Knowra Franz Brentano Franz Brentano Franz Brentano (1838–1917) was a German-Austrian philosopher and psychologist who defined mental phenomena by their directedness toward objects and developed a theory of inner perception.
Intentionality : The directedness of mental states toward objects, contents, or states of affairs. Brentano made intentionality the defining mark of mental phenomena.
Edmund Husserl : A German philosopher who founded phenomenology and developed a systematic analysis of consciousness. Husserl studied with Brentano and transformed the analysis of intentionality.
Aristotle : An ancient Greek philosopher whose writings shaped logic, metaphysics, ethics, and natural science. Brentano’s early scholarship and later philosophy drew heavily on Aristotle.
Brentano’s thesis : The claim that intentionality is the mark distinguishing mental phenomena from physical phenomena. Philosophers dispute whether intentionality uniquely characterizes everything mental.
Mental act : A conscious episode such as judging, imagining, loving, or perceiving. His psychology classifies mental phenomena by their acts.
Alexius Meinong : An Austrian philosopher known for a theory of objects that includes nonexistent objects. Meinong extended Brentano’s account of intentionality into a distinctive theory of objects.
Scholasticism : A medieval tradition that used philosophical argument to examine theological and metaphysical questions. Brentano’s training in Catholic theology brought him into contact with scholastic thought.
Intentional inexistence : Brentano’s term for the presence of an object within a mental act, not necessarily as a real existent. Its interpretation affects whether intentionality requires an existing object.
Inner perception : Awareness of one’s own mental activity as it occurs. Brentano treats this awareness as the distinctive way mental phenomena are known.
Carl Stumpf : A German philosopher and psychologist who studied perception, music, and the foundations of psychology. Stumpf carried Brentano’s descriptive approach into perceptual and psychological research.
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