Brentano's soul and the unity of consciousness

Abstract

In the following paper, I discuss Fisette’s reconstruction of Brentano’s view, according to which Brentano’s conception of consciousness and of its unity is based on the presupposition that consciousness has a bearer, i.e. the soul. First, I identify Fisette’s real target (sect.1) and challenge his conception of the mental agent as central to Brentano’s account (sect. 2 and 3). In section 4, I formulate some doubts about the sources used by Fisette, and, in section 5, I propose another reading of the relation between the unity of consciousness and the mental agent in the late Brentano.