This book starts with a representation of Husserl''s idea of
phenomenology as a foundational theory of science. The following
essays elucidate the main features of the phenomenological method as
worked out by Husserl in the course of the development of his
philosophy - starting from merely ''descriptive'' and going on to
''transcendental'' and ''constitutive'' phenomenology - in order to
get access to the foundations of knowledge in general and of
scientific knowledge in particular. Further essays deal with the
Husserlian foundations of natural science, and the relations between
phenomenology and psychology, as well as those between phenomenology
and history.

This second revised and enlarged edition - the first appeared
in 1987 and was edited by Lee Hardy - contains two further
essays: one deals with Husserl''s never abandoned idea of phenomenology
as a rigorous science and his further claim to restore
phenomenological philosophy as ''First Philosophy'', and the other one
on the problem of crisis of the Western culture Husserl was concerned
with during several periods of his life, demonstrates the actuality of
his phenomenology even for philosophy of science in our times.