What if description isn't necessary?

In last week's class we discussed how "Sense Certainty" failed, by the very fact that, in describing itself, it uses universals in their least descriptive form. By using the universals as explanation for understanding, there is an inherent failure to understand. I understood Hegel's process that guided us to this realization and don't argue with the chain of logic. However, one point that seems to be troublesome for me is that Hegel seems to never address one concept. What if knowledge doesn't need to be described to another person? Sense Certainty seems to have failed at the basic level of explanation due to its inability to describe what it knows without using universal such as the "here," "now," and "this.” What if Sense Certainty knows, but needs not describe? Hegel seems to be grappling with the problem of description and public understanding of what is known, but what if Sense Certainty can know in that it knows and has no need to explain. For it is explanation itself that leads to a lack of true understanding. There are some religious groups that experience their environment and do not speak of their understanding because it is internal, personal, and indescribable. Could it be possible that in Hegel's attempt to extract what each stage "knows" he fails to understand what it knows, but it still knows? Maybe the religious group doesn't necessarily capture Sense Certainty, since part of those beliefs and practices are what Hegel would consider to be illogical, but for me it presents an interesting example of how there could be a failure in language to describe what it knows and not a failure in Sense Certainty. It almost seems to be that Sense Certainty is the ability to live and sense and react in the here and now, but without having to use those terms we place on it. Although one problem with this questioning is that I fail to address is the idea of constant rediscovery and unfamiliarness of everything around us. Potentially, this idea of constant confusion, and everything being Sensed as a blur of constant rediscovery, isn't illogical, but rather a process of coming to terms with the individuality of the world. Because when I really think about it, how often are two things complete identical? This is potential a question that Hegel answers more thoroughly elsewhere, or I completely missed this point, but I wanted to address it since I didn't ask during class.

Hegel explanation of Colonization

In the Hegel's allegory of the Lord and the Bondsman, Hegel depiction of struggle for recognition of self is works well as an explanation of the development and eventual downfall of the colonial system of oppression.

The allegory begins with two hypothetical people (or consciousnesses) who have never encountered another person before. At first, it is a harmless mirroring of each others movements but it slow escalates into a death struggle as both become dependent on the other for recognition.

The problem I have with the death struggle is that it is in terms of life and death. To me, life and death are biological concepts, so have a lot of theoretical baggage which is not part of the experience of the struggle for self-hood. What would be better here is 'existence' and 'non-existence.' One discovers the unessential or contingency of their existence, meaning that their existence can cease, by recognizing that one is not the only existence, and they recognize what existence is putting it at stake. This is quite true as one doesn't really grasp the nature or the limits of existence without its negation.

The mirroring and subsequent death struggle is analogous to how different cultures interact on first contact. At first, they are surprised another culture exists almost immediately they start fighting, with extinction of one as a possibility. If recognition of self-hood is the cause of these confrontations is highly speculative, but works well as a explanation of how the European explorers reacted when they first contacted strange foreign cultures in the East and New World.

As Hegel stated in the first sentence of the section that self-consciousness can only be achieved through another (178), the two consciousness soon realize that by killing the other, that would leave the survivor without another to recognize his self (188). This gives into a battle for dominance where one becomes lord or master and the other slave or bondsman.

This step corresponds to the period in which one nation is dominated by another nation and the result is colonization. Their national image is then bolstered as they recognize that they are the free ones.

The next step is that the lord makes the bondsman produce things that the lord desires. Because the act of production is a creative process, the bondsman develops a self-consciousness through their relationship with their work. As these creations become more developed because the lord restrains bondsman's desires, a contradiction occurs as the lord becomes dependent on the bondsman. This leads to a new struggle for dominance between the two self-consciousnesses, one between the producer and the consumer, or this is how I interpreted the end of the allegory.

This last part corresponds to the revolution where colonized and enslaved, having developed a power over their lords through the relationship both have to the slave's work, revolt against the colonizer and slaver. This revolt is in the name of becoming independent and is only possible if the enslaved can recognize their power to revolt like they did in many colonies before, during, and after Hegel's time.

Consciousness and Progress

            In class on Tuesday, we established through our discussions of “Sense-Certainty” and “Perception” that the way in which we perceive objects is determined by the subjects. We view things in terms of universals, but because of the makeup of consciousness, we can’t decide whether it is correct to perceive things in terms of “also” or “one.” That we have two competing ways to perceive the same object shows, according to Hegel, that perception is more about the subject than the object. Somewhat obviously, this seems to suggest that all human consciousnesses are the same in this regard; perception necessarily depends on consciousness, which for all people necessarily cannot decide between “also” and one.” Although this suggests sameness of human consciousnesses on the issue of perceiving objects, this opens the door to the idea that all human consciousnesses may share many things in common or have the same basic template.  That all human consciousnesses may share aspects other than perception of objects is further suggested in “Lordship and Bondage” (but I haven’t really looked at that in detail yet).

            In the week before this last class, we discussed progress as it occurs among humanity over time. Reading the blog last week, I thought that the types of progress we were discussing necessitated that progress occur over multiple lifetimes and that one generation kind of picks up where the previous one leaves off. (For, if this weren’t true, when people die, progress would seemingly have to start from scratch instead of continuing. Then, it would seem, real progress would never really occur.) With this in mind, history progresses with each generation or group, thinking about things and reacting to things in a way that grows out of (but is still at least slightly different from) the thought of the previous groups. When it occurred to me that Hegel implies that consciousnesses all have some commonality, I thought of this again. I questioned, what does the nature of progress suggest about inherent similarities between consciousnesses? I came to two different conclusions. In one sense, progress in this manner implies some similarities between all consciousnesses. For, if there were no common ground inherent in all consciousnesses, progress in this regard wouldn’t really be possible because there would be no ground for continuation. I also thought that consciousnesses can’t all be the same in manner completely, because if everyone was born with the same potential for development of consciousness, there would be no progress because the way of looking at things would never change. I recognize that these claims are debatable, and that there are many ways they could be argued against, and I’m not entirely sure whether I stand by them, but they’re interesting to think about. So in the end, I question, do consciousnesses share certain bases, but do these bases correspond to and change with progress in the world?

Lordship, Bondage, and Colonialism

In the notes at the back of the Phenomenology, J. N. Findlay suggests that in “Lordship and Bondage” “’imperialism’ and ‘colonialism’ at certain stages of development are given a justification” (523). His comment is perhaps motivated by Hegel’s statement, at the end of “Lordship and Bondage,” that “the bondsman realizes that it is precisely in his work wherein he seemed to have only an alienated existence that he acquires a mind of his own.  For this reflection, the two moments of fear and service as such, as also that of formative activity, are necessary, both being at the same time in a universal mode” (196, my emphasis). I agree with Findlay that this seems problematic at best. Hegel may be asserting the independence of the bondsman, but this independence only seems to come by way of his fear, oppression, and exploitation. In fact, it sounds strikingly similar to the rhetoric of the benevolent colonizer, who helps the colonized people to develop towards greater sophistication. This is, perhaps, not surprising; we’ve already noted in class discussion Hegel’s Euro-centric conception of history and progress. But I think we can also find hints at these troubling conclusions in other parts of this text, where Hegel seems to present a more innocuous, even idealistic, model of social interaction as mutual recognition.

As Findlay notes, the end of “Lordship and Bondage” seems to point towards troubling conclusions. Even earlier, the encounter between two self-consciousnesses seems (unnecessarily) hostile, and has less to do with “recognizing” the other as an individual that denying the other’s difference or “otherness”; in the encounter with the other, Hegel says, self-consciousness “has lost itself, for it finds itself as an other being; secondly, in doing so it has superseded the other, for it does not see the other as an essential being, but in the other sees its own self” (179). This strikes me as quite similar to the dynamic that Emmanuel Levinas refers to as a kind of “denial of alterity,” in which the Self refuses to acknowledge the Other as Other but rather subsumes the Other in the Self. Levinas considers this an ethically problematic dynamic, and Hegel also implies that it is not the end goal of social interaction. At this stage, the two self-consciousnesses have not attained self-certainty because they do not “recognize themselves as mutually recognizing one another” (184). They still appear to each other as objects, rather than “pure being-for-self, or as self-consciousness” (186).

Levinas envisions social interaction as the mutual recognition of alterity, or otherness—such an ungraspable otherness that the Self cannot, and should not, attempt to “comprehend” the Other in its entirety. Hegel, though he does not stop at the Self’s supersession of the Other, nevertheless seems to supersede the alterity of the Other in the universal. In fact, to attain self-certainty, each self-consciousness must root out “all immediate being,” as “the pure abstraction of self-consciousness consists in showing itself as the pure negation of its objective mode, or in showing that it is not attached to any specific existence, not to the individuality common to existence as such, that it is not attached to life” (187). This denial of specific existence, I think, is where this dialectic first becomes especially threatening in a colonial context, where blanket universals tend to obscure rather than recognize difference, and ignore individual suffering rather than ameliorate it. Hegel seems to realize the difficulties in this model as well; presumably that’s why there are over 300 pages left. Without and reference to “specific existence” or relevance to “individuality,” the Self-Other encounter strikes me as empty and unfulfilling at best, and exploitative and oppressive at worst.

On an unrelated note, did anyone else immediately think "Tyler Durden is the Unhappy Consciousness"? 

Recently, while illegally streaming the first episode of True Detective, I watched one of the lead characters, Rust Chole, played by Matthew McConaughey, argue that the development of consciousness, like all evolutionary adaptations over generations, occured accidentally and, more importantly, tragically. His reasons for this post-lapsarian ontology are, relevantly, non-christian and, more generically, non-religious. After this particularly dark diatribe, his partner, Martin "Marty" Hart, played by Woody Harrelson, urges his new friend to, basically, "shut the fuck up." At the nominal level, Hart seems to be scoffing at his partner's beliefs; however, in the context of the scene, he's actually attempting to protect his friend from himself. By espousing such controversial ideas, Chole positions himself in tension with pretty much all of Louisiana. Chole takes the hint but this newly appropriated taciturn-ity only allows for the unaddressed observation to linger in the air. Given all of the cognitive loops consciousness goes through to make some sense of the world, we--as an audience--may share Chole's concern and apprehension, even if we haven't, like him, lost a daughter to the universes' chaos. After watching consciousness--or Geist--fail over and over again to find itself comfortable within the world, Hegel seems to indirectly address the absurdity of Chole's inquiry. In an attempt to find solid epistemological grounds, consciousness begins with the simplest of things: the Here, the Now, the This, and the I. Within a given space-time slice, what could be more direct and more accurate than these designations? Yes, of course, they are devoid of content; even so, communication seems to be happening, at least. As Hegel shows us, however, Here, Now, This, and I are, in fact, the most abstract universals. Upon her utterance, she invokes all Heres, all Nows, all Is, and all Thises. In an attempt to access the world unmediated, the subject ends up accessing nothing. Frustrated by her attempts to speak unequivocally, she migrates to another alternative: perception. While the first option, sense-certainty, with all its uncertainty, surly doesn't appeal to us in the most resounding fashion, we more or less rely on perception to at least avoid catastrophe within our every day movements. As I walk down the street, I have templates for how objects appear. Given these templates, the dumpsters, sidewalks, and rushing cars do not disorient me; in fact, at times, I hardly even realize they are there--they almost disappear, like the 'black' in between blinks. Where does that place us as far as knowing, though. This disposition seems to be a simple solution to a difficult problem, an almost stop-gap measure. The workability of this situation, though, makes it more desirable than the alternative: perpetual inundation of unfamiliar sensory data.  

Hegel, the Self, and Interdependent Arising

       As I have been working my way through Hegel’s dense thoughts and even denser prose I have not been able to help but make connections to things I have read in other classes. As I may have mentioned the first day of class I have a minor in Asian Studies focusing on Asian philosophy and religion, and as I read Hegel I have been thinking a lot about various ideas found in Buddhism. It seems to me that there are many things on which Hegel and Gotama Buddha would agree, but other issues not so much.  In the Kalama sutta for instance, the Buddha advises his followers that they “should not be convinced by unconfirmed reports, by tradition, by hearsay, by scriptures, by logical reasoning, by inferential reasoning, by reflection on superficial appearances, by delighting in opinions and speculation, by the appearance of plausibility, or because you think this person is our teacher (Wallis, Basic Teachings of the Buddha, 23) Rather, we ought to “know for ourselves,” that is we need to try things on, to work them out in our own minds and our own lives. The Buddha’s strenuous criteria for “truth” seems at least on par with Hegel’s if not entirely the same.

Buddhism emerged at roughly the same time that Upanishadic Hinduism was on the rise, and many of the ideas found within Buddhism react to ideas within that tradition. If you all remember in class the other day we briefly discussed the upanishadic Hindu tradition when we talked about “Brahman,” a monistic concept which reduces all reality to one thing (Brahman).  As Buddhism was emerging at the same time as ideas about Brahman were developing, it is only natural that Buddhism, like Hegel should develop a healthy skepticism towards monistic ideas. Like Hegel Buddhsm attempts to break down the subject object barrier, while still remaining skeptical of monistic ideas. Instead Buddhism posits that the world is bound together by an infinite web of causality whereby every phenomenon is related and interdependent, this casual principle is routinely translated as “interdependent arising,” or “conditioned genesis.” 

I am not entirely sure, but I think that the Buddhist idea of interdependent arising is very similar to the way Hegel sees the world. In both cases phenomena do not appear spontaneously and the entire process of their becoming is present within their existence therefore understanding requires that one understand the process as well as the result.  Of course these two thinkers have some major differences as well. Ultimately the Buddha is attempting not to create a science of philosophy, but to end human suffering, and with this different goal in mind he obviously came to some different conclusions. 

Ultimately the Buddha believes that our suffering comes from our own ignorance about ourselves and about the world. Essentially, we think we have a “self” and because of that we spend our lives trying to satisfy it, but in reality our self is merely an amalgamation of various different substances and phenomena, it is constantly in flux and will never be satisfied. The key to ending our suffering, then is not to change reality but to change the way we look at it. In this regard, the Buddha and Hegel seem to agree, the world always has been rational, it is I who have not been looking upon it rationally. Given all of their similarities I wonder what Hegel would have thought of the Buddhist understanding of the “self”? The Buddha saw the self simply as the coming together of 5 aggregates: body, feeling, perception, conceptual fabrications, and cognizance. Basicaly he believed that there is perception but no perceiver, thought but no thinker, etc, the self is simply the conglomeration of all of these different phenomena, each of which is in a constant state of change.

  

Does Dialectical Thinking Arrive at a Positive Result?

                So far, in Hegel’s expression of what we know as Dialectical thought, he seems to claim that negative processes leads to a positive result. My understanding is that this process is essentially a process of elimination in which we throw away concepts, bits of knowledge, as we come to realize their incapacity to stand up to the criterion of truth and knowledge. This process is peculiar in that all options are not made apparent to us. A more accurate account of Hegel’s Dialectical thought is that we throw away deficient concepts for new ones that we accept with the full force of truth. This is odd, because according to Hegel, this new idea is most likely not truth as well. This means that at some point we will negate it. In fact, Hegel seems to suggest that this pattern continues indefinitely. It does not seem that there is a positive result in the process. If by positive he means merely creating and not producing actual truth, then there has been a positive event in an interval of time. But this interval comes to an end when the recently new concept is thrown away. It is possible that I misunderstand the kind of knowledge he is describing, but it does not seem to me that there is truly a positive result if it will simply be negated in the future.  It might be that Hegel’s accounts of the whole and combining results and processes could clarify the issue. 

Consciousness and American Politics

Hegel says that Consciousness is ever-evolving, and is therefore never complete. With consciousness, which endeavors to understand and interpret it, is truth too ever evolving. Therefore, something that is true now may not have necessarily been true previously because consciousness may not have been in a state previously that was prepared to define this truth as such. The example that I brought up in class was the right of American women to vote. Has it always been women's right to vote? What changed over time to predicate a conscious acceptance of women having a right to vote? In class I brought up the evolution of the American education system. Once segregated only to white men, the education system in this country evolved over time to accept white women as well, and eventually to accept everyone - regardless of race or socio-economic status. This systemic evolution took to a long time. If we admit that education was the leading cause of the inclusion of the idea within within social consciousness that women had finally become academically equal - or on an equal plane of social awareness - with men, then we may concede that consciousness in America evolved with the nation's education system, and that from this consciousness grew a truth that women, too have a right to vote in America. (Apologies for the Hegelian length of that sentence.)

Why did the evolution of truth and consciousness in this example take so long to happen? Hegel might say that this is because of what he calls "geists", or because consciousness is on an endless journey - a journey to discover itself. Consciousness has two objectives, as mentioned in the Introduction: discovery of the "in-itself" and discovery of the "being-in-itself consciousness of the in-itself." Consciousness in-itself is not a complete understanding of itself, but only comes to know itself through the understanding of itself in the world. In the context of the mentioned early-1900's American world, perhaps the reason that the statement "women have the right to vote" took so very long in the nation's history to become true is that consciousness was not yet prepared to define the statement as such. Perhaps because consciousness did not yet understand the fullness of itself within the context of this country, it had not yet reached an evolutionary point of understanding "women have the right to vote" as true.

I invite feedback on this "little musing." Do you believe that anyone in this country has a right to vote? Was is evolution of consciousness or something else that predicated this political phenomenon in our country? What does education have to do with it? What's love got to do, got to do with it?

This last question is obviously rhetorical... Happy blogging!

Relationships between Consciousnesses

So far, our in class discussions have come to the general consensus that the main problem Hegel wishes to address is that the world seems irrational and rational. Philosophy’s purpose is partially to show how the world is rational and how we are “at home in the world”. The task of philosophy is to lead ordinary consciousness to overcome conceptual tensions that make the world appear irrational. One example of how this happens is Hegel’s depiction of the three stages in the development of thought: abstract thinking, dialectical, and speculative. Hegel gives us a rather traditional role for philosophy, clarify concepts, come up with criteria, and provide accounts of phenomena and our experiences with genuine explanatory power. This kind of idea of the purpose for philosophy is shared with a variety of thinkers from the ancients like Plato to contemporary thinkers like Philip Kitcher Realism and Scientific Progress, but before I go off on a tangent let’s get back to Hegel.

What is especially unique about Hegel’s view is his concept of consciousness, which is probably the biggest and most challenging thing for a philosophic theory to explain adequately. Hegel is very concerned with consciousness becoming aware of itself. He shows us how this is done by discussing how the realization of self-consciousness is a wrestling for recognition between individual consciousnesses. Before going further, we should remember that Hegel thinks that being aware of an object implies some kind of awareness of the self. Hegel’s idea of self-consciousness is consciousness 1’s awareness of consciousness 2’s being aware of consciousness 1. For Hegel, implied in this relation is a “struggle for recognition” that he seems to suggest is necessary, in the strict sense. I think that Hegel is not merely speculating and pulling things out of his ass here, think about how animals act when they encounter a baby or any other species which they have no previous experience with, such as a dolphin meeting a cow or something-sadly I couldn't justify sifting through tons of youtube videos to find an example. Anyway, what I find particularly interesting is that if this “struggle for recognition” is necessary, what does this tell us about our concepts of friendship or our relationships with others in general? Hegel implies that all relationships between consciousness are necessarily an antagonistic competition for dominance. This suggests a very Rousseau-like version of human nature. Are there genuine cases of friendship or love between individuals? It seems like Hegel’s view implies that there is not, yet I’m sure many would contest this conclusion. I find Hegel’s reduction of relationships between consciousnesses to one kind of relationship unnecessarily restrictive and lacking evidence to support this reduction. Thoughts?  Also here’s a comic.

Hegel and Progress

Last class we discussed Hegel’s idea of progress through history. As a history major this thought stuck with me and I know this idea will be important to Marx later so I thought I would address it. Like Dr. J said there can be no doubt that intellectually we are at a better state than ever. But even if this is what Hegel means, I think this idea of inevitable progress can be disputed, or at least has very little grounds. We like to think progress throughout history is this nice linear line leading up to today. That way we would know the world would continue to get better and better. But historically “progress” certainly could not be considered linear. Undoubtably Hegel is considering a merely Western historical perspective, but even then it would be difficult to argue the “Dark Ages” were intellectually more progressive than Greek and Roman times. The Arab world clearly had its own ups and downs throughout its own history. Intellectual progress is based on a host of other factors, such as economics and politics. If the Cold War had gone to a Dr. Strangelove direction then history would have not seemed to have progressed at all.  

Would Hegel connect the progress of geist to include other aspects of life, such as morality and even happiness? I think that this intellectual history clearly cannot be accounted for separately. But there are easier arguments to make in several categories if we wanted to expand that out. Suicide rates are skyrocketing, indicating happiness is tumbling rather than progressing. In any case I find the argument that history has to progress a basic logical fallacy. There is not necessarily a correlation that because we believe today’s world to be more progressive than the past that it will continue to progress to the future. Could it? Certainly. Would it have to? That seems doubtful. 

Hegel and the Process

            In paragraph 3 of the Preface, Hegel begins discussion of a theme that seems to be essential to his work. This theme is the issue of results versus processes. In this paragraph, Hegel writes that stating the aim or the result of something gives a minimal amount of insight into it. He says that real issue of something is not its result or aim but these things taken along with the process of carrying the aim out. On this, he writes, “The aim by itself is a lifeless universal, just as the guiding tendency is a mere drive that as yet lacks an actual existence; and the bare result is the corpse which has left the guiding tendency behind it” (2). Here Hegel implies that aims and results are really nothing without the process or development associated with them.

            Hegel builds on this basic point in paragraph 20 when he claims that the “true” is the whole, which in turn is “the essence consummating itself through its development” (11). It seems to follow from this that anything that is a part of something and does not encompass it wholly with both its result and the full process leading to it is not really the truth of something. This seems to make sense on a basic, common sense level. A part of something as opposed to a whole may be misleading and to its actual veracity or meaning; the truth in the whole may not be fully expressed by a part. It seems to make sense that in order to truly comprehend something, as Hegel expresses in both of these paragraphs, one must know the whole and that the whole includes the process or development from the aim to the result.

            I’m not sure I fully understand all of this, and my questions regarding it may be completely off-base, but I do question Hegel’s viewpoint. It seems like the process towards the development of something may not just proceed in a straight, narrow vacuum. It seems like the process something develops in may not be one-sided but may come from different directions. For example, in the line of development, it may be the case that from point a to point b multiple forces from different people, things, etc. may influence the process to get it to point b. Moreover, there may be more results that stem from all of these different forces than just arrival at point b. However, it seems farfetched that for a given process, a person may know or comprehend all of these forces, and the truth is the whole. Would this mean that the true is really in some cases unintelligible to any given person because said person cannot really know all of the things involved in a process? For some things, is it actually possible that no one can know the whole which in turn means that no one can know the true?  

Can texts be Unintelligible?

After discussing subject-predicate propositional logic, Hegel says the following:

This abnormal inhibition of thought is in large measure the source of complaints regarding the unintelligibility of philosophical writings from individuals who otherwise had the educational requirements for understanding them. Here we see the reason behind one particular complaint so often made against them: that so much has to be read over and over to be understood....(63)

At first, I took this as a joke about how people would react to the author's text, for the Phenomenology appears to be so unintelligible and one has to read it over and over to understand. But this got me thinking: Can texts be unintelligible? Given the centrality of the rational universe for Hegel, would the mere existence of an unintelligible text mean that our world is irrational?

Before I can explore further, it is necessary to clarify what I mean by text. For my purposes, text will refer to anything that can be perceived with the intention of finding meaning, whether it be a text message on a cellphone, a painting on a wall, or a song on the radio. There are four levels of a text that people can know. I want to argue that perhaps on some these levels it is possible for a text to be unintelligible.

To demonstrate what an intelligible text is like, I will use the song In the Hall of the Mountain King.

First level of this text is the sound vibrations in the air. Next is the immanent experience of the song. We can hear the notes. Third is we feel something because how those notes are put together. The song is in B minor, which often reflects more foreboding or sadder moods. The song also increases in pace after every repetition, increasing the song's expression of these feelings. The fourth level of the text is its meaning, which those moods produce. This meaning level is also the world inside of the text in which the action of the song is taking place. The song creates an atmosphere of being in the hall of the mountain king. If a text does not reach this fourth level, it fails to be intelligible.

To demonstrate an unintelligible text, I will use a Jackson Pollock painting.

The first two levels of this painting are completely intelligible. We understand that it is made of paint and canvass. We can see the colors. We, however, cannot know what to feel in response to it because it is constructed so chaotically. Unless we take into account what the author was trying to achieve with this painting, which is another angle of a text, our minds will try and probably fail to make meaning out of this text. In other words, it is a text specifically designed to have allow no imposition of meaning.

This leads me back to the question: If the world of the text can be irrational, does that mean there is irrationality in the world we live in?

The answer might come from how people tend to react to partially intelligible textual worlds. For instance, one could read a fiction in which details from one part of the story keep contradicting ones in other parts, causing the world inside the text to be impossible as a unified whole. In response to such a text, people often either admit that the world of the text is not one (multiverse response) or admit that the world of that text is unintelligible and, therefore, void. This is how comic book hero enthusiasts deal with contradictory canonical accounts of their superheroes.

Perhaps how we should respond to Jackson Pollock's painting the same way. We could either impose meaning on the painting in order to make it intelligible or we could deny that it even has a textual world altogether. 

Self-certainty

Hegel's Preface to the Phenomenology of Spirit brings up the idea of self-certainty and how this destructive and equally frustrating concept is a mere acceptance of ignorance and avoidance of absolute truth. It is a cycle that is both unending and tiresome as it continuously leaves the individual in a state of self-certainty and therefore ignorance. Hegel writes "The commonest way in which we deceive either ourselves or others about understanding is by assuming something as familiar, and accepting it on that account..." (P. of S. § 31). He goes on to describe that it is vital to not accept things as familiar and to instead use a different process of coming to understand. It is the process by which one analyses an idea by separating it into individual parts as they appear to consciousness. These individual thoughts/parts are in themselves identified as familiar, but by taking the idea and breaking it into 'non-actual' pieces is what allows what Hegel describes as an 'essential moment'. Hegel moves forward making the claim that, "The activity of dissolution is the power and work of the Understanding, the most astonishing and mightiest of powers, or rather the absolute power" (P. of S. § 32). It is possible that this interpretation of self-certainty and the necessity for further analysis is in correlation with Hegel's ideas on 'in itself' and 'for itself,' such that the individual is stuck in one's own consciousness 'for itself' and forgetting that the idea 'in itself' exists outside of ones consciousness. For example, my understanding is that when looking at a ball there are three different perspectives that are coexisting; the ball's existence outside of one's consciousness, the ball's existence as one's consciousness observes and interprets it, and finally the understanding that both are intertwined and connected to bring upon a deeper and possibly more 'True' understanding of such ball. To stay within the realms of self-certainty is to be stuck in a state of understanding the ball only by means of consciousness's creation of the ball, which would be to exclude another understanding of the ball. Hegel talks about how it is education's goal to strip away or break down these barriers of familiarity and certainty in order to introduce the different perspective of understanding an idea's existence outside of self-consciousness. He says that the goal of education is to free "determinate thoughts from their fixity so as to give actuality to the universal, and impart to it spiritual life" (P. of S § 33). It seems as if one of the important processes involved in coming to
'Understand' is to deteriorate the familiar and attempt to interpret and experience the phenomenological processes involved in the idea such that it exists 'in itself' as well as 'for itself.'

Derrida and Hegel

I said I took this class because Hegel pops up everywhere, but as an English major with a cursory philosophy education, I only regularly encounter Hegel in Derrida. Hegel’s Preface serves as a focal point for Derrida’s “preface” to Dissemination, and as I read Hegel’s Preface I found myself returning to Derrida’s, specifically to this passage: “There is nothing but text, there is nothing but extratext, in sum an ‘unceasing preface’ that undoes the philosophical representation of the text, the received opposition between the text and what exceeds it” (43). I bring this up because it seems to identify a problem that Hegel only gestures towards and that nevertheless seems to complicate his project. Hegel would like, he tells us, “to help bring philosophy closer to the form of Science, to the goal where it can lay aside the title ‘love of knowing’ and be actual knowing” (5). “Actual knowing,” though, seems to be a pretty slippery concept. In the first few paragraphs, Hegel also refers to the “real issue” (3) and the “true shape in which truth exists” (5), and again in the Introduction to “the truth in its purity” (73)—equally non-descript terms (presumably) for “actual knowing.” Words are paltry things—as Hegel mentions, some words “do not express what is contained in them” (20)—and I don’t mean to be stubborn or dense, but I think that poses a not insignificant problem for Hegel’s “goal.”

And I think Hegel knows this. In the Introduction, Hegel considers that knowing a thing “in itself” might only be knowing a thing “for consciousness,” or how a thing relates to and is perceived by the consciousness. It sounds almost as though consciousness, even in comprehending things “in themselves,” comprehends consciousness itself: “The first object, in being known, is altered for consciousness; it ceases to be the in-itself, and becomes something that is the in-itself only for consciousness. And this then is the True: the being-for-consciousness of this in-itself” (86). “Actual knowing,” it seems, is really knowing about knowing, or as Hegel says, consciousness can “comprehend nothing less than the entire system of consciousness” (89). If this is what “actual knowing” is, it seems like an impossibly tall order to really get on with the actual knowing.

Perhaps I am being needlessly skeptical, and perhaps it's still too early to say, but I doubt that Hegel’s Phenomenology will get much further than what Derrida calls the “unceasing preface.” If Hegel would like his text to accomplish actual knowing, it seems his text would have to exceed itself. And Hegel certainly resists the suspicion that language can only dance around the meaning it gestures towards when he says (almost regretfully) that “sometimes what is in itself meaningful, e.g. pure determinations of though like subject, Object, Substance, Cause, Universal, etc.—these are used as thoughtlessly and uncritically as we use them in everyday life” (50). Certainly these words are used uncritically, but I’m not sure these words are in themselves meaningful, and I am certain they aren’t pure determinations—if only because they have been determined in many different ways. Yet these are the words on which  Hegel’s text depends. So while I admire Hegel’s ambition to get on with the actual knowing, I suspect that he won’t be able to go much further than a prefatory note on actual knowing. 

Noumena and Truth

Hegel's first work, The Difference between Fichte's and Schelling's Systems of Philosophy, acts as a preface to the Phenomenology of Spirit's preface. In both of these texts, Hegel addresses the limitations of noumena as a concept, specifically the inability of the subject to access a thing in of itself outside of the human sensorium. As Georg Lukacs observes, "For Hegel the terms 'in itself' and 'for us' are by no means opposites; in fact they are necessary correlatives. That something exists merely 'in itself' means for Hegel that it merely exists 'for us'. The antithesis of 'for us or in itself' is rather 'for itself', namely that mode of being posited where the fact that an object is thought of implies at the same time that the object is conscious of itself." In other words, the human subject's consciousness must be incorporated into any empirical system, that is, it must be accounted for, in its idiosyncrasies, and biases. Appropriating a system--like the one in natural science--to help create a methodological distance from the subject--in effect, compensating for the failures of human faculties--fails for the very reason that human beings will end up translating the results for comprehension. No matter how regimented this process becomes, the observer/scientist gets no closer to knowing an object independent of human consciousness. As a massive deviation from German idealists like Kant, Schelling, and Fichte, this act of reorientation appears justifiably revolutionary. Given the studied limitations of the subject's observational faculties, one can easily understand why philosophers--since the beginning of philosophy--attempted to find ways around this issue. In some respects, Hegel continues this project; however, his solution involves a recognition and acceptance of this limitation, in an attempt to translate the world into terms that appear rational to the subject. Within this system, the result--that is, correctness--must be combined with the method: "To judge a thing that has substance and solid worth is quite easy, to comprehend it is much harder, and to blend judgment and comprehension in a definitive description is the hardest thing of all" (P. of S. § 3). With this project in mind, how does the conception of capital 'T' Truth change? Again, it requires a both-ness, that is, the conjunction of both 'subjective or objective certitude' and 'Being' (Outlines of Hegel's Phenomenology § 42). Philosophy, as a discipline, serves this process by the creating the categories through which Science (and other sectors) conceptualize the world, render it comprehensible. In addition to terminology,  philosophy provides the methods for comprehension. 

Welcome to Class!

Welcome to the blog-home for Dr. J's Spring 2014 19th Century Philosophy course! This site will serve as a forum for students to discuss the material we cover in class, as well as a place to raise questions we may not have addressed in class or to make connections between our material and current real-world events. Each week, students will be divided into two groups, with half of the class designated as "Authors" and the other half designated as "Commenters." In any given week, "Authors" will post a short essay (minimum 400 words) related to the course material before Friday at 5pm. "Commenters" will respond to at least two of that week's Author-posts before the beginning of Tuesday's seminar. Students are encouraged to post or comment beyond the requirements stated here, as frequent and quality blog activity will be rewarded in the final grade.

First, if you don't know ANYTHING about blogs or blogging, there are (fortunately) lots of tutorials out there to help!  If you have a specific question, you can usually find the answer to it at the Blogger Help Center.  For a quick YouTube introduction to blogging, I suggest this video and this one.  There's also a "Complete List of Blogger Tutorials" available.  That's the amazing thing about the internet, of course... you can learn to do almost anything with a few clicks!

Second, it's important to know that blog-writing differs from the writing you might do for "traditional" papers in some ways, but not in others. Here are some things to think about as you compose your posts and comments:

FOR AUTHORS:

• Do not wait until the last minute to write your post! Students should think of the blog as a community exercise. In this community, Authors are responsible for generating that week's discussion and Commenters are responsible for continuing and elaborating upon it. In order for the Commenters to be able to provide the best commentary they can, it is necessary that Authors do not wait until the last minute to post entries in any given week. Like traditional papers, it is almost always obvious when a student has elected to write his or her blog-posts at the last minute, as they end up being either overly simple, poorly conceived or poorly edited. Your contribution to the blog discussion is important, so take care to show the respect to your classmates that you would expect them to show you.
• Be concise, but also precise. The greatest challenge of blog-writing is to communicate complex ideas in a minimal amount of words. It is important that you keep your posts short, in keeping with the blog format, but also that you do not sacrifice the clarity or completeness of your ideas for the sake of brevity.
• Be focused. If you find that your blog-entry is too long, it is likely because you have chosen too large a topic for one post. (Consider splitting up long entries into two or more posts.) It should be eminently clear, on the first reading, what your blog post is explaining/asking/arguing. Use the Post Title to clearly state the subject of your entry.
• Choose a topic that will prompt discussion. The measure of a good blog post is how much commentary it can generate. To that end, do not use your blog posts for simple exegesis or to revisit questions already settled in class. Good discussion-generators often include bold claims about, or original interpretations of, our classroom texts. Connecting the course material to current events or controversies is also a good way to generate discussion. Pay special attention to in-class conversations, as many of the issues that generate discussion in class will also do so on the blog.
• Proofread. Proofread. PROOFREAD. As a rule, blog-writing is (slightly) less formal than the writing you might do for a paper you hand in to your professor. For example, you may write in the first person, and a more "conversational" style is usually acceptable. However, ANY writing with glaring punctuation, spelling or grammatical mistakes not only will be difficult to read and understand, but also will greatly diminish the credibility of its Author. It is NOT ADVISABLE to "copy and paste" the text of your post into blog's "new post" box, as you will inevitably end up with a format that is difficult to read. Be sure to familiarize yourself with the formatting buttons above, and always preview your post before publishing it.
• Make use of the "extras" provided by new technology. When you write a traditional paper for class, you don't have many of the opportunities that blog-writing affords. Take advantage of the technologies available here to insert images, embed video or employ hyperlinks to other relevant materials.
• Respond to your commenters. Authors should stay abreast of all the comementary their posts generate. If you are asked for clarification by a commenter, or if one of your claims is challenged, it is the Author's responsibility to respond.

FOR COMMENTERS:

• Read carefully BEFORE you comment. The biggest and most frequent error made by commenters is also the most easily avoidable, namely, misreading or misunderstanding the original post. Don't make that error!
• Simple agreement or disagreement is not sufficient. Sometimes it will be the case that you fully agree or disagree with an Author's post. However, a comment that simply states "I agree" or "I disagree" will not count for credit. You MUST provide detailed reasons for your agreement or disagreement in your comment.
• Evidence works both ways. Often, the source of disagreement between an Author and a Commenter will involve a textual interpretation. If an Author claims in his or her post that "Advocates of the death penalty are obviously operating within a Kantian moral framework," the Author should have also provided a page citation from Kant supporting that claim. If you (as a Commenter) disagree, it is your responsibility to cite a passage from Kant that provides evidence for your disagreement. For disagreements that are not text-based-- for example, disagreements about statistical claims, historical claims, claims about current events, or any other evidentiary matters-- hyperlinks are your friend.
• Dr J's Rule #7. Be sure to read Rule #7 under "Dr. J's Rules" on your syllabus. There are no exceptions to this rule. Even on the blog.

Although this blog is viewable by anyone on the Web, participants have been restricted to member of the PHIL315 class only. This means that only members of your class can post or comment on this blog. However, anyone can read it, so students are reminded to take special care to support the claims that they make, to edit their posts and comments judiciously, and to generally represent themselves in conversation as they would in public. If you are new to blogging, you can visit the sites for other Rhodes course blogs listed in the column to your right.

I look forward to seeing your conversation develop over the course of this semester!
--Dr. J