Abstract

My working hypothesis is based on the project of a theory of science (Wissenschaftslehre) at the very beginning of the Prolegomena and it consists in conceiving this theory of science as the program which insures their cohesion to the whole of the Investigations in this work. In order to test this hypothesis, I will first examine the different steps which led to the project of a theory of science in the pre-phenomenological period. I will secondly expound the guidelines of the theory of science, insisting in particular on its relation to pure logic. In the third section, I will attempt to define the function of the theory of knowledge and of phenomenology in such a programme. I will conclude with some remarks on the fate of this theory of science after the Logical Investigations. Most of Husserl’s allusions to the theory of science, be it in his lecture notes, the manuscripts that were written after 1901 or other works published during Husserl’s lifetime, seem to suggest that the theory of science kept on assuming the very role it was playing in Husserl’s seminal work: the theory of science provides its basis to Husserl’s philosophical agenda.