Page 143 - Contribution To Phenomenology

136 /. AT MOHANTY
.
himself the task of proving that there are other egos, his task was never
to overcome solipsism (for he was never a solipsist). It was also not his
self-appointed task to decide how we know that there is another ego
over there inhabiting that body.
Since my reflections with regard to the other culture will begin with
asking if a Husserlian meditation on this theme, analogously to the Fifth
Cartesian Meditation, is at all possible, I should spend a little more time
distinguishing between the various problems about "other minds" which
philosophers have been concerned with. I would like to distinguish
between three levels of problems with regard to other minds. Husserl,
I maintain, was concerned only with one of them, certainly not with the
other two.
First of all, many philosophers have been concerned with the
question, how do I know, for example, that the other person—he or she
or you—has such and such mental state (pain, anxiety, fear, for example).
Answers to this question range from the theory of analogical inference
to the theory of direct empathy. But this question already presupposes
that we know the other to be another ego with its own inner experien-
ces, mental states or intentional acts. There is therefore another
philosophical question, which many philosophers have asked: how do we
at all know that that body over there has a mind, an inner life, like
mine, that it is not a mere body with no inner life, a painted wax figure
for example? This question presupposes that I have a mind, that I am
an ego and not a mere body. It asks, how do I know that the
other—that body in front of me—is also an ego like me and not a mere
body? It thus presupposes that I have the concept of ego, and that I also
have the concept of the other ego. It only wonders, on what grounds the
latter concept is appUed to this body over there.
Both these questions are questions about truth of certain cognitive
claims I may make. The first question is concerned with the cognitive
claim made by me when I say "He is in pain.'' The second question is
concerned with the truth or falsity of the cognitive claim I make when
I say "That is only a mannequin, not a real person'' or when I say "That
computer is not a mere metal box, but has a mind of its own, it thinks,
believes, questions, remembers, supposes, etc."
There is still another level of questioning: how does the ascription
of the predicate "ego" to the other at all make sense? The point of the
question may be clarified thus: if my concept of the "ego" is from my
own case, then it would appear as if it belongs to the very concept of