Page "Edmund Husserl" Paragraph 5

Following his doctorate in mathematics, he returned to Berlin to work as the assistant to Karl Weierstrass.

Yet already Husserl had felt the desire to pursue philosophy.

Then professor Weierstrass became very ill. Husserl became free to return to Vienna where, after serving a short military duty, he devoted his attention to philosophy.

In 1884 at the University of Vienna he attended the lectures of Franz Brentano on philosophy and philosophical psychology.

Brentano introduced him to the writings of Bernard Bolzano, Hermann Lotze, J. Stuart Mill, and David Hume.

Husserl was so impressed by Brentano that he decided to dedicate his life to philosophy ; indeed, Franz Brentano is often credited as being his most important influence, e. g., with regard to intentionality.

Following academic advice, two years later in 1886 Husserl followed Carl Stumpf, a former student of Brentano, to the University of Halle, seeking to obtain his Habilitation which would qualify him to teach at the university level.

There under Stumpf's supervision he wrote Über den Begriff der Zahl ( On the concept of Number ) in 1887, which would serve later as the base for his first important work, Philosophie der Arithmetik ( 1891 ).