Bakhtin, leitor de Husserl: um cotejo entre a filosofia de investigações lógicas e a de para uma filosofia do ato

Abstract

The present research, positioned within the broader scope of an investigative project on the sources and epistemic relations of Mikhail M. Bakhtin’s thought [1895–1975], was initially established as a preliminary inquiry, through a philosophical comparison, into possible parallels between the philosophy that Edmund Husserl [1859–1938] developed in Logical Investigations [LI] (Husserl, 2014 [1900]; 2015 [1901]; 1975 [1901]) and the theory outlined by Bakhtin in Toward a Philosophy of the Act [TPA] (Bakhtin, 1993a [1986]; 1993b [1986]). The intention was to assess the extent to which a proximity of philosophical topics debated in Bakhtinian philosophy can be observed with others previously defended by Husserl, namely: a) the critique of psychologism, common to both philosophies, which resemble each other in certain fundamental aspects while differing significantly in others; b) the idea of an absolute, unconditional, irrelative, and objective truth, expressed in Husserlian philosophy in LI through the term truth in itself and in Bakhtinian thought through the concept of истина (ístina [unconditional truth]); and c) the distinctive dichotomy between act and content, which frames the domain in which Husserl proposes the phenomenological problem of the correlation between consciousness and ideality, a theme seemingly echoed by Bakhtin in his discussion of the rupture and reconciliation between the answerable act and content/meaning. The final perception was the intuition that many topics in LI either seem to have been reworked through Bakhtin’s epistemic incorporation or appear to have become foundational for him to establish his theoretical path more autonomously, in alignment with the philosophical goals that shape the programmatic project of his philosophical anthropology. To achieve this, the study initially engaged in a discussion of the aforementioned themes in Husserlian philosophy and their corresponding main theses, drawing on theoretical support from interpretations of specialized scholars (Soffer, 1991; Moran, 2000; Kusch, 2005; Santos, 2010; De Santis, 2021). It then sought to compare the resulting debate with the corresponding positions that Bakhtin presents in TPA, aiming to highlight the convergences and divergences that justify sustaining parallels concerning the themes addressed by both in their respective treatises. At the same time, the philosophical perspective of Vladímir S. Solovyov [1853–1900] was introduced into the discussion, as his concept of truth and anti-psychologistic stance help contextualize these themes within the horizon of Russian philosophy. As a result, the study concluded that: a) although Husserl’s positions in LI can be considered sources for Bakhtin’s philosophy in TPA, there are other influences that seem to have been similarly assumed by Bakhtin; b) despite the analogies that ground partial agreements between both, there are constitutive differences concerning the philosophical project each one proposed; c) the examined philosophical topics, although finding a well-defined expression in LI, appear to trace back to earlier traditions, to which Bakhtin and Solovyov, along with Husserl, also belong.