Techné, Life-world, and Art

Abstract

The notion of techné in Husserl’s phenomenology is related to his treatment of the three layers of the “teaching of craft” and the two layers of the science of “life-world.” The superior layer of both is of philosophical significance. Aristotle’s statement in ethics and metaphysics: techné is man-made, but can transit to spontaneity, and then to natural becoming, which manifests physis as the ultimate aim of his philosophical system, enlightens us to notice the following aspects in Husserl’s phenomenology. 1. Pure or formal ethics is of a high-level téchne in the philosophical sense. 2. The concept of life-world leads to transcendental phenomenology. 3. What Ideas II implies – as a technique the method of phenomenology tends to let the pure I and spiritual I as matters appear themselves by the natural attitude – could conduct us to understand the artistic aspect of Husserl’s philosophical theory.