Monday, March 06, 2006
Notes for Tuesday, March 7, 2006
Post-Kantian British and Continental Philosophy. Hegel, Schopenhauer. Read to p. 242.
Hegel (1770-1831) Main work: Phenomenology of Spirt (1807)
Classified as a German Idealist, he called himself an absolute idealist (as opposed to a subjective idealist), in the sense that he equated reality with mind or idea, but not just the human mind--rather God's mind. There is an evolution of spirit or "Geist," as it is called in German, which constitutes history. History will play a greater role in Hegel's philosophy than it had in any previous philosophy. There is an immanent law of development or unfolding of reality in such a way that spirit moves in the direction of self-realization. In the beginning, being and nothingness are identical. But as the process of universal self-realization gets underway, the subject (the thinker) thinks the object. This is God's (or the Universe's) self-alienation.
The movement of history is a dialectical advance, from thesis to antithesis to synthesis. The thesis then functions as a new (simple) thesis, which then engenders its opposite, an antithesis, which eventually generates a new synthesis, and so on.
Brief discussion on Hegel's system.
I. The Idea-in-itself (= logic). Being, Nothingness, Becoming.
II. The Idea-outside -itself (= nature, i.e. material being, the opposite of spirit, but potentially destined to become spirit).
III. The Idea for itself ( = spirit); the idea recovered from its loss into its opposite. Subjective and objective spirit.
(See p. 230 for rest of system.)
Schopenhauer (1788-1860)
Rivalry with Hegel. Influence of Indian philosophy. Schopenhauer the pessimist. The dark side of mankind is thinly veiled. We are nature's playthings, in the grip of an impersonal will, that can only say "more"! Thematized the drives (sex, violence). Influenced Sigmund Freud, notion of the id. Civilization is the sublimation of drives, delayed gratification. Baroque music and nirvana. Schopenhauer was a good writer and became relatively popular in Germany. Influenced Nietzsche, whose idea of the "will to power" appears to owe something to Schopenhauer.
Hegel (1770-1831) Main work: Phenomenology of Spirt (1807)
Classified as a German Idealist, he called himself an absolute idealist (as opposed to a subjective idealist), in the sense that he equated reality with mind or idea, but not just the human mind--rather God's mind. There is an evolution of spirit or "Geist," as it is called in German, which constitutes history. History will play a greater role in Hegel's philosophy than it had in any previous philosophy. There is an immanent law of development or unfolding of reality in such a way that spirit moves in the direction of self-realization. In the beginning, being and nothingness are identical. But as the process of universal self-realization gets underway, the subject (the thinker) thinks the object. This is God's (or the Universe's) self-alienation.
The movement of history is a dialectical advance, from thesis to antithesis to synthesis. The thesis then functions as a new (simple) thesis, which then engenders its opposite, an antithesis, which eventually generates a new synthesis, and so on.
Brief discussion on Hegel's system.
I. The Idea-in-itself (= logic). Being, Nothingness, Becoming.
II. The Idea-outside -itself (= nature, i.e. material being, the opposite of spirit, but potentially destined to become spirit).
III. The Idea for itself ( = spirit); the idea recovered from its loss into its opposite. Subjective and objective spirit.
(See p. 230 for rest of system.)
Schopenhauer (1788-1860)
Rivalry with Hegel. Influence of Indian philosophy. Schopenhauer the pessimist. The dark side of mankind is thinly veiled. We are nature's playthings, in the grip of an impersonal will, that can only say "more"! Thematized the drives (sex, violence). Influenced Sigmund Freud, notion of the id. Civilization is the sublimation of drives, delayed gratification. Baroque music and nirvana. Schopenhauer was a good writer and became relatively popular in Germany. Influenced Nietzsche, whose idea of the "will to power" appears to owe something to Schopenhauer.
# posted by Michael @ 6:55 PM 
