BRENTANO, Franz. – Philosopher, b. at Marienberg near Boppard on the Rhine on 16 Jan. 1838 into a Catholic family of Italian origin, d. at Zurich in Switzerland on 17 March 1917. Ordained priest in 1864, he obtained his habilitation at the University of Würzburg in 1866; in 1873, following the controversies surrounding papal infallibility, he left the Church and lived outside any denomination, though always retaining a lively faith in God. Having moved to the University of Vienna, he abandoned teaching due to progressive blindness and retired to Florence, from where he had to go into exile when Italy declared war on Austria.
Brentano was a teacher of exceptional efficacy, drawing crowds of students around his lecture podium. From his ecclesiastical formation, he drew and retained a strong attachment to Aristotelianism, which he was able to deepen under the guidance of Adolf Trendelenburg in Berlin. His early works on Aristotelian exegesis remain highly regarded today: *Von der mannigfachen Bedeutung des Seienden nach Aristoteles* (Freiburg in Br. 1862); *Die Psychologie des Aristoteles insbesondere seine Lehre vom NOETICO* (Mainz 1867); *Aristoteles' Lehre vom Ursprung des menschlichen Geistes* (Leipzig 1911); a sharp and vigorous critique of Zeller, as a new edition of the earlier *Über den Creationismus des Aristoteles* (Vienna 1882); *Aristoteles und seine Weltanschauung* (Leipzig 1911). In the controversy over the nature, origin, and unity of the intellect in man, Brentano defended with keen insight and warmth the Thomist interpretation.
Within the realm of theoretical philosophy, rather than constructing a system, Brentano limited himself to the analysis of certain fundamental problems, reconstructing their framework and probing their requirements through examination and critique of previous solutions, focusing especially on problems of knowledge. In an era dominated by positivism, with its successes in the experimental sciences, he sought to give philosophy the rigor of method and the evident conclusiveness enjoyed by science—a task he fulfilled in his major work, *Psychologie vom empirischen Standpunkt* (1st ed., Leipzig 1874, for Part 1). In this work, setting aside purely metaphysical questions about the nature of the soul and its faculties, Brentano defined psychology as the “science of psychic phenomena” and assigned it the method of phenomenological analysis, namely the description of acts and functions of consciousness; hence descriptive psychology or “phenomenognosia.” The “psychic” phenomenon is the conscious act and is distinguished from the “physical” by the properties Brentano termed “intentionality” (v.), the intentional inexistence of an object, inasmuch as such an act always implies “relation to an object.” Intentionality is common to acts of knowing as well as to those of desiring and willing (contrary to Hamilton, who limited it to the former): in representation something is represented, in judgment something is affirmed or denied, in love something is loved, in hatred hated, in desire something is desired. What is known, loved, etc., is called the primary object, while the act of knowing, loving, etc., is the secondary object. Regarding the structure of the act, Brentano distinguished a “direct” mode of perception, which is the immediate and direct consciousness of the act, and an “oblique” mode of perception, which concerns the relation to the content to which observable variations of space and time refer. Hence Brentano denied the immediate perception of the external world and admitted the possibility of solipsism. Similar oscillations are found in his positions on ethical, metaphysical, and religious problems, torn between attachment to ancient wisdom and the temptation of modern solutions into which his faith also sank.
Brentano’s work stimulated original research among his disciples across all fields of philosophy, effecting a true renewal of German culture: Chr. von Ehrenfels, A. Meinong, A. Marty, St. Witasek developed the theory of “Gestaltqualität”; his favorite student Stumpf had as assistants W. Köhler and K. Koffka, who, together with M. Wertheimer, constructed the “Gestalt theory” that revolutionized contemporary psychology; E. Husserl turned to “pure” or eidetic phenomenology. In Italy, Brentano’s influence is visible in the spiritualism of F. De Sarlo (v.).