7083
|
Highest reason is aesthetic, and truth and good are subordinate to beauty [Hegel]
|
|
Full Idea:
I am now convinced that the highest act of reason, which embraces all ideas, is an aesthetic act, and that truth and goodness are brothers only in beauty.
|
|
From:
Georg W.F.Hegel (Oldest System Prog. of German Idealism [1796]), quoted by Simon Critchley - Continental Philosophy - V. Short Intro Append
|
|
A reaction:
This seems to be the distinctive value framework of the romantic movement and the nineteenth century, where art is destined to replace religion. However, Plato in the Symposium is an interesting ally. Aim for beauty, and the rest follows?
|
22037
|
Objectivity is not by correspondence, but by the historical determined necessity of Geist [Hegel, by Pinkard]
|
|
Full Idea:
What gives objectivity to a judgment about an object is not correspondence, but the way in which a judgement is located within a pattern of reasonng that is determined by the way in which Geist is historically determined as necessarily taking the object.
|
|
From:
report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Science of Logic [1816], Intro) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860
|
|
A reaction:
I quote this, but I'm blowed if I can make sense of how objectivity could be achieved in such a way. How can a historical process create a necessary judgement? Sorry, I'm fairly new to Hegel. Pinker says it is the practice of giving reasons.
|
15626
|
Categories create objective experience, but are too conditioned by things to actually grasp them [Hegel]
|
|
Full Idea:
It is the categories that elevate mere perception into objectivity, into experience; but these concepts ...are conditioned by the given material. ...Hence the understanding, or cognition through categories, cannot become cognizant of things-in-themselves.
|
|
From:
Georg W.F.Hegel (Logic (Encyclopedia I) [1817], §43-4)
|
|
A reaction:
As one often fears with Hegel, this sounds like a deep insight, but is less persuasive when translated into simpler English (if I've got it right!). Being 'conditioned by the material' strikes me as just what is needed for good categories.
|
21983
|
Being and nothing are the same and not the same, which is the identity of identity and non-identity [Hegel]
|
|
Full Idea:
Pure being and pure nothing are the same, ...but on the contrary they are not the same ...they are absolutely distinct. ...This is the identity of identity and non-identity.
|
|
From:
Georg W.F.Hegel (Science of Logic [1816], I.i.i.1C p.82,74), quoted by A.W. Moore - The Evolution of Modern Metaphysics 07.7
|
|
A reaction:
Even Moore, who is very patient with Hegel, gets cross at this point, describing such talk as 'shocking'. He's not wrong. Moore later says that the reason in reality tolerates contradictions, but human understanding can't.
|
15616
|
If truth is just non-contradiction, we must take care that our basic concepts aren't contradictory [Hegel]
|
|
Full Idea:
If truth were nothing more than lack of contradiction, one would have to examine first of all, with regard to each concept, whether it does not on its own account, contain an inner contradiction.
|
|
From:
Georg W.F.Hegel (Logic (Encyclopedia I) [1817], §33 Rem)
|
|
A reaction:
This is a very nice thought, which modern analytic philosophers, steeped in logic, should think about. It is always presumed that a contradiction is between a proposition and its negation, not some inner feature.
|
15639
|
Socratic dialectic is subjective, but Plato made it freely scientific and objective [Hegel]
|
|
Full Idea:
It is in the Platonic philosophy that dialectic first occurs in a form which is freely scientific, and hence also objective. With Socrates, dialectical thinking still has a predominantly subjective shape, consistent with his irony.
|
|
From:
Georg W.F.Hegel (Logic (Encyclopedia I) [1817], §81 Add1)
|
|
A reaction:
I don't understand how dialectic can be 'objective', given that it is a method rather than a belief. Plato certainly seems to elevate dialectic into something almost mystical, because of what is said to be within its power.
|
21978
|
Hegel's dialectic is not thesis-antithesis-synthesis, but usually negation of negation of the negation [Hegel, by Moore,AW]
|
|
Full Idea:
The dialectic is often described in terms of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis - though this is not a Hegelian way of speaking. Hegel himself sometimes describes it in terms of negation and negation of the negation.
|
|
From:
report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Science of Logic [1816], I.i.i.C(c) p.150) by A.W. Moore - The Evolution of Modern Metaphysics 07.4
|
|
A reaction:
A footnote says the first form of description only occurs once in Hegel's work. I am guessing that Marx is responsible for the standard misrepresentation.
|
20952
|
Rather than in three stages, Hegel presented his dialectic as 'negation of the negation' [Hegel, by Bowie]
|
|
Full Idea:
Hegel's 'dialectic' is often characterised in terms of the triad of thesis, antithesis and synthesis. This is, however, not the way he presents it. The core of the dialectic is rather what Hegel terms the 'negation of the negation'.
|
|
From:
report of Georg W.F.Hegel (works [1812]) by Andrew Bowie - Introduction to German Philosophy
|
|
A reaction:
Interestingly, this connects it to debates about intuitionist logic, which denies that double-negation necessarily makes a positive. Presumably Marx emphasised the first reading.
|
21766
|
Dialectic is the instability of thoughts generating their opposite, and then new more complex thoughts [Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
|
Full Idea:
The dialectical principle, for Hegel, is the principle whereby apparently stable thoughts reveal their inherent instability by turning into their opposites and then into new, more complex thoughts (as being turns to nothing, and then becoming).
|
|
From:
report of Georg W.F.Hegel (Science of Logic [1816]) by Stephen Houlgate - An Introduction to Hegel 02 'The Method'
|
|
A reaction:
Houlgate says this is unique to Hegel, and is NOT the familiar thesis-antithesis-synthesis idea of dialectic, found in Kant and Engels. Hegelian idea shares the Greek idea of insights arising from oppositions.
|