Franz Brentano (1838-1917), German philosopher and psychologist, founder of intentional psychology. A nephew of the poet Clemens Brentano, Franz Brentano was born in Marienberg, and ordained a priest in 1864. He first taught philosophy at the University of Wurzburg between 1866 and 1873, after which he renounced his priesthood and his post. In 1874 he wrote his most famous work, Psychology From an Empirical Standpoint (trans. 1973). That same year he became a teacher in Vienna. Among his audience and pupils were Sigmund Freud and Edmund Husserl.

Brentano’s aim was to establish a philosophy that would incorporate scientific methods. He was more interested in the actions of the mind, rather than its suppression, and he modernized the scholastic concept of intentio, or intentionality, in his attempt to explain consciousness. According to Bretano, physical phenomena are characterized by their being directed towards an object. The object thus possesses, according to Brentano, an imminent objectivity. His work had a direct influence on Husserl.

Brentano is also the author of The Origin of Our Knowledge of Right and Wrong (1889; trans. 1969), Die Vier Phasen der Philosophie und ihre Augenblicken Stand (The Four Phases of Philosophy and Their Current Position, 1895), Aristotle and His World View (1911; trans. 1978), and Von der Klassifikation der Psychischen Phänomenon (1911; The Classification of Physical Phenomena).