In the course of years, references to Husserlian Phenomenology have emerged and multiplied in some sectors of cognitive science. To many, these attempts to connect cognitive science with a central current of 'continental' philosophy remain somehow mysterious, not to say suspicious. My ambition is to help dissipating these remnants of misunderstanding and suspicion by showing that such attempts are an answer to a perfectly legitimate theoretical problem, although one usually not made sufficiently explicit. Namely: the problem of the cognitive relevance of Husserlian Phenomenology.

The main part of my talk will be devoted to offering a synthesis of the views I have myself put forward as to how this problem should be understood at its most general level, as well as to the main – although not sole - answer it calls for. This answer is in substance that Husserlian Phenomenology is essentially instrumental for the development of the level of systematic first-person description of phenomenological properties that we need to integrate into the naturalist framework of contemporary cognitive science in order to overcome the explanatory gap problem. It is shared by a number of people, and under the name of "Husserlian Phenomenological claim" I have developed my own version of it, that presents the distinctive feature of being minimally Husserlian.

In the second part of my talk, I will offer a new critical argumental in favour of it drawn from A Noë's treatment of the phenomenological proprety of virtual presence in visual experience.