Combining Philosophers

Ideas for David Fair, Georg W.F.Hegel and Arthur Schopenhauer

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2 ideas

16. Persons / A. Concept of a Person / 4. Persons as Agents
Hegel claims knowledge of self presupposes desire, and hence objects [Hegel, by Scruton]
     Full Idea: Hegel seems to argue that the immediate knowledge of self (the Cartesian premise) presupposes the activity that constitutes the self, and this presupposes desire, and hence the knowledge of objects.
     From: report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Phenomenology of Spirit [1807]) by Roger Scruton - Short History of Modern Philosophy Ch.12
     A reaction: This hardly amounts to an argument, but I find it quite sympathetic as a claim. It fits comfortably with modern externalist accounts of thought. While solipsism seems a logical possibility, it hardly amounts to a coherent account of mental life.
A person is a being which is aware of its own self-directed and free subjectivity [Hegel]
     Full Idea: A person is a subject which is aware of its subjectivity, for as a person, I am completely for myself: the person is the individuality of freedom in pure being-for-itself.
     From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Elements of the Philosophy of Right [1821], 035 add)
     A reaction: Sartre's being 'pour-soi'. Presumably the freedom is for action as well as thought. He ignores Spinoza's claim that such freedom is just an illusion.