Meinong, Alexius
(1853-1921) Was originally a disciple of Brentano, who however emphatically rejected many of Meinong’s later contentions. He claimed to have discovered a new a priori science, the “theory of objects” (to be distinguished from metaphysics which is an empirical science concerning reality, but was never worked out by Meinong). Anything “intended” by thought is an “object”. Objects may either “exist” (such as physical objects) or “subsist” (such as facts which Meinong unfortunately termed “objectives”, or mathematical entities), they may either be possible or impossible and they may belong either to a lower or to a higher level (such as “relations” and “complexions”, “founded” on their simple terms or elements). In the “theory of objects,” the existence of objects is abstracted from (or as Husserl later said it may be “bracketed”) and their essence alone has to be considered. Objects are apprehended either by self-evident judgments or by “assumptions”, that is, by “imaginary judgments”. In the field of emotions there is an analogous division since there are also “imaginary” emotions (such as those of the spectator in a tragedy). Much of Meinong’s work was of a psychological rather than of a metaphysical or epistemological character. — H.G.
Main works
Psychol.-ethische Untersuch. z. Werttheorie, 1894;
Ueber Annahmen, 1907;
Ueber d. Stellung d. Gegenstandstheorie im Syst. d. Wissensch., 1907;
Ueber Mglichkeit u. Wahrscheinlichkeit, 1915.
Cf. Gesammelte Abh. 3 vols., 1914.