Marcuse and the Crisis of the European Sciences

Abstract

Abstract In his essay “On Science And Phenomenology” Herbert Marcuse discusses Husserl's Krisis, essentially rejecting it as the expression, the last expression, of the old western rationality and as the incarnation of a new humanist “ myth “. Although admitting some positive aspects in Husserl's last work, such as its therapeutic character, Marcuse in practice rejects it in traditional philosophical terms, saying that in it everything moves around an abstract reason. What he says is that, ultimately, the most serious limitation of the Krisis is in its being a purely theoretical analysis. It is clear that Marcuse accepts the distinction between theory and practice and, at least in this, he is himself an accomplice of the old philosophy.