response to frustration or threat, and instrumental aggression that is more goal directed [Blair 2004]).What are the implications of these two sets of cognitive-affective neuroscience literature for a philosophical consideration of evil and of narcissism? [End Page 261] It may be useful to differentiate healthy processes (e.g., having sufficient frontal cortical activity to be able to deceive others) from psychopathologic processes (e.g., not having the necessary frontal-amygdala circuitry required for empathic processing of emotions in social interaction). Similarly, it may be useful to differentiate between normal healthy narcissism (Taylor and Brown 1988) and pathologic malignant narcissism (Kernberg 1985), and between normal altruistic punishment (Hamilton 1963) and pathologic sadistic personality (Kaminer and Stein 2001). In addition, it is perhaps the case that some cognitive-affective processes that do not seem to involve psychopathology may nevertheless be seen as evil (e.g., arguably, the processes that allow a human to eat a battery-raised chicken), whereas some cognitive-affective processes that are clearly psychopathologic may not be viewed as evil (e.g., impulsive aggression in the context of a frontal lobe tumor may be viewed as excusable, as "mad" rather than "bad").Taken together with recent work on the cognitive-affective neuroscience of psychopathy, narcissism, and sadism, these considerations may lead to somewhat different approaches from those taken by Peck and Davidson. In his work on psychopathy, for example, Blair emphasizes a dysfunction in cognitive-affective processing resulting in abnormalities in the weighing up of social emotions (Blair 2004). This account is not inconsistent with a view that in psychopathy there is a disturbance in moral processing that is evil (contra Peck). Furthermore, this... (shrink)

The phenomenological movement originates with Edmund Husserl, and two of his young students and collaborators, Edith Stein and Hedwig Conrad-Martius, made a notable contribution to the very delineation of the phenomenological method, which pushed phenomenology in a “realistic” direction. This essay seeks to examine the decisive influence that these two thinkers had on two specific areas: the value of the sciences and certain metaphysical questions. Concerningthe former, I maintain that Stein, departing from a philosophical, phenomenological analysis of the human (...) being, is interested particularly in the formation of the cognitive value of the human sciences. Regarding the latter, Conrad-Martius, given her knowledge of biology, tackled the question of the role and meaning of the sciences of nature. The second question, related to metaphysical themes, became a specific and relevant object of research for both women phenomenologists.It will be investigated by comparing two works, one by each thinker, namely, the Metaphysische Gespräche by Conrad-Martius and Potenz und Akt by Edith Stein. (shrink)

I investigate the complex relationship between politics and philosophy by focusing on the notion of testimony. I argue that there is a necessary and fruitful tension between sapiential and political life. Testimony is characterized here as a free value-response in an intersubjective relation that requires empathy on both sides of the communication. This act of affirming a truth or value goes beyond the limits of prudent self-realization and self-preservation: authentic testimony requires some kind of self-sacrifice. I contrast this general image (...) of testimony to Jan Patočka’s interpretation of «care for the soul». Patočka, by following the early Husserl’s renewal of philosophy, managed to establish and to preserve the harmony between theory and praxis even during persecution of the communist regime. His courageous acts come close to and illuminate the testimony of Edith Stein, who set the measure for philosophical authenticity and self-donation. The comparison of these two testimonies helps to elaborate the notion of exemplary sapiential life — a highly relevant notion for politics. (shrink)

The availability of a range of new psychotropic agents raises the possibility that these will be used for enhancement purposes (smart pills, happy pills, and pep pills). The enhancement debate soon raises questions in philosophy of medicine and psychiatry (eg, what is a disorder?), and this debate in turn raises fundament questions in philosophy of language, science, and ethics. In this paper, a naturalistic conceptual framework is proposed for addressing these issues. This framework begins by contrasting classical and critical concepts (...) of categories, and then puts forward an integrative position that is based on cognitive-affective research. This position can in turn be used to consider the debate between pharmacological Calvinism (which may adopt a moral metaphor of disorder) and psychotropic utopianism (which may emphasize a medical metaphor of disorder). I argue that psychiatric treatment of serious psychiatric disorders is justified, and that psychotropics are an acceptable kind of intervention. The use of psychotropics for sub-threshold phenomena requires a judicious weighing of the relevant facts (which are often sparse) and values. (shrink)

Data are presented that focus on the nature and development of argumentative reasoning. In particular our study describes how support for or against an issue affects memory for critical parts of an argumentative interaction, judgments of argument goodness, and the content of the reasons given in support of one view versus another. Two other factors were examined: developmental differences in argumentation skill and the conditional nature of supporting one side of an argument across varying contexts. Our results show that even (...) seven year old children can recognize, identify, and use the basic components of an argument to provide evidence for and make judgements about their favored position. Moreover, if position support is held constant across all age groups of students, seven year old children were found to give reasons and explanations that were highly similar in content and principle to college students. The same similarities held across age with respect to biases in memory and judgements of argument goodness. The primary difference between children's and college students' argument behavior lay in the side of an argument the students chose to support. Seven year old children and some eleven yearold children supported positions that impute more value to friendship and social consequences than to the maintenance and advancement of individual rights, as specified in a contract agreement. The similarities and differences across development are discussed with respect to a theory of argumentation that speaks to the importance of understanding the nature of goal conflict and a theory of intentionality in predicting how arguments will be represented and resolved. (shrink)

This initial volume of the Collected Works of Edith Stein offers, for the first time in English, the unabridged biography of Edith Stein (Teresa Benedicta of the Cross), depicting her life as a child and young adult. Her text ends abruptly because the Nazi SS arrested, then deported, her to the Auschwitz concentration camp in 1942. Edith Stein is one of the most significant German women of the 20th century. At the age of twenty-five she became the (...) first assistant to Edmund Husserl, the founder of Phenomenology. She was much in demand as a writer and lecturer after her conversion from atheism to Catholicism. Later, as a Discalced Carmelite nun, she maintained her intellectual pursuits until she, like so many others, became a victim of the Nazi persecution that raged across Eastern Europe. By making this landmark work available in English, the Institute of Carmelite Studies provides an eye-witness account of persons and activities on the scene at the time when psychology and philosophy became separate disciplines. In addition to photographs and a map, this volume is enhanced with a preface, the foreword and afterword, notes, and a list of places associated with Edith Stein’s life. It is our aim that these, together with Edith Stein’s text, may help bring into relief the many background details of the rich autobiographical work she has left us. (shrink)

Edith Stein comes alive through these warm, totally attentive letters. She joins a deeply sensitive heart with her keen intelligence, revealing herself to be a wise mentor and a caring friend available to anyone who approached her. Here we learn what was truly important to her: the total well-being of those who treasured her letters enough to preserve them even while suffering the havoc of war and oppression. This volume offers the first English translation of the majority of her (...) surviving letters, with 4 photos and a fully linked index of recipients. (shrink)

In queste pagine è delineata la vicenda esistenziale e intellettuale di Edith Stein. Donna straordinaria, è stata capace di racchiudere nella sua persona molte "possibili" vite. Le ha realizzate come ebrea e cattolica, fenomenologa e filosofa cristiana, docente e monaca carmelitana, agnostica e santa. Si tratta di un processo vitale dagli apparenti salti qualitativi, i quali si volgono all'ascolto di un medesimo nucleo identitario. Questa viva "formazione di sé" ha condotto Edith Stein a una "donazione di sé", culminata (...) nell'Olocausto. Il Diario di Edith si sovrappone ai pensieri di Angela Ales Bello, in veste di narratrice d'eccezione. Con la sentita partecipazione della narratrice, e insieme mantenendo il distacco critico della studiosa, viene scoperta la storia di un'anima. Le emozioni e le conquiste intellettuali trovano una sintesi grazie al peculiare approccio ai "fenomeni" che Edith Stein aveva appreso alla scuola di Edmund Husserl, di Tommaso d'Aquino e di Teresa D'Avila. Sintesi mirabile di pensatori che "si danno la mano" al di là dello spazio e del tempo--Front flap. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to clarify the notion of shared emotion. After contextualizing this notion within the broader research landscape on collective affective intentionality, I suggest that we reserve the term shared emotion to an affective experience that is phenomenologically and functionally ours: we experience it together as our emotion, and it is also constitutively not mine and yours, but ours. I focus on the three approaches that have dominated the philosophical discussion on shared emotions: cognitivist accounts, concern-based (...) accounts, and phenomenological fusion accounts. After identifying strengths and weaknesses of these approaches and summarizing the elements that a multifaceted theory of shared emotions requires, I turn to the work of the early phenomenologist Edith Stein to further advance an approach to shared emotions that combines the main strengths of Helm and Salmela’s concern-based accounts and Schmid’s phenomenological fusion account. According to this proposal, the sharedness of a shared emotion cannot be located in one element, but rather consists in a complex of interrelated features. (shrink)

This paper presents a phenomenological account of empathy inspired by the proposal put forward by Edith Stein in her book On the Problem of Empathy, published originally 1917. By way of explicating Stein’s views, the paper aims to present a characterization of empathy that is in some aspects similar to, but yet essentially different from contemporary simulationist theories of empathy. An attempt is made to show that Stein’s proposal articulates the essential ingredients and steps involved in empathy and that (...) her proposal can be made even more comprehensive and elucidating by stressing the emotional aspect of the empathy process. Empathy, according to such a phenomenological proposal, is to be understood as a perceptual-imaginative feeling towards and with the other person’s experiences made possible by affective bodily schemas and being enhanced by a personal concern for her. To experience empathy does not necessarily or only mean to experience the same type of feeling as the target does; it means feeling alongside the feeling of the target in imagining and explicating a rich understanding of the experiences of the very person one is facing. (shrink)

Edith Stein’s work revolves around one central question, namely, the identity of the person. Discussions of this topic are already present in Stein’s dissertation. Iexamine her theory of identity, developed throughout her work and maturing in her magnum opus, Finite and Eternal Being, in three stages, each of which is historically relevant and original. First, Stein’s development of the question is examined phenomenologically, focusing on Stein’s early work. Second, I will show how Stein takes her early phenomenological positions concerning (...) the nature of the human person and combines them with Greek and medieval insights into ontology. Here I focus on Finite and Eternal Being. Finally, I concentrate on the meaning and value of Stein’s theory of identity as it contributes to a theory of the person in connection with Greek and medieval metaphysics, and a phenomenological philosophy of consciousness. Together, the three stages of the essay will demonstrate Stein’s systematic contribution toward a theory of personal identity, one of the most difficult problems of philosophy. (shrink)

Originally published: New York: Random House, 1972.

"Any state exists only for the benefit of human beings. this basic tenet of Edith Stein's political thought rests on her conviction that humanity is fundamentally one community, precious beyond measure.

Edith Stein's (1891-1942) pivotal philosophical study of being. Includes two appendixes: "Martin Heidegger's Philosophy of Existence" and "The Interior Castle".

Between 1923 and 1933, Edith Stein worked as a teacher at a Dominican girls’ school in the German town of Speyer. Her experiences, combined with her philosophical background and her religious faith, inspired her writings on the philosophy of education, including her first public lecture: ‘Wahrheit und Klarheit im Unterricht und in der Erziehung’, delivered in 1926. In this text, Stein discusses ideas that had been raised in a set of guidelines and themes given to teachers for their work (...) in the school year. Stein focuses on the concepts of ‘truth’ and ‘clarity’, exploring the epistemological meanings of these terms, their significance in guiding the work of teaching, and their importance for the entire upbringing (Erziehung) of a child, with particular reference to preparing him or her for life as a Christian. Stein’s lecture is here presented in a German-English parallel text translation, along with a short introduction by the translators discussing the text in its historical and philosophical context. (shrink)

Die Neubearbeitung der "Einführung in die Philosophie" präsentiert ein Grundlagenwerk für das Verständnis der Philosophie von Edith Stein. Sie stellt hier ihre phänomenologische Grundoption wie ihren durchgängig anthropologischen und gegenüber Husserl eigenständigen Ansatz vor. Die vorliegende Bearbeitung ermöglicht einen Einblick in die philosophische Werkstatt Edith Steins. Ein textkritischer Apparat weist auf die wesentlichen begrifflichen Neuerungen hin, eine methodische Hinführung klärt die Werdensgeschichte. Für Interessierte bietet das Werk eine grundlegende Einführung in Edith Steins philosophisches Denken, für Forschende trägt (...) diese textkritische Ausgabe zur Klärung vieler Fragen hinsichtlich ihrer Anthropologie und Erkenntnistheorie bei. (shrink)