The paper has been written from a philosophical perspective and triggered by the recurrent discussions in psychology about the most suitable methods to study our multifaceted subjectivity. Its main point is that a phenomenological understanding of the human person provides a robust and also flexible philosophical framework for psychology. The first part discusses three classical distinctions –individual/general; explaining/understanding; induction/interpretation– which, in spite of possible deficiencies, are useful to illustrate the specificity of the human sciences relative to the natural sciences. If not understood as an either-or dichotomy these distinctions represent the search of the right balance to reflect the complexity and richness of psychological science. The second part presents the phenomenological notions of ‘vital reduction’ and ‘personalist reduction’, where reductions does not take on an eliminativistic meaning, but of directing the mind’s gaze to attend to what is originally the case. The ‘vital reduction’ reveals a subject of experience at the center of the lifeworld, and the ‘personalist reduction’ sees in rationality –i.e., the power to grasp the meaning of things and to recognize other subjects of experience­– a deeper dimension of the subject, who we can thus call a person. Psychology and phenomenology converge in disclosing the person-centeredness of our lifeworld.

My purpose in this paper is to illustrate that what the Christian tradition calls the peccatum naturae consists neither in the mere privation of the gift of original justice and of grace, nor in the total corruption of nature. I try to dig into the conceptual conditions under which we can coherently understand that our present condition is characterized by a twisted inclination of the will, which without totally corrupting human nature, still runs contrary to its proper good and cannot be considered as belonging or being inherent to it. I first present Thomas Aquinas' understanding of the peccatum naturae as a moral defect and not simply as privation. Then, I take recourse mostly to Rosmini's work in order to better understand how we can have a moral weakness, which could be rightly called corruption, without our moral condition being completely irrecoverable. In other words, how can the will be in a sinful condition if no actual fault can be imputed to the person, for that is the notion of a sin of nature.

El trabajo realiza un aporte a la ontología de primera persona reclamada por Searle para lo mental. Recurre a la filosofía de Antonio Rosmini sobre el sentimiento fundamental corpóreo, correspondiente a lo que se suele llamar cuerpo vivido o subjetivo (Leib). Tras revisar diversas formulaciones contemporáneas del hilemorfismo, se concluye que no cualquier versión resulta convincente para una filosofía de la mente. Mediante las nociones de principio y término Rosmini amplía el repertorio ontológico capaz de dar cuenta de la unidad del hombre, incorporando las nociones de materia y forma desde una perspectiva lato sensu cartesiana.

Pieper’s originality and interest in contemporary thought are to be found above all in his having revitalized precious insights about the true being of man contained in classical wisdom. The structure of the philosophical act and the human spirit share a fundamental characteristic, that both are open to the whole of being. Thus, Pieper suggests that authentic philosohizing must consider all aspects of a question, including theological ones.