A Return to Retention and Recollection: An Analysis of the Possible Mutual Influence of Consciousness and its Content

Abstract

Most analyses of Husserl’s phenomenology of inner time-consciousness focus on the structures of this aspect of phenomenology. Inner time-consciousness is, after all, the foundation for all phenomenological research and for the relation of consciousness to its objects. However, the fact that I can make mistakes, that I can think I am recollecting when I actually am not, forces us to consider not just the structure of inner time-consciousness, but its content as well. How could any noetic act be incorrect? This paper takes up the intersection of Husserl’s analyses of recollection and belief in order to identify how apodictic acts of consciousness can be mistaken. In doing so, I examine: (1) the relation of the content of consciousness with its activity; (2) the importance of the context of an experience to how I take it up as actual or not; and (3) the relation of retention and recollection with regard to their content. Ultimately, I show that, at this level of analysis, no experience can be taken in isolation. Rather, every experience must be taken up in light of the horizons of its context, both meaningfully and temporally.