Franz Brentano_The True and the Evident.pdf

Contents of Judgement, Propositions, Objectives, States of Affairs 61
sparrow, and I affirm or accept the beak, because the beak is an essential physical part of
the sparrow. 29 These parts are judged only implicitly inasmuch as they are considered or
thought about only implicitly.
Suppose that, in the strict sense of the words, one could reflect upon the non-being
of a sparrow and accept or affirm it. This thought and affirmation of the non-being of a
sparrow would not implicitly include the thought and affirmation of the non-being of a
bird, or that of the non-being of the beak of a sparrow; but it would implicitly include the
thought and affirmation of the non-being of an old sparrow, of a healthy sparrow, of a sick
sparrow, of a tame sparrow, of a wild sparrow, of a male sparrow, of a female sparrow, of a
nesting sparrow, of a hungry sparrow, of a sparrow that has a mate, and so on and so forth.
But obviously, this is not what happens. Even those who say that it does, concede that the
mental process—which they mistake for the thought of the non-being of A—is a process
which actually presupposes the thought of A. It would follow, then, that if a person thinks
implicitly of all these non-beings when he thinks of the non-being of a sparrow, then he
really must have had before his mind an old sparrow, a young sparrow, and so on, just as
anyone who thinks of a sparrow must have had before his mind a bird and a beak and all
the other parts which are essential to a sparrow. But these consequences are all absurd, and
therefore the supposition that gives rise to them is false. 30
And now let me comment on what you say about “correct”. According to you, it is
generally agreed that the concept of “the correct” presupposes a relation or a relative
determination; that the concept is applicable, therefore, only when someone stands in a
certain suitable relation to some other thing; hence that it cannot be acquired by means
of abstraction (and the same thing is supposed to hold of all other reflexive concepts);
and therefore that the concept of “the correct”, unlike that of red, cannot be elucidated by
means of intuition. 31
Is this, by any chance, the kind of psychology that Marty now accepts? If so, it has
become estranged in its essential aspects not only from mine but also from Aristotle’s.
I’m afraid that it shows a remarkable resemblance to the doctrines of Husserl, who also
professes to be acquainted with concepts that do not originate in intuition. All this pertains
to your two final comments. My own view is that, in addition to outer intuition, there is
also an inner intuition, and that this inner intuition is the source of what are called reflexive
ideas.
I would concede this much to you—that whenever we intuit a secondary object, we also
intuit a primary object. 32 But I don’t see at all how you get from this to the conclusion that,
if I apprehend myself as one who is making a correct judgement or as one whose love is
correct, I must also know, at the same time, that something other than I exists. Indeed I find
this assertion extraordinarily baffling, especially when it is applied to the case where I make
a correct negative judgement, or where I may love or hate something without believing
that the thing exists. There are those who would say that there is a certain entity to which
we are related when we make a correct negative judgement and also (if I am properly
informed) when we love or hate correctly. But no one who talks in this way would hold
that this entity is itself the object of the judging, or of the loving or hating. For the object of
a correct negative judgement could not possibly exist unless the judgement contradicting
the negative judgement were correct. I find it entirely unacceptable, therefore, to say that