Teleology in Living Beings: A Phenomenological Approach to Intentionality and Intentional Actions

Abstract

This paper makes a phenomenological distinction between constitutive intentional movements and intentional actions. A phenomenological understanding of embodied and situated relations between living beings and their worlds shows that intentional movements do not imply an implicit or explicit experienced “what for” that organizes and directs what an organism does. We question the immanent teleology of autopoietic enactivism and the agentive semiotics theory. This discussion allows us to separate the idea of intentionality from objectives, goals, and agendas. This yields a different way of understanding the behavior of living beings based on the phenomenological notions of intentional body, intentional movement, animation, and the time-consciousness structure.