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Single Idea 22780
[filed under theme 13. Knowledge Criteria / D. Scepticism / 6. Scepticism Critique
]
Full Idea
The assertion that human beings cannot know the truth, but have to do only with appearances …deprives the spirit of intellectual dignity.
Gist of Idea
It is a rejection of intellectual dignity to say that we cannot know the truth
Source
Georg W.F.Hegel (Elements of the Philosophy of Right [1821], 132)
Book Ref
Hegel,Georg W.F.: 'Elements of the Philosophy of Right', ed/tr. Wood,Allen W. [CUP 1991], p.159
A Reaction
It is a relief to find Hegel making this assertion. His later followers seem to have slid into an extreme cultural relativism. I'm not sure that 'intellectual dignity' is a very secure foundation for his claim.
The
207 ideas
from Georg W.F.Hegel
5644
|
In Hegel's logic it is concepts (rather than judgements or propositions) which are true or false
[Hegel, by Scruton]
|
15607
|
We don't think with concepts - we think the concepts
[Hegel]
|
15608
|
The act of thinking is the bringing forth of universals
[Hegel]
|
15609
|
The sensible is distinguished from thought by being about singular things
[Hegel]
|
15610
|
Active thought about objects produces the universal, which is what is true and essential of it
[Hegel]
|
19072
|
In the deeper sense of truth, to be untrue resembles being bad; badness is untrue to a thing's nature
[Hegel]
|
19071
|
The deeper sense of truth is a thing matching the idea of what it ought to be
[Hegel]
|
19070
|
Superficial truth is knowing how something is, which is consciousness of bare correctness
[Hegel]
|
19073
|
True philosophy aims at absolute unity, while our understanding sees only separation
[Hegel]
|
21768
|
Logic is metaphysics, the science of things grasped in thoughts
[Hegel]
|
22081
|
Let thought follow its own course, and don't interfere
[Hegel]
|
22078
|
Even simple propositions about sensations are filled with categories
[Hegel]
|
15613
|
Real cognition grasps a thing from within itself, and is not satisfied with mere predicates
[Hegel]
|
15614
|
Old metaphysics tried to grasp eternal truths through causal events, which is impossible
[Hegel]
|
15612
|
Older metaphysics naively assumed that thought grasped things in themselves
[Hegel]
|
15615
|
Older metaphysics became dogmatic, by assuming opposed assertions must be true and false
[Hegel]
|
15616
|
If truth is just non-contradiction, we must take care that our basic concepts aren't contradictory
[Hegel]
|
15617
|
In abstraction, beyond finitude, freedom and necessity must exist together
[Hegel]
|
15618
|
If God is the abstract of Supremely Real Essence, then God is a mere Beyond, and unknowable
[Hegel]
|
15619
|
Empiricism made particular knowledge possible, and blocked wild claims
[Hegel]
|
15620
|
Empiricism contains the important idea that we should see knowledge for ourselves, and be part of it
[Hegel]
|
15622
|
Empiricism unknowingly contains and uses a metaphysic, which underlies its categories
[Hegel]
|
15621
|
Empiricism of the finite denies the supersensible, and can only think with formal abstraction
[Hegel]
|
15623
|
Humean scepticism, unlike ancient Greek scepticism, accepts the truth of experience as basic
[Hegel]
|
15624
|
Free thinking has no presuppositions
[Hegel]
|
15625
|
Sense perception is secondary and dependent, while thought is independent and primitive
[Hegel]
|
15626
|
Categories create objective experience, but are too conditioned by things to actually grasp them
[Hegel]
|
15628
|
The idea that contradiction is essential to rational understanding is a key modern idea
[Hegel]
|
15629
|
Tenderness for the world solves the antinomies; contradiction is in our reason, not in the essence of the world
[Hegel]
|
15630
|
Antinomies are not just in four objects, but in all objects, all representations, all objects and all ideas
[Hegel]
|
15631
|
The ideal of reason is the unification of abstract identity (or 'concept') and being
[Hegel]
|
15632
|
The Humean view stops us thinking about perception, and finding universals and necessities in it
[Hegel]
|
15633
|
We establish unification of the Ideal by the ontological proof, deriving being from abstraction of thinking
[Hegel]
|
15634
|
Thought about particulars is done entirely through categories
[Hegel]
|
15635
|
The older conception of God was emptied of human features, to make it worthy of the Infinite
[Hegel]
|
15636
|
The Cogito is at the very centre of the entire concern of modern philosophy
[Hegel]
|
15637
|
Essence is the essential self-positing unity of immediacy and mediation
[Hegel]
|
15638
|
Dialectic is the moving soul of scientific progression, the principle which binds science together
[Hegel]
|
21767
|
Dialectic is seen in popular proverbs like 'pride comes before a fall'
[Hegel]
|
15639
|
Socratic dialectic is subjective, but Plato made it freely scientific and objective
[Hegel]
|
21980
|
God is the absolute thing, and also the absolute person
[Hegel]
|
21981
|
The one substance is formless without the mediation of dialectical concepts
[Hegel]
|
21986
|
Hegel's system has a vast number of basic concepts
[Hegel, by Moore,AW]
|
21984
|
We must break up the rigidity that our understanding has imposed
[Hegel]
|
21595
|
Excluded middle is the maxim of definite understanding, but just produces contradictions
[Hegel]
|
22300
|
Existence is just a set of relationships
[Hegel]
|
22039
|
Geist is distinct from nature, not as a substance, but because of its normativity
[Hegel, by Pinkard]
|
22040
|
Freedom is produced by the activity of the mind, and is not intrinsically given
[Hegel]
|
21756
|
All revolutions result from spirit changing its categories, to achieve a deeper understanding
[Hegel]
|
22077
|
Metaphysics is the lattice which makes incoming material intelligible
[Hegel]
|
20109
|
Hegel inserted society and history between the God-world, man-nature, man-being binary pairs
[Hegel, by Safranski]
|
23270
|
We should all agree that there is reason in history
[Hegel]
|
23272
|
The human race matters, and individuals have little importance
[Hegel]
|
23273
|
In a good state the goal of the citizens and of the whole state are united
[Hegel]
|
23271
|
The goal of the world is Spirit's consciousness and enactment of freedom
[Hegel]
|
23276
|
The soul of the people is an organisation of its members which produces an essential unity
[Hegel]
|
23274
|
World history has no room for happiness
[Hegel]
|
23275
|
The state of nature is one of untamed brutality
[Hegel]
|
21974
|
The world seems rational to those who look at it rationally
[Hegel]
|
21753
|
If we look at the world rationally, the world assumes a rational aspect
[Hegel]
|
22042
|
Natural beauty is unimportant, because it doesn't show human freedom
[Hegel, by Pinkard]
|
22043
|
Hegel largely ignores aesthetic pleasure, taste and beauty, and focuses on the meaning of artworks
[Hegel, by Pinkard]
|
20413
|
For Hegel the importance of art concerns the culture, not the individual
[Hegel, by Eldridge]
|
20394
|
The purpose of art is to reveal to Spirit its own nature
[Hegel, by Davies,S]
|
21794
|
The main purpose of art is to express the unity of human life
[Hegel]
|
18549
|
Nineteenth century aesthetics focused on art rather than nature (thanks to Hegel)
[Hegel, by Scruton]
|
21795
|
What I hold true must also be part of my feelings and character
[Hegel]
|
21793
|
Genuine truth is the resolution of the highest contradiction
[Hegel]
|
20415
|
Art forms a bridge between the sensuous world and the world of pure thought
[Hegel]
|
21757
|
Philosophy is the conceptual essence of the shape of history
[Hegel]
|
21798
|
To universalise 'give everything to the poor' leads to absurdity
[Hegel]
|
21797
|
Immortality does not come at a later time, but when pure knowing Spirit fully grasps the universal
[Hegel]
|
22041
|
Representatives by region ignores whether they care about the national interest
[Hegel, by Pinkard]
|
21781
|
The absolute right is the right to have rights
[Hegel]
|
21785
|
We are only free, with rights, if we claim our freedom, and there are no natural rights
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
7083
|
Highest reason is aesthetic, and truth and good are subordinate to beauty
[Hegel]
|
21987
|
History is the progress of the consciousness of freedom
[Hegel]
|
6917
|
God is the essence of thought, abstracted from the thinker
[Hegel, by Feuerbach]
|
6915
|
Hegel made the last attempt to restore Christianity, which philosophy had destroyed
[Hegel, by Feuerbach]
|
21776
|
Philosophy aims to reveal the necessity and rationality of the categories of nature and spirit
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
22035
|
The structure of reason is a social and historical achievement
[Hegel, by Pinkard]
|
22034
|
Modern life needs individuality, but must recognise that human agency is social
[Hegel, by Pinkard]
|
21774
|
Genuine idealism is seeing the ideal structure of the world
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
5648
|
For Hegel knowledge of self presupposes objects, and also a public and moral social world
[Hegel, by Scruton]
|
20741
|
Consciousness is shaped dialectically, by opposing forces and concepts
[Hegel, by Aho]
|
5647
|
Hegel claims knowledge of self presupposes desire, and hence objects
[Hegel, by Scruton]
|
15611
|
I develop philosophical science from the simplest appearance of immediate consciousness
[Hegel, by Hegel]
|
21773
|
Experience is immediacy, unity, forces, self-awareness, reason, culture, absolute being
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
22033
|
Hegel tried to avoid Kant's dualism of neutral intuitions and imposed concepts
[Hegel, by Pinkard]
|
21770
|
Consciousness is both of objects, and of itself
[Hegel]
|
21771
|
Consciousness derives its criterion of knowledge from direct knowledge of its own being
[Hegel]
|
22082
|
Truth does not appear by asserting reasons and then counter-reasons
[Hegel]
|
21775
|
The God of revealed religion can only be understood through pure speculative knowledge
[Hegel]
|
8927
|
Philosophy moves essentially in the element of universality
[Hegel]
|
8928
|
The Absolute is not supposed to be comprehended, but felt and intuited
[Hegel]
|
8929
|
In the Absolute everything is the same
[Hegel]
|
7077
|
The true is the whole
[Hegel]
|
8930
|
The in-itself must become for-itself, which requires self-consciousness
[Hegel]
|
8931
|
The movement of pure essences constitutes the nature of scientific method
[Hegel]
|
8932
|
Truth does not come from giving reasons for and against propositions
[Hegel]
|
8933
|
Science confronts the inner necessities of objects
[Hegel]
|
8934
|
Being is Thought
[Hegel]
|
8935
|
Without philosophy, science is barren and futile
[Hegel]
|
8936
|
Human nature only really exists in an achieved community of minds
[Hegel]
|
21796
|
Man is God if he raises himself, by denying his nature and finitude
[Hegel]
|
21783
|
State slavery is a phase of education, moving towards a full culture
[Hegel]
|
21784
|
Slavery is unjust, because humanity is essentially free
[Hegel]
|
22085
|
Freedom requires us to submit to a family, or a corporation, or a state
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
21790
|
Moral individuals become ethical when they see the social aspect of a matter
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
8030
|
For Hegel, the moral life can only be led within a certain type of community
[Hegel, by MacIntyre]
|
21988
|
In the 1840s Hegel seemed to defend society being right as it is, as a manifestation of Mind
[Hegel, by Singer]
|
21787
|
Evil enters a good will when we believe we are doing right, but allow no criticism of our choice
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
8029
|
You can't have a morality which is supplied by the individual, but is also genuinely universal
[Hegel, by MacIntyre]
|
22051
|
The categorical imperative lacks roots in a historical culture
[Hegel, by Bowie]
|
22767
|
I aim to portray the state as a rational entity
[Hegel]
|
22766
|
Philosophy is exploration of the rational
[Hegel]
|
21979
|
Wisdom emerges at the end of a process
[Hegel]
|
21778
|
True liberal freedom is to pursue something, while being free to cease the pursuit
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
21779
|
People assume they are free, but the options available are not under their control
[Hegel]
|
22768
|
Subjective and objective are not firmly opposed, but merge into one another
[Hegel]
|
21780
|
A free will primarily wills its own freedoom
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
22769
|
The concept of the will is the free will which wills its freedom
[Hegel]
|
22770
|
A person is a being which is aware of its own self-directed and free subjectivity
[Hegel]
|
22771
|
Be a person, and respect other persons
[Hegel]
|
22772
|
Personality overcomes subjective limitations and posits Dasein as its own
[Hegel]
|
21782
|
Man has an absolute right to appropriate things
[Hegel]
|
22773
|
Because only human beings can own property, everything else can become our property
[Hegel]
|
22774
|
A community does not have the property-owning rights that a person has
[Hegel]
|
22775
|
The owner of a thing is obviously the first person to freely take possession of it
[Hegel]
|
22776
|
Slaves are partly responsible for their own condition
[Hegel]
|
22777
|
Individuals must dedicate themselves to the ethical whole, and give their lives when asked
[Hegel]
|
22778
|
Individuals can't leave the state, because they are natural citizens, and humans require a state
[Hegel]
|
22779
|
The good is realised freedom
[Hegel]
|
22780
|
It is a rejection of intellectual dignity to say that we cannot know the truth
[Hegel]
|
22781
|
The categorical imperative is fine if you already have a set of moral principles
[Hegel]
|
21786
|
Conscience is the right of the self to know what is right and obligatory, and thus make them true
[Hegel]
|
22782
|
To have pagan beliefs and be a pagan are quite different
[Hegel]
|
22783
|
Rights imply duties, and duties imply rights
[Hegel]
|
22784
|
Love is ethical life in its natural form
[Hegel]
|
22785
|
Even educated women are unsuited to science, philosophy, art and government
[Hegel]
|
22786
|
Children need discipline, to break their self-will and eradicate sensuousness
[Hegel]
|
22787
|
The family is the first basis of the state, but estates are a necessary second
[Hegel]
|
22788
|
A human only become a somebody as a member of a social estate
[Hegel]
|
22789
|
Society draws people, and requires their work, making them wholly dependent on it
[Hegel]
|
22790
|
We cannot assert rights which are unnatural
[Hegel]
|
22791
|
The state is the march of God in the world
[Hegel]
|
21791
|
Social groups must focus on the state, which must in turn respect their inclusion and their will
[Hegel]
|
21789
|
Slaves have no duties because they have no rights
[Hegel]
|
22792
|
Individuals attain their right by discovering their self-consciousness in institutions
[Hegel]
|
22793
|
Some religions lead to harsh servitude and the debasement of human beings
[Hegel]
|
22795
|
People can achieve respect for their state by insight into its essence
[Hegel]
|
22794
|
A fully developed state is conscious and knows what it wills
[Hegel]
|
22796
|
A constitution embodies a nation's rights and condition
[Hegel]
|
22798
|
Money is the best way to achieve just equality
[Hegel]
|
22797
|
In modern states an individual's actions should be their choice
[Hegel]
|
22799
|
The people do not have the ability to know the general will
[Hegel]
|
22800
|
Majority rule means obligations can be imposed on me
[Hegel]
|
21792
|
The state should reflect all interests, and not just popular will, or a popular party
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
22801
|
The great man of the ages is the one who reveals and accomplishes the will of his time
[Hegel]
|
22802
|
Wars add strength to a nation, and cure internal dissension
[Hegel]
|
21763
|
When we explicate the category of being, we watch a new category emerge
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
20953
|
Every concept depends on the counter-concepts of what it is not
[Hegel, by Bowie]
|
22058
|
Hegel's 'absolute idea' is the interdependence of all truths to justify any of them
[Hegel, by Bowie]
|
20954
|
The 'absolute idea' is when all the contradictions are exhausted
[Hegel, by Bowie]
|
21762
|
To grasp an existence, we must consider its non-existence
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
21760
|
Thinking of nothing is not the same as simply not thinking
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
21765
|
The ground of a thing is not another thing, but the first thing's substance or rational concept
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
22059
|
Kant's thing-in-itself is just an abstraction from our knowledge; things only exist for us
[Hegel, by Bowie]
|
22083
|
Hegel believe that the genuine categories reveal things in themselves
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
21972
|
Hegel, unlike Kant, said how things appear is the same as how things are
[Hegel, by Moore,AW]
|
22038
|
Hegel's non-subjective idealism is the unity of subjective and objective viewpoints
[Hegel, by Pinkard]
|
22044
|
Hegel claimed his system was about the world, but it only mapped conceptual interdependence
[Pinkard on Hegel]
|
21464
|
The Absolute is the primitive system of concepts which are actualised
[Hegel, by Gardner]
|
21761
|
If we start with indeterminate being, we arrive at being and nothing as a united pair
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
21764
|
Thought about being leads to a string of other concepts, like becoming, quantity, specificity, causality...
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
21766
|
Dialectic is the instability of thoughts generating their opposite, and then new more complex thoughts
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
22037
|
Objectivity is not by correspondence, but by the historical determined necessity of Geist
[Hegel, by Pinkard]
|
21983
|
Being and nothing are the same and not the same, which is the identity of identity and non-identity
[Hegel]
|
21978
|
Hegel's dialectic is not thesis-antithesis-synthesis, but usually negation of negation of the negation
[Hegel, by Moore,AW]
|
21977
|
Nothing exists, as thinkable and expressible
[Hegel]
|
21985
|
The so-called world is filled with contradiction
[Hegel]
|
21975
|
The absolute idea is being, imperishable life, self-knowing truth, and all truth
[Hegel]
|
21976
|
The absolute idea is the great unity of the infinite system of concepts
[Hegel, by Moore,AW]
|
22080
|
The nature of each category relates itself to another
[Hegel]
|
22084
|
Authentic thinking and reality have the same content
[Hegel]
|
21772
|
In absolute knowing, the gap between object and oneself closes, producing certainty
[Hegel]
|
21769
|
We must start with absolute abstraction, with no presuppositions, so we start with pure being
[Hegel]
|
16011
|
Hegel doesn't storm the heavens like the giants, but works his way up by syllogisms
[Kierkegaard on Hegel]
|
5433
|
For Hegel, things are incomplete, and contain external references in their own nature
[Hegel, by Russell]
|
3301
|
On the continent it is generally believed that metaphysics died with Hegel
[Benardete,JA on Hegel]
|
19635
|
Hegel produced modern optimism; he failed to grasp that consciousness never progresses
[Hegel, by Cioran]
|
8215
|
Hegel was the last philosopher of the Book
[Hegel, by Derrida]
|
20952
|
Rather than in three stages, Hegel presented his dialectic as 'negation of the negation'
[Hegel, by Bowie]
|
21777
|
Negation of negation doubles back into a self-relationship
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
22079
|
Hegel said Kant's fixed categories actually vary with culture and era
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
5645
|
The dialectical opposition of being and nothing is resolved in passing to the concept of becoming
[Hegel, by Scruton]
|
21755
|
For Hegel, categories shift their form in the course of history
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
21754
|
Our concepts and categories disclose the world, because we are part of the world
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
5646
|
Hegel gives an ontological proof of the existence of everything
[Hegel, by Scruton]
|
9225
|
Hegel reputedly claimed to know a priori that there are five planets
[Hegel, by Field,H]
|
4347
|
When man wills the natural, it is no longer natural
[Hegel]
|
6686
|
Hegel said he was offering an encyclopaedic rationalisation of Christianity
[Hegel, by Graham]
|
4188
|
Hegel's entire philosophy is nothing but a monstrous amplification of the ontological proof
[Schopenhauer on Hegel]
|
3909
|
Society isn’t founded on a contract, since contracts presuppose a society
[Hegel, by Scruton]
|
21758
|
Humans have no fixed identity, but produce and reveal their shifting identity in history
[Hegel, by Houlgate]
|
20414
|
Hegel's Absolute Spirit is the union of human rational activity at a moment, and whatever that sustains
[Hegel, by Eldridge]
|
19661
|
Making sufficient reason an absolute devalues the principle of non-contradiction
[Hegel, by Meillassoux]
|