The ambiguity of the reality as a translation of Wirklichkeit

Abstract

There is a tendency to translate the German word Wirklichkeit by the word reality, along with its equivalents in other languages, and although there are other ways of translating this term, in Husserl's Ideas I it has been translated as such. In this work, Husserl explains the precise meaning of the term, which distinguishes it from Realität, a term also translated as reality and its equivalents. This produces an ambiguity that also appears in the German language (where Wirklichkeit and Realität are commonly understood as synonyms), and this ambiguity is described by Heidegger as a "misinterpretation" of the terms. In this paper, I will review the context of the terminological appearance of these concepts in the work of Master Eckhart and their relationship with Albertus Magnus, in order to establish criteria that allow the evaluation of the technical sense of these terms and the reasons why they are ambiguously understood. I will argue that, in contexts of terminological precision such as Husserl's work, the choice of the word reality, as a translation of Wirklichkeit, is not optimal and the ambiguity it produces is unnecessary.