Intersubjectivity and sociality

Abstract

The phenomenological discussion on intersubjectivity can be retrospectively structured along several lines. One of them is the distinction between the theories of intersubjectivity based on experiences oriented towards individual others and the theories based on being-with others. The distinction between intersubjectivity and sociality used as a basic scheme to structure the discussion should not conceal the importance of another modality of being with others—that of the plural subject or group. The problem of intersubjectivity motivated Levinas to challenge the Western history of philosophy in its entirety. If Martin Heidegger conceives of the history of philosophy as a history of forgetfulness of being, Levinas captures it as a history of the forgetfulness of the Other, a forgetfulness with fatal consequences. Merleau-Ponty would definitely agree that the structure of experience of these different forms of transcendence is in each case specific, but he would not see a reason to introduce the concept of a radical transcendence restricted to but one of them.