Part I tackles head-on the thorny issue of the suitability of Husserl's phenomenological method to yield results that adequately address the phenomenon of human existence. The two studies that comprise this part show in an exemplary way that the current understandings of the attempted "immanent" critiques of the putative ontological shortcomings of Husserlian phenomenology, undertaken respectively by Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty, stand in need of major correctives.