From Happiness to Blessedness: Husserl on Eudaimonia, Virtue, and the Best Life

Abstract

Th is paper treats of Husserl's phenomenology of happiness or eudaimonia in fi ve parts. In the fi rst part, we argue that phenomenology of happiness is an important albeit relatively neglected area of research, and we show that Husserl engages in it. In the second part, we examine the relationship between phenomenological ethics and virtue ethics. In the third part, we identify and clarify essential aspects of Husserl's phenomenology of happiness, namely, the nature of the question concerning happiness and the possibility of a phenomenological answer, the power of the will, the role of vocation, the place of obligation, the signifi cance of habituation, the necessity of selfrefl ection and self-criticism, the importance of sociability and solidarity, the impact of chance and destiny, and the specter of regret. In the fourth part, we establish the inextricable linkage between Husserl's metaethics and his metaphysics. In the fi ft h part, we provide a provisional exploration of his conception of the connection between happiness and blessedness. We acknowledge that there is an extensive literature on Husserl's phenomenological ethics, and our study has benefi tted greatly from it, but we also suggest that our holistic approach critically clarifi es his description of happiness, virtue, and blessedness by fully recognizing that his phenomenological metaethics is embedded in his phenomenological metaphysics.

¿Hay una teoría husserliana de la desigualdad? Para ampliar el concepto de destino a su dimensión social

“…El destino se 4 Cf. Cabrera, 2017;Crespo, 2019;Cavallaro y Heffernan, 2019. hallaría en íntima conexión con la idea de que el mundo circundante cósico de los sujetos, es decir, por lo menos por ahora, la naturaleza, contiene en ella una serie de dinámicas propias, tendencias, que hace a los acontecimientos del mundo ir en determinadas direcciones, que son mayormente azarosos e imprevisibles para el ser humano. Esta constatación se tornaría tan relevante para Husserl que le conducirá a afirmar que la ética debe pensarse como una «lucha contra el destino» [Kampf gegen das Schicksal] (Hua 42, p. 321).…”

Book Review: The Routledge Handbook of Phenomenology of Emotion

“…For a thorough examination of the phenomenon of happiness specifically in Husserl along the lines of Summa's interpretation, seeCavallaro & Heffernan 2019. …”