brentano

This paper investigates the theory of Reism through the perspectives of Brentano and Kotarbiński, examining its contribution to clarifying philosophical concepts and resolving linguistic ambiguities. Reism, by denying the existence of abstract entities and emphasizing concrete objects, seeks to separate genuine philosophical issues from pseudo-problems that arise due to imprecise language. Brentano’s approach, centered on his theory of intentionality, asserts that every mental act is directed toward a concrete object. He argued that dismissing abstract constructs—such as universals, properties, and relations—can streamline language and logic, thereby alleviating philosophical skepticism and confusion. Extending this line of thought, Kotarbiński further developed Reism by proposing that all philosophical concepts be reduced solely to concrete objects. He argued that language should function as a precise instrument, stripped of abstract elements like qualities, relations, and states of affairs, to ensure clarity in philosophical discourse. Employing Lesniewski’s logical system, he shows how Reism addresses significant challenges in analytic philosophy, including issues related to non-existent proper names and difficulties inherent in Frege’s theory of meaning. Although critics note that rejecting abstract entities may limit its applicability in domains such as mathematics and set theory, the theory’s emphasis on simplicity and linguistic clarity continues to offer valuable insights into both linguistic and metaphysical studies.

Presumably, Brentano''s theory of intentionality besides his other theories of the mind, at least in some particular aspects, could be contrasted with some of the issues in Islamic philosophy including, issues on mental existence, some of Suhrawardi Illuminationist rules ( even Ghazzali in Mishkat al-anwar) on knower''s essential luminosity and its principality and centrality in cognition, compound theory of knowledge or knowledge of knowledge in Ibn Sina and others, human soul as a cosmos in Mulla Sadra, soul''s creation as real nature of perception at least sensible and imaginal level, essential awareness of the self to itself meanwhile, any other awareness, can be recourse to certain capacities on comparative studies. The present paper is an attempt to explore some centrality aspects of Brentano''s theory of intentionality in early and later forms and its outcomes such as reism. In this study, a glance will be cast at Muslim philosophers'' views in this regard in order to pave the way for a comparative study. In order to observe the standard of the journal, I refrain from going into detail about the issues. .