AND Sciences: Hegel THE

HEGEL AND THE SCIENCES
BOSTON STUDIES IN THE PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE
EDITED BY ROBERT S. COHEN AND MARX W. WARTOFSKY
VOLUME 64
HEGEL
AND THE SCIENCES
Edited by
ROBERT S. COHEN
and
MARX W. WARTOFSKY
D. REIDEL PUBLISHING COMPANY

A MEMBER OF THE KLUWER ACADEMIC PUBLISHERS GROUP
DORDRECHT/BOSTON/LANCASTER
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Main entry under title:
Hegel and the sciences.
(Boston studies in the philosophy of science; v. 64)

Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Science-Philosophy. 2. Logic. 3. Hegel, Georg
Wilhelm Friedrich, 1770-1831. I. Cohen, Robert Sonne. II.
Wartofsky, Marx W. III. Series.
Q174.B67 vol. 64 001'.01s [509'.2'4] 83-13911
[QI75]
ISBN-13: 978-94-009-6235-4 e-ISBN-13: 978-94-009-6233-0
001: 10.1007/978-94-009-6233-0
Published by D. Reidel Publishing Company,

P.O. Box 17, 3300 AA Dordrecht, Holland.
Sold and distributed in the U.S.A. and Canada

by Kluwer Academic Publishers
190 Old Derby Street, Hingham, MA 02043, U.S.A.
In all other countries, sold and distributed

by Kluwer Academic Publishers Group,
P.O. Box 322, 3300 AH Dordrecht, Holland.
All Rights Reserved

© 1984 by D. Reidel Publishing Company.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 15t edition 1984
No part of the material protected by this copyright notice may be reproduced or
utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and
retrieval system, without written permission from the copyright owner
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE vii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ix
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS TO THE SYMPOSIUM

ON HEGEL AND THE SCIENCES
PETER BERTOCCI / The Scholar, the Liberal Ideal, and the Philos-
ophy of Science 3
1. THE SCIENCES
GERD BUCHDAHL / Conceptual Analysis and Scientific Theory in

Hegel's Philosophy of Nature (with Special Reference to Hegel's
Optics) 13
JOHN COMPTON / A Comment on Buchdahl's Paper 37
DIETRICH VON ENGELHARDT / The Chemical System of Sub-
stances, Forces and Processes in Hegel's Philosophy of Nature and
the Science of His Time 41
HENRY PAOLUCCI/Hegel and the Celestial Mechanics of Newton
and Einstein 55
JOHN FINDLAY / The Hegelian Treatment of Biology and Life 87
GEORGE DI GIOVANNI/More Comments on the Place of the
Organic in Hegel's Philosophy of Nature 101
MILIC CAPEK / Hegel and the Organic View of Nature 109
DIETRICH VON ENGELHARDT / Hegel's Philosophical Under-
standing of Illness 123
RUDIGER BUBNER / On Hegel's Significance for the Social Sciences 143
MURRA Y GREENE / Hegel's Conception of Psychology 161
II. PHILOSOPHY AND METHODOLOGY OF SCIENCE
ERROL HARRIS / The Dialectical Structure of Scientific Thinking 195

ERNAN McMULLIN / Is the Progress of Science Dialectical? 215
vi TABLE OF CONTENTS
HERMAN LEY / Some 'Moments' of Hegel's Relation to the Sciences 241

KENLEY DOVE / Hegel's 'Deduction of the Concept of Science' 271
DANIEL COOK / Theory and Praxis and the Beginning of Science 283
LOYD EASTON / The First American Interpretation of Hegel in
J. B. Stallo's Philosophy of Science 287
III. DIALECTICS AND LOGIC
YVON GAUTHIER / Hegel's Logic from a Logical Point of View 303

MICHAEL KO SO K / The Dynamics of Hegelian Dialectics, and Non-
Linearity in the Sciences 311
HECTOR SABELLI / Mathematical Dialectics, Scientific Logic
and the Psychoanalysis of Thinking [Comment on Kosok and
Gauthier] 349
IVAN SOLL / Comments on Kosok's Interpretation of Hegel's Logic 361
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 365
INDEX OF NAMES 369

PREFACE
To the scientists and philosophers of our time, Hegel has been either a ne-
glected or a provocative thinker, a source of irrelevant dark metaphysics or
of complex but insightful analysis. His influence upon the work of natural
scientists has seemed minimal, in the main; and his stimulus to the nascent
sciences of society and to psychology has seemed to be as often an obstacle
as an encouragement. Nevertheless his philosophical analysis of knowledge
and the knowing process, of concepts and their evolutionary formation, of
rationality in its forms and histories, of the stages of empirical awareness and
human practice, all set within his endless inquiries into cultural formations
from the entire sweep of human experience, must, we believe, be confronted
by anyone who wants to understand the scientific consciousness. Indeed, we
may wish to situate the changing theories of nature, and of humankind in
nature, within a philosophical account of men and women as social practi-
tioners and as sensing, thinking, feeling centers of privacy; and then we will
see the work of Hegel as a major effort to mediate between the purest of
epistemological investigations and the most practical of the political and the
religious.
This book, long delayed to our deep regret, derives from a Symposium on
Hegel and the Sciences which was sponsored jointly by the Hegel Society of
America and the Boston University Center for Philosophy and History of
Science a decade ago. To the Symposium papers we have added several
others, and we are grateful to Dietrich von Engelhardt of the University of
Heidelberg and Hermann Ley of the Humboldt University of Berlin for their
agreement to contribute. We are also grateful to Carolyn Fawcett for her
help with the difficult tasks of editing and for the beautifully organized and
detailed bibliographical apparatus.
Where shall the philosopher of science see Hegel's contributions most
clearly? To some, this question must lead to his dialectical logic; to others,
it must suggest the methodology of the social sciences, especially via the
philosophical analysis of history; yet another approach will look to his
theory of knowledge; another his critical epistemology of religious claims;
another his metaphysics of nature, particularly in its analysis of incom-
pleteness and creativity; another his early apen;us concerning labor and
vii
viii PREFACE
cognition; yet others his inspiration for the historical dialectic of science,
technology and society in the thought of Karl Marx. Some of these ways to
Hegel will be found in this book. Perhaps there is no direct entry to Hegel,
and perhaps there will never be a supplementary Section to Hegel's
Phenomenology devoted to the stage of scientific consciousness, that extra-
ordinary stage of Western, and now universal, civilization. We are pleased
that the authors of these essays have so intelligently, lucidly, judiciously
given us their signposts on the way.
October 1983
Center for Philosophy & History of Science ROBERT S. COHEN

Boston University
Department of Philosophy MARX W. WARTOFSKY

Baruch College,
The City University of New York
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We gratefully acknowledge permission by the respective publishers to reprint

substantial quotations from the following publications. Hegel's Science of
Logic [1929]. Trans. W. H. Johnston and L. G. Struthers. 2 vols. London,
Allen and Unwin, 1951. Hegel's Science ofLogic. Trans. A. V. Miller. London,
Allen and Unwin. New York, Humanities Press, 1969. Hegel's Philosophy of
Nature. Trans. A. V. Miller. © Oxford University Press 1970.
ix
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS TO THE
SYMPOSIUM ON HEGEL AND THE SCIENCES
PETER BERTOCCI
THE SCHOLAR, THE LIBERAL IDEAL,

AND THE PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE
Benedetto Croce was to live much of his life during the turbulent period in
the history of Italy which had far-reaching consequences for the history of
Europe and the world. At the end of World War II, this Senator of the
Kingdom of Italy and Minister of Public Instruction, owing to his age, refused
the request of Albert Einstein and others to offer himself for the leadership
of a war-weary, war-tom Italy. Croce's whole life might be seen as an
attempt, in the midst of the authoritarianism of the right and of the left, to
discover what is living and what is dead in the philosophy of Hegel. Writing in
1940 on 'The Roots of Liberty' , he said:
The liberal ideal is a moral ideal, expressing an aspiration toward a better humanity and
a higher civilization. The new ideal that is to triumph should therefore present itself with
the promise of a newer, richer, deeper humanity and civilization. 1
And he adds:
As regards our scholars and thinkers of the present time, it is their task to keep the
concept of freedom precise and clear, to broaden it and work out its foundations.
The act of thought, he urged, '''is at the same time the act of willing." 2
This theme is at the heart of Croce's famous statement: "History is the
history of freedom." History is the effort of human beings to create political,
religious, scientific, social and artistic modes of being that allow persons
themselves to define the forms in which the different dimensions (distinzioni)
of their lives will fmd fulfillment.
I happen to think that Croce saw, even more clearly than Hegel, what the
dialectic of freedom involves. He saw, if I may put it this way, that even the
dictum: " ... Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free",
can destroy the free search for truth, goodness, beauty, and social organiza-
tion. There is not one of us in this gathering tonight who has not seen the
search for truth cramped by some orthodoxy whose purpose was to protect
the truth. In the name of humanity, in the name of the true God, in the name
of a particular ethical code, of a specific aesthetic style, and of the true
3
R. S. Cohen and M W. Wartofsky (eds.), Hegel and the Sciences, 3-10.
4 PETER BERTOCCI
science, some conscientious truth-seeker has been warned, suppressed,

destroyed in spirit and in body - in the name, once more, of some paradigm
of truth and goodness. The true Church, the true State, the true science are
to keep men free from ignorance, from superstition, from moral wickedness,
from soul-destroying pornography, from allowing freedom to become license.
Who of us assembled here is not experiencing the conflict between what he
believes to be the quality of freedom - the way really to free the human
spirit - and the belief that persons ought to be free to search for that quality
of freedom?
In a moment I shall focus on some basic grounds of this conflict as
experienced by Hegel himself. But perhaps I may first indicate one way in
which this conflict between 'being free' and 'being really free' faces philo-
sophers of science as it has, and does, philosophers of religion. In the realm
of religion there are believers who think of faith as the way to truth and
reality. They stipulate a particular method by which Reality manifests itself,
and with such certainty that rationalistic or reasonable speculation may
indeed explain, but may not call into question, the method itself or its
fundamental revelation. The theological dogmas developed by this route are
beyond reason, and beyond aesthetic and moral categories; man is to reason,
yes, but not to reason about this basic method, epistemology, and the
assumptions presumably consistent therewith. Freedom,yes, but not freedom
to ask whether the method, faith or revelation, is correct; otherwise
scepticism and moral chaos will overcome men. Nevertheless, in our own day
the formulations of religious truth and theological truth are being questioned
by many, within and without the religious-theological realm - by men who
feel cramped by these formulations and by the institutions inspired by them.
It is not far-fetched for me to point to a faint parallel, at least, in the
development of scientific method and dogmas. From many sides we hear
complaints today that scientists are, wittingly or unwittingly, claiming access
to the highway to reality; that, whatever the mysteries of being, there is no
security apart from the scientific ascent to Being; that all other approaches,
so-called, to reality are acceptable provided they do not question the basic
possibilities of the method, epistemology, and assumptions presumably
consistent with scientific effort and morals.
The response to these complaints often has a religious fervor about it.
There can be no compromise with the autonomy of science; no appeal to
moral, aesthetic, or religious considerations must be allowed to stain the
purity of the fundamental method of science or of the world-view proclaimed
in its name. Freedom within the basic 'presuppositions' of science, yes, but
LIBERAL IDEAL AND THE PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE 5
no freedom to question the fundamental validity of certain hard-won truths,

or of appropriate method.
At the moment I am concerned with no more than the parallel between
the claims and counter-claims made in the name of religious and of scientific
world-views. What concerns me is the larger issue that lies within or beneath
the claims and counter-claims. May it not be that these warisome claims and
counter-claims need to be examined, especially in our day, within a larger
phenomenology of spirit? Hegel was to place the different forms of human
experience, such as the scientific, the aesthetic, the religious, within the Idee;
in our day, the debate still goes on as to which of the sciences - physics,
chemistry, biology, psychology, sociology, history - is to provide the
sovereign paradigm in the kingdom of science. We need not despise such
debates provided we hearken also to the cry in our day of the human spirit
which asks, with Croce, that every segment of human experience be related
to the human venture as a whole. When Hegel said: The true is the whole, he
was reminding us that the true will not be found in less than the whole of
human experience. Can the scholar be satisfied with less than a total pheno-
menology of the human spirit? This is our continuing problem, especially
if we follow Croce's concern that the scholar "keep the concept offreedom
precise and clean ... broaden it and work out its foundations."
It may not be amiss, then, if in this context we remind ourselves once
more of Hegel's own struggle to be clear about the nature of freedom and
its foundation. Brevity forces me to put a complex issue over-simply, and
largely in my own way, but, I hope, without losing the essential Hegelian
thrust. My own response to Hegel calls for a dialectic of freedom that Hegel
could hardly accept, but his struggle finds a response that should not be
repressed.
II
The French Revolution broke out while Hegel was a student at Ttibingen
University; the singing of the 'Marseillaise', the anti-establishment speeches,
were not events that were taking place in France alone; the new ferment
expressed and inspired Rousseau's Emile and the Social Contract. "It is
Rousseau," Hegel was to write in his History of Philosophy, "who has
inaugurated the Absolute as Uberty.,,3 But as he was to say in The Pheno-
menology of Spirit, "Universal Freedom can produce neither a positive
achievement nor a deed ... it is merely the rage and fury of disappearance
and destruction." Freedom was no unmixed blessing, and for Hegel, the
6 PETER BERTOCCI
search for 'true freedom' was a continuing concern as he tried to understand

the nature of personal and social experience.
In particular, Hegel was not satisfied with a doctrine that nevertheless
influenced him greatly, namely Kant's concept of moral freedom. Kant, we
recall, removes inclination and desire from the defmition of a moral act and
of moral worth. Kant insists that it is experientially false, and in any case
reflectively spurious, to suppose that morality is based on anything less than
a will that can choose among alternatives. As he says in Section I of The
Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals, that good will is
"not ... a mere wish, but the summoning of all means in our power". There
is no doubt that a person's activity of willing is not to be reduced to any
other mode of personal experiencing.
But this is only the beginning of Kant's view. Hegel was to brand it
Moralitiit and move on to Sittlichkeit. Yet Kant himself realized that a person
can not only will from the wrong motive but he can also be mistaken in his
reasoning. Whatever else we may think about Kant's ethics, I think that there
is no denying his insistence that the will is itself not an isolated part of a
person's being. The willing person is a person capable of reasoning, and his
actions take place in a social context affecting himself and others. There is
no doubt in Kant's mind that a person who reasons about his choices ought
to will by a maxim which his universalizing reason can approve.
I am not suggesting that Kant's categorical imperative is not by itself open
to the charges of an empty formalism. But I am suggesting that there is open
to us a not unreasonable interpretation of Kant's further meaning. Since the
categorical imperative itself expresses what it means to be a reasoning person,
persons ought to be treated never as means only but always as ends. In a
word, the twisting of arms, the appeal to feeling (to 'gut-reactions'), to non-
rational pressures, may bring conclusions; but persons who are not convinced
through reasonable persuasion will not only remain unconvinced, but they
will be degraded as persons.
If I am right, Kant's own basic effort, no less than Hegel's, is to reject
ethical atomism, if only because a reasoning person is obligated to respect
other persons and their capacities for freedom and reasoning. Even if a
'step motherly Nature' makes the realization of a will for reasonable inter-
action all but impossible, Kant had no doubt that the good, reasoning, will
is a jewel shining by its own light - the one absolute, obligatory, moral good.
I repeat that in all consistency Kant could hardly allow freedom and
obligation to end in ethical atomism; for each free moral agent confronts
another free and responsible moral agent. In this matrix of moral choice,
whatever the specific good in question, each reasoning person is to respect

other reason-capable moral agents. Duty for duty's sake, yes, but the duty
cannot exclude others and their conscientiousness as persons. As I see it, it is
not surprising, therefore, that Kant envisions a social moral order as a Realm
of Ends in which persons respect each other's sense of duty and the freedom
that inspires it.
I myself do not believe that Hegel would be in essential disagreement with
such a view of Kant. But even such a conclusion is not penetrating enough for
Hegel. For reasons I cannot pursue here, he questioned the atomic ontological
view of the self that this view, as he saw it, presupposed. In any case, what he
saw as the inadequacy of such Kantian moral autonomy (Moralitat) led him
to a view of the ethical ideal (Sittlichkeit) that, as I see it, handicaps and even
threatens the Kantian autonomy of the moral agent. Yet in his inability to
accept the Kantian realm of ends as concrete enough, Hegel puts his finger on
the conflict that I think goes on in all thoughtful minds today. Let us follow
his own reasoning for a moment.
Granting Kant's universalizing individual conscientiousness, we cannot find
in it the concrete ethical ideal. Hegel is correct in noting that the very taking
of the conscientiousness of other persons into account may well lead us to
question whether Kant's initial thesis, that the individual conscience is an
autonomous jewel, is a stable description of the actual situation in which
persons find themselves. There are reasoning, conscientious believers; but
there are also reasoning, conscientious unbelievers! The fundamental, and in
some respects tragic, fact is that the conscientiousness of any free person
may be a barrier to that of another free person.
Thus, Hegel reasons, if conscientious persons ought to take account of
each other, the fact that they are persons and conscientious does not
illuminate the choices they need to make as they disagree with each other.
It is not enough, therefore, to seek a realm of ends, as if we could solve
concrete issues on those terms. The fact with which we must begin is that as
persons we need to see ourselves and our conscientiousness as intrinsically
imbedded in a social whole without which we cannot exist as moral creatures.
Mature ethical awareness, therefore, must resist the conception of monadic,
self-determining persons linking themselves together into what would be a
collection of morally righteous (self-righteous) persons. For, to press Hegel's
objection, from such an atomic, moral, collection of beings one could never
get to the concrete ethical community without which the moral conscious-
ness remains an empty ideal.
Accepting this objection to Kant, does Hegel himself leave us with a
8 PETER BERTOCCI
tenable solution? As he says, the self-determining conscientious individual is

self-defeating if he does not think out who he is and what he is to choose.
A person's very attempt to think out what to choose does force upon him the
realization that his freedom remains sterile until he fmds concrete modes of
realizing what this freedom is for. Freedom to involves some pattern of
organization that will keep freedom from remaining a self-protecting free
from. A self-righteous conscientiousness may break no windows, but neither
will it light any candles. To paraphrase James, the road to hell is paved with a
sense of moral purity that leaves freedom romantically idle. The way out is
to deny any latent atomicity of the individual, to place him, his freedom and
his conscience, squarely within a qualitative structure of reality and a
qualitative social matrix that keeps freedom from being capricious and
wicked, and also prevents conscientiousness from being sterile and self-
righteous.
What has happened here? A conception of qualitative freedom becomes
the only acceptable meaning of freedom. Kant's formal freedom, the freedom
of conscience of the individual, succumbs to the dialectic of the moral
person's search for quality which cannot avoid, which ought not to avoid,
the demands of Sittlichkeit, or a well-organized society. What comes to mind
here is Hegel's treatment of the dialectic of master and slave in the
Phenomenology. The master, Hegel argued, comes to be so dependent upon
the slave that he is no longer master. So here, Kantian formal freedom comes
to be so dependent on qualitative ethical freedom, that both are unacceptable
and must find their fulfillment in the large unity, the State, what Hegel called
"the reality of the ethical idea" ,4 or the "self-conscious ethical substance".
That is, for Hegel, reason, inspired by the vision of the truth that shall make
men free, confines the moral will to that quality of freedom at the cost of
denying the validity of the autonomous free conscience as Kant saw it. The
good of the State becomes at once the ideal of freedom, and the embodiment
of reason, which, presumably cannot in fact be alien to the individual.
One cannot but sympathize with Hegel's conviction, as expressed in the
third volume of his Lectures on the History of Philosophy,S that men find it
hard to believe that a common reason exists, and can grow; and that they
consequently clothe their vanity in conscientiousness. Hegel was aware, as
Croce is, that freedom is man at war with himself. And Hegel found it
necessary to keep freedom from destroying itself - in the name of a
reason that could keep it qualitatively free! And each of us follows him in
knowing that persons must fmd some way of rendering their consciences
concrete, some laws and institutions, some economic order, and some
educational ideal that will assure men that their freedom will be self-
fulfilling.
III
But, I suggest, even this formulation of the solution is inadequate. For once
men think they have found the way to keep men really free, be it in religion,
in philosophy, or in science, they invite the alternative vice offorgetting that
freedom and reason live in persons who are never complete either in their
vision of truth or their own self-fulfillment. Thus I fmd Croce more accurate
when he says:
But the Jiberal mind ... does what the heart of mankind cannot do: [it] regards the
withdrawing of liberty and the times of reaction as illnesses and critical stages of growth,
as incidents and means in the eternal life of liberty. 6
And, in Kantian vein, I find Croce closer to the truth than Hegel when, in
another context, he says:
Liberty is not dependent on any particular economic systems [and I add political,
theological, or scholarly structures] .... It calls all systems to the bar of judgment. 1
May I, then, finally suggest that as philosophers of science - and not the
least as scholars and as persons - we keep the Kant-Hegel (the MoralWit-
Sittlichkeit) tension before us as a struggle that does not have a or the historic
solution? Can we avoid the great seduction, the belief that there is some
specific system that will solve the dialectic opposition between formal and
qualitative freedom? Is it not our task to keep the tension between formal
and qualitative freedom alive? As Heraclitus said, "Strife is justice", a justice
that never allows the opposition between formal and qualitative freedom to
fade out.
As persons and scholars we conscientiously continue to confront each
other in the search for truth and goodness. We know that every Eden will
have its serpent, that every specific ideal of fulfillment may endanger the
freedom to say yes or no. On the other hand, we must insist that, if persons
are to be free to find full freedom, they must be free to be wrong in so doing.
At the same time we must insist that every claim to actual freedom, actual
truth, face the bar of reasoned judgment. Indeed, must we as scholars not be
aware that the guide of reason is indeed at work in the realm of freedom?
To be free is to seek qualitative freedom in some method or mode of life.
Since every ideal, personal or communal, will be inadequate, persons will be
10 PETER BERTOCCI
imprisoned by their ideal unless they are responsibly-responsive to those who

challenge their ideal. F. H. Bradley was right when he said that "there is no
sin ... which philosophy can justify so little as spiritual pride.,,8 To say this
is to underscore the reminder of Pico della Mirandola: we are neither earthly
nor divine, neither mortal nor immortal, but we do have the freedom to shape
ourselves in accordance with such truth as is open to reasonable and free men.
Free men are not outside of reason; they are reasoners who are courageous
enough to remain free - and responsible.
Boston University
NOTES
1 Anshen, R. (ed.), Freedom, Its Meaning [by Croce and others] (New York, Harcourt
Brace, 1940), p. 24.
2 Ibid., p. 27.
3 lowe this reference to T. N. Munson, Monist 48 (1965), 100.
4 Ibid., p. 105.
S See edition translated by E. S. Haldane and F. H. Simson [1892] (New York,
Humanities Press, 1968).
6 Croce, B., Politics and Morals, tr. S. J. Castiglione (New York, Philosophical Library,
1945), p. 121.
7 Anshen, op. cit., p. 38.
8 Bradley, F. H., Appearance and Reality (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1897), p.7.
PART ONE
THE SCIENCES
GERD BUCHDAHL
CONCEPTUAL ANALYSIS AND SCIENTIFIC THEORY

IN HEGEL'S PHILOSOPHY OF NATURE
(WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO HEGEL'S OPTICS)
In a popular textbook on physics, written with an historical and philosophical

bias, when turning to the chapters devoted to the subject of 'colour', we all
of a sudden light upon a section entitled 'The Estrangement between Science
and Philosophy'. 1 Prior to this, the reader has been taken through the
properties of the refraction and reflection and propagation of light, lenses,
mirrors, rays of light, angles of incidence, image formation, and so on. Here
the text interrupts, and the author turns to Hegel, quoting from the Zusatz to
§ 275 of the Philosophy of Nature the 'definition of light':
Light is the enclosed totality of matter, only as pure force, the intensive life sustaining
itself within itself, the celestial sphere which has withdrawn within itself, whose vortex
is just this immediate opposition of directions of the self-relating motion, in whose flux
and reflux all distinction is extinguished. As existent identity, it is a pure line which
refers only to itself. Light is this pure existent force of space-filling, its being is absolute
velocity, present pure materiality, real existence which is in itself, or actuality as a trans-
parent possibility (PN, § 275, Z, p. 87).2
The author of our textbook thereupon makes considerable play with the
hostile reaction that this approach received from the men of science in
Hegel's time, which, he says, was part of the cause of "the emotional drive
behind the scorn which the scientific world came to hold for philosophy".3
Now it is true that no greater contrast could be imagined between the poetic
lines quoted above and the down-to-earth procedures of the sober scientist,
with his concern for observations held together by a network of theoretical
conceptions. I think, however, that where we come face-to-face with such a
total intellectual, not to say emotional, clash of temperaments, it is likely
that there is some grave misunderstanding concerning intentions. More
specifically, Hegel's purposes in all probability have here been both mis-
conceived and torn from their natural context.
For what Hegel tells us at the start of the passage from which I quoted is
that he is attempting to provide an 'a priori notional determination
[Begriffsbestimmung] of light'. By this Hegel means a conceptual formulation
which defmes light as a state of matter, instead of as an independent element
13
R. S. Cohen and M. W. Wartofsky (eds.), Hegel and the Sciences, 13-36.
14 GERD BUCHDAHL
(as was still done in his day); furthermore, as a formulation which seeks to
furnish an explication in terms of the categories and concepts of Hegelian
dialectical logic .
Assuming here some familiarity with the outlines of Hegel's logic,4 let me,
in order to exemplify the process of notional determination, give a brief
outline of Hegel's progressive elucidation of the concept of light, as it emerges
from the structure of that logic. Let us take for granted an understanding of
the place held in the logic by the overarching index of 'the Notion' [Begriffl .
And singling out some of the details, we fmd, to start with, that the Notion is
determined 'in itself as pure Being, and in particular, as 'Being-for-itself.
Then, when specified further, the latter is conceived both as 'a one' and as
'a many'. This one-many relation, Hegel claims, further can be shown to
involve a 'process' which may be labelled as 'repulsion-attraction', concepts
which characterise Hegel's idea of 'matter'. 5 Now let us also note that all
these logical articulations have their parallel in Hegel's philosophy of nature,
where the logic of Being turns up more concretely interpreted as the subject
of 'Mechanics', and in particular (for the above example of matter), of 'Finite
Mechanics' (PN, § 262, p. 44; more of this in section III).
We cannot (and need not) - at least for the moment - enter into the
details of this account. We only note that we meet here, in a nutshell, the
kind of consideration of a concept - in our case, 'Matter', explicated in terms
of Hegel's logical categories (all specifications or stages in the development of
the so-called 'logical Idea' as 'Nature')6 - which is what Hegel understands by
an 'a priori notional determination'. In a similar way, as we proceed up the
ladder of the logic with our example, where the Logic deals with 'Essence',
and in particular, with the categories of reflection, so in parallel, in the
Philosophy ofNature, we likewise "enter logically into the sphere of Essence"
(PN, § 274, Z, p. 86) which exhibits matter as a kind of 'reflection-into-self,
interpreted by Hegel here as a kind of 'manifestation'. Where matter at first
was purely inert, at best determined gravitationally and only 'externally', it
has now gained a sort of 'independent existence', whereby it manifests itself
as what Hegel calls 'light', but which - considering Hegel's characterisation -
is perhaps on the whole more adequately labelled a field of energy, appearing
only in certain instances as a 'singularity' (Hegel says 'individuality'); for
example, as the stars; and especially, as the sun (PN, § 275, p. 87).
Now I want to claim that the general significance of this procedure
amounts to an attempt to see certain very general scientific concepts
articulated within a logical framework, to which they become thereby tied, in
order to discover how much can be said about a given concept within such a
CONCEPTUAL ANALYSIS AND HEGEL'S OPTICS 15
local context. And this is not absurd. We have in our own day become
familiar with the idea that the broad formative concepts of a science govern
its development, and that a considerable part of their intellectual articulation
relates to what we may vaguely call a 'metaphysical dimension'. And we have
learnt that revolutionary changes in science frequently parallel, not to say are
triggered off by, categorial changes. It is in this way we can understand Hegel
when he writes in his Introduction to the Philosophy of Nature:
All revolutions, in the sciences no less than in world history, originate solely from the
fact that Spirit, in order to understand and comprehend itself with a view to possessing
itself, has changed its categories, comprehending itself more truly, more deeply, more
intimately, and more in unity with itself. 7
Similarly, we find that in our own day we have less difficulty with a
typically Hegelian formulation, according to which 'nature is posited by
spirit', though, to be sure, as a natural process the latter emerges from the
former - remembering that a characterisation of this 'process' itself involves
scientific and philosophical theorising. And equally we can say, with Hegel,
that
spirit is not the mere result of nature, but in truth its own result; it produces itself out of
the presuppositions which it creates for itself, - out of the logical idea and external
nature (PG, § 381. Z, p. 23).
When we speak of Hegel's Logic, we need to keep in mind of course the

dynamic character of that logic. Its very nature, as Hegel tells us, is best
comprehended as a kind of 'serial progression' or 'evolution' (PN, § 249, Z,
p. 21), from the abstract to the concrete, from the basic categories of pure
Being to the most complex organisation of animal nature, of life and of
cognitive thought. 8 By making the considerations of the philosophy of
nature run in parallel with this serial process, it gets caught up in it, and thus
gains its place as well as its significance within the whole.
II
So far, however, I have talked as though 'notional determination' was at best

only an extra, altogether standing outside the scientific process, with its
special concepts, empirical observations, unifying laws and theories. But
clearly, unless there were some connection between these two elements, the
whole procedure would lose its interest. In particular, we want to ask, what is
the relevance of Hegel's notional determination for particular scientific
16 GERD BUCHDAHL
theoretical articulations? And as a special case we must pose the question:

what place in all this has the specific, contingent individual sensory fact?
Now, that Hegel does not ignore the observational and experimental detail
of science, emerges from every page of his philosophy of nature; we need
only mention his unequivocal declaration that
not only must philosophy be in agreement with our empirical knowledge of Nature, but
the origin and formation of the Philosophy of Nature presupposes and is conditioned by
empirical physics (PN, § 246, Remark, p. 6).
I think this point need no longer be laboured, although it is necessary always

to keep in mind that the science here involved is that of Hegel's time, of the
first two decades of the nineteenth century. Moreover, in the Hegelian
scheme these detailed facts, as pure contingencies, to some extent remain
standing; the 'external material' here confronts 'spirit' (i.e. both scientific
theory and notional determination); it remains 'indifferent' to it, and only
accepts the idealisations of science 'on sufferance' (PC, § 381, Z, p. 22).
Hegel is so deeply aware of this confrontation of the notional by the
empirical detail of nature, that he characterises it as a veritable 'contradiction
of the Idea'; the 'necessity' of the forms generated by the Notion is faced by
the 'indifferent contingency and indeterminable irregularity' of the empirical
detail (ef. PN, § 250, p. 22). It is a received tradition that Hegel claims to
deduce empirical facts from the categories of his logic; which (if true) would
of course strike an empiricist logician as a logically absurd undertaking,
colliding head-on with their strong conviction of such a mistaken jump from
the realm of logic to that of substantial fact, particularly when such facts
happen to be different from those now recognized by modern science! Quite
to the contrary, however, Hegel expressly denies deducibility of contingent
facts:
This confusion of contingency ... , this impotence of Nature, [he writes 1, sets limits to
philosophy and it is quite improper to expect the Notion to comprehend - or as it is
said, construe or deduce - these contingent products of Nature (PN, § 250, Remark,
p.23).
In a similar way, the notorious Hegelian legend of the a priori deduction of

the number and distances of the planets, on closer inspection turns out to be
no more than a harmless insistence that we should try always to discover a
plausible 'empirical formula' (as this would now be called) covering the
independently and empirically ascertained observ~tional planetary data
(PN, § 270, Remark, Z, p. 82). There may be "traces of the determination by
the Notion", but even these enter into science in a very complex way, to be
considered presently. This is not to say that notional exploration may not on
occasion yield some astonishing insights and anticipations, for instance those
concerning the relations of energy and space. Thus, in accordance with the
'notional determination' mentioned before, light, Hegel writes, cannot
properly be said to 'fill space', but only to be "present in space, and then not
as something individual". Indeed, since under the Hegelian scheme, space
turns out to be - as he puts it - "only abstract subsistence or virtual being",
whilst 'light' is the "existent being-within-self" [daseyendes Insichseyn],
there is an aspect of light according to which, in its 'abstract manifestation'
it is as such primarily "spatial, an absolute expansion in space". And, Hegel
concludes, "light is infinite spatial dispersion, or rather it is an infmite
generation of space" (PN, § 275,Z, pp. 87-88).
We may interpret this as a conceptual exploration, according to which we
cannot speak of empty space as such, but only of a spatial field of energy, not
unlike ideas of more recent science. In such terms, field and space are more
closely interwoven than in the traditional Newtonian context, though Hegel's
ideas here go back perhaps also to older medieval or Renaissance or seven-
teenth-century ideas.
At any rate, the question of the relationship between such general ideas
and the presence of empirical phenomena is easily misunderstood. For
instance, one of the 'singularities' in our field of energy is a concentration of
'matter' which we call 'the sun'. Now on the one hand, that there is such a
singularity, constitutes a fact which, so Hegel expressly notes, "is empirically
ascertained" (PN, § 275, Z, p. 89). Here, seemingly a complication arises. For
about this fact he expresses himself in an apparently contradictory way. At
first he tells us that the body of the sun is "the primordial, uncreated light"
(PN, § 275, Z, p. 89). However, immediately afterwards, when enquiring into
"the finite causes of the existence of that which shines in this way", the
account which he gives, in terms of 'internal friction' due to rotation of the
sun, seems to clash with this claim to the light being 'uncreated'.
Now his answer to this problem tells us something further about the
relation between scientific theorising and the Notion. The theory, Hegel
implies, simply states the physical conditions incident upon the production
of light in the finite contingent body of the sun. But this says nothing about
the notional status according to which the sun is a singularity in a spatial
field of energy, regarded as a tense-neutral manifestation. It is only this
notional determination with which we are there concerned. And from this,
'matters of empirical fact', such as the account in terms of friction, cannot be
18 GERD BUCHDAHL
deduced (PN, § 275. Z, p. 90). Evidently, the Notion supplies the conceptual
framework; causal investigations at best are only guided by the conceptions
thus explored.
III
In general, we can see that the relations between notional investigations,

scientific theory, and empirical fact are rather complex, and to appreciate the
variety of relations involved we must now explore these in more detail;
partly, because, without such a survey, the chief aim of this essay, which is to
characterise the method of Hegel's optics, must remain incomprehensible.
Concerning the problem of deducibility of empirical data from the Notion,
compared with the situation as it obtains in the theoretical approach of
science, Hegel is in fact quite explicit. In an important passage, which appears
at the end of his extended comparison between the approach of Kepler and
Newton towards gravitational theory, he says:
Philosophy has to start from the Notion, and even if it does not assert much, we must be
content with this. The Philosophy of Nature is in error when it wants to account for
every phenomenon; this is what happens in the fmite sciences, which try to trace every-
thing back to general conceptions, the hypotheses. In these sciences, the sole verification
of the hypothesis lies in the empirical element and consequently everything has then to
be explained. But what is known through the Notion is clear by itself and stands fIrm;
and philosophy need not feel any embarrassment about this, even if all phenomena are
not yet explained. I have therefore set down here only the rudiments of a rational
procedure in the comprehension of the mathematical and mechanical laws of Nature as
this free realm of measures (PN, § 270, Remark, Z, p. 82).
This passage makes it very clear that Hegel's philosophy of science has a
two-tier structure. We must distinguish, he says, between the science,
including its theoretical formulations, on the one hand, and "the course of its
origin and of its preliminary investigations" (PN, § 246, Remark, p. 6). It is
these preliminaries that a're governed by notional determination, or - as we
might say - conceptual explication. On the other hand, and this raises the
problem, Hegel also maintains, in the same passage, that not only must
experience "name the empirical appearance corresponding" to the result of
conceptual explication; we must also show "that the appearance does, in fact,
correspond to its Notion" (PN, § 246, Remark, pp. 6-7).
Is Hegel saying that there should, and that there should not, be deducibility
between Notion and phenomena? The answer must be that this, for Hegel,
is a matter of degree. The more 'brute' the empirical data, the less grip may
be expected from the side of the Notion. But then, scientific theorising itself
already banishes much of the purely qualitative and specific in its investiga-
tions: the more theoretical thought "enters into our representation of things,
the less do they retain their naturalness, their singularity and immediacy ....
The rustle of Nature's life is silenced in the stillness of thought", in one of
Hegel's truly memorable formulations (PN, § 246,Remark, Z, p. 7).
Now the more theoretical our approach - and it is a commonplace for
Hegel, that the purely immediate sensory datum cannot maintain itself intact
as such - the logically 'softer' the constructions. Here, on the one side,
hypothetical and constructive thinking always allow of alternatives. Not only
that, but - and this is important - on the other side, science itself will always
attempt to tie its fundamental constructs back to still more basic experience,
and for Hegel this means: to the categorial determinations of the logical Idea.
So it is here that we may expect Hegel, when confronted by scientific
constructions and positions, usually and quite properly surrounded by much
that is still problematic, to offer alternatives, or to reject hypotheses incon-
sistent with the development of his Logic. The variety of relations, either
agreements or disagreements, between the developing Notion and the
scientific laws and constructs, is however not so simple, and in this section" I
shall attempt to distinguish several different cases. Studying these in tum is
perhaps the best way of coming to grips with Hegel's intentions.
I have elsewhere argued that there are some clearly defmable groups of
criteria for the acceptance of scientific theories, including conceptual or
metaphysical, inductive, systemic, and regulative or architectonic components
of appraisal. 9 Such a stratification seems to me to have had its first clear
expression in the writings of Kant, from whom - as will be found presently -
Hegel, too, appears to have received his prime inspiration. Hegel's develop-
ment of this theme in rather an extreme fashion presents an opportunity to
study at close quarters the range and limits of such a methodology, quite
apart from the incidental gain of offering the modern student of the
philosophy of science an entry to Hegel's philosophical intentions which has
been somewhat overlooked.
1. Consider, as a first instance, Hegel's attitude towards atomistic theories

in chemistry. In his Science of Logic we find a sustained discussion of
Berthollet's law of mass action, Berzelius's development of this topic and the
whole theory of chemical affmity. In particular, Hegel discusses Berzelius's
account to be found in his Textbook of Chemistry, published contem-
poraneously with the composition of the Logic (Hegel was nothing if not
20 GERD BUCHDAHL
up-to-date), of the atomistic interpretation of what happened in chemical

combination.
Now as is well known, Hegel has fundamental objections to any atomic
theory which exhibits the essential features of the Democritean-Newtonian
type of approach. For this allows the atomic unit to stand independently of
and side-by-side with the void; and quite contingently, and only subsequently,
adds forces of repulsion and attraction, in order to explain phenomenal
effects. Hegel's rejection of Berzelius's form of this atomism occurs in two
ways:
(i) He emphasises its hypothetical status, by complaining that "the
theory goes beyond the limits of experience" (SL [M] , p. 359). Furthermore,
it is merely ad hoc, and "not corroborated in any other way", i.e. indepen-
dently (SL [M] , p. 360).
(ii) The conception of the atom as here used requires "corroboration ...
from metaphysics, which is logic" (SL [M] , p. 360). And of course, Hegel's
Logic is opposed to the atomist-mechanist metaphysics of the Newtonians.
In this example, then, we note that logic is not opposed to the empirical
phenomena, but to their hypothetical explanation, and this for two reasons:
(a) because they are hypothetical, as going beyond experience; (b) because in
so far as they do transcend the phenomena, they are underpinned by a
metaphysics inconsistent with that expounded by Hegel himself.
These are, it will be seen, two quite different objections. The first
expresses a preference for a special type of scientific theory, labelled by sub-
sequent philosophers of science in various ways: generalising, mathematical,
external, abstractive, reticular, phenomenological or nomological; as con-
trasted with what are called explanatory, internal, hypothetical, analogical,
dynamic, or aetiological theory-types. And it seems that Hegel usually sides
with the rust of these, as explained in the Encyclopedia section of his Logic
which discusses the relations of whole and part, force and its expression, and
the contrast between inner and outer.1 0 Hegel thinks this distinction quite
misplaced, and both here and in the Introduction to the Philosophy ofNature
he quotes with approval from Goethe's poem 'Zur Morphologie': "Nature has
neither core nor shell, but is all at once".l1 In other words, he shares
Goethe's hostility to the scientists' method of theorising in terms of entities
regarded as concealed, underlying, hypothetical, espousing instead a formal
approach which steers close to the pure phenomenon.
However, and this is the second objection, no doubt this hostility to
aetiological theory-types is fed by an aversion to the kind of hypothetical
entities espoused by the scientists, above all atoms and forces; and to the
realisation (of which Hegel is well aware) that this involves a metaphysics of
mechanism which forever seeks to absorb the realm of the organic into
itself.12
2. The same opposition to existential or independent reification of forces

(centripetal force of attraction, centrifugal force of repulsion) we meet with
in the section on gravitational theory, already alluded to. Gravitation is there
explicated essentially in phenomenological or nomological terms, as the
Notion of a universal corporeality which partitions itself into particular
bodies whilst at the same time these bodies close up again to what has an
aspect of singularity, manifesting itself in motion, through which the several
bodies make a systematic whole (PN, § 269, p. 62),13 This is a Notion, says
Hegel, which manifestly includes two moments, the being-for-self of the
particular bodies, and the suspension [aujheben] of this as the continuity of
the system of bodies. But these two moments, the aspect of continuity and
the aspect of particularity, have been interpreted quite wrongly as two
separate forces (PN, § 269,Remark, p. 63).
If we follow the bidding of the Notion, we must therefore confme our-
selves to the nomological theory of Kepler, who restricted himself to an
elucidation of the laws of the system, even though this does not very easily
cope with perturbation, as Hegel has to admit (PN, § 270, Remark, p. 68).
Per contra, we must oppose the reification of gravitation as an independently
existing force, involving as it does "an unspeakable metaphYSiCS which,
contrary to experience and the Notion, has the said mathematical deter-
minations alone as its source" (PN, § 270, Remark, p. 67). Basically he seems
to have thought that - as he puts it in the Encyclopedia Logic - "the
explanation of a phenomenon by means of a force is ... an empty
tautology" .14
3. In the instance just mentioned, we have a case where notional determina-

tion (Le. conceptual explication), though still not involving any deductive
claims, does affect the form of presentation of a scientific theory. As a
footnote to § 267 makes clear, Hegel preferred the analytical approach of
Lagrange. 1S Sometimes, however, he goes further; we then get the notional
approach to scientific theory in what we may call a 'degenerate' form. Optics
(the laws of geometrical optics) provides an example; to this we shall return
in the last section. Galileo's law of free fall is a second example. The empirical
law with which we are here concerned is expressed in quantitative terms as
s = 1/2gt 2 , where s is the displacement, t the time and g the constant of
22 GERD BUCHDAHL
acceleration. Now, Hegel freely agrees, the "a priori proof independent of
empirical methods" of this expression has "been furnished by mathematical
mechanics" (PN, § 267, Remark, p. 57). It simply follows from the Galilean
law that v = ds/dt = gt by integration.
However, contrasted with this there is also another, logically otiose
Newtonian proof, which involves the "conversion of the moments of the
mathematical formula into physical forces", a force of inertia, responsible
for uniform motion of falling, and a force of acceleration which adds
continuous increments, and thus involves the sum of two independent
elements, when the result is a relation of powers. (This is, of course, a
distortion of the Newtonian argument, though not too uncommon in the
period immediately following Newton.) Hegel's basic objections here are,
first, that we introduce the law of inertia as such, a law which he holds to be
an unreal abstraction, and a case that never occurs in nature; a taking in
separation of the principle of identity, and thus simply reducing to the
tautologies that motion is motion, and rest is rest. 16 Secondly, in the
Newtonian proof we make an unreal transition from uniform velocity to
uniformly accelerated velocity.
And it is this, what Hegel considers a confused Newtonian gloss of a proof,
involving a confused 'metaphysics', that requires replacement by something
more in line with his own notional approach. We must therefore, Hegel says,
"against the abstract, uniform velocity of lifeless, external determined
mechanism" , seek a genuine proof for the "law of descent of a falling body" ,
a law which is a "free law of Nature". As such, its basis must involve some-
thing notional, and it follows that "the law must be deducible from this
Notion" (PN, § 267, Remark, p. 58).
The proof that follows is rather bizarre; but in any case, Hegel is con-
cerned only with what he calls "the qualitative relation" of "powers"
[Potenzen]. The argument (which I will put in my own words) seems to
involve the contention that in free motion, space and time form an intrinsic
whole. If we now plot the axes of space and time, we obtain a space-time
diagram in which we can picture time as a second dimension, the diagram
resulting in a plane figure whose simplest representation is a square. ('Raising
to a power', it will be remembered, is the third determination of numbers,
which are a development of 'the quantum'; and here the simplest case,
accoqling to Hegel, is 'the square'. This third determination is regarded as the
"equality of the multiple and the unit [Anzahl und Einheit] ". 'The square'
has thus a definitive place in the development of the logical Idea.)17 And
this is the notional explication or 'proof of why the spaces traversed when
a body is falling freely with uniformly accelerated motion are developable

as the square of the times. IS
If punning were taken further, we might say that this is perhaps a species
of proof now-a-days called 'a dimensional argument', except that Hegel would
protest that his development, despite the involvement of the quantum, is
concerned with only the purely 'qualitative' aspect of the interconnection of
the concepts of space and time. So despite talk about "proof of the law of
descent of the falling body as derived from the Notion of [this kind of]
event" (PN. § 267, Remark, p. 59), we notice considerable looseness of fit
between the argument and the mathematical conclusion. In any case, we have
to keep in mind Hegel's complete awareness of the competing existence of the
mathematical proof. We may say that Hegel's intentions are to let notional con-
siderations provide a form of putatively-clinching plausibility; demonstrating
a 'possibility' that Newton's exposition does not offer us. Above all, there lies
behind this the assumption that a genuine support for the Galilean law, as ex-
pressed in the formula, needs more than merely mathematical demonstration.
4. Probably the prime inspiration for Hegel's approach, which centres on the
need for a notional determination of the elements of natural science, was
Kant's attempt to construct the metaphysical foundations of the basic
conceptions of dynamics, especially of matter and force. It is not too much
to say that, as for Schelling, so for Hegel, this was in all probability the most
important source for his whole approach, with Hegel sticking more respon-
sibly than Schelling to the basic intentions of Kant's procedure. Kant's
metaphysical exposition, Hegel says in the Science of Logic
is noteworthy, ...... because as an experiment with the Notion it at least gave the
impulse to the more recent philosophy of nature, to a philosophy which does not make
nature as given in sense-perception the basis of science, but which goes to the absolute
Notion for its determination (SL [M] , p. 179).
Those who have difficulty in unravelling Hegel's views about the relation
between notional determination and empirical science may therefore hope to
gain some light from Kant's procedure in the Metaphysical Foundations,
provided that has been properly understood.
Let us briefly consider Hegel's treatment of the subject of matter and
force. Here again, Hegel follows the twofold path of empirical and notional
determination. Whilst empirical science operates with the concept of matter
regarded as subject to the twin forces of attraction and repulsion, these
forces, says Hegel,
24 GERD BUCHDAHL
in so far as they are regarded as forces of empirical matter, are also based on the pure
determinations here considered, of the one and the many and their interrelationships,
which, because these names are most obvious [the Encyclopedia describes them as
'metaphorical expressions' - bildliche Ausdrucke), 1 9 I have called repulsion and
attraction (SL [M), p. 179).
Now what is here called 'pure determination' of matter had been described
by Kant as an a priori elucidation of its concept; an elucidation which was
supposed to establish the 'possibility of matter' by 'constructing' the concept
through its reduction to the just-mentioned fundamental forces. The method-
ological approach here followed by Kant involves a sharp distinction between
establishing the 'possibility' of a scientific construct, and the inductive
'probability' of its application. 2o In the present context, it is of course the
establishment of 'the general possibility of the concept of matter,21 with
which we are concerned. Actually, Kant's procedure, 'constructive' from one
point of view, from another was basically 'analytical' (as Hegel rightly points
out (SL [M] , p. 179)); it departs from an analysis of the meaning of matter as
impenetrable, by interpreting this property as repulsive force. He then
proceeds to show that matter cannot be conceived as existing with repulsion
alone without attraction; which completes the exposition.
This, then, is an extremely clear case of conceptual analysis or explication;
it seeks to show how much of the concept of matter is already contained in
our basic modes of categorial thinking; and on the other side, how much of
the fabric employed in empirical science can be shown to answer to this
conceptual explication. There is no attempt to 'deduce' attractive or repulsive
forces, let alone their laws of action.
This looseness of fit is also quite apparent in Hegel's treatment of
repulsion and attraction, emerging as they do from within his own notional
analysis as metaphorical expressions - evidently thus borrowed from the
domain in which they originally have their empirical home.
The details of Hegel's account would take too long to unravel at any
length. Of Kant's analysis he complains that although it has the merit of
making the two forces internal to matter, deriving - unlike in the Newtonian
procedure - matter from the forces, it still leaves them standing side by side,
independent of each other (SL [M], p. 181), instead of treating them as
"moments which pass over into each other" (SL [M] , p. 182), an instance of
the process of the Hegelian dialectical evolution of the logical Idea. The
argument, as already mentioned at the start, is that Being, qua being-for-
itself, is a one; yet as such, at the same time, it relates itself to itself as an
'other'. Hence the one is incompatible with itself; it is "that which thrusts
itself off itself; and what it thus posits itself as, is the many. Hence we may
designate this side of the process of being-for-itself through the metaphorical
expression, repulsion" .22
The intention of the argument, if not its logical formulation, at least may
be clear; when reflecting on matter as one, this turns into many; but the
conclusion can maintain itself only via a process which bears similarity to
what in mechanics is called 'repulsion'. Or rather, that concept, in its notional
determination, boils down to this fundamental aspect of the being-for-itself
of anything in respect of its material aspect. Similarly, each of the many is
itself a one, and in this way turns round into its opposite, viz. attraction.
Attraction and repulsion, on this view, are a dual aspect of the one-and-the-
many.
Modern (Le. Newtonian) physics, comments Hegel, still operates, through
its conception of the molecule, with the picture-aspect of the old atom, even
though admittedly - unlike original atomic theory - it has added the force
of attraction to that of repulsion. "But their mutual relation, what
constitutes their concrete and true nature, must be tom from its opaque
confusion, in which even Kant's Metaphysical Foundations of Science has still
left it.,,23 In other words, attraction and repulsion must not be introjected
ab extemo, but need to be explicated as logical aspects of the Notion
involved in the very consideration of matter qua matter, under its aspect of
the one and the many.
Hegel's analysis has thus a dual aspect. On the one hand, it seeks to incor-
porate these forces into the intimate process of the logical Idea, and thus
project what Kant had called 'the possibility' of the concept. On the other
hand, the method is so contrived as to deprive forces of their quasi-
independent reality, or as merely borrowed from the theory of science. At
the same time it is clear that Hegel's derivation is meant also to support his
preference for the use of phenomenological theory-types, as already noted.
For his 'deduction' is incidentally meant to have the effect of de-substantial-
ising the forces of Newtonian physics, and thus to point to the adoption of
the Continental 'mathematical' approach.
IV
With these explanations, we may now hope to gain some understanding of the
significance of Hegel's philosophy of optics for his general philosophy of
science. We shall be prepared for a phenomenological approach to that
theory. We shall expect a rejection of any realist interpretation of the
26 GERD BUCHDAHL
explanatory terms of the optical theory of traditional science. Further, we

shall expect Hegel seeking to provide a notional determination (conceptual
foundation) of the prime terms of optics. Finally, we shall have to see how,
with the apparatus that results, Hegel approaches the laws of geometrical
optics. And once again we will want to seek a satisfactory interpretation of
those 'quasi-deductive' procedures of Hegel, which to the outsider so easily
look like a competing scientific explanations of the laws of optics.
We began this essay with some comments on Hegel's notional determina-
tion of light, so that we may take these here for granted. It is of course an
analysis of a purely qualitative kind. Like the conception of Essence (whose
"standpoint is altogether that of reflection,,24) which, as I said, it parallels,
light is firstly - if we allow once again for a certain amount of punning,
indicative of analogical insight - matter qua 'unity of reflection-into-itself' ;25
it becomes 'manifest', so to speak, just like opaque or mere Being, when
reflected upon by ourselves;26 when Being is lit up through consciousness.
In fact, Hegel once likens light to what 'is simply Thought itself, present in
the natural mode' (PN, § 276, Remark, Z. p. 93). Similarly, he calls light also
'the abstract self of matter', from which he seems to draw the questionable
conclusion that it is 'absolutely light' (in the sense of being opposite to the
absolutely heavy); nor is it therefore separable into parts; it is simple self-
externality - remember the relation between matter and space, alluded to
at the start.
The two aspects of interest are, (i) the parallel with the logic of Essence,
and one of its models, reflecting consciousness; (ii) the attempt to make a
characteristic play on the distinction between the 'passiveness' or 'lifelessness'
of matter and the free activity of what we might call energy of radiation. The
main point is the contention that the second cannot be notionally grasped
without the logic of the first. This means that the 'manifest' continuity, and
undifferentiated simplicity, of light, by contrast with the opposite character-
isation of 'inert' matter (roughly falling within the domain of Being),
becomes a notional necessity. But this at once leads to a difference, in respect
of the relation between notional determination and scientific theorising, from
the cases we have so far considered. For now the weight of the notion is such
as seemingly to destroy the theoretical fabric of the optkal science of Hegel's
time altogether. In the case of gravitation, the impact from the notion
resulted only in Hegel's preference for purely 'mathematical' (i.e. phenomen-
ological) representations of dynamics, as contrasted with that of the
Newtonian form. It is the kind of preference which Hegel thought he had
found realised in French eighteenth-century dynamics, but which was later
CONCEPTUAL ANAL YSIS AND HEGEL'S OPTICS 27
made explicit in Hertz's Mechanics, and which is reflected in the standpoint

of General Relativity theory? 7 Again, in the case of the law of free-fall,
although we saw Hegel offering what I called a 'dimensional argument' from
the Notion, the procedure of mathematical mechanics was not rejected. It is
apparently quite otherwise when we turn to optics. Newton's corpuscular
theory, the wave theory, Euler's aether; indeed, the whole conception of
"simple rays of light, and of particles and bundles of them", are all rejected,
being "of a piece with those other barbarous categories for whose prevalence
in physics Newton is chiefly responsible" (PN, § 276, Remark, p. 92; Z,
p.94).
Of course, once again these rejections are not thought of as being in
opposition with the empirical phenomena; quite to the contrary. Since Hegel
regards them as purely theoretical, "since [as he says] nothing empirical
obtains here" (PN, § 276, Remark, Z, p. 94), he feels at liberty to condemn,
but the opposition is primarily due to the fact that he assumes - quite
correctly - that the scientists of his time regard their theoretical constructs as
"materialistic representations"; and it is as such that they are "quite useless
for the comprehension of light" (PN, § 276, Remark, Z, p. 94). Naturally,
Hegel does not object to the geometrical representation of light-rays, as
purely mathematical devices, witness the diagrams that accompany his
account of refraction (PN, § 318, Remark, Z, p. 188). It is when these con-
structions are interpreted materialistically that they involve a break in the
"abstract ideality of light" , and hence, thinks Hegel, "its absolute continuity".
Falling back again on the analogy of mind, he sarcastically remarks that the
expression, 'bundles of rays' is meaningless; light can "no more be divided
into bundles of rays than can the Ego or pure self-consciousness" (PN, § 276,
Remark, Z, pp. 93-94).
It is of course possible that had there been a mathematical theory of
optics, such as was developed during the nineteenth century, e.g. by Fresnel,
Hegel would have opted for this alternative, and allowed some use to
expressions such as wave-length, aether, light-ray. As it is, from the stand-
point of his time, we have the result that the notional analysis tends to
destroy the science of optics altogether. This is unusual. It is more normal for
philosophers to underwrite the science of their time, and to let their meta·
physics issue in an underpinning of the foundations of that science. True,
even Hegel cannot quite stand up to the pressure. In the case of Newton's
theory of gravitational force, he had admitted that that theory had a superior
power because it accounted as precisely and elegantly for planetary pertur-
bations; but he still rejects it, giving instead a purely qualitative, and indeed
28 GERD BUCHDAHL
purely descriptive alternative to that of Newton (PN, § 270, Remark, p. 68).

In the case of light, we meet with a similar awkwardness, and momentary
anxiety. Here, the notional account for him implies that 'light has immediate
expansion' (i.e. is propagated instantaneously). Yet he admits that astrono-
mical observation of the solar system shows that it has a finite velocity. To
meet the contradiction, he falls back on an auxiliary explanation, which
connects the finiteness of velocity with the existence of a medium. On the
other hand, he contends, we are not automatically entitled to extrapolate to
empty space; and he fmds "something eerie" in Herschel's reckoning that
some of the light from the stars must have left them "about 500 years ago".
But never mind "these far-fetched conclusions" (PN, § 276, Remark, Z,
p. 94): words which betray a clear expression of unease; whether they mark
honesty or dishonesty on the part of our philosopher, I will not decide.
Reflection, in all this, is - as we have seen - of central importance.
Indeed, without reflection light is not visible. So light requires, as its
opposite, the darkness of matter: "Light and darkness have an external
relationship to each other; it is only at their common limit that light attains
to existence, for it is in this being-for-another that something is lit up"
(PN, § 277, Z, p. 95). And there is not here, he adds, "as yet any question of
colour" - foreshadowing the theory of colour, which in opposition to
Newton's will insist that coloured light is as it were a modification of light
proper, through the interference from darkness or opacity. This aspect of the
theory of colours we shall have to ignore here for lack of space. But we can
perhaps understand better now how a coalescence of the deductions from the
Notion, the rejection of the Newtonian theoretical constructions, and Hegel's
preference for phenomenological approaches could lend force to his
audacious attempt of total contradiction to the Newtonian theory of the
dispersion of light. No doubt, this opposition to the Newtonian theory of
colour was fed by psychological, not to say nationalistic considerations. And
when we read on, and find Hegel exclaiming that in the Newtonian account
"trivial phenomena obtained by intricate experiments are used as arguments
against [Goethe's theory]; [that] Newton's experiments themselves are
complicated, bad, pettily done, mean, and dirty" (PN, § 320, Remark, Z,
p. 211), we must admit that Hegel often did lack a grasp of the circumstantial
procedures of theoretical science. At least, his feel for these was sometimes
so weakly developed that it yielded to the stronger pressure of the notional
account, fed by the psychological motivations just mentioned.
Let us, however, now briefly consider the laws of rectilinear propagation,
reflection and refraction. Since any theory of reflection in terms of the
motion of luminiferous particles or the propagation of waves is rejected, only
notional considerations are left, mixed up in a peculiar manner with a purely
geometrical approach, perhaps somewhat akin to the procedure of Ptolemy's
theory of reflection?8
The law of rectilinear propagation, according to Hegel, is implied by the
fact that the manifestation of objects to each other is a purely spatial
relationship; furthermore, since no other conditions obtain bar this, it must
be "direct or rectilinear". Presumably this conclusion assumes some principle
of simplicity, though Hegel does not make this explicit. Besides, it is not clear
whether 'rectilinearity' has any meaning without the conception of a ray;
but as already remarked, Hegel did not object to the use of this conception,
provided it be treated as a purely geometrical model.
As regards reflection, Hegel's account is extremely brief, implying that we
must not regard it as a form of deductive derivation. All consideration of
material categories of transmission, he tells us, must be excluded. We are in
these considerations simply to confine ourselves to the defmition of light,
"as abstract ideality, as inseparable self-externality", as "intrinsically spatial"
(PN, § 278, p. 96). Once again, use is made of the basic notion ofreflection:
one object can be manifest to another, and that to a third: this is a basic
aspect of light. Hegel now at once concludes - hardly a deductively mediated
inference - that
in these spatial determinations the law of manifestation can only be that of equality -
the equality of the angles of incidence and reflection, and the unity of the plane of these
angles. Nothing whatever is present which could in any way alter the identity of the
relation (PN, § 278, p. 96).
Evidently, the 'can only be' of the text, and the appeal to simplicity con-
sideration, shows that Hegel is not providing a deductive account but a
notional contribution to what he knows is supported on experimental
grounds. But such looseness pays of course its price. For as soon as we turn
to more complex phenomena, e.g. of the polarization of light, the notional
account can get us no further. Hegel, instead of admitting this, however,
simply falls back altogether on to the pure description of a limiting case: the
mere determination of the angle at which a second reflection occurs does not
lead to any diminution of the light intensity.
30 GERD BUCHDAHL
Still, for us the moral is interesting: between notional determination,

theoretical processing, and experimental description, any number of
emphases are possible. At no point does Hegel flagrantly conflict with the
observational phenomena; at no point is there an inkling of that famous
'a priori deductive' approach of which he is usually accused, especially in the
context of his optics. So his various escape routes can only be conducive to
teaching us something about the stresses and strains that persist between the
different components of scientific reasoning. If anything, Hegel -like Goethe
- had too little appreciation of the importance of exceptions to any simple
'empirical' approach. Time and again we are told that a certain empirical
phenomenon is in conflict with predictions from Newtonian theory, when in
fact the 'conflict' could easily be resolved if Hegel allowed Newtonian con·
structions their rightful place. Instead, he sees his 'empirical phenomena' as
backing up - though usually only illustratively - his notional interpretation.
Hegel's treatment of refraction is, however, perhaps one of the severest
tests for his whole approach; where we can, so to speak, put the method
under a critical microscope. For since he has abandoned the concepts of the
physicists, i.e. their theoretical constructions such as those of Descartes or
Newton, of Huygens or Young, which all employ 'deficient' 'materialistic
representations' of light, and yet has no other theoretical ideas to put in its
place, we may expect him to make a wholesale notional determination take
the place of theoretical explanation; though once again, as he expressly says,
merely "stating and sticking to general points of view" (PN, § 318, Remark,
Z, p. 192).
Theories of refraction have often been a touchstone and symbol for
metaphysical standpoints. Descartes's methodological as well as metaphysical
(mechanistic) views are perfectly represented in his theory of refraction, just
as Leibniz's teleological idea of 'least impediment' was the focal technical
model for his all-embracing metaphysics of finality, of physical contingency
being an expression of an optimum choice,z9
What were some of the basic phenomena? When you fill a kettle with
water, and view it from above, the bottom appears raised, and - as an
immediate inference - the apparent volume is diminished. Geometrical optics
explains this phenomenon by appeal to the refraction of the light rays, in
accordance with Snell's law of sines; qualitatively, as the light passes from the
water into air, it is bent away from the normal to the interface, the 'angle of
incidence' increasing with increased angles of refraction. Note, moreover,
that if the angle of incidence is zero, the angle of refraction is zero likewise,
and the resulting phenomenon ought not to appear: a coin viewed vertically
from above ought not seem to be raised. Yet it is! (PN, § 318, Remark, Z,
p.191).
This is a prominent specimen of one of Hegel's 'counter-examples', to
'prove' that even the physicists' own theory leads to a conclusion inconsistent
with observation! I mention this to show that Hegel does not oppose physical
theory merely on ideological grounds. Unfortunately, the counter-example
involves a confusion: since both the eye of the observer and the coin are
objects extended in space, Hegel's assumption of zero-angle of incidence does
not apply. Still, as usual, we should note the intention, and the method-
ological implications, which make good sense.
What of the 'positive', notional 'explanation' of refraction? Let me state
it in brief outline. We need to stick entirely to the phenomenological
situation, employing solely concepts that have emerged in the course of the
increasing specification of the logical Idea. The concepts involved are light,
the transparency of the two media, and one primary property - there are
others, but they have less relevance in the context - viz. 'specific gravity',
or the relative density of the media. Then, Hegel holds, the only property
which has any relevance to the passage of light from one medium to the other
must be the specific gravity.
Hegel now proceeds to a move, very difficult to grasp for any quantitative,
let alone mechanistically orientated approach, although it bears a curious
likeness to one of the many hypothetical accounts of refraction - though
unlike Hegel's, framed in purely quantitative terms - which Kepler con-
jectured in his treatise on optics of 1604, theAd Vitellionem Paralipomena. 30
Whether Hegel, an avid student of Kepler's writings, was influenced by this
work is not known. At any rate, Hegel talks as though the specific gravity of
one medium could be 'active'; as though, for instance, the specific gravity of
the air could become affected by the specific gravity of the water (PN, § 318,
Remark, Z, p. 190); specific gravity being regarded here as a hybrid
quantitative-qualitative concept, defined as 'space-determining form'; as
though it were a kind of activity whose effects can spread?! Suppose now
the eye, starting from the visual medium of the air, to reach a certain volume
of the water, say V w; we may then regard the situation as though a corres-
ponding volume Vw of air had been impregnated with the specific gravity of
water, contained in that volume, the latter resulting in the determination of
a new (apparent) volume. Since the imaginary mass of air in the volume V w
is constant, to the greater specific gravity there must therefore correspond
a smaller volume; the volume of 'air' (i.e. water) will seem diminished, which
was what we tried to explain. (Remember: density = v~a:e.)
32 GERD BUCHDAHL
"This is the sort of way in which this phenomenon must to be grasped",

Hegel remarks, "it may appear artificial but there is no alternative" (PN,
§ 318, Remark, Z, p. 190). We may wonder. Since about 775 cc of air at
N.P.T. weigh 1 gram (its sp.gr. taken as 0.00129 g/cc), a very large diminution
in apparent volume ought to result! This simple fact is overlooked in Hegel's
reasonable (though incorrect) point that "the refractive power depends on
the specific gravity of media" (PN, § 318,Remark, Z, p. 192). Besides, Hegel
has to admit that even this is not always true; whereupon he falls back on
auxiliary saving devices, introducing ad hoc the relevance of additional
properties. It is clear that, being intent on operating with notional considera-
tions, from their nature 'qualitative', the rejection of the scientist's quantita-
tive approach has turned into a degenerate device; "the driving energy of
Reason", of which Hegel once speaks (PN, § 316, Remark, p. 179) has spilled
over into the theoretician's domain where it does not belong; the stratification
of the metaphysical and inductive levels is insufficiently maintained.
Of course, this idea of a qualitative property impregnating another
substance belongs to an earlier period, and it is indeed frequently the case
that we find in Hegel such reversions to Renaissance and even earlier con-
ceptions. The most interesting aspect here is his account of specific gravity as
an 'intensive' quantity. The readiness with which he employs this device
derives its 'justification' (in Hegel's eyes) from its definite position in the
evolution of the logical Idea. In the relevant paragraph of the Philosophy of
Nature, where he notes that the purely quantitative (,extensive') approach to
specific gravity does "not express any reality" (PN, § 293 ,Remark, p. 128),
he refers us back to the section of the Logic which deals with the doctrine of
Being, under the heading of 'Quantity', and more specifically 'Degree' (PN,
§ 293, Remark, p. 127); and this itself is viewed as a transition to the next
section, 'Measure' regarded as the 'qualitative quantum' ,32 a determination of
the Notion which, as he explains in the Zusatz to Sect. 111, immediately
leads to Essence?3 This approach to specific gravity as an intensive quantity
is (as Hegel notes) due to Kant, where, in the section on 'The Anticipations
of Perception' of the first Critique, it supposedly receives its transcendental
justification (CPR, esp. pp. 206-207 [AI73-5/B215-16]). In Hegel's hands
this treatment of specific gravity is simply an attempt to replace the otiose
atomistic approach of traditional mechanistic theory by a new hybrid
quantitative-qualitative conception. It usefully links with his idea of light as
something inward, since intensive magnitude for him "potnts to the category
of Measure and begins to hint at an inwardness which, as a determination of
the Notion, is an immanent determinateness of form, which only appears as
a quantum by way of comparison" (PN, § 293, Remark, p. 127). In this way

- I confess that Hegel's reasoning is almost oppressively opaque at this point
- a connection is made between transparency of media and the relationship
of two transparent media, whereby only the different specific gravities "bring
about a particularisation of visibility". And so we get the transition to the
final view that
the second medium is, so to speak, infected by the immaterial density of the fIrst one
posited in it, so that the space in which the image is seen in the second medium shows
the same contraction as is suffered by this medium itself (PN, § 318, Remark, Z,
pp. 187-88).
Perhaps the fascination of the whole story for us is just that it is so vastly
at variance with the methodological constraints of the scientific tradition
which has come down to us these last 300 years. It provides us with a
reductio ad absurdum of that view which I already mentioned when quoting
from the Hegelian introductory passage to the Philosophy of Nature, where
we are told that scientific revolutions originate solely from the change in
categories through which Spirit seeks to comprehend itself more truly (PN,
§ 246,Remark, Z, p. 11).
Light must not be represented as a material propagation: the water, as visible, is ideally
present in the air. This presence is a specific gravity with this specific determinateness
alone, the water preserves and exerts itself in that into which it has been transformed,
and so transforms this its transformation into itself (PN, § 318, Remark, Z, p. 190).
Clearly, this is a different world. Hegel appreciates this; he offers us certain

operative analogies, for example, that of the petty soul which "measures the
grandeur of a great man's heroic deed by its own dwarfish standards and
reduces it to its own level" (PN, § 318, Remark, Z, p. 190).
As the hero I imagine is actively present in me, if only in ideal fashion, so too does the
air receive within itself the visual space of the water and dwarf it to itself (PN, § 318,
Remark, Z, p. 191).
Evidently, this is 'a different way of seeing' the physical phenomenon. The
fact that the natural manifold needs interpretation through spiritual articula-
tion has become transformed into a method of envisaging the phenomena
themselves as spiritual. It has become fashionable recently to emphasise that
Hegel's Logic is not the logic of Russell or Frege, but that its roots lie in
the mystical visions of a Jacob Boehme or a Meister Eckhart, and that his
influence must be sought in the direction of the poets, both from whom
34 GERD BUCHDAHL
he received so much (Goethe, Holderlin) and to whom he bequeathed at least

his language, if nothing more (e.g. the influence on Mallarme in recent times).
For the philosopher of science, the value of a study of Hegel's logic lies in
its clear characterisation of the structure of scientific theory, of its conceptual
component, its theoretical dimension, and its empirical data. And the value of
such a study is increased, not diminished, when we find it taken to extremes,
transcending the boundaries of conventional methodology, for this teaches us
something about the limits of its usefulness. In many cases, as remarked
before, Hegel has to abandon the articulative power of his Logic; the
empirical sensory material then serves only as illustration of the stages of the
Notion. In this essay I have tried to light up those corners in the Hegelian
edifice where we may glean a more defmitive structure of scientific reasoning.
Whether the specific abandonment of theoretical mechanistic approaches, in
favour of the more plastic notional imposition, of which the theory of
refraction gives such a bizarre example, might ever find application in other
more naturally adapted regions of scientific enquiry, we must leave to
subsequent speculation.
University of Cambridge
England
NOTES
1 Lloyd William Taylor, Physics. The Pioneer Science (Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1941),
p. 490. (New York, Dover, 1959,2 vols.)
2 I have occasionally (as here) modified Miller's translation. Taylor himself actually
quotes from the summary given by J. B. Stallo, General Principles of the Philosophy of
Nature (London, 1847).
3 Taylor,loc. cit.
4 I cannot do better than refer the reader to J. N. Findlay's excellent modern introduc-
tion, Hegel. A Re-examination (London, George Allen and Unwin; New York,
Humanities Press, 1958).
5 Cf. Logik, §§ 96-7, pp. 189-92. I have made my own translations of relevant
passages from the Logik, Wallace's rather free translation being often too unreliable
(The Logic of Hegel, second edition (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1892». I have, however,
given the corresponding page references from Wallace, thus here: L [W, 1892], pp.
179-81.
6 PN, § 86,Z, 2, p.166;cf. Logik. § 131,Z, p. 261;L [W, 1892], pp. 159,240.
7 PN. § 246, Remark, p. 11. Cf. also PG, § 381. Z, pp. 21-3, for a summary of Hegel's
position.
S Cf. Logik. § 86, Z, 2, pp. 168-8; L [W, 1982], pp. 159-61. Cf. also Logik. § 160, Z,
p. 315; L [W, 1892], p. 287.
9 Cf. Gerd Buchdahl, 'History of Science and Criteria of Choice', in Historical and
Philosophical Perspectives of Science. Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science,
vol. 5 (ed. R. Stuewer, Minneapolis, Minnesota University Press, 1970), pp. 204-30. I
have used a similar criterial scheme for a more general characterisation of Hegel's
Philosophy of Nature in 'Hegel's Philosophy of Nature and the Structure of Science',
Ratio 15 (1973), 1-27.
10 Logik, § 136, pp. 269-75;L [W, 1892], pp. 246-51.
11 Logik, § 140, p. 276;L [W, 1892], p. 253;PN, § 246, Renwrk, Z, p. 12.
12 Cf. Hegel's remarks in Logik, § 195, Z, p. 369 (section on 'Mechanism'); L [W,
1892], p. 337.
13 I have paraphrased this, since neither the German text, still less the translation, give
much inkling of what Hegel intended.
14 Logik, § 136, p. 270; L [W, 1892], p. 248.
15 PN, § 267, Remark, p. 58n. Cf. also p. 67, the reference to Francoeur's Traite
elementaire de mecanique (Paris, 1798). Hegel goes on to say that Newton's presentation
is such that 'what have been adduced are not so much propositions as bare facts; and the
requisite reflection is only this, that the distinctions and determinations brought forward
by mathematical analysis, and the course it has to follow in accordance with its method,
are wholly distinct from what is supposed to have physical reality'.
16 PN, § 266, Renwrk, p. 52; cf. SL [M], pp. 379 ff.
17 Cf.Logik, § 102,pp.203-4;L [W, 1892],pp.190-92.
18 PN, § 267, Renwrk, p. 59. For a somewhat fuller development, see my Ratio article,
note 9 above, sect. vii, pp. 17 - 21.
19 Logik, §97,Z,p.I92;L [W,1892],p.181.
20 Cf. Gerd Buchdahl, Metaphysics and the Philosophy of Science. The Qassical
Sources: Descartes to Kant (Oxford, Blackwell; Cambridge, Mass., MIT Press, 1969),
ch.8, sect. 4c(iv), pp. 512-16.
21 Cf. Kant's Prolegomena and Metaphysical Foundations of Science (tr. E. B. Bax,
London, Bell, 1883), ch. II: 'General Observation on Dynamics', p. 200; Schriften
(Ak. ed., Berlin, 1911), vol. 4, p. 524, line 24. Also Buchdahl, Metaphysic . ... , pp.567-8.
22 Logik, § 97, Z, p. 192; L [W, 1892], p. 181.
23 Logik, § 98, p. 193;L [W, 1892], p. 182.
24 Logik, § 112,Z, p. 224;L [W, 1892], p. 208.
25 PN, § 275, p. 87; ~ 277, p. 95.
26 Logik, §112,Z,p.224;L [W,1892],p.208.
27 Cf. E. Nagel, The Structure of Science (New York, Harcourt, 1961), ch.6, especially
sect. 4; P. Duhem, The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory (tf. P. P. Wiener, Princeton,
Princeton University Press, 1954), Part I; N. R. Campbell, Foundations of Science (New
York, Dover, 1957), ch.6. For an earlier source, E. Mach, Die Principien der Wiirmelehre
(Leipzig, Barth, 1896): 'The contrast between mechanical and phenomenological
physics', pp. 362-4.
28 For Ptolemy, see M. R. Cohen and I. E. Drabkin, A Source Book in Greek Science
(New York, McGraw Hill, 1948), pp. 268-71.
29 Cf. Buchdahl, Metaphysics . .. ch.3, sect. 2c-d, for Descartes's Optics, and ch.7,
sect. 3b, pp. 425-34, for Leibniz's use of his theory of refraction.
30 Cf. Johannes Kepler. Gesammelte Werke, vol. 2 (ed. W. v. Dyck and Max Caspar,
Munich, Beck, 1938 -), ch.2, pp. 85-86. See my 'Methodological Aspects of Kepler's
36 GERD BUCHDAHL
Theory of Refraction', Stud. Hist. Phil. Sci. 3 (1972), 265-298, especially pp. 283-86.
31 PN, § 318, Remark, Z, p. 190; cf. § 293, Remark, p.127.
32 Logik, § 107, p. 215; L [W, 1892], p. 201.
33 Logik, § 111, Z, p. 221;L [W, 1892], pp. 205-206.
JOHN J. COMPTON
A COMMENT ON BUCHDAHL'S 'CONCEPTUAL ANALYSIS

AND SCIENTIFIC THEORY IN HEGEL'S PHILOSOPHY OF
NATURE (WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO HEGEL'S OPTICS),
In his 'Foreword' to the English translation of Hegel's Philosophy of Nature,

J. N. Findlay confesses that the section devoted to physics is the most
difficult part of the work and "requires a detailed, paragraph-by-paragraph
commentary by one as much versed in physical science and its history as in
Hegelian concepts" (p. xviii). Fortunately for us, Gerd Buchdahl is just such
a one. His lucid and subtle comments illuminate what are indeed very dark
corners of the Hegelian edifice. My intent in these brief comments on the
comments is simply to lure him on to further, more intensive and extensive
luminosity.
At several junctures in his paper, Buchdahl suggests that his purpose is to
explicate what he regards as a general Hegelian philosophy of science -
particularly its "clear characterization of the structure of scientific theory, of
its conceptual component, its theoretical dimension, and its empirical data."
(p. 34) He does this by considering cases. He carefully examines Hegel's treat-
ment of gravitation, free-fall, matter and force, and most notably of optical
effects, in order to explore the relationships among (i) the 'notional' meaning
of the related concepts, (ii) the prevailing theoretical constructs used by the
phYSicists to deal with them, and (iii) the observed phenomena. Buchdahl
effectively disposes of the hallowed misunderstandings which have Hegel
either totally ignoring empirical facts and regularities or else claiming some-
how to derive them deductively from the notion of Nature as manifestation
of the Idea perfecting itself in selfo(;onscious spirit. And he points out the
complex relations of agreement and disagreement between the developing
Notion and the scientific laws and constructs. However, from this the implied
(if not promised!) general methodological account does not emerge. Does
Hegel have a statable, general theory of science, and particularly a theory of
the logical relationships between his philosophy of nature and empirically
based, scientific theorizing? And if so, what is it? Putting Hegel's specific,
contentual claims aside - including the claim that there is only one coherent
philosophy of nature, namely his own - what I should like to know is
whether one could take his philosophical style as a paradigm and go out into
the world, the world of contemporary physics, say, and do philosophy of
nature after him? What would one do and how would one understand the task?
37
R. S. Cohen and M. W. Wartofsky (eds.), Hegel and the Sciences, 37 -40.
38 JOHN 1. COMPTON
Now I do not even hint that I am able to answer these questions. I believe
that Buchdahl can do so and I profoundly hope that he will. However, I can
suggest a possible context for an answer - one which is already implicit,
I believe, in Buchdahl's paper, and one which is by now familiar in any case.
Consider, for example, that there are three distinct levels of scientific
thought - and their correlative concepts of nature: (1) The level of observed
and experimentally tested regularities in the behavior of things; (2) The level
of physical constructs or theoretical explanations, hypothetically offered to
account for those regularities - leaving the crucial expression "to account
for" undefined for the moment; and (3) the level of metaphysical or
conceptual models which represent what is thought to be intrinsically
intelligible or self.explanatory in nature, and which function in a regulative
way to suggest hypothetical constructs for possible scientific use.
Now consider further that there are competing master, metaphysical
models - among them one given by the tradition of atomistic materialism,
suitably amended by adding various sorts of forces, and another based on the
notion of a self-alienating and self-fulfilling Absolute Spirit. And suppose, still
further, that while most of the tested and wen-accepted physical constructs
have been suggested by the atomistic-mechanical model, one has convincing
reasons to believe that this model is inferior in systematic coherence to that
of the Absolute Spirit. Then it seems clear that what one should rationally set
out to do is precisely what Hegel did set out to do in the Philosophy of
Nature: One should try so to develop and apply the model of nature based on
the notion of Absolute Spirit that it would give sense to the given phenomena
of level (1) but without using the physical constructs of level (2), which are
based on the competing, atomistic-mechanical picture.
But "give sense" or "account for" in what sense? What precisely should be
the logical relations among the three levels of scientific thought? At this
point, as Buchdahl writes the story, Hegel seems to have failed clearly to
distinguish two quite distinct alternatives or, if he did, he seems to have taken
them both.
I. One option is a conventionalism of scientific theory. It is to treat the

(largely atomistic-mechanical) physical constructs of level (2) as merely
hypothetical, conventional, or instrumental, but not true, while taking the
metaphysical model (of the self-exteriorizing Spirit) as truly referential. Then
the philosophical task is simply to eliminate false rei[ications of forces and to
re-interpret the given phenomena of level (1) directly in notional terms drawn
COMMENT ON BUCHDAHL 39
from the metaphysical model (3). This is the view that seems to be implicit in
Hegel's analysis of gravitation and of free-fall, where he expresses strong
preference for formal, mathematical laws only and seeks to supplement such
laws with a qualitative demonstration of their inner meaning and basis.
Similarly, he appears willing to allow talk of light rays and of their rectilinear
propagation so long as this is understood to refer to purely geometric,
heuristic representations. On this option scientific agnosticism (d fa Kant)
allows metaphysical fulfillment (d fa Hegel).
II. On the other hand, a second option is a realism of scientific theory. But
this implies a new and more adequate scientific theory, the constructs of
which will be based on the genuinely referential model of the Absolute Spirit.
Here, the philosophical task is not only to criticize materialistic representa-
tions and to re-interpret observed phenomena in notional terms, but more:
it is to use the notional determinations to generate new theoretical hypotheses
which might afford discovery and explanation of new phenomena. While
Hegel never explicitly espouses this view, perhaps it is nascent in his reformu-
lation of the Kantian dynamic theory of matter - which could be used to
suggest a field theory of matter-energy. And it seems obvious in his treatment
of the relations between light and space which, as Buchdahl points out, yields
some astonishing insights such as that of the dependence of space upon the
dispersion of light-energy. Even, and perhaps especially, Hegel's 'excessive'
spiritualization of light in his account of refraction, suggests this more con-
structive role for metaphysical models - for we should not expect a
metaphysical model invariably to yield positive results!
Now let me put my basic puzzlement this way: Why is it that Hegel
held back from this second, more constructive view of the role of
philosophy of nature? Why did he seem to favor the first, more cautious
option - conventionalism and formalism of scientific theory coupled with
metaphysical redescription of the already given empirical data? To be sure,
it is far less risky; but it is also far less dialectical, less open to permitting
new phenomena to bear upon and perhaps force modifications in what we
had thought to be the categorial features of nature, and in being far less
dialectical it is less true to Hegel's own vision. The second option would
have more adequately fulfIlled Hegel's aim to reveal the drama of the Idea
not only as consistent with known phenomena but as requiring new ones -
not deductively, but in the way in which a rich and fundamental model
affords new analogies for examination, quantified formulation and test.
40 JOHN J. COMPTON
Perversely, I suppose, I find myself wishing that Hegel had indulged in some
more 'bizarre' excesses like that of "the ideal presence of water in air"; he
might then have found some more astonishing successes as well.
Vanderbilt University
Nashville, Tennessee
DIETRICH VON ENGELHARDT
THE CHEMICAL SYSTEM OF SUBSTANCES, FORCES

AND PROCESSES IN HEGEL'S PHILOSOPHY OF NATURE
AND THE SCIENCE OF HIS TIME
In the history of Hegel research his philosophy of nature has been unjustly
neglected. Only some fifty studies of this subject have appeared since 1830;
and the greater part of these are devoted to the philosophy of nature as
a whole. On chemistry as a special domain of physical nature no more than
perhaps five treatises are to be found. Academic concern with Hegel's
philosophy of nature has not been less insignificant. In the years from 1945
to 1970, 15,500 seminars and lectures were held at the universities of the
Federal Republic of Germany. Of these only twelve treated Hegel's philo-
sophy of nature, only two exclusively so. This low esteem seems strange if we
consider that the second part of Hegel's system is formed entirely by the
philosophy of nature and recall furthermore how much attention the
philosopher had devoted to the natural sciences throughout his life. Indeed,
the treatment of philosophy of nature was so important for Hegel that he did
not hold back from polemical commentaries dealing with the entire formal-
analogical speculation about nature of his time, and he did not shrink from
allowing his friendship with Schelling to be broken off because of these.
The rejection which his philosophy of nature has met, is based above all on
Hegel's alleged contempt for and neglect of both empirical work and modern
research. The general indifference displayed toward the philosophy of nature
after 1830, however, cannot adequately be explained by these objections, be·
cause they were raised only among natural scientists and by few of them even
though with a vehement and offensive tone; and they found but meager reso-
nance. The reason for the indifference lies rather in the polarization of the
sciences of nature and the sciences of the mind [Geisteswissenschaften] during
the nineteenth century, which Hegel had foreseen; indeed he had seen one es-
sentially important significance of philosophizing to be the overcoming of that
polarization. The positivist sciences' understanding of themselves, separating
nature and mind [Geist], and apparently legitimated by impressive technical
achievements ,has become the epitome of the domin?nt attitude toward nature
after the idealist period; it has confirmed a self-centered and self-satisfied
readiness to leave the world of nature to the empirical approach and know-
ledge, and in this way has freed the natural scientist from the philosophic
requirement to establish the grounds for the forms and materials of nature.
41
42 DIETRICH VON ENGELHARDT
The study of Hegel's philosophy of nature offers the possibility of allow-

. ing reflection about the falling apart of nature and mind to begin again.
Hegel's philosophy of nature can be investigated from three perspectives:
(1) according to its place in the system as a whole, its relation to the logic and
the philosophy of mind; (2) with respect to the contents and structures them-
selves; and (3) in its relation to empirical studies. However, while a critical
interpretation of the idealist philosophy of nature will receive little considera-
tion and support by those philosophers who are scarcely interested in nature,
it could much more readily awaken the unrestricted interest of historians of
natural science and medicine if it were to take on the form of a confrontation
between empirical science and philosophy.
We will seek to give an example of such a method of interpretation in what
follows, and this with respect to chemistry alone. To a limited attitude
toward nature, such a restriction may seem questionable, which is incontro-
vertible in the domain of the mental [Geistige]; for who would expect of an
investigation in philosophical psychology at the same time an evaluation of
the philosophy of right? The scientific system of chemistry will be presented
first, and after that the philosophical; and finally we will set forth the
essential 'moments' of their agreement and difference together with several
general provisions [Bestimmungen] of the philosophy of nature.
To unite system and empirical work was the general goal of natural science in
the second half of the eighteenth century. To meet the demand of empirical
research and at the same time to proceed systematically, this was to initiate
a new phase of research. In addition, mathematics was declared to be the
model of scientific method, the possibility of mathematization held to be
proof of the scientific (d' Alembert, 1751: Discours preliminaire; Kastner,
1768: p. 2, 5; Erxleben, 1772: Preface; Condillac, 1780). Both parts of
natural science - theoretical knowledge of nature and natural history -
sought to achieve the principle of the empirical combined with the systematic.
In natural history, the description and classification of phenomena of the
three natural kingdoms was required, which meant the development of a
natural order instead of an artificial system or any arbitrary preoccupation
with some specific subject-matter; in the natural sciences explanation of the
causes and effects of phenomena was demanded, the uniting of separate
phenomena and their manifold conditions into a natural order. Theoretical
natural science was subdivided into physics and chemistry, natural history
THE CHEMICAL SYSTEM IN HEGEL'S PHILOSOPHY OF NATURE 43
into mineralogy, botany and zoology. However, these fundamental criteria

of research were by no means met consistently, neither in the theoretical
sciences nor in natural history. This shortcoming also applied to making
mathematics absolute, which in any case found persuasive critics.
Chemistry, the science of elements, compounds, forces and processes, was
also guided by the general goal of the natural sciences (Erxleben, 1775:
Preface and p. 5ff; Lavoisier, 1789: Discours prl!liminaire; Berzelius, 1820:
p. 19ft), but it too was not capable of complete success. For here too mathe-
matics served as certification of scientific character. The conception of the
elements and their combination was transformed in the closing years of the
eighteenth century by the controversy between phlogistic and antiphlogistic
chemistry. Around 1800 the oxygen theory had established itself. It, and the
doctrine of forces and processes developed mainly by the proponents of the
phlogiston theory, was combined during the nineteenth century with the
atomic and electrical theories to form a system of chemistry.
The concept of the element fulftlled the requirements of empirical investi-
gation, insofar as it was bound to the observable. In this way the absolute
concept of the element was replaced by a relative one. Element is no longer,
as formerly, simply and entirely indivisible, but an undivided substance whose
future dissociation [Disoziirnng] could not be excluded. Instead of the
designation 'element', the term 'undivided substance' [unzerlegte Substanz]
became current (Trommsdorff, 1800, p. 22ft). This change of meaning took
place in phlogistic as well as antiphlogistic chemistry (Erxleben, 1775 :
Preface; Elliott, 1784; p. 7; Lavoisier, 1789: Discours preliminaire and
p. 193ft). The absolute conception of element of the past did survive, how-
ever, in the confrontation of simple, undivided and compound substances,
in which, however, the older conception of three or four elements was not
taken up again, but instead all those things were included among the simple
substances, whose further division was considered impossible. Although, with
the principle of quantitative measurement, antiphlogiston chemistry had
replaced phlogiston by oxygen, it propounded a view of elements which was
indifferent as to weight, for it accepted light, heat, magnetism and electricity
among the elements. Only after the turn of the century did the conception
gradually prevail that chemistry was the science of substances which could be
weighed; with that the so-<:alled imponderable substances were dropped from
the class of elements. The vacillation of the concept of element, and the
discovery of new elements and compounds, which till then had been con-
sidered as basic substances, led to the virtually unchanged number of about
fifty elements.
To the concept of element corresponded the concept of compound. By

this was understood the union of two or more basic substances. A com-
pound was considered to be what could be dissolved into simple substances,
and then be put together again from these. Although synthesizing organic
substances was not accomplished until the second decade of the nineteenth
century (Wohler, 1828), their status as compounds was established earlier.
Physical mixtures and chemical compounds were not always clearly distin-
guished, especially during the eighteenth century. A contributing cause to the
imprecision of the concept of compound was the indecisiveness about the
elementary nature of the substances that could not be weighed -light, heat,
magnetism and electricity. Around 1790 the number of possible compounds
was determined by arithmetic means to be about 1200; however, this was a
hypothetical number that could not be verified empirically, for its reality was
far from being scientifically attested (lavoisier, 1789: p.182).
But chemistry was not regarded as an exclusively geometrical and static
science of the elements and their compounds; rather, it was above all a theory
of forces and processes. Basically, the chemical processes were divided into
synthetic and analytic (also diathetic), the former producing compounds
from the basic substances, the latter extracting basic substances from the
compounds. The theory of the forces which underlie chemical changes was
also called the theory of relationships [Verwandtschaftslehre] , the theory of
attractions and affmities. Generally a combinatory affmity and a simple and
dual elective affmity were distinguished; the former designated the striving
of heterogeneous or differentiated substances to amalgamate to form homo-
geneous or undifferentiated substances, the latter the tendency of homo-
geneous substances to separate or to exchange their components. In the last
third of the eighteenth century, this theory was decisively completed by the
phlogistonists, while at first the antiphlogiston chemists neglected this
domain (Lavoisier, 1789: Discours preliminaire). According to the theory of
affinities, it should not only be possible to specify in which proportion
elements and compounds would combine, but also which distinguishable
degrees of affinity exist among the substances. With the exploration of
preferences, the theory of chemical forces had already made its first
beginnings shortly after 1700 (Geoffroy, 1718), but only in the last third of
that century was it extended to the whole of chemistry and an attempt made
to bring chemistry under mathematical categories (Bergman, 1775; de
Morveau et al., 1777; Wenzel, 1777; Richter, 1789, 1972-4). The achieve-
ment of the mathematization principle first raised chemistry from the status
of an art to the rank of a science, as was emphasized everywhere (de Morveau
et al., 1780: vol. 2, Preface; Richter, 1792: vol. 1, pp. 1 fi). This transforma-
tion appeared all the more justified, the more the demonstration of the
constancy of the proportions of substances within compounds succeeded, and
where these proportions were variable, to show them as multiple - which
means to show that they stood in a simple relation to each other. The theory
of forces was questioned at first, before its fmal adoption due ,to the obser-
vation and investigation of such factors as heat, physical conditions, and
mass, which influenced the constant and multiple proportions; but finally
the theory was refmed and extended by these insights (Berthollet, 1803).
But the combination of the theory of attraction with electrochemical theory
(Volta, 1792,1800; Davy, 1807, 1812; Berzelius, 1803,1819) and atomic
theory (Higgins, 1789, 1814; Dalton, 1808-1810) proved much more prob-
lematical. According to the electrochemical view, also called Galvanism,
substances were positive and negative electrically charged matter; the
chemical processes were the uniting and the separating of the two kinds of
electricity. This interpretation reduced the theory of attraction to the two
electrical poles, and beyond that made the validity of atomic theory appear
questionable; for with the tendency then prevailing to regard electricity - as
well as heat, light and magnetism - not as substance, but as force or
manifestation of forces, required that a dynamic view of nature become more
pro bable again. To be sure, the controversy, which was not to be resolved
empirically, was then decided in favor of atomism. The dogmatic and, for the
time, still ambiguous character of the system of chemistry that was linked to
this was certainly noticed by scientists, as in general it had to be admitted
that science and its progress was unthinkable without hypotheses and specula-
tion (Gmelin, 1817: vol. 1, pp. 54ff; Berzelius, 1820, p. 19ff).
Elements, compounds, forces and processes were the constitutive
'moments' of chemistry between 1780 and 1830. A closed system was not,
however, produced from these moments by. the scientists of those decades.
Fundamentally a system of chemistry could have been constructed from two
principles and their combination: first, according to a principle of substances,
and this either in the fonn of a mathematized classification of the elements
and their compounds, those of a simple and a higher order, or in the form of
a natural history taxonomy; the other according to the principle of forces and
processes. Neither of the two possibilities nor their integration into a com-
prehensive unity was realized. The system of chemistry remained disjointed
among the varied presentations because of the irregular connection of the two
fundamental possibilities, as well as due to the special preeminence accorded
to specific substances or forces, as for instance oxygen or electricity. To be
sure, proceeding logically from its scientific premisses (Condillac, 1780), anti-
phlogiston chemistry had developed an analytic method for the language of
chemistry (de Morveau et al., 1787) and for the system of elements and com-
pounds on various levels, but then, due to the emphasis given to oxygen and
an orientation reflecting the three kingdoms of nature, it had arrived at an
arbitrary claiisification (Lavoisier, 1789). Furthermore, the theory of forces
and the theory of processes on the whole remained excluded from the anti-
phlogiston theory, although they were mentioned here and there. This situa-
tion did not change in the subsequent decades. About 1800 a system began
with a conceptual explanation of the elements, compounds, forces and pro-
cesses, proceeded to the examination of fire, water and air, then went on to
the acids, alkalis, oxides and chlorides, and metals and ended with an account
of the mineral, vegetable and animal substances (Trommsdorff, 1800-1804).
The organization of chemistry reached a certain consistency around 1815,
since after the weightless substances the ponderable elements were presented,
these divided into non-metals and metals; and to the description of the
individual metals, that of the compounds of each was added. However, the
theory of forces and processes was expounded independently of the elements
and compounds (Gmelin, 1817). Around 1830, the non-metallic fundamental
substances and their combinations stood at the beginning of the system; air
and water and the theory of attraction followed; to these finally the acids,
bases and metals were added (Mitscherlich, 1829-1830). All the chemical
systems were characterized by the fact that the theory of forces and processes
had no influence on the order of the substances. The theory was treated quite
arbitrarily, now at the beginning, now at the end or at some point within the
account of the elements and their compounds, and at times not at all or only
in part. Substance, force and process remained apart. Beyond that, the theory
of forces, of atoms and of electrochemistry were not and could not be
brought into correspondence. By proceeding neither from one of the basic
possibilities by themselves nor from their combination was a consistent order
of chemical substances and processes developed. The universal demands
placed upon science during the eighteenth century were not fulfilled.
II
Hegel's philosophy of chemistry is a unified system of empirical chemistry;

substance, force and process are combined to form a real and conceptual
unity. Without resorting to all those logical categories that are decisive for the
study of chemistry, and without taking too much into consideration those
physical phenomena and their philosophical interpretation that precede it and

form its foundation, the general concept of chemistry can be represented and
clarified in the following manner: chemistry is the 'in differentiation' of
differing substances and the 'differentiation' of indifferent substances. The
first process refers to the uniting of opposed substances into neutral products,
the second, their separation into substances that are again opposed. A third
process is the combination of these two [Vereinigung]; it is the neutral
process, the production of neutral substances through dissolution of other
neutral substances. It neither begins with opposing substances, nor does it
lead to opposing substances; it can be called the 'indifferentiation' of
indifferent substances, and is called by Hegel the 'total process'. However, the
chemical substances are not subjected to these changes by external, mechani-
cal means - this would only lead to mixtures, aggregations, amalgamations;
for Hegel this is "the formal process which is a combination of merely
different, unopposed bodies" (PN, § 327, p. 236).
Instead, these changes are the expression of forces inherent in the sub-
stances, their striving to unite and to separate. Acids and lyes are in reality
themselves the force of neutralization. The attractive forces belong to the
individual substances; these are to be characterized according to the principles
of the theory of attraction: every individual substance is a specific combina-
tion of bodily-individual phenomena and equivalent forces. As every sub-
stance is phenomenon as well as force, and the force does not coincide
precisely with the phenomenon, but is instead directed toward its changing in
chemistry, we can speak of a falling apart of concept - the goal of the
substance's force - and reality - the phenomenal state of the substance. The
process overcomes [aufhebt] this falling apart. Forces are the tendencies of
heterogeneous substances to become homogenized, of neutral substances to
separate again into heterogeneous substances or merely to exchange their
components. In the then contemporary tenninology which Hegel too
employs, combinatory affinity and simple and double elective affinity are the
conditions of the three processes. Such a philosophy cannot share the usual
understanding of element and compound, which however, it well knows. In
philosophical chemistry the element is simple, being the resultant substance
of the synthetic process. On the other hand, by its different nature, namely as
substance and force in one, the element is also a compound, while the com-
pound, through its quality of indifference, its neutral character, which means
the negation of the opposition of substance and force, is also elementary.
This complex definition of element and compound cannot be reconciled with
a purely atomic interpretation. But according to Hegel, the question of
atomism or dynamism will not be decided within chemistry, but already in

the derivation of matter.
The class of the simple product, the resultant substances of the synthesis,
which are heterogeneous because of an affinity directed toward neutrality, is
thus to be determined in a twofold respect: as heterogeneous substances with
their striving toward homogenization they are in reality different, but as their
striving is directed toward this homogenization, as it anticipates it, they are
at the same time conceptually indifferent. Overcoming and transcending
[Aujhebung] this contradiction between concept and reality is the synthetic
process. Conversely the class of substances of the analytic process are indiffer-
ent in reality and different conceptually, as they are indeed neutral, but still
consist of opposing substances to which separation will again restore them. The
class of neutral substances, the formation of neutral compounds from neutral
compounds, the process of exchange solely of the foundations of their com-
position, all remain on the level of neutrality or indifference. The substances
different in reality, resultant substances, products of the synthetic process,
are: metals, metal hydrates and metal oxides, non-metallic and combustible
substances like sulphur, phosphorus, and finally the acids and lyes; the sub-
stances indifferent in reality, resultant substances, products of the analytic
process, are: the salts. The subdivision of the synthetic and ~nalytic processes
into a number of subprocesses forms the basis of a detailed grouping of the
simple and compounded substances. To list and describe all of the substances
in detail, according to Hegel, is not the task of philosophy. Its task is to
structure the manifold conceptually, but not to prepare a handbook for it.
The division of the chemical substances is philosophical; it must, however,
be documented by experience: substances manifest their nature as pheno-
mena, forces and processes in reality, and this nature establishes their place in
the system. We cannot mention nor evaluate here the numerous empirical
results, which Hegel selects from the literature to show what substances are
qualified to represent the different or indifferent classes. The philosopher
who, with the science of his time, has gone beyond the alternative of
phlogiston or antiphlogiston chemistry, compiles natural perceptions and
experimental observations from worldwide research, compares them, notes
contradictions and incoherencies, and above all discovers the hypothetical
character of many empirical statements and the metaphysical within natural
science. Pre-eminently in the theory of forces and processes, of constant and
multiple proportions and also with respect to the table of eguivalents, Hegel
proves remarkably knowledgeable. The history and the most up-to-date state
of research are equally familiar to him.
The philosophical system of chemistry is not consistent solely because

substance, force and process are brought into an immanent order, which
furthermore is verified in empirical work, but also because a foundation is
established for conceptually concrete connection with physics and organic
science, and a derivation is provided for the specific independence of the
various domains of nature. Reduction and the production of neutral com-
pounds do not pass over from the one to the other without external
mediation. The neutral process of double elective affinity is, to be sure,
separation and compounding at the same time, but does not take place in the
real difference between reality and concept, which is the distinctive mark of
synthesis and analysis: in chemistry, there is no immediately coherent cycle
of synthetic and analytic changes. The unity of the two processes is only a
conception in thought without any corresponding reality. Just as concept and
reality fall apart for the compounding and separating substances, so the
concept of the unity in thought of the synthetic and analytic processes also
does not correspond to the chemical reality. The first two incongruities
between simple and compounded substances are overcome [aufheben] by the
chemical processes, and the resolution of the second incongruity is achieved
by a new process, the process of the organic. The existent combining of
separating (analytic) and uniting (synthetic) acts is the distinctive mark of
living individuality. In Hegel's words:
this concrete unity with self, self-produced into unity from the particularizing of the
different corporealities, a unity which is the activity of negating this its one-sided form
of reference-to-self, of sundering and particularizing itself into the moments of the
Notion and equally of bringing them back into that unity, is the organism (PN § 336,
p.270).
More decisive than the deduced emergence of the living from chemistry is
the real-ideal genesis of chemistry from the phenomena of physics that
precede it. The concept of chemical reality follows immanently from the
processes of magnetism and electricity; the concept of chemistry is the unidn,
conceived in thought, of two aspects of magnetism and electricity, namely
the conceptual indifference of a polar body - that is, magnetism - and the
real indifference of two polar bodies - that is, electricity:
In magnetism, the difference is manifest in one body. In electricity, each difference
belongs to a separate body; each difference is self-subsistent, and the whole shape does
not enter into this process. Chemical process is the totality of the life of inorganic
individuality; for here we have whole, physically determined shapes .... The two sides
into which the form sunders itself are thus whole bodies, such as metals, acids, and
alkalis; their truth is that they enter into relation (PN, § 326, Zusatz, p. 233).
Just as the organic realizes a concept that follows from chemistry, so

chemistry realizes a concept that arises from magnetism and electricity. And
beyond this, a class of physical elements is constitutive for the chemical
substances and their transmutations; these elements are: air, fire, water and
earth, or, as one could also say, airiness, fieriness, wateriness and earthiness.
The physical elements are fundamentally distinguished from the chemical
ones in that they are formless general materials and display no chemical
affinity toward each other, indeed are in reality indifferent to themselves.
Actually, earth, water, fire and air find each other without a chemical
process, with neutral products resulting from this, even though they stand in
changed relationships to each other; however, these are solely physical, as,
for example, meteorological processes. Now the processes of chemical sub-
stances take place within the medium of the physical elements. The salts
exchange their constituents in the medium of water. In chemical actions,
physical elements too are decomposed into a further class of substances,
called abstract chemical substances; abstract, as they are the decomposition
products of physical elements. They are: oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen and
carbon. They unite with the chemical substances and multiply the forms
of possible combination. From the immanent union of substance, force and
process and the distinctiveness of their physical and their chemical mode
comes the complete philosophical system of chemical substances, which
differs considerably from the scientific one. Hegel states his view with respect
to this in the following manner:
In empirical chemistry, interest mainly centres in the particularity of the substances and
products grouped together according to superficial, abstract determinations in such
fashion that no order is brought into their particularity. In this grouping, metals, oxygen,
hydrogen, etc., metalloids (formerly called earths), sulphur, and phosphorus, are placed
side by side as simple chemical bodies and on the same level. The great physical diversity
of these bodies is such that it straightway arouses opposition to such grouping; no less
varied, too, is their chemical origin, the process from which these bodies result. But in
equally chaotic fashion, the more abstract processes are put on the same level as those
that have more reality. If scientific form is to be introduced into this sphere, each
product must be defined according to the stage of the concrete, fully developed process
from which it essentially results and from which it has its peculiar significance; for this
purpose it is equally essential to distinguish between the stages of abstraction or reality
of the process.... A further matter is the empirical, quite special particularity of
reaction shown by bodies to all other particular bodies; a knowledge of this involves
going through the same litany of reactions to every re-agent (PN § 334, Remark,
pp. 264-265).
Although the physical elements participate in the chemical processes and

share in determining them, they are not properly chemical substances; the
methods of physics are also transferrable to other domains of nature, but
they do not lose their own proper meaning. Rejecting the intermingling of
the domains of nature and their categories - an identification, which,
according to Hegel, much more deserves a reproach than that which identity
philosophy has received - also forbids inclusion of imponderable substances
such as light, heat, magnetism and electricity within chemistry, since science
has reached agreement concerning their physical character only hesitantly.
Though electricity - like magnetism too - has a part in chemistry, and above
all in the syntheses of metals, for which Hegel also adopts the term
Galvanism, the category of polarity can by no means adequately explain the
qualitative characteristics of substances, their forces and processes:
Let philosophy no more be reproached with 'its ignoring of particularity and its empty
generalities', when all the physical properties just mentioned can be disregarded in
favour of positive and negative electricity. A former style of Philosophy of Nature
'potentialized' - or rather dissipated and attenuated - the system and process of animal
reproduction to magnetism and the vascular system to electricity: such schematism was
not more superficial than this reduction of concrete, corporeal opposition to electricity.
In the former case, such a summary method of dealing with concrete phenomena to the
neglect, by abstraction, of their characteristic features, was rightly rejected. Why not also
in the present instance? (PN § 330, Remark, pp. 248-249).
According to Hegel it is also not legitimate to equate mathematizability

with scientific status. The conditions for scientific character lie in the inner
connectedness of conceptual categories with the phenomena, and this cannot
be achieved only quantitatively, for the relation of quantity and quality in
nature, apart from individual domains, has an indeterminate measure. An
arithmetic classification of the chemical substances constructed with the
usual scientific conception of element and compound is inadequate. However,
the application of mathematics is not rejected in any fundamental fashion. To
comprehend the measures of the constituents quantitatively is a justified and
extremely significant goal, from the perspective of constant, as well as multiple
and equivalent proportions. Hegel did not turn solely against the absolutized
transfer of mathematical-physical methods to chemistry - according to him,
it is just as impossible to explain the organic entirely chemically, and yet it is
still permissible to subject the realm of the living to chemical analysis.
III
To unite system and empirical work was not the universal goal of science
alone, for philosophy too took itself to be subject to the demand for a
natural order. An adequate conceptual grasp and explanation of nature is,
however, for Hegel, only possible for a science that does not deny resting on
metaphysical conditions, that does claim to be without presuppositions, but
is conscious of its metaphysics, tests it in its empirical work and orients its
experience by it. The inadequacy with respect to nature, and the incon-
sistency of the chemical system are the result of a lack of metaphysical
reflection, of the admixture of unrecognized speculative presuppositions with
hypotheses and empirical theories; they are the result of the isolated treat-
ment of chemical phenomena that destroys their natural unity, of neglect of
the specific methodologies of individual domains of nature, and especially of
the internal disconnectedness of the chemical substances, forces and processes.
However, several other attempts in the natural sciences to pursue corres-
pondence and lawfulness in the scattered and contingent sensuous world meet
with Hegel's approval: the ordering of plants according to the principle of
mono- and dicotyledons, the conception of the metamorphosis of plants, the
division of animals into those with and without vertebrae, and, more specially,
according to their teeth and claws, these are in accord with nature and not
artificial; for teeth and claws are the instruments with which the animal itself
confronts its environment, and plants too arise in the beginning as the unfold-
ing of one or of two germinating leaves; the leaf is the basic form of the
plant's form, and the vertebra the archetype of the animal bone structure.
However, these attempts, too, are still inadequate for Hegel; they fail to see
the one-sidedness of their category, do not comprehend its conceptual
character, tear apart the unity of nature.
If for the formation of natural order, scient;e must depend on philosophy,
so philosophy must also depend on science. The conceptual categories are
extracted from description and observation, the speculative operations that
make a formal-material derivation of nature have to be verified in experience.
The concept of chemistry is the result of the reality of magnetism and electri-
city - and chemical reality makes a concept emerge whose reality is the
organic. The concept of chemistry and the genesis of a new concept must be
capable of confirmation in empirical research. But, philosophy is not
research, it must presuppose it, it must allow itself to be instructed by it:
"Not only must philosophy be in agreement with our empirical knowledge of
Nature, but the origin and formation of the Philosophy of Nature presupposes
and is conditioned by empirical physics" (PN, § 246, Remark, p. 6).
Hegel refers to about 100 natural scientists; one third of these are
chemists. The observations and insights incorporated in indirect and direct
quotations, which - as a consequence of inadequate attribution - to some

extent appear to be Hegel's text, testify to his complete familiarity with the
fundamental traits, divergent theories and essential faGts of the chemistry of
his time, and even of its history.
The reproach that Hegel showed contempt for empirical study and
neglected it, was the predominant justification for science to disparage
Hegel's philosophy of nature; the reproach is indefensible. Three further
accusations: low esteem for mathematics, scorn for experimentation, and
rejection of technology, these too cannot withstand even a casual examina-
tion of his philosophy of nature. The utility of mathematics is emphasized,
the necessity of its application to the disciplines of physics, chemistry,
mineralogy, botany and zoology is demonstrated - but at the same time the
independence of these domains is underlined. Experiment is recognized as a
procedure - but beyond this the demand is made not to overlook the
implications of artificial observation. The technological relationship to nature
receives Hegel's approval, and is even justified as an integral 'moment' of the
philosophical relationship to nature - but it is rejected as the sole guideline
for research.
To place philosophy in contradiction to empirical science is, according to
Hegel, one of the 'evil prejudices' and 'violent bisections'. The characterization
of Hegel's philosophy of nature as closed off to empirical research must be
abandoned; a critical exegesis will continue to investigate the conditions of
agreement and difference between science and the philosophy of nature. To
confront philosophy and science with each other facilitates access to specula-
tion about nature, "a subject-matter that in any case is abstruse", as Hegel
confesses; and furthermore, it aids in the clarification of other obscure
passages of Hegel, as for instance the chapters 'Force and Understanding' and
'Observation of the Organic' in the Phenomenology of Spirit and 'measure'
and 'objectivity' in the Logic. To relate philosophy and science as opposed to
each other, allows us to comprehend the claim and the meaning of a philo-
sophy of nature, and to recognize its transience and its present relevance.
Ruprecht-Karl-University
Heidelberg
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Alembert, J. L. R. d'. 1751. 'Discours preliminaire' of the Encyclopedie ou Dictionnaire

raisonne des sciences, des arts et des metiers. 17 vols. Paris, 1751-1765.
Bergman, T. 1775. 'Disquisitio de attractionibus electivis' in Nova acta Regiae societatis

scientiarum upsaliensis 2,159-248.
Berthollet, C. L. 1803. Essai de statique chimique. 2 vols. Paris.
Berzelius, J. J. and Hisinger, W. 1803. 'Versuche betreffend die Wirkung der electrischen
Saule auf Salze und auf einige von ihren Basen', Neues Allgemeines Journal der
Chemie 1, 115-149.
Berzelius, J. J. 1819. Essai sur la theorie des proportions chimiques et sur ['influence
chimique de I 'electricite. Paris.
Condillac, E. B. de. 1780. La logique. Paris.
Dalton, J. 1808-1827.A New System of Chemical Philosophy. 3 vols. London.
Davy, H. 1807. 'The Bakerian Lecture on Some Chemical Agencies of Electricity' in
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society 1, 1-56.
Davy, H. 1812. Elements of Chemical Philosophy. London.
Elliott, Sir John. 1782. Elements of the Branches of Natural Philosophy Connected with
Medicine ... London.
Erxleben, J. L. P. 1775. Anfangsgriinde der Chemie. Gottingen.
Erxleben, 1. L. P. 1772. Anfangsgriinde der Naturlehre. Gottingen.
Geoffroy, I. S. C.1741. 'Table des differens rapports observes en chirnie entre differentes
substances' in Memoires de l'Academie des sciences (Paris), annee 1718, pp. 202-212.
Gmelin, L. 1817. Handbuch der theoretischen Chemie. 2 vols. Frankfurt a. Main.
Guyton de Morveau, L. B., Lavoisier, A. L., Berthollet, C. L. and Fourcroy, A. F. de.
1787. Methode de nomenclature chimique. Paris.
Guyton de Morveau, L. B., Maret, H. and Durande, J. F. 1777. aemens de chymie,
theorique et pratique . .. 3 vols. Dijon, 1777-1778.
Hegel, G. W. F. 1958. System der Philosophie. Part II: Die Naturphilosophie.
(Jubiliiumsausgabe 9).
Higgins, W. A. 1789. A Comparative View of the Phlogistic and Antiphlogistic Theories.
London.
Higgins, W. A. 1814. Experiments and Observations on the Atomic Theory, and Electrical
Phenomena. London.
Kastner, A. G. 1768. Anzeige seiner niichsten Vorlesungen iiber Mathematik und Physik.
Gottingen.
Lavoisier, A. L. 1789. Traite eit!mentaire de chimie. Paris.
Morveau et al. See Guyton de Morveau et al.
Mitscherlich, E. 1829-1830. Lehrbuch der Chemie. Berlin.
Richter, J. B. 1789. De usu matheseos in chymia. Konigsberg.
Richter, J. B. 1792-1794. Anfangsgriinde der Stachyometrie. 2 vols. Breslau.
Trommsdorff, J. B. 1800-1804. Systematisches Handbuch der gesammten Chemie.
7 vols. Erfurt.
Volta, A. 1792. 'Observationum circa electricitatem animalem specimen' in Commen·
tarii de rebus in scientill naturali et medicina gestis. Leipzig. Vol. 34, pp. 685-688.
Volta, A. 1800. 'On the Electricity Excited by the Mere Conduct of Conducting Sub-
stances of Different Kinds' in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society 90,
403-431.
Wenzel, C. F. 1777. Lehre von der Verwandtschaft der Karper. Dresden.
Wohler, F. 1828. 'Uber kiinstliche Bildung des Harnstoffs, Annalen der Physik und
Chemie 12,253-256.
HENRY PAOLUCCI
HEGEL AND THE CELESTIAL MECHANICS

OF NEWTON AND EINSTEIN
My object here is, first, to review Hegel's criticism of Newton's 'system of the
world' and then to examine critically the many aspects of it that seem to
anticipate the approach to mathematical physics, which is today associated
with the name of Einstein.
One must emphasize that Hegel's criticism was well informed. Certainly he
knew the Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica and Opticks first hand
and had the requisite training in mathematics to comprehend what he read.
Through hundreds of well-documented pages of his Science of Logic (large
and small) and Philosophy of Nature, Hegel explores the meaning of
Newton's fluxional calculus, his concepts of space, time, mass, inertia, centri-
petal and centrifugal forces, his laws of motion, his gravitational world-
system, and, finally, his theory of light and colors. Particularly under the
headings 'Quantity' and 'Measure' in the Logic and 'Mechanics' in the
Philosophy of Nature, Newton's doctrine provides much of the empirical
datum upon which the Hegelian philosophical dialectic operates. And that
represents no small tribute to the achievement of Newton, especially when we
bear in mind that, according to Hegel, "without the working out of the
empirical sciences on their own account, philosophy could not have reached
further than with the ancients" (HP 3, p. 176V
Unfortunately for Hegel's reputation, some of his pages on Newton have a

vein of rather heavy~handed humor running through them that can easily be
mistaken for /(:se-majeste or, worse, an ethnic slur against the British people.
Such passages are few, but ethnic pride and sensitivity have sought them out;
and, at least among sanguine admirers of the greatness of Newton - qui genus
humanum ingenus superavit 2 - their effect has been to draw upon Hegel an
imputation of gross scientific ignorance and presumption.
Even at its worst, however, Hegel's criticism nowhere matches the
sustained sarcasm of the anti-Peripatetics of the century before Newton -
the Galileos and Bacons, for instance - who pilloried Aristotle for his 'bad'
science, regardless of the fact that he had been revered for centuries as, in
55
56 HENRY PAOLUCCI
Dante's phrase (Inf. IV, 131), the "teacher of those who know" -- maestro
di color che sanno. Still, there is no denying that the Newtonian sacramenta
are subject to much abuse in the pages of the German philosopher; and,
despite the reigning relativism of our age, it is a bold scholar who will
presume, as J. N. Findlay has, to qualify it as "much fine abuse.,,3
Admittedly hard to take, on a first reading, is Hegel's comparison of
Newton with Moliere's bourgeois gentilhomme - all to the advantage of the
latter! Moliere's M. Jourdain was "surprised to learn that he had talked prose
all his life, not having had any idea that he was so accomplished"; but he, at
least, learned - Hegel observes - whereas Newton seems never to have
realized "that he thought in and had to deal with notions of the under-
standing, while he imagined he was dealing with physical facts" (HP 3,
pp. 323-324). On the same level is Hegel's discussion of what the English
generally understand by the term Philosophy and why it is that among them
"Newton continues to be celebrated as the greatest of philosophers." In
England, he explains, not only the empirical sciences but also the mechanical
arts are confounded with philosophy; "and the name goes down as far as the
price-lists of instrument-makers." With grudging admiration, as well as irony,
Hegel in the same passage commends the heirs of the tradition of Bacon and
Newton for at least taking the name of philosophy seriously enough to apply
it to the study of matters of the greatest importance to them - like political
economy, free trade, and the imperial administration, as well as chemistry,
mineralogy, natural history, agriculture, and the arts - whereas in most other
lands "the name of philosophy is now generally used only as a nickname and
insult, or as something odious" (L [W, 1975], § 7, pp. 11-12).4
More abusive, from a Newtonian standpoint, is Hegel's rejection of the
Principia's 'proofs' of Kepler's laws - proofs which he characterizes as
"demonstrationaljugglery and counterfeiting" (SL [J/S] 2, p. 290); and most
offensive of all, perhaps, is his assessment of the Opticks, where he speaks not
only of ineptitude, incorrectness, and thoughtless inconsistency, but also of
stupidity, blind prejudice, and dishonesty (PN, § 320, Remark, p. 199). 5
It is no wonder, therefore, that, for longer than a century in Newton's
English-speaking world, most scholars have responded by refusing to take
Hegel's Naturphilosophie seriously, or even to read it at all - as, it is said, the
seventeenth century Aristotelians of Padua refused to take Galileo seriously,
or even to look through his optical tube. The fact is that, whereas the French
and Italians, less sensitive to criticism of Newton, have had translations of the
complete Encyclopedia of Hegel, including the Naturphilosophie, since the
1860s, the English-speaking academic community, on the contrary, has
HEGEL, NEWTON AND EINSTEIN 57
delayed until this bicentennial anniversary of Hegel's birth the labors of filling
the gap between the excellent versions of the Logic and the Philosophy of
Mind, which Professor Wallace provided three generations ago.
But this year is destined evidently to mark a turning point in the fortunes
of Hegel's Philosophy of Nature. Thanks largely to the sustained interest of
Professor Findlay, we now have an excellent translation - that of A. V. Miller
- presented to us by Findlay with a challenge that the Anglo-American
academic community will sooner or later have to accept. Back in 1958,
Professor Findlay had written of the Naturphilosophie:
This part of the system is one that many Hegelians have thought fit to ignore entirely,
mainly on account of the outmoded character of the science on which it reposes.
Nothing can, however, be more unfit than this ignoring, and, in view of Hegel's
undoubted greatness, more impertinent. The Philosophy of Nature is an integral part of
Hegel's system, and one can no more understand that system without taking account of
it, than one can understand Aristotelianism while ignoring the Physics or the History of
Animals, or Cartesianism while ignoring the physical portions of the Principles of
Philosophy. In Hegel's theory of Nature, as in the parallel theories of Aristotle and
Descartes, one sees the philosopher's principles at work, casting their slant upon our talk
and thought about the world around us. The complete misunderstanding of Hegel's
idealism by British philosophers, and its reduction to a refined form of subjectivism, are
probably due to their ignoring of the Naturphilosophie .
. . . Hegel's grasp of contemporary science was, moreover, informed and accurate: the
reading of the Naturphilosophie is made easy by its wealth of experimental illustration,
and by its long citations from contemporary treatises. Hegelgives one the sciences of his
own day, together with the interpretations he puts on them. [His views remain] as
worthy of study, and of detailed scholarly comment, as are the views of Aristotle, or
(in recent times) ofWhitehead. 6
In his foreword to the Miller translation, Professor Findlay says that his
object in publishing it has been primarily utilitarian, to make its thought
accessible "to students and teachers, particularly in regions where prejudiced
simplifications might otherwise be their only route of access to it." The work
itself is proof, he asserts, "that Hegel, like Aristotle and Descartes and
Whitehead, is one of the great philosophical interpreters of nature, as steeped
in its detail as he is audacious in his treatment of it." Praising its "thorough-
going realism," Findlay concludes that what is to be admired most in it is
Hegel's manifest "willingness, unusual in philosophers, to read, digest, and
take full account of so much detailed scientific material, a willingness which
puts him on a pinnacle of scientific information and understanding shared
only by Aristotle" (PN, pp. viii-ix, xxv).
Thus, under unprecedentedly favorable auspices, we now have the
58 HENR Y PAOLUCCI
Philosophy of Nature before us in a thoroughly English context. There can no

longer be, therefore, any excuse among us for the 'impertinence' of ignoring
its doctrine ~ including the details of its criticism of Newton. Still, it remains
to be seen how that criticism will fare under the closer scrutiny it is now
certain to receive. Studied popularly in its fulness, it may appear to be all the
more presumptuous and ill-informed and lead to a general discrediting of the
rest of the Hegelian System ~ the Philosophy of Mind as well as the Logic ~
precisely on the grounds that the System is an integrated whole. "Nature, and
the world or history of spirit, are the two realities" ~ says Hegel in the
closing pages of his History of Philosophy; and the "ultimate aim and
business of philosophy is to reconcile the thought of the Notion with reality"
(HP 3, p. 545). If the Newtonian perspective, which is also the Darwinian,
is true, and the Hegelian perspective false, what is the use, apart from anti-
quarianism, of a renaissance of interest in the Naturphilosophie? If Hegel's
notion of the reality of nature is inadequate, then there can be no truth, no
adaequatio intellectus et res, in his general synthesis. And, except for truth's
sake, why should the Anglo-American academic community take Hegel
seriously when it can get as much of German dialectical philosophizing as it
apparently needs in the doctrine of Karl Marx, which leaves the greatness of
Newton and of Darwin iritact?
II
Before focusing on Hegel's systematic elaboration of his criticism of

Newton's science which is developed in the larger Science of Logic and
culminates in the Philosophy of Nature, we would do well to consider
briefly the condensed expressions of it in scattered pages of his Phenomeno-
logy of Mind, History of Philosophy, and smaller Logic. Newton is not
named in the Phenomenology, but his chief contribution to the development
of scientific thought ~ the concept of force ~ is taken up as part of the
phenomenology of consciousness under the heading "Force and Under-
standing, Appearance and the Supersensory World (Kraft und Verstand,
Erscheinung und ubersinnliche Welt)." In attempting to understand the
perpetual flux of the world of appearances (phenomena), consciousness
labors to look through the phenomena to see what, in reality, sustains them.
In the process of 'thinking through' appearances, the understanding, Hegel
says, discovers or fashions for itself a supersensory model which stands for
it in place of the complexities of the restless sensory world. As Hegel
expresses it, continued reflection develops that supersensory model into a
"kingdom of laws," which is "no doubt beyond the world of perception -

for this exhibits the law only through incessant change - but likewise present
in it, and its direct immovable copy or image" (Phen [B], p. 195V
In the first stages of this reduction of phenomenal complexity to the
simplicity of reflection, laws of the understanding are discovered or
formulated singly, to account for a relatively narrow range of phenomena.
But the understanding longs for unified comprehension; and its tendency is,
as Hegel says,
to let the many laws coalesce into a single law, just as, e.g., the law by which a stone
falls, and that by which the heavenly bodies move have been conceived as one law. When
the laws thus coincide, however, they lose their specific character. The law becomes
more and more abstract and superficial, and in consequence we fmd as a fact, not the
unity of these various determinate laws, but a law which leaves out their specific
character; just as the one law, which combines in itself the laws of falling terrestrial
bodies, and of the movements of celestial bodies, does not, in point of fact, express both
kinds of laws. The unification of all laws in universal attraction expresses no further
content than just the bare concept of law itself, a concept which is therein set down as
existing. Universal attraction says merely that all things retain their difference with
respect to one another. The understanding presumes that in this it has found a universal
law that expresses universal reality as such; but in fact it has merely found the notion of
law in itself, though in such a way as to permit it to assert that all reality, in itself, is
subject to law (Phen [B], pp. 196-197).
The important point to stress here is that Hegel exhibits this activity of the
understanding as an essential moment in the phenomenological process. What
Newton did had to be done by human consciousness. The idea of universal
gravitation "is therefore of the greatest importance," Hegel concludes,
"because it is directed against the unthinking way of representing reality that
makes everything appear to have happened by accident, and for which
qualitative distinctiveness has the form of merely sensory differentiation"
(Phen [B], p. 197).
Newton thus comes off rather well in the Phenomenology - in marked
contrast with the caustic treatment we get of him in the lectures on the
History of Philosophy. There Hegel calls the author of the Principia an
intellectual "barbarian" for having treated the basic concepts of his natural
science as if they were physical facts - sensuous things, to be dealt with
"as men deal with wood and stone." Especially barbaric, according to Hegel,
was the Newtonian attitude summed up in the maxim, "Physics, beware of
metaphysics," which amounts to saying, "Science, beware of thought." The
worst of it is, Hegel continues, that physical scientists since Newton's time
have for the most part
60 HENRY PAOLUCCI
faithfully observed this precept, inasmuch as they have not entered upon an investigation
of their conceptions, or thought about thoughts .... And this is even now the case. In
the beginnings of physical science we read of the power of inertia, for instance, of the
force of acceleration, of molecules, or centripetal and centrifugal forces, as of facts
which definitely exist; what are really the final results of reflection are represented as
their first grounds (HP 3, p. 323).
Yet here again, Hegel acknowledges the value of Newton's scientific work
in "introducing to physics the determinations respecting forces, which pertain
to reflection." By setting "the laws of forces in the place of the laws of
phenomena," Newton "raised science to the standpoint of reflection," and
for that he deserves high praise. He is to be blamed, according to Hegel, only
for imagining that he is still functioning on the level of sensory perception,
free of metaphysics, when, by undertaking to 'compose' the empirically-
derived laws of phenomena out of the interrelations of 'component' forces,
he has obviously slipped back into metaphysics without knowing it - which
is to say, ignorantly. The harshest part of Hegel's judgment here is his
prophecy that physical science will make no significant advance in the
theoretical sense until it gives up the naive Newtonian dogmatism that con-
founds abstract concepts of the understanding with the reality of nature
(HP 3, pp. 322-324).
That surely was a 'hard saying' in the first decades of the nineteenth
century. Today, however, it has become the prevailing view of the most
expert practitioners in the field. In his Physics and Microphysics, for instance,
the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Louis de Broglie writes:
For scientists, and in particular for the theorists, there is a certain danger in trying to
ignore the efforts of philosophers and especially their work as critics .... Thus many
scientists of the present day, victims of an ingenuous realism, almost without perceiving
it, have adopted a certain metaphysics of a very materialistic and mechanistic character
and have regarded it as the very expression of scientific truth. One of the great services
that the recent evolution of physics has rendered contemporary thought, is that it has
destroyed this simplified metaphysics, and with the same stroke has caused certain
traditional philosophic problems to be considered in an enterely new light .... For the
development of science to continue, we must embark on, or at any rate touch upon,
questions of philosophic import and sometimes consider their new and very original
solutions. 8
Discussing the reluctance of the Newtonians to abandon their long-cherished

concepts of space, time, motion, and force, the same author observes that too
many physicists even today would no doubt "prefer merely to perfect and
amend the existing theories rather than be obliged constantly to reconstruct
them." But a willingness to abandon long-cherished concepts is, he concludes,

"the condition and ransom of scientific progress.,,9
In the smaller Logic, Hegel does not explicitly discuss the Newtonian
celestial mechanics. He does, however, discuss the logical presuppositions
upon which any analysis of laws of phenomena (such as Kepler framed) into
laws of forces (such as Newton framed) ought to be based, if it is to make
philosophical sense. And this he does at considerable length under the sub-
headings 'Repulsion and Attraction', 'Quantity', 'Magnitude', 'Quantum',
'Number', 'Degree', 'Quantitative Ratio', 'Measure', 'Thing', 'Properties',
'Matter', 'Form', 'Phenomena', 'Forces', and 'Expression of Forces' - all of
them terms we now familiarly encounter in contemporary treatises on post-
Planckian physical theory.
Under the heading "Repulsion and Attraction," Hegel draws a parallel
between Newtonian physics and the ancient atomism of Leucippus and
Democritus. In both systems, particles of matter and an enveloping void are
posited as the ultimate constituents of nature, with the void serving as a
separating or repulsive principle. The Newtonian advance over the old
doctrine consists in having posited "an attractive by the side of a repulsive
force," which - Hegel acknowledges - "certainly gives completeness to the
contrast" between the Democritean Full and Empty (L [W, 1975], § 98,
p. 143). Still, what Aristotle criticized in ancient atomism remains to be
criticized, according to Hegel, in the Newtonian doctrine.
The old atomists traced fixed patterns (equivalents of the Newtonian laws
of forces) through all the manifold flux and multiplicity of the phenomenal
world. But when required to say what, in the first place, caused the atoms to
start bumping together, acting and reacting as they do in their great web of
necessity, the reply of the Democriteans was simply: a primordial, fortuitous
swerving, a whirl of indeterminate origin - which is another way of saying
that, in the final analysis, like our modern Heisenbergians, Democritus as-
cribed all things to chance. ("Democrito," Dante wrote in the fourth canto of
the Inferno, "che '[ mondo a caso pone" [who ascribes the world to chance] 10
- and it can easily be demonstrated that, despite the popular view which
holds that Necessity is the atomists' God, Dante's phrase is drawn straight out
of the very precise Aristotelian analysis of the Democritean doctrine in
Book IV of the Physics - an analysis upon which Hegel dwells in his Lectures
on the History of Philosophy.) The Newtonians, when all is done, do precisely
the same - Hegel argues; for, despite all their talk of matter and void, inertia
and gravity, it is a chance thrust dating from some indeterminate moment of
the remotest past that is assumed to have originally set the planets in course
62 HENRY PAOLUCCI
to be pushed and tugged as they are by centrifugal as well as centripetal

forces.
Hegel's concern in all of this is to indicate that the Newtonian mechanics,
despite pietistic and deistic protests to the contrary, is essentially a materialist
doctrine. He is, of course, aware that, as a man of God, Newton strenuously
resisted the assimilation of his doctrine to that of the avowed materialists.
"I feign no hypotheses" about final causes, Newton had pleaded in the
celebrated General Scholium of the Principia, where, indeed, he explicitly
rejects as untenable the Cartesian theory of vortices on the grounds that no
merely mechanical causes could give birth to so much orderly motion as we
can trace in the heavens. By asserting that such orderliness presupposes an
intelligent creation, Newton had hoped, as Hegel remarks, to leave unimpaired
the "honor of God as the Creator and Governor of the World" while at the
same time excluding him from consideration in the actual search for under-
lying forces (L [W, 1975], § 136, p. 195).
Under the sub-headings 'Force' and 'Expression of Force' in the smaller
Logic, Hegel discusses at length why it is that Newtonian science would
sooner or later have to give up its veneer of theistic piety. "Contrasted with
its deinfinitized world of independent forces and matters," he writes, "the
only terms in which it is possible to describe God will present him in the
abstract infinity of an unknowable supreme Being in some other world far
away." And that, Hegel continues, is "precisely the position of materialism,"
from as far back as Democritus and Epicurus down to the "free-thinking"
deism and agnostic atheism of the Enlightenment. The medieval Church,
confronted with the renaissance of ancient doctrines, was in that respect
right, therefore, Hegel says, in resisting the "search for underlying causes" as
impious, as tending to deny to God the things that are God's, which are
assigned instead to indeterminate causes. From the vantage point of religious
faith, no less than from that of philosophy, it must be acknowledged, Hegel
says, that "the finite forms of the understanding certainly fail to fulfill the
conditions for knowledge either of Nature or 'of the formations of the world
of Mind as they truly are" {L [W, 1975], § 136,p.195).
Yet while religion has a right to be dissatisfied with the results, it has no
right to frustrate the labors of the understanding, whose 'finite forms' are -
for Hegel - indispensable moments in the development of consciousness to
the level of truly scientific comprehension. In words that anticipate the
scientific posture of Pierre Duhem in the concluding sections of his masterful
Aim and Structure of Physical Theory, Hegel writes against the false claims
of religious piety:
On the other hand, it is impossible to overlook the formal right which, in the first place,
entitles the empirical sciences to vindicate the right of thought to know the existent
world in all the speciality of its content, and to seek something further than the mere
abstract faith that God creates and governs the world. When our religious consciousness,
resting upon the authority of the Church, teaches us that God created the world by his
almighty will, that he guides the stars in their courses, and vouchsafes to all his creatures
their existence and their well-being, the question Why? is still left to answer. Now it is
the answer to this question which forms the common task of empirical science and of
philosophy (L [W, 1975], § 136, p. 195).
Defending the practice against the piety of the Newtonians, Hegel asserts that
when religion appeals to the 'unsearchableness' of the decrees of God, it is,
in effect, aping the agnosticism of the enlightenment rationalists. "Such an
appeal," he concludes, "is no better than an arbitrary dogmatism which
contravenes the express command of Christianity, to know God in spirit and
truth, and is prompted by a humility which is not Christian, but born of
ostentatious bigotry" (L [W, 1975], § 136, p. 196).
III
The larger Science of Logic, which provides what amounts to a running

commentary on the terse paragraphs of the Logic of the Encyclopedia, takes
us to the philosophic core of Hegel's criticism of the Newtonian celestial
mechanics. No one pretending to assess the adequacy of that criticism can
afford to ignore, or skim over, what Hegel has to say about Quantity,
Quantum, and Quantitative Ratio in his book-length discussion of
'Magnitude', or about Specific Quantity, Real Measure, and the Measureless
(as transition to Essence) under the heading 'Measure', or about Mechanism,
Chernism, and Teleology under the heading 'Objectivity'. As in the smaller
Logic, Hegel is here examining the preconceptions and methods of study of
all sciences that take not abstractions but the concrete realities of nature and
mind as their qualitatively determined objects.
Under 'Magnitude' and 'Measure', Hegel examines, among other things,
the basic notion of the Newtonian-Leibnizian calculus and traces the history
of the mathematical infinite and infinitesimals upon which that calculus is
built; he considers at length the difficulties of assimilating analytical calculus
to analytical geometry and of applying both to the analysis of accelerated
rectilinear and non-uniform curvilinear motion; and, anticipating things to
come in our own time, he speculates on the possibility of developing a
mathematics of qualitative quanta which would be a science of measures,
competent to deal with the qualities as well as the quantities of existent
64 HENRY PAOLUCCI
things (as, for instance, Einsteinian and Planckian physics now deals with
qualitatively determined quanta, or measures, of space, time, light, and a host
of electro-magnetic phenomena).
The first explicit reference to Newton comes under the sub-heading
'Quantum' and it consists of singularly high praise. Considering the "chief
determinations which have been offered in mathematics about the infinite,"
Hegel asserts unequivocally that "no correcter determination of the thought
can be made than that offered by Newton." The problem of the mathematical
infinite is ancient. It was first clearly defined by the Eleatics (notably Zeno)
in their efforts to demonstrate the irrationality of the Heraclitean 'flux'; and
Zeno's paradoxes have remained vital paradoxes for mathematical physicists
to this day - Hegel insists - despite all the walking to and fro of old
Diogenes and cynics of more recent times. That Hegel was competent to deal
with the problem in its abstractest geometrical and algebraic as well as logical
aspects, he has amply demonstrated not only in the Science of Logic itself,
but also in the History of Philosophy, where he takes it up as often as it
surfaces in his sources.
Newton tells us that he "invented the methods of series and fluxions in
the year 1665," and his first published treatise on the subject, Methods of
Fluxions and Infinite Sequences, appeared in 1674. But Hegel is concerned,
as he says, with Newton's maturest thought on the subject, which is that of
the Principia. Hinting at what he will later criticize, Hegel writes:
I here set apart the determinations belonging to the idea of motion and velocity (from
which latter chiefly he took the name of fluxions), for there the thought appears not in
its due abstraction, but concrete and mixed with unessential forms.
In praise of the duly abstract thought, Hegel says:
Newton explains these fluxions (Prine. Mathem. Phil. Nat. L. i. Lemma XI, Schol.) by
saying that he takes them not as indivisibiUa (a form used by earlier mathematicians,
Cavalieri and others; it contains the concept of a Quantum determinate in itself), but as
vanishing divisibilia; and, further, not as the sums and ratios of determinate parts, but as
the limits (Umites) of the sums and ratios. It will be objected, he says, that vanishing
magnitudes have no final ratio, because the ratio before they vanish is not the last, and,
after they have vanished, no longer exists. But by the ratio between vanishing
magnitudes must not be understood the ratio that exists either before or after, but that
with whieh they vanish (quacum evanescunt). And, similarly, the first ratio of becoming
magnitudes is that with which they arise (SL [J/S] 1, pp. 271-272).
After noting that the "magnitudes at the point of vanishing" are understood
by Newton to be "quanta no longer," Hegel makes clear that, in his judgment,
Newton has here adequately expressed the notion of transition from quantity
to quality which is so essential an element in the Hegelian dialectic. As much
Newtonian as Hegelian is the statement that: "The limit of the magnitudinal
ratio is that point where it is and it is not - or, more precisely, where the
Quantum has vanished, and the ratio, therefore, is preserved only as qualita-
tive quantity-ratio" (SL [1/S] 1, p. 272).
But while Newton grasped the concept of the qualitative quantity-ratio
and expressed it clearly, in practice - says Hegel - the author of the Principia
let it slip through his fingers. And the same must be said of the other great
mathematicians of the period, including Newton's master Barrow, as well as
Fermat, Leibniz, Lagrange, Landen, Euler, and their successors. It seems,
Hegel writes, that "when mathematicians turn to practice, the finite deter-
minateness of quantity returns, and the operation can no longer do without
the idea of a Quantum which is merely relatively small" (SL [J/S] 1, p. 277).
Indeed, the idea of the relatively small, of increment, of addition, "of growth
of x by dx or i, and so on," Hegel concludes, "must be considered the funda-
mental evil inherent in these methods - as an enduring obstacle which makes
it impossible to disengage the determination of the qualitative moment of
quantity from the idea of ordinary Quantum" (SL [J/S] 1, p. 274). In other
words, the evil is that those "ghosts of departed quantities" (as Bishop
Berkeley called them) are too easily mistaken for never-perishing indivisibilia,
and the transition from quantity to quality is lost to thought.
If mathematicians could take another approach so as to develop a mathe-
matics of qualitative quantity-ratios, Hegel observes, the result would be a
magnificent instrument for the advancement of a truly physical as distinct
from an abstractly mechanical science. Such a mathematics, he writes, would
have to be in essence -
a science of measures - a science for which much has been done empirically, but little
in a truly scientific, that is philosophic, manner. Mathematical principles of Natural
Philosophy - as Newton called his work - if they were to fulfill this determination in a
philosophic and scientific meaning deeper than that which was reached by Newton and
the whole Baconian generation, must contain quite other things in order to bring light
into these regions, dark as yet, but most worthy of contemplation (SL [J/S] 1, p. 361).
Later, in the Philosophy ofNature, Hegel will add on this theme:
The truly philosophical science of mathematics as theory of magnitude, would be the

science of measures; but this already presupposes the real particularity of things, which is
found only in concrete Nature. On account of the external nature of magnitude, this
would certainly also be the most difficult of all sciences.
66 HENR Y P AO L VCCI
Newtonian science, Hegel stresses, is not a science of measures. In fact, all

that most needs to be measured in nature - the actualities of space, time, and
the light by means of which spatial measurements are possible - is taken for
granted by the Newtonians, exactly as defined in the abstract presuppositions
of their calculus. That calculus was developed, it is true, to deal with motions
of qualitatively determined phenomena; but, in the process, the traditional
mathematical spirit of abstraction took over. Forgetting the qualitative forms
of the phenomena of falling bodies and orbiting planets, the mathematicians
focused on the terms of the ratios in the formulas - with the result that pro-
ducts of analysis (of the decomposition of the magnitude of a phenomenon,
such as motion) there received, in Hegel's words -
an objective meaning, such as velocity, accelerated force, and so on; according to this
newly acquired objective meaning they were to produce correct propositions and
physical laws; their objective connections and relations, too, were to be determined by
analytic means; for instance, it was said that in a uniformly accelerated motion, there
existed a special velocity proportional to the periods of time, while besides, an accretion
was added uniformly from the force of gravity. In the modem analytical form of
mechanics such propositions are regularly cited as results of the calculus (SL [J /S 1 1,
p.289).
Hegel was well aware that Newton had not arrived at the conclusions
demonstrated in Book Three of the Principia (where the universal law of
gravitation is expounded as the System of the World) by means of the
analytical calculus and geometry he uses there. Newton himself says, at the
beginning of that book, that the method of exposition there was an after-
thought, and that he introduced it rather to prevent than to facilitate general
understanding. He had at first, he says, written the entire book in a more
direct, popular way; but afterwards, "considering that such as had not
sufficiently entered into the principles could not easily discern the strength
of the consequences, nor lay aside the prejudices to which they had been
many years accustomed," Newton decided to avoid any direct confrontation
with ignorance and prejudice by choosing "to reduce the substance of this
Book into the form of Propositions (in the mathematical way), which would
be read by those only who had first made themselves masters of the principles
established in the preceding books."!!
What might have become of the great law of universal gravitation of that
Third Book, had Newton not reduced his exposition to the form of Pro-
positions, in a mathematical way, one can hardly guess. But perhaps the Ernst
Machs and Einsteins would have got at its absolute space and time, the
essentially non-empirical character of its laws of motion, and its oddly
convenient equivalence of inertial and gravitational mass, much sooner. In

the light of what has since become the fate of Newton's mathematical
'proofs', it was eminently fair and extraordinarily perceptive for Hegel to
have said over 1 50 years ago:
It will be impossible to deny that in this sphere much has been accepted as proof -
chiefly veiled under the kindly mist of the infinitesimally small - on no other ground
than that the result was already known beforehand, and the proof, which was arranged
in such a manner as to produce the result, at least effected the illusion of a framework of
proof - which illusion was preferred to mere belief or empirical knowledge. But I do not
hesitate to regard this method as no better than demonstrational jugglery and counter-
feiting; and I include even some of Newton's demonstrations, and especially such as
belong to those just mentioned, for which Newton has been extolled to the skies and
above Kepler, because what Kepler had discovered empirically he demonstrated mathe-
matically (SL [J IS 1 1, p. 290).
Hegel then proceeds to explain that, by its very nature, the mathematics
of Newton and his peers is unable to "prove the magnitudinal determinations
of physics in so far as they are laws based upon the qualitative nature of the
moments." The qualitative element is lost in the processes of the calculus;
and it is rather a moral than a scientific question why, to many mathe-
maticians, it has seemed against the honor of their discipline - so Hegel
phrases it - to "acknowledge simply experience as source and sole proof of
empirical propositions" (SL [J/S] 1, p. 290).
Needless to say, Hegel has long since won his point on this score. Modern
mathematicians and the best mathematical physicists of recent years are all
of a mind in acknowledging - and indeed often boasting - that they no
longer hold, with Galileo, Descartes, and Newton, that mathematics of itself,
or mathematically conducted experiments, can lead to true knowledge of the
realities of Nature. As Professor Tobias Dantzig expressed it in his Number:
The Language of Science:
The mathematician may be compared to a designer of garments, who is utterly oblivious

to the creatures whom his garments may fit. To be sure, his art originated in the
necessity for clothing such creatures, but this was long ago; to this day a shape will
occasionally appear which will fit into the garment as if that garment had been made for
it. Then there is no end of surprise and delight! There have been quite a few such
delightful surprises. The conic sections, invented in an attempt to solve the problem of
doubling the altar of an oracle, ended by becoming the orbits followed by the planets
in their courses about the sun .... The absolute differential calculus, which originated as
a fantasy of Riemann, became the mathematical vehicle for the theory of Relativity ....
Mathematics and experiment reign more firmly than ever over the new physics, but an
all-pervading skepticism has affected their validity. Man's confident belief in the absolute
68 HENR Y PAOLUCCI
validity of the two methods has been found to be of an anthropomorphic origin, both
have been found to rest on articles of faith.12
Bertrand Russell, who (with Alfred North Whitehead) gave us an updated

Principia Mathematica in 1914, has said to the same effect: "It is a curious
fact that, just when the man in the street has begun to believe thoroughly in
science, the man in the laboratory has begun to lose his faith"; and, again:
"Science, which began as the pursuit of truth, is becoming incompatible with
veracity, since complete veracity tends more and more to complete scientific
scepticism." 13
But the truly great scientists of our time, the Einsteins and Plancks, have
not been content that mathematical science, which once boasted of its
certainty, should now boast of its uncertainty. Einstein admits that, in its
pursuit of the open questions of the Galilean and Newtonian mechanics,
mathematical science has been led inevitably - as Hegel predicted - to
Democritean, or Heisenbergian, indeterminism. But, according to Einstein,
that is hardly an outcome to gladden the scientific heart. "Some physicists,"
he wrote in 1941, "among them myself, can not believe that we must
abandon, actually and forever, the idea of direct representation of physical
reality in space and time.,,14 Hegel, too, refused to abandon that idea. like
Aristotle long before him, he sought, by means of a dialectical criticism of
the limits of mechanistic science and its mathematical methods, to prepare
the way for a truly philosophic science of nature - a science that can not
only represent but also comprehend in its truth the qualitative reality of
nature, from the merest externality and duration of space and time, up
through the great chain of inorganic and organic being, to the animal
existence - birth, life, health, reproduction, disease, and death - of thinking
man.
IV
With one notable exception, all references to Newton in the Philosophy of

Nature are confined to the first part - Mechanics - where the object of study
is matter in the abstract, as contrasted with the qualified matter of Physics
and the living matter of Organics. Under Mechanics, the sub-divisions are:
'Space and Time' (including the abstract concepts of Place and Matter);
'Matter and Motion, Finite Mechanics' (including the concepts of Inert
Matter, Thrust, and Falling); and 'Absolute Mechanics' (with Universal
Gravitation, Kepler's Laws, and Transition to Physics as sub-headings). The
subdivisions and subheadings obviously represent a graded order, ranging

upward from the simplest and most abstract object of study in mechanics
(space) to what in Hegel's judgment is the most complex and least abstract
(the solar system as described in Kepler's laws). The fact that Universal
Gravitation is placed beneath Kepler's Laws in the graded order reveals at a
glance that here, as elsewhere, Hegel will represent Newton's 'System of the
World' to us as a 'reductionist' analysis of a higher into the terms of a lower
determination.
In the whole range of Mechanics - Hegel writes - "bodies exist only as
points; what gravity determines is only spatial interrelations of points. The
unity of matter is only the unity of the place it seeks, not the unity of a
concrete One. That is the nature of this sphere." And yet, on its highest level
of development, Mechanics is able to transcend its own abstract character;
for, in its descriptive laws of the solar system - tracing a pattern of elliptical
orbits about an energizing center - it comprehends the notion of what
matter, as manifest motion, must really be in itself. In a startling anticipation
of the vision of Niels Bohr, Hegel writes:
What the solar system is as a whole, matter is now to be in detail .... The determina-
tions of form which constitute the solar system are the determinations of matter itself
and they constitute the being of matter. The determination and the being are thus
essentially identical; but this is the nature of the qualitative, for here, if the determina-
tion is removed, the being, too, is destroyed. This is the transition from Mechanics to
Physics (PN, § 271, Z, pp. 83-84).
The whole of Newtonian science is comprehended within the abstract

range of Mechanics, excepting only the theory of light of the Optics -
Newton's one major attempt to make the transition from Mechanics to
Physics (in Hegel's sense of the terms). Newton had confidently imagined
that, with the method of the Principia, he could easily make that transition,
and then move on from Physics into Organics to complete his Natural
Philosophy. But in Hegel's judgment, as in the judgment of Einstein and his
peers, Newton's attempt to comprehend scientifically the phenomena of light
was a failure, and foredoomed to be a failure because of the inadequacies of
its analytical, decompositional method. Just as Newton decomposed the
ellipses of Kepler's laws into rectilinear components, thereby depriving them
of their qualitative identity, so he decomposed the fluid transparency of
white light into colored corpuscles, which he declared to be primary and
simple; and, with that, the qualitative, distinctive actuality of light slipped
out of his scientific grasp.
70 HENRY PAOLUCCI
Hegel was aware that Light - which for him as for Einstein was the first
physical manifestation of matter - united qualitatively the characteristics of
abstract corpuscular and wave motions; he knew also that light, in reflecting,
refracting, and otherwise manifesting itself, shows all the colors of the entire
universe, including those revealed in the dark when a prism is set up, just
right, as a divider between light and dark. But, about the corpuscular and
wave theories, Hegel held that they were both one-sided, and therefore
inadequate approaches to the dialectical notion of light in its qualitative
unity. Hegel writes:
Light is an interesting theme to treat; for we think that in Nature we have only the
individual, this particular reality. But light is the very opposite of this .... In thinking of
light, we must renounce all conceptions of composition and the like .... The expression
'bundles of rays' is merely one of convenience, it means nothing; the bundles are light in
its entirety, which is only outwardly limited; it is no more divided into bundles of rays
than is the Ego or pure self-consciousness. It is the same when I say: in my time or in
Caesar's time. This was also the time of everyone else; but here I am speaking of it in
relation to Caesar, and restrict it to him without meaning that he really had a separate
ray or parcel of time. The Newtonian theory according to which light is propagated in
straight lines, or the wave theory which makes it travel in waves, are, like Euler's aether
or the vibration of sound, materialistic representations quite useless for the compre-
hension of light (PN, § 276, Z, pp. 93-94).
But the best, in this extraordinarily thorough anticipation of things to come

in physical theory, is what follows - where Hegel rejects (as modern
Quantum Physics rejects) the notion that the wave theory is superior to the
corpuscular theory. According to the wave theory, he writes -
the dark element in light [the color-producing element] is supposed to run through the
movement in a series of curves which can be mathematically calculated; this abstract
determination has been introduced into the theory, and is nowadays thought to be a
great triumph over Newton. But this is nothing physical; and neither of these two ideas
is in place, since nothing empirical obtains here. There no more exist particles of light or
waved aether than the nerves consist of a series of globules, each receiving an impulse
and setting others in motion (PN, § 276, Z, p. 94).
Hegel died, it is to be noted, more than a generation before the birth of the
people who are usually honored in our catechisms of popular science for
having discussed such matters for the first time. Also on the speed of light,
Hegel anticipates the pioneers, writing:
The propagation of light occurs in time, since, being an activity and an alteration, it
cannot dispense with this moment .... The distances which light is supposed to travel
involve time; for illumination, whether through a medium or by reflection, is a modifica-
tion of matter requiring time (PN, § 276, Z, p. 94).
But the speed of light is not, according to Hegel, like the speed of other
physically determinate manifestations of matter. In the sphere of qualified
as distinct from abstract matter, light is primary - the first, and therefore
limiting manifestation of matter in motion. The sun, says Hegel, does not
pour out its light incidentally while serving as the central material point of
the solar system. That system's orbital structure is the inner form of matter
itself, as we have noted, and it is that circling about a center that shows itself
physically as light. But, as each particle of matter is a microcosmic solar
system, all matter is - for the eye that can discern its true, centralized orbital
speeds -luminous. Again in a thoroughly Einsteinian vein, Hegel characterizes
Light as the "self-contained totality of matter," explaining that, as an
"existent, space-filling force," it is "absolute velocity, pure materiality which
is everywhere present, real existence which remains within itself, or actuality
as transparent possibility." "Light," he concludes, "brings us into the
universal interrelation; everything exists for us in theoretical, unresistant
fashion because it is in light (PN, § 275, Z, p. 88).
Einstein has told us that it was as a consequence of the labors of Faraday,
Clerk Maxwell, and Hertz, but particularly of Maxwell, in the study of light
and electro-magnetic phenomena, that modern science generally abandoned
the established view that Galilean-Newtonian mechanics could stand as the
"basis of all physics." Attempts to solve the difficulties of application of the
Newtonian principles to the newly-developed spheres led first to formulation
of the field theory of electricity, then to the effort to base all physics upon
the concept of field, and finally to the theory of relativity, which is the
"evolution of the notion of space and time into that of the continuum with
metric structure,,,15 which is in our view then qualitatively determined. "The
general theory of relativity," Einstein has said with his usual respectful regard
for the overthrown Titan of classical mechanics, "formed the last step in the
development of the programme of the field-theory. Quantitatively it modified
Newton's theory only slightly, but for that all the more profoundly
qualitatively.,,16
Already in Hegel's day, the phenomena of magnetism, electricity, and
chemism, together with those of light, were calling into being a unified
science very different in principle from Newtonian mechanics. Scientific 'law'
in the mechanical sense means, he explains, "the combination of two simple
determinations such that merely their simple interconnections constitute the
whole relationship, and yet each must have the show of independence with
regard to the other" (PN, § 270, Z, p. 72). But such a concept of law has, he
insists, a very limited range - that of mathematical abstraction. It will not do
72 HENR Y PAOLUCCI
in the study of bodies as they actually fall, or as they actually orbit around an
energized center; but the inadequacy there may be obscured by assuming that
the bodies in those qualitatively determined relationships are really nothing
more than points in the geometric sense. It is otherwise, however, with the
phenomena of light, magnetism, electricity, and chemism.
In magnetism, for instance, Hegel writes, "the inseparability of the two
determinations is already posited"; consequently there is not a co·relationship
of 'law' in the mechanical sense (PN, § 270, Z, p. 72). Magnetic phenomena,
he explains, are not gravitational phenomena which mathematical analysis
can, for its arbitrary convenience, separate into inertial as well as gravitational
components. "Magnetism," he writes, "differs from gravity in this, that it
forces bodies into a quite different direction from the vertical." Motion in the.
sphere, or 'field' of magnetism is not that of rectilinear attraction; but it is
also "not rotary, not a curve upon itself, like the motion of the heavenly
bodies, which is accordingly neither attractive nor repellent" (PN, § 313, Z,
p.171).
Summing up his case against scientific 'reductionism' in this sphere, Hegel
continues:
In all higher forms [as contrasted with the forms of abstract mechanics 1 the individual-
ized whole constitutes the third in which the determinations are conjoined, and we no
longer have the direct determinations of two things which are in relationship with each
other.
Laws in the mechanical sense are possible for the planetary motions, he says,
because those motions involve two distinct phenomenal elements - not to be
confounded with the non-empirical centripetal and centrifugal forces. Those
two phenomenal elements are "the form of the path and the velocity of the
motion." But if such laws are to be comprehended in a higher principle so as
to embrace the phenomena of light and magnetism as well, the "thing to be
done," he concludes, "is to develop this from the Notion. This would give
rise to a far-reaching science and the difficulty of the task is such that this has
not yet been fully accomplished." (PN, § 270,Z, p. 72).
The men who have undertaken to develop that "far-reaching science"
in our time have all started from the premise that it would have to be
built up from the very bottom - from a rectification of the first
'reductionist' error of classical mechanics, which consisted in its positing
space and time as only externally interrelated in the phenomena of motion.
Identifying the essential element in Einstein's labors of rectification, Bertrand
Russell wrote:
The scientific merit of Einstein's theory lies in the explanation, by a uniform principle,
of many facts which are unintelligible in the Newtonian system. The philosophical
interest lies chiefly in the substitution of the single manifold, space-time, for the two
manifolds, space and time.! 7
How the original 'reductionist' error came to be made, Einstein himself has
explained as follows:
The lack of definiteness which, from the point of view of empirical importance, adheres
to the notion of time in classical mechanics was veiled by the axiomatic representation
of space and time as things given independently of our senses. Such a use of notions -
independent of the empirical basis, to which they owe their existence - does not
necessarily damage science. One may however easily be led into the· error of believing
that these notions, whose origin is forgotten, are necessary and unalterable accompani-
ments to our· thinking, and this error may constitute a serious danger to the progress of
science.1 8
Literally billions of words have been written on this theme since Ernst Mach
and then Einstein opened it up for the academic community of mathematical
scientists. Yet in all that literary production, which still floods the markets
today, there is, I am confident, no discussion of the reductionist error as
profound or as philosophically consistent as Hegel's in the opening sections of
his Mechanics, from which point he pursues the process of philosophical
rectification up through the whole range of mechanics into those higher
spheres of nature where to mathematize at all is to commit the gravest sort of
reductionist error - unless one's purpose is avowedly reductionist and
utilitarian.
In reviewing Hegel's approach to Newton in the Philosophy of Nature,
we have started from the 'difficulties' of the phenomena of light and electro-
magnetism only because it has been from that standpoint that our contem-
porary science, always working 'reductionistically', has found its way back
to the beginnings, ironically getting a reductionist satisfaction out of the
effort to rectify the original reductionist error of Newton. Hegel pursued
a 'reductionist' course in his great intellectual voyage of discovery, the
Phenomenology of Mind; but in his systematic exposition of the doctrine of
Mechanics, as in all the philosophical sciences of his Encyclopedia, he reverses
that course, working his way up from the most abstract to the most concrete
conceptions.
v
Although we have the assurances of the greatest practitioners that, in
74 HENRY PAOLUCCI
mathematical science, intellectual insight and discursive reasoning (nous and

episteme) come first and mathematization follows, many of us are still
reluctant to believe that we are dealing with truly scientific thought when its
utterance is not in equations. For those of us who feel that way, the best
approach to Hegel's Mechanics is, as we have suggested above, through close
study of the several hundred pages on 'Quantity' and 'Measure' in the larger
Science of Logic, which bristle with formulas and constructions of the
analytical calculus and geometry. Hegel was, as we noted, well trained in the
higher mathematics. But, as a great philosopher in the Aristotelian tradition,
he knows that the place of mathematically-shaped abstractions lies between
the purely logical and the sensory, and that such shaped abstractions can be
used meaningfully in natural science only after fITst principles (in mechanics,
the principles of space, time, matter, and motion) have been logically deter-
mined in thought.
Early in the Mechanics, Hegel sums up the range of concepts he is about to
explore. "Self-externality," he writes (linking the Naturphilosophie with
what precedes it in his System),
splits at once into two forms, positively as Space, and negatively as Time. The first
concrete thing, the unity of these abstract moments, is Matter; this is related to its
moments, and these consequently are related to each other, in Motion. When this
relation is not external, we have the absolute unity of Matter and Motion, self-moving
Matter (PN, § 253, Z, p. 28).
When mechanistic physics speaks of material 'points' in Space (as Newton

does), the concept of Time, Hegel explains, is incidentally introduced. For
the mathematical point, having no dimension, is obviously a negation of
Space, and that is precisely what Time is. And it is the point of Time in space
that traces the 'lines' of spatial dimensionality as its loci. Anticipating the
need for the Riemann-Einsteinian advance, he observes:
There is no science of time corresponding to the science of space, to geometry. The
differences of time have not this indifference of self-externality which constitutes the
immediate determinateness of'space, and they are consequently not capable of being
expressed when the Understanding has paralyzed it and reduced its negativity to the unit
(PN, § 259, Remark, pp. 37-38).
Here is where Hegel observes that a science of measures, competent to deal

with time in its negativity, as the moving-point of space, "would be the most
difficult of all sciences."
Hegel then points out that, in its traditional meaning (philosophically
defmed by Aristotle), the term Place has always expressed "a posited identity
of space and time." That is a profound as well as obvious observation. The

moderns who speak of the space-time continuum for want of a suitable single
word, might do well to consider the long historical development of the
doctrine of Place - a doctrine which, according to Pierre Duhem, holds the
future of natural science. In our ordinary usage, Hegel notes, a thing in 'place'
is understood to be a thing in space-time, here and now, or there and then.
Zeno's paradox of motion, we are reminded, was defined as a space-time
paradox of places. A thing at rest or in motion is in 'place' always, even
though, in motion, we distinguish (as Hegel says) "three different places: the
present place, the place about to be occupied, and the place which has just
been vacated" - in which distinction the "vanishing of the dimensions of
time is paralyzed." Yet it remains clear in all of this, Hegel continues, that
"there is really only one place, a universal of these places, which remains un-
changed through all the changes ;it is duration, existing immediately according
to its Notion, and as such is Motion" (PN, § 261 ,Remark, Z, p. 43).
Zeno's paradox shows that rectilinear motion, out of one place into
another, no matter how far extended, contains no measure of itself, and is
therefore not really motion. Having no measure means that it has no time,
which is the measure of motion. Curvilinear motion that returns to its former
places, on the other hand, contains its own measure. The lines of a space-time
continuum (as contrasted with the timeless space of Euclidean geometry)
must, therefore, curve back on themselves. With 'Einsteinian' insight, Hegel
writes:
This return of the line is the circle; it is the Now, Before, and After which have closed
together in a unity in which these dimensions are indifferent, so that Before is equally
After, and vice versa. It is in circular motion that the necessary paralysis of these
dimensions is first posited in space. Circular motion is the spatial or subsistent unity of
the dimensions of time .... It is motion in its essence, motion which has sublated the
distinctions of Now, Before, and After, its dimensions or its Notion. In the circle, these
are in unity; the circle is the restored Notion of duration, Motion extinguished within
itself. There is posited Mass, the persistent, the self-consolidated, which exhibits motion
as its possibility (PN, § 261, Remark, Z, pp. 43-44).
The so-called mass-point, in other words, is 'circling motion' in itself. I

doubt that anything more profound has been written in modern times on the
abstract foundations of mechanics. To sum up, and hurry forward, we may
say: Anticipating the language of Ernst Mach, Einstein, and Planck, Hegel
defines space and time as positive and negative determinations of Motion,
which, in its se1f-circling, is Mass. Time is the restless, ubiquitous point of
space that negates dimensionality in itself while generating the same as 'loci'
76 HENRY PAOLUCCI
of its Future and Past. Time gives 'place' to the lines, planes, and volumes of
space. And Hegel dares to conclude that 'moving place' or, as we usually say,
locomotion, is the sole constituent of Matter.
Every time-point is thus a mass-point circling in itself: an essentially
moving place that tends restlessly to circle 'out of place' and back into it.
Thus this universal gravitation of time-points is simultaneously a moving away
and a moving toward, self-repulsion from one center and attraction toward
another. As Hegel expresses it: "Matter is both moments [repulsion as well as
attraction] and their unity, centralized in a point, is gravity." Matter itself is
"tending toward a center, but - and here is its other determination - a
center located outside itself." More precisely: Gravity is not mere attraction,
which is the tendency to negate spatial separateness and produce continuity.
On the contrary, "gravity preserves both separateness and continuity" as
moments of its concept (PN, § 262, pp. 44-47). And these moments,
apprehended abstractly as repulsion and attraction, are destined to be
narrowly determined as independent forces, centrifugal and centripetal
(PN, § 269, pp. 62-65).
Those who take space and time abstractly, who conceive of 'matter' as
'occupying' space and as being 'acted upon' by independent forces of 'inertia'
and 'gravity' have, in other words, taken rectilinear uniform motion as simple,
and accelerated and curvilinear motion as composed. From Hegel's standpoint
these are to be reversed. And in what he has to say on this point, "there is
undoubtedly [as Professor Findlay has said of his concept of light] a flavor
of relativity-physics." 1 9 Hegel says:
That movement in general is movement that returns upon itself may be concluded from
the determinations of particularity and individuality in a body, which give it an internal
focus of separateness together with a tendency to join a center outside itself. These are
the determinations underlying the concepts of centripetal and centrifugal force; these are
then taken abstractly as independent vectors which, brought to bear accidently on the
same inert body, give it the empirically observed motion. Thus you have the transforma-
tion of physical reality into lines that really serve only to facilitate mathematical
expression (PN, § 270, Remark, pp. 68-69).
Before the development of a 'field' theory of gravitation in our own time,

Hegel's application of the dialectic to analysis of physical phenomena had no
counterpart in the mathematical thinking of physicists or astronomers. But
now even children are familiar with a concept of geometric space suffused
with a time that varies with each point of space, and with pictures of the
circling centers of atomic particles. In terms less rigorous than Hegel's but not
inconsistent with them, Einstein has written:
We have two realities: matter and field . ... But what are the physical criterions distin-
guishing matter and field? Before we learned about the relativity theory we could have
tried to answer the question in the following way: matter has mass, whereas field has
not. Field represents energy, matter represents mass .... From the relativity theory
we know that matter represents vast stores of energy and energy represents matter ....
the division into matter and field is, after the recognition of the equivalence of mass and
energy, something artificial and not clearly defined .... What impresses our senses as
matter is really a great concentration of energy into a comparatively small space. We
could regard matter as the regions in space where the field is extremely strong .... There
would be no place, in our new physics for both field and matter, field [in Hegelian
terms, 'moving place'] being the only reality. This new view is suggested by the great
achievements of field physics, by our success in expressing laws of electricity,
magnetism, gravitation in the form of structure laws, and fmally by the equivalence of
mass and energy. 20
We noted in passing that it was on the basis of the field theory that the
Einsteinians rejected the Newtonian principles of rectilinear inertial and
gravitational motion, adopting a four-dimensional geometry in place of
Newton's calculus to express mathematically their conception of an astrono-
mical order in which inertial and gravitational mass are identified and the
fundamental motion is curvilinear. And, while we cannot dwell on it, we
should at least mention here that, at one point in his larger Science of Logic,
Hegel speaks of the possibility of developing a four-dimensional space-time
geometry to do justice to Kepler's laws. Such a geometry, Hegel says, "might
prove powerful with regard to free movement, wherein one (spatial) side is
governed by geometrical determination (in Kepler's law S3 :t 2), and the other
(temporal) side by arithmetical determination." The mathematics of that
geometry, Hegel suggests, might serve to comprehend the elliptical motions
of planets in their uncomposed naturality, in a manner consistent with the
Hegelian concept of matter and gravity (SL [J/S] 1, p. 324).
VI
Hegel, as we said, places Kepler's laws of planetary motions at the apex of the
grand pyramid of Mechanics. On that apex, looking beyond itself, mechanistic
science transcends the abstract, and the transition is made into the sciences of
qualified matter. Just below that apex Hegel sets the Galilean laws of falling
bodies.
Of these laws, Hegel says: "they are immortal discoveries which redound
to the greatest honour of the analysis of the Understanding." Still, in them-
selves they are not enough. "The next step," he continues, requires "their
78 HENR Y PAOLUCCI
proof independently of empirical methods." And such proof, according

to the Newtonians, has already been supplied - furnished, allegedly, "by
mathematical mechanics itself, so that even a science base.d on empirically·
ascertained facts is not satisfied with· the merely empirically pointing out
(demonstration)." What Einstein and Planck and their peers have undertaken
to do mathematically, beyond the sphere of the empirically verifiable, Newton
also attempted to do; but, according to Hegel, his method was inadequate.
Newton's 'proof of Galileo's laws, Hegel says, takes for granted what those
laws describe: the empirically-established fact of the uniformly-accelerated
motion of a freely falling body. Newton's analytical treatment of that given
fact consists, Hegel says,
in the conversion of the moments of the mathematical formula into physical forces, into
an accelerating force imparting one and the same impulse in each unit of time, and into
a force of inertia which perpetuates the (greater) velocity acquired in each moment of
time - determinations utterly devoid of empirical sanction and equally inconsistent with
the notion (PN, § 267, Remark, p. 57).
In other words, Hegel indicates that Newton treats a heavy, falling body,
which naturally gravitates toward a center outside itself, as if it were an inert
body responding inertly to an external thrust or force - as if it were not itself
essentially gravitational. "The motion of falling," Hegel writes, "forms the
transition and middle term between inert matter and matter whose Notion is
absolutely realized, that is, absolutely free motion." Inert matter is the
abstraction of a single material point, conceived as having no time in itself.
It will remain at rest, or, if moved, will move inertially as if it were at rest, the
two being equally timeless and therefore not really distinguishable as rest
and motion. On the other hand, "heavy matter in the motion of falling,"
Hegel writes, is at least "partly adequate to its Notion, namely, through the
sublation of the Many, as the effort of matter to reach one definite place, as
center." The next step in the determination of matter is that 'falling toward'
a center must also be seen as 'repulsion from' a center - which is what the
so-<:alled fixed stars manifest in their 'constellational' pattern. Though in
themselves they are matter orbiting about an energized center, with respect to
one another, they are simply held in a rigid equilibrium of attraction and
repulsion. The stars, says Hegel, "belong to the sphere of dead repulsion ....
Matter, in filling space, erupts into an infinite plurality of [luminous] masses,
but this, which may delight the eye, is only the first manifestation of
matter.,,21
Not in abstraction as inert, not in falling, not in the rigid equilibrium of
stellar repulsion and attraction, but only in the absolute mechanics of

universal gravitation - in the grand mechanics of the sun and planets, moons
and comets - is the true Notion of matter realized.
As in his discussion of the Newtonian calculus and the concept of force, so
here in his discussion of Newton's concept of universal gravitation, Hegel
praises before he criticizes. "Universal gravitation," he writes, "must be
recognized as a profound thought in itself, though it is especially by reason
of the quantitative determinations bound up with it that it has attracted
attention and credit." So far from criticizing the concept, Hegel takes it up as
an essential moment of his system, which (it should be recalled) is, like
Aristotle's, a system of gravitation, in which all components, those of the
Logic and Philosophy of Mind as well as those of the Philosophy of Nature,
are drawn together and sustained by a single principle that operates on or in
them like a magnet on metal fIlings; or, better, like the command of a
commander-in-chief to all his armies - a command that exists apart, perfectly,
in the commander-in-chief, but which is also present in all the purposeful
activities of the army on all levels. Hegel is more concerned than Calileo or
Newton were with the cause of such universal gravitation; but, as we suggested
earlier, he does not deny the right of empirical science to study the fIlings in
a magnet field (or the moving multiplicity of nature as a whole for that
matter) as if there were no underlying, magnetic mover.
The trouble with Newton's use of the notion of universal gravity in his
treatment of Kepler's laws is the same we identified in considering his treat-
ment of Calileo's laws. In Newton's "law," Hegel notes, "there are included,
as we have shown, two moments" whose unhappy fate it has been "to be
regarded as separate forces, corresponding to the forces of attraction and
repulsion, more precisely determined as centripetal and centrifugal forces.
These forces are conceived as acting on bodies, and as accidently and
independently brought to bear upon a third something" - the material point
of the pattern of motion under study. "In this way," Hegel goes on, "whatever
deeper meaning might have been in the thought of universal gravitation is
again lost"; and he predicts that science will not be able to "penetrate into
the theory of absolute motion so long as the much-vaunted discoveries of
forces prevails there" (PN, § 269, Z, p. 63).
To make clear the line of Hegel's argument, we should remark here on the
great cultural paradox that presents Newton to us as the fulfIllment of a
scientific development that is usually traced to him from the labors of
Copernicus through those of Calileo and Kepler. That development from its
inception aimed at creating a single physics, made up of a single set of
80 HENRY PAOLUCCI
principles, to displace the old Aristotelian double physics with its double set
of principles (celestial and curvilinear, terrestrial and rectilinear). Galileo, as
any serious student of his works must know, opted for unity on the basis
of curvilinear motion, so that all apparent rectilinear motion would be either
an optical illusion (like that of falling bodies, where the rotational movement
of the earth is shared by body and 0 bserver, and therefore cancelled out) or a
resultant compounded of naturally curvilinear motions. Copernicus had
abolished the entire realm of rectilinear motion by assigning celestial motion
to the terrestrial orb. And Kepler, too, while laboring to eliminate the com-
plexities of circles on circles in the Ptolemaic and Copernican systems, was
none the less a champion of curvilinear physics. From Copernicus to Galileo
and Kepler, the triumphant claim of science had been, therefore, that the
physical universe is indeed One, and all celestial. But then came Newton to
bring the whole business down with a Baconian thud: The universe is
physically One, as required, but - according to Newton's doctrine - it is all
earth, all rectilinear - so that all curves are either optical illusions or
resultants of compounded, naturally rectilinear motions.
From Hegel's point of view both positions, the Galilean as well as the
Newtonian, were one-sided abstractions of the Understanding - like the
contradictory corpuscular and wave theories oflight. Against both (and again
in an Einsteinian vein), Hegel argues that the proper scientific course is to
distinguish and preserve qualitative differences. Inert, falling, rigidly-fixed
stellar, and the freely-moving matter of the solar system must be compre-
hended together in their qualitative differences. Altogether, Hegel concludes
after a long discussion of principles,
There exist three motions: (a) mechanical motion which is communicated from outside
and is uniform; (b) the partly conditioned and partly free motion of falling, where the
separation of a body is still posited contingently but where the motion already belongs
to the gravity itself; and (c) the unconditionally free motion, the principal moments of
which have been indicated, the great mechanics of the heavens. This motion is a curve.
In it, the positing of a central body by the particular bodies, and conversely, the positing
of these by the central body, occur simultaneously. The center has no meaning apart
from the periphery nor the periphery apart from the center. This puts to rout those
physical hypotheses which start now with the center and now with the particular bodies,
sometimes making the former and sometimes the latter the original factor. Both points
of view are necessary, but, taken separately, they are one-sided. The diremption into
different bodies, and the positing of the moments of subjectivity, is a simple act, a free
motion, nothing external like pressure and thrust (PN, § 269, Remd1'k Z, p. 64).
That is a summation worthy of Einstein or Planck. On the lowest, abstract

level are the inert, unorganized material entities: their motion comes to them
from the outside, is uniform, according to the pressure or thrust, but

essentially random. Focusing by abstraction on the inert particle, we cannot
know what forces may act on it from unknown sources not yet posited;
focusing on posited forces, we cannot know what particles, if any, will be
acted upon, here or there. But on the level of heavy, organized matter, the
motion is not only random or mechanical, but also determined, by its
organization around a center of gravity, as a weighing down of one organized
mass toward other organized masses. Higher still, however, is the gravitational
relation manifested in the organized equilibrium of the solar system - and
that, as Hegel says, has nothing random or forced about it. On that level, he
writes,
we must not speak of forces. If we want to speak of force, then there is but one force,
and its moments do not, as two forces, pull in different directions. The motion of the
celestial bodies is not any such pulling this way and that but is free motion; they go on
their way, as the ancients said, like blessed Gods (!>N, § 269, Remark, Z, p. 65).
That last phrase, it should be noted, was cited by Sir Arthur Eddington in
The Nature of the Physical World to epitomize his own doctrine of the
planetary movements, in the light of the Einsteinian general theory of
relativity.22 Einstein himself has observed that in the "translation of the law
of inertia into the language of the general theory of relativity" we get a new
law of motion which is not rectilinear at all, being the law of "a system of
total differential equations, the system characteristic of the geodetic line"
which curves back on itself. Einstein says further: "In place of Newton's law
of interaction by gravitation, we shall find the system of the simplest
generally covariant differential equations which can be set up for the gllv-
tensor. It is formed by equating to zero the once contracted Riemannian
curvature tensor (RIlV = 0)" - which means that all apparently rectilinear
motion is henceforth to be understood as the segment of a vast curve. 23
But from Hegel's point of view, this Einsteinian development is also one-
sided. All that Hegel says against Newton's 'proofs' would apply also,
mutatis mutandis, to the Einsteinian-Riemannian formulas, were they offered
as 'proofs'. The philosophic virtue of the latter, in comparison with the
Principia, is their philosophic modesty. The Einsteinians acknowledge that
their mathematical analysis, which permits them to speak of non-empirical
clocks slowing down non-empirically and about non-empirical rulers
shrinking, proves nothing. But, if more were claimed for that analysis, it
could hardly expect to fare any better at the hands of another Ernst Mach
than Newton's analysis has fared.
82 HENRY PAOLUCCI
In his fullest commentary of the relation of Newton's mechanics to

Kepler's laws, Hegel makes the following points:
1. It is a mere mathematical translation that turns the ~~ of Kepler's
Third Law into a product (~ x A2 ) of which one of the factors is the ratio
of Newton's law of gravitation.
2. Newton's 'demonstration' that a body moving around the central body
in subjection to the law of gravitation pursues a conic section, does not, by
any logical means, show the necessity for its being an ellipse. And the worst is
that
the conditions which make the path of the body a specific conic section are, in the
analytical formula, constants, and their determination is referred to an empirical circum-
stance, namely, to a particular position of the body at a certain point of time, and to the
fortuitous strength of an impulse which it is supposed to have received in the beginning;
so that the circumstance which determines the curve to be an ellipse falls outside the
formula that is supposed to be proved, and no one has ever dreamt of proving this
circumstance (PN, § 270, Remark, p. 66).
3. Newton's law of the force of gravity has only an empirical, not a

philosophical basis. There is, for instance, no reason given as to why the
centrifugal force manages to 'overcome' the centripetal force just when the
latter ought, by defmition, to be the greatest (perihelion), and then manages
to let itself be 'overcome' in turn just when the centripetal force ought to be
weakest (aphelion). The explanation is that, the empirical fact being known
in advance (as summed up in Kepler's laws), the analytical calculus is con-
ducted accordingly. One of the most thorough analyses of the relation
between Kepler's achievement and Newton's, in recent times, is that of Pierre
Duhem in his Aim and Structure of Physical Theory. Pursuing a course of
reasoning that comprehends Hegel's arguments, Duhem concludes:
The principle of universal gravity, very far from being derivable by generalization and
induction from the observed laws of Kepler, formally contradicts these laws. If Newton's
theory is correct, Kepler's laws are necessarily false. 24
VII
Summing up, we may say that the great value of Hegel's criticism of Newton's
celestial mechanics consists in its emphasis on the error of scientific
'reductionism' upon which that mechanics was founded - an error that still
plagues theoretical physics, obstructing its advance, and making impossible
a philosophically-integrated Natural Science. The popularity of Einstein has
made this part of Hegel's criticism more acceptable now than ever before. Yet
hardly less impressive than his criticism of Newton is Hegel's sustained
polemic against the pre-Darwinian advocates of an evolutionary origin of
species, which he conducts on the same grounds. Like the Newtonians in
Mechanics, Hegel argues, so the evolutionists in biology are 'reductionist'.
They 'decompose' the self-generative cycle of a species into two constitutive
elements or vectors, one of which is the characteristic actuality of the species
just below it in the unbroken chain of organic forms, while the other is a sort
of fortuitous thrust (chance mutation) acting at right angles, so to speak, and
thus deflecting the old species out of its old generative cycle into a new one.
Summing up the lesson of his entire Philosophy of Nature from this stand-
point, Hegel says:
Now, here is what is really involved in this conception. What, speaking generally, we call
inorganic nature is thought of as having an independent existence, while the organic is
attached to it in an external fashion, so that it is a mere matter of chance whether or not
the organic finds the conditions of existence in what confronts it .... The question is
this: Is that the true concept of the inorganic, and do living things represent what is
dependent? [On the contrary] this is the true relation: man is not an accident added on
to what is first; the organic is itself what is first .... Regarded in this fashion, the
universe is not an aggregate of many accidents existing in a relation of indifference, but
is a system endowed, in its essential character, with life. 25
Here we break off. The wealth of materials in Hegel'sPhilosophy of Nature

that have a bearing on the theme of this paper is inexhaustive. As I have
observed elsewhere, no scholar who has seriously occupied himself with the
history of the sciences of celestial and terrestrial mechanics, and of inorganic
and organic physics, can read Hegel on these subjects without a sense of awe;
for that history, from its Greek origins down to the nineteenth century, lives
in his pages. Those of us who have for decades poured over the sources,
gUided by Pierre Duhem and his peers, can hardly fail to recognize in Hegel an
easy mastery of much of the relevant materials. For me, at any rate, the ten
volumes of Duhem's Le systeme du monde serve as an historical commentary
on Hegel's Mechanik and Physik which, in turn, serve to make philosophical
sense out of the long development of scientific thought traced by Duhem
through all its evolutions, revolutions, and involutions, through all its errors
and aberrations, exhuming once-famous doctrines from long oblivion, showing
how the science of each epoch is nourished by the systems of past centuries,
indicating how often the scientific certainties of one proud age are laughed at
as absurdities in the next, while as often today's absurdities are seen forcing
themselves forward into acceptance as the high truths of tomorrow.
84 HENRY PAOLUCCI
Duhem's history of science displays a dialectical development, and Hegel's

Philosophy of Nature compels us to recognize the continuous presence of
that dialectical past in contemporary empirical science. It is thus a work of
permanent scientific as well as philosophic value.
St. John's University

Jamaica, New York
NOTES
1 The translations cited here from Hegel's Lectures on the History of Philosophy have
sometimes been adapted in accordance with the German text (Michelet, 1840).
2 Inscription on statue in the ante-chapel of Trinity College, Cambridge.
3 John N. Findlay, 'Hegel and the Philosophy of Physics,' in The Legacy of Hegel:
Proceedings of the Marquette Hegel Symposium, 1970, ed. J. J. O'Malley, et al. (The
Hague, Nijhoff, 1973), p. 83.
4 The translations cited here from Hegel's Logic have sometimes been adapted in
accordance with the German text (Henning, 1840, 1955).
5 The translations cited here from Hegel's Philosophy of Nature have sometimes been
adapted in accordance with the German text (Poggeler, 1959; Michelet, 1847).
6 J. N. Findlay, Hegel: A Re-Examination (New York, Humanities Press, 1958,1976),
pp.167-8.
7 The translations from Hegel's Phenomenology of Mind have been adapted in
accordance with the German text (Hoffmeister, 1949).
8 Louis de Broglie, Physics and Microphysics (New York, Grosset and Dunlap, 1966),
pp.238-9.
9 Ibid., p. 75.
10 See V. Cioffari, Fortune and Fate from Democritus to St. Thomas Aquinas (New
York, 1935), passim, for a review of the commentary on Dante's Heisenbergian line
(Inf., IV, 136) epitomizing the doctrine of Democritus.
11 H. D. Anthony, Sir Isaac Newton (New York, Collier, 1961), pp. 140-141.
12 Tobias Dantzig, Number: The Language of Science (New York, Macmillan, 1954),
pp. 234, 335.
13 Bertrand Russell, The Scientific Outlook (New York, Norton, 1932), p. 264.
14 Albert Einstein, Out of My Later Years (New York, Philosophical Library, 1950),
p.l10.
15 Einstein, Later Years, p. 97.
16 Albert Einstein, The World As I See It (New York, Covici Friede, 1934), p. 57.
17 Bertrand Russell, 'Introduction,' in A. V. VasiIiev, Space, Time, and Motion (New
York, Knopf, 1924), pp. xv-xvi.
19 FindlaY,Hegel, p. 279.
20 Albert Einstein and L. Infeld, The Evolution of Physics (New York, Simon and
Schuster, 1961), pp. 256-58.
21 PN, § 267, Z, p. 59; § 268, Remark, Z, pp. 61, 62.
22 Arthur Eddington, The Nature of the Physical World (Cambridge, Cambridge

University Press, 1948), p. 147.
24 Pierre Duhem,Aim and Structure of Physical Theory (Princeton, Princeton University
Press, 1954), p. 193.
25 Hegel's Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion, trans. E. B. Spiers and J. B.
Sanderson (New York, Humanities Press, 1962), Vol. III, pp. 340-341.
JOHN N. FINDLAY
THE HEGELIAN TREATMENT OF BIOLOGY AND LIFE
I gave a paper on Hegel's treatment ofthe physical sciences at Milwaukee last

June (1969), and another not entirely similar paper on the same theme at
Stuttgart in July, where I also contended with the German language. On this
occasion my theme is Hegel's treatment of Life and the Life-Sciences. I shall
not, however, limit myself to the dialectical analyses which occur in the
Philosophy of Nature, but shall go back to the far more fundamental treat-
ments which are to be found in the Science of Logic and the Encyclopaedia.
Life is for Hegel a category before it is a physical phenomenon in time and
space, and we have to try to understand just what sort of a category it is, and
where and how it has its place in the logical array of categories. I also wish to
say something about the treatment of Life and Biology which occurs in the
Phenomenology of Spirit, where Life is being set forth as one of the objects
which the mind contemplates and investigates on its journey to Absolute
Knowledge. After these two fundamental treatments I shall con&ider what
Hegel has to say about Life and Biology in the Philosophy of Nature,
enquiring, in the end, what he has to say to us in the present stage of develop-
ment of the biological sciences. I am compelled to leave out the interesting
discussions of Life in the various sets of Jena lectures, because I have never
been able to give these lectures that complete sentence by sentence scrutiny
which is an indispensable preliminary to understanding anything in Hegel.
It is all-important, in understanding any fundamental notion in Hegel,
that we should approach it in a purely logical, as well as, and probably before,
approaching it in an empirical manner. Hegel does not deny that certain
fundamental categories may first present themselves to us in empirical
instances: we may take note of various numerical assemblages and quantita-
tive differences before we consider what it is to be numerous or quantified,
we may observe interactions before we consider what it is for anything to be
the cause of anything, and obviously we may observe and even formalize the
behaviour of mechanically interacting bodies, or of self-active, living bodies,
or the behaviour and inner activities of particular minds, before we ask what
it is to be inertly mechanical, or what it is to be living, or what, lastly, it is to
be conscious or self-conscious. But the logical treatment of these categories
is not a mere elevation into generality of what has thus been empirically
87
88 JOHN N. FINDLAY
distinguished: it is an entirely new, much sparer treatment, a sort of reduction

to a logical skeleton in which the empirical flesh vanishes altogether. Most
Hegelian commentators have barely risen to the austerity of his logical
strippings; they have generally retained a good deal of empirical flesh and
have then been astonished how it got there. That Hegel's whole logical stock-
in-trade consists of such severe abstractions as the positive and the negative,
the one and the many, the universal, the species and the instance, the
necessary and the contingent etc., they have been very far from realizing. I
myself have only fully understood the purity of the basic Hegelian abstrac-
tions in very recent years, and I shall use this occasion in trying to com-
municate what I have come to see.
Let me first outline what I conceive to be the whole pattern of the
Hegelian Logic: I may say that it is nothing but a series of stages in which the
Begriff, the Principle of Active, Concrete Universality, becomes explicitly the
Begriff, becomes, if one likes, the Begriff of the Begriff, or the selbstbegrei-
fende Begriff. On Hegel's view what absolutely is, is simply Universality as
Such, but a Universality which only is what it is because it includes Specificity
and Individuation as a subordinate mode of itself, because it is a Universality
endlessly specified and individuated. This absolute Universality operates in a
pure and detached form in thought, but it also operates in an obscure,
embedded form in external things, and it is the categories of such embedded
Universality that are studied in the two earlier, 'objective' parts of the Logic,
the Doctrine of Being and the Doctrine of Essence. It is the pure principle of
Universality which appears in such inadequate guises as Indeterminate and
Determinate Being, as Qualified and Quantified and Metric Being, as what is
Identical-in-Difference and Different-in-Identity, as what is Underlyingly
Essential and Superficially Manifest and the necessary union of both, as what
is Necessary and Contingent and Possible. What releases itself from all this
dance of forms is, however, the Begriff or Principle of Universality as Such,
now seen, not as an external linkage of Species and Instances, but as the
unifying principle without which specification or instantiation would not be
possible at all. This Begriff first reveals itself in a system of deterministic
mechanism where the behaviour and character of everything is rigorously
determined on general lines by the behaviour and character of everything else,
the Universal being the rigorous laws which pervade and link the whole
system. But this rigorous Wechselwirkung has its 'truth' in a Teleology where
it is a unifying End, rather than a set of compelling Laws, which pervades and
works through the whole: in Teleology the mechanistic laws, which there still
seem to be among mutually external things, must be brought together and
HEGELIAN TREATMENT OF BIOLOGY AND LIFE 89
connected. In thoroughgoing Teleology the whole is operative in all the parts,

nothing is externally coerced by anything, and the End is distinguished from
its logical ancestor, the Cause, in that it, and it alone, produces itself and only
itself. Ufe is simply Teleology 'collapsed into immediacy', a system where
wholeness and unity is everywhere at work, where the external becomes part
of the internal, and where all sides of the internal are merely the same Univer-
sality differently but not separately operative. But the immediacy of Ufe
necessarily leads on the still deeper and more magisterial unity which both
posits and overcomes diremption, in which detached Universality in the form
of subjective Thought and Will confronts embedded, materiate Universality
in the form of objective natural and social being, and in which the former
overcomes the latter in the activities of knowing and doing. In all this we have
nothing but the Universal distinguishing itself from specifications and
individuations, and also asserting its unqualified mastery over the latter, as
that of which they are only the parasitic adornments, instruments and
illustrations. This philosophy of dynamic Platonism will not recommend itself
to all, and I cannot argue for it on the present occasion: I can only make
lucid what I think it without question means and involves.
Let us now consider the dialectical phases which Hegel distinguishes in his
treatment of Ufe, the immediate expression of the Absolute Idea. Ufe is, as
we have said, a universality which absolutely dominates the specific and the
individual, the former being a set of distinct organic functions quite insepara-
ble from the total being to which they contribute, and which are constantly
modified to enable that being to be continued, and the latter being the
instantiations of that totality. In Life, as thus outlined, three interrelations of
the moments of Universality, Specificity and Individuality call for considera-
tion, which Hegel describes as 'processes', in some abstract, logical sense of
the word, and also as 'syllogisms'. The first of these process-syllogisms is the
immanent process of the living individual, conceived as in relation to an
objective environment. This represents the lower mechanistic expression of
the Idea, of which the living organism represents the transcendence, but not
specifically seen in its interaction with the latter. In this immanent organic
unity each organ and function, though specific, has something totalitarian
about it, and uses every other organ and function for its own support and
sustenance, is, in fact, the whole which it also specifies and instantiates. Hegel
tells us expressly that this intra-organismic commerce is not to be understood
in a purely mechanical or chemical fashion. The living organism, in so far as
it has mutually external parts, is capable of such mechanico-chemical
relations, but in so far as it functions mechanically or chemically it is also
90 JOHN N . FINDLAY
functioning inorganically, or in a dead manner. The inner teleology of Life

does not therefore consist in the mere use of mechanism for a purpose: the
organism is not a watch, though it may have watchlike aspects. In this
internal teleology Hegel distinguishes three overall functions of Sensitivity or
Receptivity, Irritability or Reactivity, and Self-Reproduction, and tries to
give to each an a priori notional warrant.
But the living teleological system not only confronts a non-teleological,
mechanico-chemical environment: it, as the higher expression of the Begri[[,
must necessarily endeavour to overcome and dominate the latter. It is aware
of the gulf between itself and the non-teleological environment in the
experience of need and pain, and it launches out from this to assimilate the
environment to itself, to make it as it wants it to be. The precise modification
inflicted on the environment depends on the instinctual make-up of the
organism, but that it should have instincts directed to remoulding the
environment is categorial, ineliminable, necessary. The living teleological
system is, in the third place, concerned, as pure Universality, to transcend the
mere contingency of its individual embodiment: instantiated it must be, but
not necessarily or solely in this living body. It therefore extends itself as a
genus of mutually external instances, and connects its instantiations by
various genetic relations. What these are is essentially an empirical matter, but
the generic and the genetic are categorial features of living universality. It is
in fact at this point that living Universality passes over into the two-sided
Universality of Subject and Object. There can never be an adequate indivi-
dualization of living Universality in any number of living generations,
however prolonged: it achieves, however, another sort of individualization in
the thinking mind, in which guise it can stand over against the inadequate
individualization it achieves in the outside world, and can take up the latter
into the former. It is a very wonderful transformation when the endless
stream of biological generations, whose serial form is given concreteness by,
without being identical with, a series of generations in time, gives rise, in a
logically grounding rather than a temporally causative sense, to the static,
non-serial perfection of a species in thought, and shows us with what logical
purity Hegel thought of the dialectical phases in question. They are called
Life and Cognition, but they are only as close to Life and Cognition as we
ordinarily understand them as an abstract equation is to the wealth of
phenomena that it formalizes. Life is, as it were, Universality drowned in the
Specificity and Individuality which it also needs, whereas Cognition is Univer-
sality which has come out of specific-instantial immersion, but which still
drips with what it has come out of. My images will antagonize many, and
seem anthropomorphic, but what they picture is the varied forms of that
distinction-without-separation which analytic thought hates, and which is the
central feature of Hegelianism.
I shall now go over to the treatment of Life and the Life-sciences we
encounter in the Phenomenology. Here Hegel is dealing with Life as an
object of Consciousness which emerges after Consciousness has been dealing
with the world of phenomenal natural things, and seeing it as the theatre in
which unmanifest powers and laws are forever displaying themselves. Con-
templating Nature in this manner, it has gone beyond sundered moments of
the Begriff to the Begriff: it has been the Begriff as a Universality which is
forever specifying itself and individualizing itself, and in which none of the
Begriff's constituent moments, and their living interplay, can be separated
from the others. This living Begriff is, however, as much Consciousness itself
as Consciousness's object, and, in contemplating it, Consciousness, the faculty
of liberated, active Universality, is in a sense only contemplating itself. The
Begriff, qua object of Consciousness, is, however, first invested with traits
reminiscent of the sensuous externality which has belonged to its former
objects, and, seen in this manner, it is Life, the defmiteness which is always
melting into indefiniteness and the out-thereness which has also all the lack
of out-thereness which marks inner-life interpenetration. As Hegel puts it:
The determination of Life as it arises out of the Notion or general result which we
encountered on entering this sphere, is sufficient to characterize it without attempting to
develop its nature further: it is a circle embracing the following moments. Its essence is
infmity as the supersession of all differences, the pure revolution about an axis, the rest
of its own absolutely restless infmity, the very self-sufficiency in which the differences
of motion are dissolved, the simple essence of time which in this inner uniformity has
the solid shape of space. Differences, however, are just as much present as differences in
this simple universal medium, since this universal fluidity only has its negative nature in
so far as it abolishes such differences: differences must be there if differences are to be
abolished. But this fluidity, as self-sufficient uniformity, is itself the subsistence or the
substance of these differences, in which they occur as distinct members and independent
parts. Their being no longer has the meaning of being in the abstract, nor their pure
essence the meaning of abstract universality: their being is just the simple fluid substance
of pure movement in itself (Phdn [H, 1937], pp. 135-136). [Trans. by 1. N. F.].
The word that encapsulates the sense of this paragraph and of several
others that follow it is the word Fliissigkeit, Fluidity: Life is Flux as a pure
concept. It is a flux in which there are differences which assert themselves
against the flux, which mean to be determinate, specific, separately individual.
These self-asserting differences are, however, the mere instruments of a
mightier self-assertion, one which has posited such differences only in order
92 JOHN N. FINDLAY
to abolish them, to make them pass into one another, to be the pure negativity
that it is in the process of negating them all. The many differences involved in
Life do not even pretend to the separateness and self-sufficiency of solid,
inorganic things: they are there only to have their separateness and self-
sufficiency and even clear character denied, to become mere points of passage
in an unbroken motion. The teleology of the living organism simply consists
in its denial of substantial separateness, even of determinate character to its
parts: they are there only to be modified, to be bye-passed, to be swept
through and swept away. Nowhere has anyone put forward so stably unstable
and so purely logical an account of life in which structure rests on funda-
mental structurelessness: beside it the Platonic-Aristotelian accounts of Life
as the Self-moving seem hopelessly gross and inadequate. But they make
sense, for they constitute an image of that being-no-one-in-particular which is
also the possibility of being-anyone-and-everyone which is somehow the
deepest essence of our conscious personal being: life in the more defmite
medium of what exists out there is a monogram, an analogue, of that more
ultimate indefmiteness that we experience as ourselves.
Hegel develops his account of Life at a later stage of the Phenomenology
(Phiin [H, 1937], pp. 193-221) where he is discussing the observation of
organic phenomena. Here he maintains the interesting thesis that the teleology
of life, where it is present, essentially transcends natural law: there is rigorous
law connecting acids with bases, but there is no rigorous law connecting cold
climates with hairy pelts, or fluid media with the shapes of fishes. Organisms
do indeed adapt themselves to the environmental situation in which they
arise, but this does not causally produce their peculiarities, and they evince
their freedom from it by having many non-adaptive characters, some anti-
cipating the adaptations of other types of organisms or harking back to the
same. (Hegel does not believe in organismic evolution in time, but his logical
arrangement of species none the less has an evolutionary cast.) The duck-billed
platypus, which Hegel does not seem to have heard of, is a typical example of
Hegelian freedom. Arid not only are organisms ~ot products of the environ-
ment, but they produce no uniform products but themselves: it is they them-
selves which they alone produce and reproduce. An organism may be stimu-
lated by the environment into doing this or that, but, unless this stimulation
passes over into inorganic violence, what the organism does is solely what
suits its own programme, what is part of its repertoire, what is in short itself.
Organisms in short use the natural objects around them, they incorporate
them and their dead properties to some extent into themselves, they feed on
them, they walk on them, they play with them etc., but in all this they make
external objects their own: the objects which surround organisms never use
organisms, on the other hand, since they have no programmes, no directed
procedures, into whose service organisms can be impressed. These are
elementary points, but they seem, none the less, to have eluded most contem-
porary philosophers.
Hegel also thinks that, while we may properly distinguish the specific
bodily structures of organisms, their brain-structures, muscular structures
etc., from the universal organic functions which work in and through these
structures, it is quite wrong to think of these as correlated aspects of organic
being somehow connected by laws of nature. The structures of brain,
intestines, muscles are nothing apart from the uses, the indwelling purposes to
which they are put: we can no more study them to throw light on integrated
organic functions than we can throw light on the semantics of sentences by
a mere examination of their syntactical make-up. The uses to which such
structures are put are, however, ineliminably universal, and this means that an
organism can always shift its exploration or reaction or self-maintenance from
one structure to another. It is indifferent, Hegel tells us, to the stream of life
what manner of mills it drives (Phiin [H, 1937], p. 211). The freedom of
organic nature is in fact such as neither to obey the rigours which bind
physical substances in physico-chemical necessity, nor the dialectical laws
which govern the development of conscious spirit. Organic nature reveals only
rudiments of laws, suggestions of order and sequence, amusing and specious
relationships, in which the most serious statement that is ever made is that
something has a 'great influence' on something else (Phiin [H, 1937]
p. 220f). Since Hegel's day there has been a great rlevelopment in the life-
sciences and social sciences, but what he says is as true today as it was in
his time. There is not a single rigorous biological or psychological or psycho-
physical or sociological law on record, only rudiments of all these things,
given undue prominence by those who hope to assimilate the sciences of
life to the sciences of lifeless things. When will scientists and philosophers
give up this vain endeavour, and learn to study life as life and not as a
peculiarly complex case oflifelessness? I believe myself that only a revolution
in thought and life, one that radically demotes experimental science and
manipulative technology will do the trick. We are in need of a radical de-
Baconization of thought and life.
From the more fundamental treatments of Life which occur in the Logic
and the Phenomenology, I pass on to consider Hegel's treatment of Life as a
natural phenomenon. The 'Organics' is the third part of the Naturphilosophie,
and in this work we start dialectically with the Notion, the Principle of
94 JOHN N. FINDLAY
Universality, in its extreme impotence and self-alienation, in a state where

it seems lost in a set of mutually indifferent individuals, whose unity is some-
thing sought for rather than actually realized, being manifest only in the
tendency of bodies to group themselves about gravitational centers which
themselves are outside of them. We then progress through the stage of
Physics, in which there are all sorts of relations among specific natural bodies
which force them into various strait-jacketed unities, such as the magnetic,
the electrical and the chemical, but from which it is possible for them to
spring back into their old looseness of association and merely mechanical
interdependence. In chemical action we are, Hegel tells us, on the verge of
life, for the acid and the base have practically an organic relation to one
another, which only falls short of true organism because for them separate
existence comes as easy as combination, and because it is only an external
intrusion which brings them together or forces them apart. If acid and base
went in quest of one another like male and female, and sustained their union
against interferences and reproduced it in novel cases, they would be organic
instead of being the half-way house to organism that they are. Their defective
unity is also a falling short of teleology: their unity is not the self-directed,
self-maintaining thing we find in organic unity, and, while not causal and
mechanical, depends too much on external chances to be classed as truly
purposive. In the living organism, however, everything in the individual and
its relation to the environment, and in the successive generations of indivi-
duals, reflects the same generic unity, which in all internal or external change
only brings forth itself. The organic sphere is then divided by Hegel into
the Geological, the Botanical and the Zoological spheres, which we must
separately consider.
As regards the geological part of 'Organics', one is inclined to feel that
Hegel included it only because he needed three dialectical phases in his treat-
ment of Life. He says that Geological Nature is only the ground, the basis
of life, that it ought to be Life, individuality, subjectivity, but that it does not
bring its different members into unity: it is even described as a crystal, a
skeleton, which can be regarded as dead because its members still seem to
subsist formally on their own, while the geological process falls outside of
them (PN, § 337, Z). A careful reading of the paragraphs and Zusiitze dealing
with Geological Nature shows, however, that Hegel does attribute a sort of
rudimentary life to the earth, the Universal Individual, and that he makes it
break forth into manifestations which, though brief, can only by described as
organic. We are told that
this crystal of Life, the inanimate organism of the earth, which has its notion in the
sidereal connections outside of it, but possesses its own peculiar process as a presupposed
past, is the immediate subject of the meteorological process, through which this subject,
as in itself the totality of life, no longer becomes merely an individual shape but is
fructified into vitality. Land and especially sea, as thus the real possibility of life,
perpetually erupt at every point into punctiform, transitory life-forms, lichens, infusoria,
and, in the sea, countless hosts of phosphorescent points of life. But it is just because
generatio aequivoca has this objective organism outside it, that it is restricted to this
punctiform organization, does not develop internally into a specifically articulated
organism, or reproduce itself ex ovo (PN, § 341).
There are accordingly flashes of life in the earth and the elements surrounding
the earth which do not develop into lasting individuality, or the even longer
lasting life of the species, but represent something more than chemico-
mechanical materiality, having perhaps a spontaneity of origin and a brief
self-maintenance of which inert matter is incapable. It is surely a great pity
that generatio aequivoca, so unequivocally real to Aristotle and Hegel, has
since been rendered so dubious: it should on general principles have been
true. The doctrine that omne vivum ex vivo smells inexpugnably of the
analytic Understanding. Modern science has, however, not failed to find
forms of quasi-life which bridge the gulf between the organic and inorganic.
Viruses are now the front-line candidates for this position, and I do not doubt
that there will be others. But instead of being used to show chemistry and
mechanism transcending themselves, I have no doubt that they will be used
by some as but one more 'proof' ofthe mechanico-chemical nature of life.
From the Geological Organism we proceed to the Plant-Organism. Here it
would appear that we have one of the many cases where the dialectic is best
read backwards, where what comes later is necessary for the understanding of
what comes earlier. We can only understand what Hegel has to say about
plants by going on to what he has to say about animals. The animal organism
is the organism fully actualized, the plant merely approaches animality in an
inadequate manner, and falls short of it in ways that are only significant by
contrast with animality. In the animal the moment of Universality is present
in two fashions: on the one hand in the fluid organization of parts and
functions, which have no fixed, separate character, on the other hand in a
sort of rudimentary subjectivity, involving centralized feeling rather than
cognition, into which all its specific differentiations are taken back. The
animal not only is universal, but after a fashion feels its own universality. In
the plant, on the other hand, there is no such detached, centralized univer-
sality: in so far as plants have a centralized self, this lies not in themselves,
but in the light towards which they tend, and on which they depend for the
96 JOHN N. FINDLAY
full development of their functions. In the animal, likewise, Universality

specifies itself quite differently in different parts and organs, and though all
these are systematically coordinated, and can in some situations take on each
others' functions, they are not simply interchangeable. In the plant, however,
the total organic nature is not differently present, or not very differently
present, in its various parts, and hence each part can readily become
independent, or can take on the functions of another part. The animal,
likewise, having its own complexly specified pattern stands in strong contrast
to the mechanico-chemical environment, and can accordingly move about in
it: the plant, with its much lesser internal differentiation, and consequently
less differentiation from the unorganized environment, cannot prise itself
loose from the latter. The animal, strongly relieved from its environmental
background, has its characteristic temperature which it maintains whether it
is hot or cold outside: there is, Hegel thinks, no analogue of animal warmth
in the plant. The animal nourishes itself by consuming parts of the environ-
ment at times suitable to itself: the rooted plant cannot help taking in
nourishment as long as the nourishment is there. Animals have voice, which,
like their self-feeling and bodily heat, reflects their rounded individuality,
whereas plants only produce sounds mechanically after the fashion of
inorganic things. Animals, finally, reproduce their kind only by the coming
together of sexually differentiated members of the same genus, whereas
plants have a large number of less dramatic ways of preserving and multiply
instantiating generic identity.
Hegel's comparison of plants and animals is an expanded version of
Aristotle, but the essential point made is that instances of animality have an
individuality lacking in instances of plant-nature. What does Hegel mean by
this 'individuality' which he also connects with Subjectivity and Being-for-
self? He plainly means that being a certain sort of animal is in some sense
being both differentiated and rounded off: an instance of animality does not
combine with other instances into an equally valid instantial unity, or break
up into other similar subordinate units, but is a complete unit, and the genus
present in it is a universal operating through a number of such complete units.
This sort of individuality is not the mere Einzelnheit of instantiation which is
one of the moments of the Begriff: it is an Einzelnheit of instantiation which
after a fashion measures up to the universal it instantiates, nothing more or
less being thus adequate or necessary, whereas the universal thus instantiated
has built into it the need for just such a matching instance. The individuality
represented by animal life is a stage of the Idea greatly underemphasized in
Hegel's Logic, much as he also underemphasizes the finite conscious person
or Ego, of which it is the dialectical predecessor. But plainly it is in the well-

rounded individual organism, or finite personal mind, unified, differentiated
and inexhaustibly rich, that the Absolute Idea has its most concrete fulftl-
ment, rather than in any part or aspect which is a mere part or aspect, or in
some universal sum total which is only a bad infinite, never complete. Plato
ended by making his prime universals the ideas of natural units and particularly
of living things, and it is in this sort of view that Hegel, with equally unclear
emphasis, really ends.
Of the detail of Hegel's treatment of plants and animals I shall not say
much because a great deal of it is too empirically intricate for a scientifically
ill-versed person like myself. A great deal of Hegel's philosophical botany
comes from Goethe's essays on the Morphology and Metamorphosis of Plants,
where much is said as to the way in which plants fail to subordinate their
parts to any total pattern, or as to the way in which one sort of part can, in
appropriate circumstances, be transformed into another. A root is a sort of
branch and vice versa, calices are sorts of leaves and so are fruits and their
rinds, petals are sorts of calices, pistils and stamens sorts of petals, and so on.
Hegel found his own dialectical principles in Goethe's ingenious biological
speculations. Plant-life for him further organizes itself under the three heads
distinguished in the Logic, the heading of internal organization, of the
relation of the plant to the external environment and of reproductive genus-
maintenance. In internal organization we see the plant dirempting itself into
distinct parts, tissues and fluids, growing into a mature specimen and adding
a finial to its structure in the bud which is also the rudiment of a new
individual. In the relation to the environment we see the plant responding to
fire (i.e. light and heat), air and water, and assimilating them to its imperfect
selfhood. And finally in the genus-process we have an imperfect realization of
sexual specification which only makes the sex-characters distinct without
realizing them in distinct individuals, and which, being imperfect, is also
superfluous, so that the plant can quite well reproduce its kind without going
through the elaborate rituals of sexual union.
Hegel's treatment of animals has been anticipated in his contrasted treat-
ment of plants, but the details of Structure, Assimilation and Genus-process
are vastly more complex. We have a detailed discussion of Sensibility, Irrita-
bility and Reproduction as the three basic dimensions of animal existence,
of which only the third is realized in plants. What plants undergo or do is all
a part of their perpetual self-reinstatement in one or more individuals,
whereas animals have somewhat of a comprehensive sense of what they are
undergoing, and also a comprehensive total reaction to the latter. These three
98 JOHN N. FINDLAY
dimensions of animality realize themselves in three bodily systems: the

nervous system, cerebro-spinal and sympathetic, is primarily sensitive; the
muscular and circulatory systems are primarily 'irritable', reactive, whereas
the digestive system with its glands and intestines is primarily 'reproductive'
(in a sense which includes self-maintenance). The animal organism also
organizes itself into individually structured members, head, hand, eye, liver,
etc. in each of which there is a sensitive, a reactive and a sexual aspect. I was
unaware that, e.g., the liver might be an erogenous zone, but on reflection
cannot see why it should not be, even if I feel nothing sexual about it. All
these structured systems and parts are involved in an endless, immensely
complex process, each making use of the others and consuming them in its
own interest.
The immanent structural process of the animal organism is nothing with-
out the Assimilation to which Hegel gives the meaning of any sort of mastery
over the environment, or of the imprinting of self on the latter. Such imprint-
ing of self occurs in the various processes of sense-perception: though one
speaks as if, in sense-perception, the environment imprinted itself on the
animal, the case is rather that the animal assimilates the environment to itself,
transforms the latter into an inner, qualitative affection of its own. Such
need-assimilation does not involve conscious goal-foresight: it is therefore
denominated 'instinctive', implanted, being wrongly ascribed to an external
intelligence. This leads Hegel on to an elaborate study of defecation, which
for him represents the organism getting rid of its own aggression against the
environment, rather than merely of the environmental material that it has
been unable to use. In defecation we do not merely eject waste material, but
our own digestive juices also: we are like writers tearing up drafts after their
manuscript has been typed. Defecation leads on bewilderingly to the con-
structive instinct, which is really a high-grade form of defecation in which
the organism adds a little gratuitous beauty or utility to what it has defecated,
e.g. the spider and its web, the bee and its honey, etc. The reproduction of
living offspring is constructive defecation carried to a yet higher level. One
can only regret that Freud knew nothing of these scatological passages. He
would find that he was not the first to find depths and mysteries in
defecation.
If defecation of various sorts is the highest form of organic assimilation,
death is the highest achievement of the organism's generative activities. Its
sexual activities end, in principle, in its own death: it has produced another
embodiment of its genus, and can now rest in peace. Its necessary aggressions
against the environment, and particularly against individuals of other species,
likewise end, in principle, in death by violence, whereas its mere continuance

in existence leads either to the milder disharmony of disease, or to the final
discord of natural death. This stress on death in the last section of the Natur-
philosophie anticipates Heidegger as well as Freud. Only that, for Hegel, the
death of the individual points the way to the immortal life of mind, and not
to the less differentiated quiet of inorganic existence.
A few remarks must suffice on Hegel's treatment of sex, the struggle for
existence, and disease and death. Hegel sees in sex the Genus asserting itself
over the Species and the Individual: members of the same kind, irremediably
specified as to sex, seek to overcome both the one-sidedness of their sexuality
and their individuality, by copulating with another member of the opposite
sex. The outcome, unfortunately, is not the pure Genus, which Tristan and
Isolde might have achieved in their Liebestod, but another individual of the
same species, endowed with all the sexual and individual specificity which
condemns him to further copulative proceedings, and so on to the 'bad
infinite' of the generative treadmill. It is only in thought that the genus can
exist in its purity, and procreation is therefore an endlessly inadequate
substitute for thought. But Animality as Such not only specifies itself
sexually within one genus, but in the interspecific differences of the various
species of animals. Here Hegel believes, without any Darwinian background,
in an endless necessary struggle for existence among animal species, and in
a necessary development of those organs with which each attacks each or
defends itself against each (as well, of course, as of the organs with which it
attacks the environment). The purely logical differentiation of the Zoological
Idea into various specific forms of animal necessarily goes with a mutual
preying of organism on organism, which, taken together with the necessary
deficiencies of the environment, makes animal existence violent, insecure,
anxious and unhappy (PN, § 368, Remark). It is apparently only at the
human level, in the mutual recognition of developed social intercourse, that
this primal violence and unhappiness can be overcome. Hegel had not seen the
great Central African parks where mutual tolerance rather than predation
seems the rule of existence, and where only the members of the cat-family
seem concerned to break this rule.
The struggle for existence among species transfers itself, however, to the
interior of the animal organism, where various organisms or functions become
entrenched in their self-sufficiency and become enemies to each other and to
the whole: disease, therefore, is deeply natural, and is not some accidental
falling-short of the Zoological Idea. But the Zoological Idea also displays
itself in the fever which, by reducing all vital functions to fluidity, humbles
100 JOHN N. FIND LA Y
the hubris of the diseased function or organ, and makes a cure possible. The
Zoological Idea is, however, powerless against the individual's slow hardening
in habit, which is the essence of growing old: growing less and less responsive
to the environment, living more and more in the past, the organism becomes
more and more like a dead thing. But, as we have said, "the goal of Nature is
to destroy itself and to break through its husk of immediate sensuous exis-
tence, to consume itself like the phoenix in order to come forth from this
externality rejuvenated as spirit" (PN, § 376, Z).
I have now come to the end of Hegel's treatment of Life and the Life-
Sciences. I would comment, not only on the richness of its detail, and of its
application of logical principle to that detail, but also on its general metho-
dology. Hegel is neither a rationalist nor an empiricist: the basic forms of
Life are logical differentiations of a single categorial conception, but he does
not disdain to show us how these basic forms are further specified with
infinitely rich, empirical contingency. Hegel is also neither a mechanist nor a
vitalist. Life for him is led up to by processes which fall short of Life itself
and is at all times dependent on such processes, it is itself a series of stages
which lead up to and depend on one another, and it itself leads up to Spirit
which, while transcending it, never breaks with it nor loses its dependence on
it. Hegel's conceptual presuppositions are arguably those of a truly rational
biology, not those of a biology intent of making nonsense of its own subject-
matter and ultimately of itself.
Boston University
GEORGE DI GIOVANNI
MORE COMMENTS ON THE PLACE OF THE ORGANIC

IN HEGEL'S PHILOSOPHY OF NATURE
I shall come shortly to Findlay's paper.! First, for reasons that will become
apparent later, I want to broaden somewhat the scope of his discussion. It
must be remembered that the 'organic', before appearing in the Philosophy
of Nature as a form of the natural world, is already present in the Logic
as one of the determinations of thought;2 and the question I now want to
consider is whether, after Hegel's treatment of it as logical category, it can
still have legitimate meaning in the context of the Philosophy of Nature.
Speaking briefly and lucidly about Hegel's Logic always presents, of course,
virtually insurmountable difficulties. But I think that I can make my point
with reasonable clarity using Kant as a point of reference. His Transcendental
Logic had been built on a distinction between the concept of an object in
general, such as would be obtained by reflecting upon the requirements of
intelligibility that thought makes upon its object, and the concept of an
object of experience. 3 The two were by no means identical, for an object of
experience was ex hypothesi sensible; and although it too, in order to make
genuine science possible, would have had to satisfy the general conditions of
intelligibility, in its case these also had to be shown to be facts of experience.
As long as one proceeded along reflective lines to determine what, in principle,
constituted an intelligible object, one had no guarantees that such an object
would in fact be realized in experiences, or that these, as Hume had in fact
denied, were in fact a fitting subject of science. The big problem that thus
faced the critical Kant was precisely to demonstrate that the concept of an
object in general (as reflectively determined) was also a valid determination of
the immediate objects of experience.
Whether Kant in fact resolved the problem, or whether it was even possible
for him to resolve it on his principles, is a question that does not concern us
here. But it is instructive to note how Hegel managed to avoid altogether the
need of demonstrating the legitimacy of a transition from reflection to actual
experience. What had led Kant to differentiate between object in general and
object of experience had been. precisely the immediacy that characterized
experiences and that he thought detracted from their intelligibility. Hegel
realized, instead, that the same immediacy is in fact a necessary condition of
all objectivity; and while one could distinguish between types of objects,
101
102 GEORGE DI GIOV ANNI
some being more intelligible than others, the difference between them was to
be measured not by the extent they were free from immediacy, but by the
degree to which they explicitly incorporated it as an integral moment of their
being per se. 4 In other words, immediacy is for Hegel just as much a moment
of thought-life as it is of sensible experience: it should be possible, therefore,
to demonstrate from within thought itself, and on reflective terms, that a
constant transition from the immediate to the reflective and vice versa is
both possible and necessary. Once this point has been speculatively
established, and the need to justify the existential relevance of thought is thus
in principle absolved, one is free to consider whatever particular problem the
interplay between immediacy and reflection poses in a given sphere of
experience in terms that are appropriate to such a sphere. The resolution of
the problem no longer calls for the impossible task of 'applying' reflective
categories to the immediate content of experience.
Unless this point is understood, the form that Hegel's Logic assumes does
not make any sense. Its goal is to develop the idea of 'concept' and this goal
is to be realized by means of the highest possible reflection. It is clear, more-
over, that for Hegel this reflection represents the most accomplished case of
a free act; and that, in virtue of its freedom, it encompasses in principle all
things. Like Aristotle's soul, Hegel's self-thinking thought is potentially a
whole world. But precisely for this reason, the Logic opens with the category
of Being, an indeterminate somewhat which is more the intimation of an
object than anything actually recognizable. It is the form the thought itself
must first assume in front of its own reflective glance inasmuch as, since in
the reflection the distinction between itself as subject and itself as object
becomes strictly relative, what its limits as thought actually are becomes a
thoroughly open question. Thought must discover what it itself is: it re-
enacts, albeit in a highly abstract and reflectively controlled conceptual
medium, the same interplay between subject and object at work at any level
of experience. It is difficult not to refer once more back to Kant. He had
been right, after all, in arguing against Descartes that the Cogito does not
offer to philosophical reflection an especially indubitable source of certainty,5
for even thought, in order to know itself, would have to objectify itself. But
it then would have to treat itself as 'other' just like any other object. Kant,
however, had taken this peculiarity of conscious life to mean that logical
reflection is strictly formal, and that in order to be relevant to the rest of
experience, its determinations needed the complement of an extraneous,
empirical material. Hegel interpreted it, instead, in a directly opposite
manner. For him it meant that thought, even at its most reflective level,
ON THE ORGANIC IN HEGEL'S PHILOSOPHY OF NATURE 103
already exhibits the structure of all experiences; and that it is in a position,

therefore, to indicate their speculative value without having to be extra-
polated beyond its reflective limits.
In relation to experience in general, therefore, Hegel's Logic represents the
highest form of rationality possible within it. One can also say that the Logic
demonstrates the possibility of experience: not in the sense, however, that
the determinations of an object it reflectively establishes are such that one
can then legitimately use them to categorize the content of experience; but
in the sense that, as the Logic develops the idea of thought, it also completes
and epitomizes experience. The distinction Kant maintained, therefore,
between categories of the understanding and ideas of reason becomes
meaningless in the context of Hegel's Logic. None of the categories of the
latter can be exhibited in sensible experience, for they are all idealizations.
They all are, nonetheless, existentially relevant, for they express possibilities
which are in fact implicit in experience. The point might seem over-ingenious;
and it might be argued that Hegel ignored altogether the critical concern,
which had been uppermost in Kant's mind, of denying that one can deter-
mine on the strength of thought alone what actually exists. A preoccupation
of this sort, however, has meaning only in relation to a dogmatic frame of
mind: only if one expects objects of reflection to have other than purely ideal
existence. It is misplaced when directed to Hegel's Logic, for the only
existential claim the latter makes concerns thought itself. There is only one
body, after all, which responds to the determinations of the Logic, and that is
nature itself inasmuch as, as transformed by the medium of reflection, it is
expressly conceived as the context within which reason can emerge.
But with this last remark I am back to my original question, and also to
Professor Findlay's paper. I too admire the lucidity and accuracy of Hegel's
categories, especially those that have to do with 'life'. I am not ready to
extend the praise, however, to include the pseudo-scientific reconstruction of
the cosmos along organic lines that Hegel offers in his Philosophy of Nature.
The categories of 'life' as developed in the LC!gic are indeed a paragon of
rationality that would make the corresponding 'Baconian' conceptualizations
appear to be the product of a mind "intent on making nonsense (in the words
of Professor Findlay) of its own subject and ultimately of itself." But then
Hegel's categories ought to be perfectly rational, for they are ex professo the
product of pure reflection. I submit that these categories alone would be the
only kernel of reason left if one were to abstract in the Philosophy of Nature
from the mass of sundry items of empirical information and misinformation
that Hegel collects under the general heading of 'life'. And what I have just
104 GEORGE DI GIOVANNI
said about the categories of 'life' in the Philosophy of Nature would apply as
well to the rest of it. I find it difficult, in other words, to consider the place
that the 'organic' might have in Hegel's Philosophy of Nature, for I do not
accept the latter as a legitimate piece of philosophical thinking. I do not mean
to say, of course, that after Hegel's Logic there is no room left for a specula-
tive, even philosophical, study of nature.6 My point is that, since the Logic has
vindicated the speculative value of all experiences, even the most immediate
among them, after it we should be ready to explore the sense that emerges
out of our transactions with actual nature in a manner and with conceptual
means that respect the immediacy of such transactions. This is not what Hegel
does in his Philosophy of Nature. At worst, he simply uses logical categories
in order to classify data gathered elsewhere. At best, he manages to throw
upon nature a human proflle: I mean to say, he interprets it as if it were an
extension of the human body, attributing relative value to its many appear-
ances according as they approximate the perfection of existence achieved in
thought. An exercise of this sort might have a proper place and some value.
It does not help us learn, however, about nature itself (something, incident-
ally, that the 'Baconian' concepts which Professor Findlay decries might well
do); and while it might prove instructive about the ways of the spirit, even in
this respect it does not add anything to what the Logic has already taught.
Rudolf Haym said of the Phenomenology of Spirit that it was at once
Transcendental Psychology and History of Culture, and that the mixture of
the two made for a completely imaginary account of the rise of man's spirit. 7
In a similar vein, one could say of Hegel's Philosophy of Nature that it
represents an illegitimate extrapolation of logical reflection. But it must be
noted that Kant too, no less than Hegel, had tried to determine a priori the
properties of nature; and that his Transcendental Logic required, for reasons
inherent to its very conception, that its categories be extended to encompass
an empirical material. Kant needed a Metaphysics of Nature for basically the
same reason he needed a Transcendental Deduction of the categories - viz.,
in order to demonstrate the de facto relevance of his logic to the process of
experience. Hegel's Logic, however, as I have pointed out, circumvented this
need of Kant. The use, therefore, to which Hegel puts the categories of the
Logic in the Philosophy of Nature is specious not only per se, but also from
the point of view of the Logic itself. Of course, saying that Hegel was wrong
when he needed not be and that he was not in the clear with respect to his
own conception of the system, might not appear at all flattering to his
apologists. But it is an important point to make if one wants to adjudicate
the nature and the value of Hegel's contribution to German Idealism. From a
strictly historical point of view, we are today especially equipped to under-

stand how Hegel got to his final position. Recent studies on his development
during the Jena years throw a very interesting light on the process by which
he came to formulate by stages the idea and the outline of his later System. 8
We know, for instance - if I may summarize in a few words what is in fact
a very complex situation - that at Jena Hegel began by distinguishing
between logic and metaphysics, and had assigned to the former the function
of justifying dialectically the starting point of the latter by demonstrating the
insufficiency of alternative positions. He gradually collapsed the two
together, attributing positive speculative value to the dialectical method he
had first used in the logic for purely critical purposes. The result was the
creation of a new speculative logic which, while consisting essentially of a
reflection of thought upon itself, provided nonetheless a positive doctrine of
being. We also know that the form this logic finally assumed was very much
influenced by the reflections, in which Hegel was engaged during the same
years, on matters which were later to be incorporated as part of the System
under the headings of Philosophy of Nature and Philosophy of Spirit. Some
of the more concrete notions that Hegel had included in the metaphysics
were relegated eventually to the two other parts of the System, while new
categories were introduced in order to provide a complete series of logical
counterparts to the notions in the Philosophy of Nature and the Philosophy
of Spirit. The process of evolution extended well beyond the Jena years. At
the end, however, the content of the Logic dovetailed pretty well with the
Philosophy of Nature and the Philosophy of Spirit. At that point, Hegel
might well have thought to have finally a logical blueprint on the basis of
which the whole of nature and history could be interpreted as the outward
manifestation of absolute thought. And so in fact they were in the
Enzyklopadie of 1817.
But was this really the case? Was the possibility of a System the true
meaning of Hegel's newly discover-ed logic? It is instructive to reflect on the
official reason that Hegel gave in 1804, at a time when he had in fact already
hit upon the idea of 'thought' which was to control his mature logic, for the
need of a transition from the then Metaphysics to the Philosophy of Nature. 9
The alleged reason is that, by the end of the Metaphysics, spirit has been
actualized only in the sense that the idea is finally "it hand, which expresses
the movement of 'remaining oneself while becoming the other' in which its
life consists. The idea is itself the highest expression of this movement; and
Hegel can say, therefore, that as spirit actualizes itself in the Metaphysics, it
becomes Idea. But spirit does not yet recognize itself. It is not yet spirit for
106 GEORGE DI GIOVANNI
itself, for it still has to realize its own idea by exhibiting it in the immediacy
of nature and eventually (I presume) in the vicissitudes of history. Hence the
transition to the Philosophy of Nature, which Hegel justifies as the first step
in the process of realization.
Now, Hegel's alleged reason is a highly disturbing one. Philosophically,
it suggests a strange model on his part regarding the nature and the limits of
reflection. Unless one seriously expects one's awareness of oneself, and the
process that has led up to it, to become itself a 'person' (somewhat in the
manner of a Trinitarian procession), it is difficult to see how else such aware-
ness could be realized except as idea, viz., in the medium of abstract con-
ceptualization. Anything else would involve suspending the stance of specula-
tive thought, and becoming engaged instead in the concerns of actual
existence. Historically, Hegel's words evoke issues from past debates between
Fichte and Schelling that he was in fact in a position to silence once and for
all. I am referring to the controversy regarding the possibility of a philosophy
of nature that Schelling upheld and Fichte denied. Schelling had argued that
his speCUlations on nature were needed in order to provide a more concrete
counterpart to the otherwise purely abstract reflections of the Wissen-
schaftslehre; and Fichte had retorted by saying that it was wrong-headed,
perhaps even dangerous, to try to recognize the process of thought in the
appearances of nature, and that Schelling's attempts, in any event, lacked
seriousness for they too were, and could not help being, the products of
reflection.! 0 Now, Hegel could have silenced both Fichte and Schelling by
pointing out to each that his Logic was indeed only an idealization, yet,
because of the continuity of ideal reflection and natural becoming, it
provided the only purely reflective understanding of nature possible.
In brief, exactly when Hegel thought he had found a way of realizing the
System which had been, in one way or other, the ideal of all his predecessors,
he had in fact achieved an understanding of reason that opened it to all
experiences, and made irrelevant the very notion of a systematic reconstruc-
tion of reality. As a response to an apology for Hegel's Philosophy of Nature,
this amounts to saying that Hegel's merit is not to have succeeded where
modern empirical sciences have failed, but on the contrary, to have provided
the conceptual means for understanding the nature of such sciences, and the
speculative value of the knowledge they provide.
McGill University
Montreal
NOTES
1 This paper was originally prepared, thirteen years ago, as a comment on Professor
Findlay's 'The Place of the Organic in Hegel's Philosophy of Nature'. I have revised it
somewhat and updated it for publication.
2 That is, in the Logic of 1812-16, in the third part of the third book, as the first form
that Idea assumes.
3 This distinction is not usually adverted to by commentators. It is nonetheless crucial
to Kant. Without it, for instance, he could not legitimately claim to be able to think of
the thing-in-itself as affecting the mind, yet disclaim to understand the nature of the
relation involved. As applied to the thing-in-itself and the mind, the cause-effect relation
remains unschematized. It is used in the abstract sense of a determination of an object in
general. Cf., for instance, Critique of Pure Reason, A290/B346-47.
4 Immediacy appears at every stage of the Logic, but has a different meaning in each
depending on the specific form thought assumes. For the way immediacy re-asserts itself
at the end of the Logic, cf. Wissenschaft der Logik, vol. II (Hamburg, Meiner, 1963),
pp. 499 ff. I have tried to illustrate the place of immediacy in Hegel's Logic using some
specific texts as my basis in two papers: 'Reflection and Contradiction: A Commentary
on some Passages of Hegel's Logic', Hegel-Studien 8 (1973),131-61; 'The Category of
Contingency in the Hegelian Logic', in Art and Logic in Hegel's Philosophy, eds. W. E.
Steinkraus and K. L. Schmitz (Atlantic Highlands, New Jersey, Humanities Press; Brigh-
ton, Sussex, Harvester Press, 1980), pp. 179-200.
5 Critique of Pure Reason, A347/B405-A348/B406; A354-55; B423, note.
6 This was Croce's position. Cf. Logica come scienza del concetto puro (Bari, Laterza,
1958; first ed. 1909), pp.13 ff., 21-24.
7 Hegel und seine Zeit [1857] (Hildesheim, Georg Olms, 1962), pp. 240 ff. I am in no
way endorsing Haym's estimation of the Phenomenology of Spirit.
8 I have in mind especially, Otto Poggeler, 'Fragment aus einer Hegelschen Logik, mit
einem Nachwort zur Entwicklungsgeschichte von Hegels Logik', Hegel-Studien 2 (1963),
47-70; 'Hegels Jenaer Systemkonzeption', Philosophisches lahrbuch 71 (1963-64),
286-318; Heinz Kimmerle, 'Zur Entwicklung des Hegelschen Denkens in Jena', Hegel-
Studien 4 (1969), 33-47; Johann H. Trede, 'Hegels fruhe Logik (1801-1803/4)" Hegel-
Studien 7 (1970), 123-68.
9 Logik, Metaphysik, Naturphilosophie, Fragment einer Reinschrift (1804/05), Hegel -
Gesammelte Werke, vol. VII (Hamburg, Meiner, 1971), pp. 176-78.
10 For the controversy, see the following letters: 1800, Nov. 15 - Fichte to Schelling;
Nov. 19 - Schelling to Fichte; Dec. 27 - Fichte to Schelling; 1801, May 29 - Schelling
to Fichte; May 31 - Fichte to Schelling; Oct. 3 - Schelling to Fichte; 1802, Jan. 15 -
Fichte to Schelling. F. W. 1. Schelling, Briefe und Dokumente, ed. H. Fuhrmans (Bonn,
Bouvier, 1973), vol. II, Zusatzband.
MILIC CAPEK
HEGEL AND THE ORGANIC VIEW OF NATURE
As the title of this paper may easily yield to a misunderstanding, my first

obligation is to dispel it. I plan to deal not with Hegel's organic view of nature
(for reasons which I am going to state) but with Hegel and the organic view of
nature, which is something entirely different. The main reason I prefer not to
dwell primarily on Hegel's own philosophy of nature, including his own views
of organic nature, is that it makes specific claims, many of which are
obviously and fantastically wrong, not only in the light of our present
science, but even in the light of the science of Hegel's own time. On this
point, I feel that Findlay's view that Hegel's science was "the science of his
own time" is rather too charitable;l for the tragedy, or rather tragicomedy,
of Hegel's philosophy of nature is that it was far behind the science of his
own time. Hegel's errors fall into two main groups: (a) the plain and arrogant
denials of those scientific discoveries which were generally accepted by the
scientific community of his own time and without which classical nineteenth-
century science was unthinkable; and (b) the peculiar, artificial, and often
fantastic interpretations of some of the facts which even Hegel could not
deny. I shall deal first with group (a).
To this group belong Hegel's strange views concerning physics, chemistry,
and biology. In physics he remained persistently opposed to Newton, from
his Latin dissertation, De orbitis planetarum, in which he wrongly predicted
that no celestial body can exist between Mars and Jupiter, until the last
edition of his Encyclopedia of Sciences. According to Hegel, three times in
history an apple was disastrous to mankind: first, in causing the fall of Adam;
second, as the apple of discord, which precipitated the Trojan war; and
fmally, when it fell on Newton's head and thus ruined the philosophy of
nature. 2 Certainly this joke, intended to ridicule Newton, does far greater
damage to its author; it illustrates graphically Benedetto Croce's sardonic
judgement that there is no better caricature of Hegel's philosophy of nature
than what Hegel unwittingly wrote himself. What is truly astonishing is that
Hegel, according to his own admission, spent no less than twenty-five years in
studying Kepler and Newton (PN, § 270, p. 67), and apparently not without
some success; he reproduces correctly certain formulae such as that for the
freely falling body, which he calls Galileo's "immortal discovery," but which
109
110 MILlC CAPEK
he understands only in part and not without occasionally committing an

incredible elementary algebraic blunder. (For instance, when he claims that
t: sit = s: t 2 !) (PN, § 267, p. 60). What is even more puzzling is his meta-
physical justification of this formula. The passage, which defies translation, is
characteristic of Hegel's approach to the problems of philosophy of nature
in general. He is obviously not satisfied with Galileo's mathematical deriva-
tion and subsequent confirmation of the formula s = Ihgt 2 (s=distance,
t=time, g=acceleration of gravity), and adds his own interpretation to disclose
its 'deeper' philosophical meaning. Here it is:
It is quantity [to wit: t) coming out of itself, positing itself in the second dimension and
thus expanding itself [sich vermehrendJ, but only according to its own specific nature;
in this expansion sets itself as its limit to its own expansion, and thus in the process of
becoming an Other [Anderswerden) it only relates itself to itself.
And Hegel adds confidently: "This is the proof of the law of descent of a
falling body derived from the Notion of the thing.,,3 Only one thing is clear
in this obscure passage: Hegel's so-called proof is nothing but a vague and
questionable application of his triadic method - first the thesis, then its
negation, and, finally, the synthesis as a negation of the previous negation.
There are hundreds of similarly obscure 'proofs' in Hegel's writings on nature.
It is not difficult to see that under such circumstances the whole meaning
of Newtonian mechanics completely escaped him. Thus he denies the validity
of Newton's deduction of Kepler's law from the law of gravitation. On the
contrary, he claims that the law of gravitation can be derived from Kepler's
third law and offers another of his 'proofs', based on an elementary confusion
of symbols and the failure to understand the very meaning of mathematical
proof. 4 But does he really believe in the law of gravitation itself when he says
that the motion of the heavenly bodies is not a result of their being pulled
this way or the other, but is a 'free' motion? "They go on, as the ancients
used to say, like the blessed gods" (PN, § 269, Remark, Z, p. 65). As Edding-
ton observed, "this sounds particularly foolish even for a philosopher."s
Perhaps what Hegel was trying to say is that mechanics and astronomy
describe what is a mere external aspect of a process whose intrinsic structure
is akin to human will and to mind in general. This would be consonant with
Hegel's view of nature as the self-externalization of the Absolute Idea; hence
his opposition to Newtonian mechanism and his leaning toward an organic
view of nature. But his own organic philosophy of nature is, at least in this
particular context, of a very crude, hylozoistic kind; of the passage above it
may be said without unfairness that it is on the same level as that of Thales
HEGEL AND THE ORGANIC VIEW OF NATURE 111
talking about the soul of the lodestone. In truth, Hegel's view of magnetism
differs from that of Thales only by its triadic jargon: the magnet with its pair
of poles and a neutral field in between is a sensible manifestation of syllogism
(PN, § 312, pp. 162-163)! No wonder that, as Hegel's disciple and editor,
Karl Ludwig Michelet conceded, Hegel's philosophy of nature was met by
scientists with a shrugging of shoulders and compassionate smiles. No wonder
that Harald Hp[fding called it "une partie honteuse" of Hegel's philosophy, 7
and that Emile Meyerson was rather polite when he confessed that the
resulting impression it leaves in the mind of the reader is that of "profound
bewilderment" (profond ahurissement):
Nothing which would resemble the science of today or the science of his contemporaries
... not even any science in any era such as the Aristotelian physics or the chemistry of
alchemists. It is as if, while expecting to see human faces, we were presented with a series
of absurdly grimacing monsters. Sometimes the reader begins to doubt whether he
understood properly and re-reads the text several times to be sure that the phenomenon
of which the author speaks is really that which is known to science - to such degree
does the interpretation given by the author differ from everything which science knows
or has known. The' examples abound and on this point one is embarrassed which one to
choose. 8
Benedetto Croce, who cannot be suspected of any antipathy against

Hegelianism, but who neverthless was not blind to the absurdities of Hegel's
philosophy of nature, gives several times the whole list of Hegel's incredibly
strange views concerning physical nature. Indeed that list shows that
Meyerson was correct when he wrote that examples of Hegel's theoretical
monstrosities abound. Of Croce's list I select only a few: gravitation is
regarded as the concept of material corporeality realized in the form of idea;
light is material ideality, the abstract self of matter and infinite externality
(Ausser-sich-seyn); the sun is more abstract and, as such, less perfect than the
planets which are more concrete and thus more perfect; the senses of the
animals are objectified in the physical world - sight as the sun, taste as water,
and smell as air.9 We could continue indefmitely; let these suffice.
Hegel's views on physics were plagued by his failure to understand
Newton; his views on chemistry suffered by ignoring Lavoisier and Dalton.
What may be regarded as a mitigating circumstance is that chemistry was then
a recent science; its founders, Lavoisier and Dalton, were older contem-
poraries of Hegel. Furthermore, their ideas were not generally accepted; thus
some of their contemporaries, like Priestley and Cavendish, still adhered to
the phlogiston theory despite Lavoisier's researches, which discredited it. Yet
it is odd for one who so confidently pontificated about sciences and scientists
112 MILlC CAPEK
not to be aware of the chemical revolution of his own time. It is even more
odd to see an outstanding nineteenth-century philosopher adhering to the old
Aristotelian doctrine of the four elements (PN, § 281 ).10
As for Hegel's biological views, we have already mentioned his odd theory
of the senses. Obsessed by the dialectical triad, he tried hard to prove that
there are really only three senses. In a similar way he reduced the number of
continents to three: Europe, Asia, and Africa; for America is a mere appendix
of European civilization, and Australia is eliminated. But the most surprising
feature of Hegel's biological views is the denial of biological evolution. It is
true that he lived before Darwin; but Cuvier and Lamarck were his contem-
poraries. Paleontology, founded by Cuvier, was dismissed by him as a
'nebulous' science; and the fossils, according to him, have no evolutionary
significance since they are not the relics of extinct organisms, but mere freaks
of nature. The idea of evolution of plants and animals is explicitly rejected in
§ 249 of Hegel's The Encyclopedia of Sciences. Nature is devoid of history;
history begins with historians. When Hegel speaks of the hierarchy of nature,
he means by it the system of gradations without any' evolutionary significance,
the static scala naturae of the pre-evolutionary thought,u
The only possible conclusion, then, is that if there is any value in Hegel's
philosophy of nature, it must not be looked for in his specific claims, which
are mostly false, often absurd, at best irrelevant. It should be looked for in his
more general, metaphysical ideas; among them the idea of becoming occupies
first place. Yet, what was just said about Hegel's attitude toward evolution
indicates that the status of becoming in Hegel's overall view of reality is
uncertain and ambiguous. This question is of fundamental importance in our
present context. On the way in which it is answered will depend our answer
to another important question: What is the relation of Hegel's philosophy to
the modern organic view of nature? Since the modern organic view of nature
can hardly ignore evolution and the dynamic and historical aspect of reality,
it is obvious how important for us is the status of becoming in Hegel's
thought.
It is frustrating that the question concerning the status of becoming in
Hegel's thOUght cannot be answered in a definite and unambiguous way. The
reason is that the ambiguity is inherent in Hegel's thought, as various texts
clearly indicate_ On the one hand, in his own words, there was not a single
idea of Heraclitus which was not incorporated into his own system (HP 2,
p. 279). On the other hand, Hegel's leaning toward a dynamic view of reality
was counterbalanced by his strong Eleatic emphasis on the timeless character
of the Absolute Idea. The latter tendency was certainly strengthened by the
Kantian heritage, more specifically by the Kantian doctrine of the pheno-

menality of time, which is characteristic of all post-Kantian idealisms from
Fichte to Bradley. The unresolved tension between Heraclitus and Parmenides
pervades the system of Hegel and led to two opposite interpretations of his
concept of dialectics.
Is 'dialectical process' an objective process whose phases are genuinely
(and not merely phenomenally) successive, as the most common interpre-
tation of Hegel holds? Or should we prefer McTaggart's interpretation,
according to which the Absolute Idea is timelessly realized, and the dialectical
movement, which consists of the succession of increasingly more and more
adequate approximations, is merely in our minds?12 Both interpretations can
claim the support of authentic texts and a definite answer can be obtained
only by selecting some of them and ignoring others. What makes any defmite
solution of this difficulty impossible is that Hegel uses the term 'dialectical
triad' in two different senses and illustrates it in two different ways. Some-
times the triadic pattern 'thesis - antithesis - synthesis' designates three
successive phases of the temporal, historical process. This is especially true
of Hegel's philosophy of history. On the other hand, in other instances, the
triadic pattern is clearly static, and thesis, antithesis, and synthesis appear as
three complementary and coexisting aspects of one single, though complex,
fact which itself is devoid of succession. It is clearly meaningless to say that
in the triadic nature of magnetism - to use one of his odd illustrations -
there is any successive relation between the north pole, the south pole, and
the neutral field between them. In his philosophy of life, or, as he called it,
'organics', Hegel seems to deal with the successive phases of the development
of life when he speaks of the Earth as the Geological Organism, generating by
the process of spontaneous generation the Vegetable Organism and the
Animal Organism. This looks like a successive triad, but it has merely an
evolutionary cast, since we know on the authority of Hegel himself, quoted
above, that he explicitly rejected the idea of the evolution of species. Findlay
nevertheless maintains that
if any philosopher is a philosopher of evolution, that philosopher is Hegel ... Had the
Darwinian and later data been available, he would almost certainly have acknowledged
the historical trends in nature that he admits in the realm of Spirit ... 13
I am not so sure of it; in the first place, there were evolutionists prior to
Darwin - lamarck during Hegel's own life, Buffon and Diderot even before
him; to believe that the idea of evolution came into being with Charles
Darwin is a mere 'ethnic' prejudice. Furthermore, it is doubtful that Hegel
114 MILlC CAPEK
was opposed to evolution because of the lack of scientific evidence; he was

certainly formulating pseudo-empirical conclusions on the basis of much
slimmer evidence than that available at the time of Lamarck in favor of the
variability of species. Finally, judging by his cavalier treatment of the well·
established Newtonian physics, I doubt that any additional evidence in favor
of evolution would have impressed him; his opposition to it stemmed from
the Eleatic strain in his thought, that is, from the characteristically idealistic
contempt for time and change. Fortunately, he was not consistent in this
respect and his own Heraclitism, which is so conspicuously absent in his
philosophy of nature, showed itself fully in his philosophy of history.
On this second dynamic aspect of Hegel's thOUght I intend to dwell in the
remaining part of my paper. Emphasis on it is sadly lacking in Hegel's philo·
sophy of nature in general and in his thoughts on organic nature in particular.
Yet, without becoming there can be no organic view of nature; only nature
unfolded in time can meaningfully be called living nature - die lebende Natur
- to use Hegel's own term.
II. Becoming appears as the third term of the first and most fundamental
dialectical triad, that is, as the synthesis of Being and Non-Being. It is another
instance of Hegel's dialectical triad, which cannot be understood as a 'dialec-
tical process'; certainly neither Being nor Non-Being are anterior in a
temporal sense to Becoming. Should then the priority of Being and Non·
Being with respect to their synthesis be understood in a logical sense? If so,
should we regard Hegel's attempt to deduce Becoming as successful? As early
as ten years after Hegel's death it was pointed out by one of his critics that
Becoming cannot be obtained by a synthesis of two equally static terms. This
objection was formulated by Trendelenburg and was also raised by Victor
Cousin, by Paul. Janet, and much more recently by Emile Meyerson in his
un translated work De ['explication dans les sciences (1925).14 Meyerson
observed that the predicament in which Hegel found himself was not basically
different from that of Parmenides; but while Parmenides realized that
between two equally static, becomingless terms, no intermediate and non-
static term can be smuggled, Hegel tried to do just that. But his deduction of
becoming was fallacious; the only way that he was able to smuggle it in was
to borrow it surreptitiously from experience, that is, from something
altogether heterogeneous to the couple of static and abstract concepts. In the
light of the history of ideas it was thus not accidental that Eleatism re-
appeared with neo-Hegelian thinkers, in particular in the thought of
McTaggart.
Harald H~ffding raised basically the same objection, even though super-
ficially it looks different since it is formulated in the language of formal
logic. 15 He pointed out that if each synthesis is a negation of the previous
negation, we should obtain the original term - Being instead of Becoming.
This is the well-known law of double negation, which is closely related to
the law of the excluded middle. It is certainly valid within the two-valued
logic. But is Hegel's thought intelligible within the framework of the tradi-
tional two-valued logic? Does it not transcend it as the thought of Heraclitus
did before him and Bergson's dynamism after him? This, it seems to me, is
hinted by Findlay when he wrote that
Hegel is not wrong in pointing out that our thought hates borderlines or transitional
situations, that it is averse to anything that would now be called a three-value logic, and
that it seeks to break up its subject-matter into mutually exclusive aspects of phases, so
that the conceptual position of anything is immediately clear. 16
All three philosophers mentioned - Heraclitus, Hegel, and Bergson - tried to

rediscover the continuity underlying the artificially isolated aspects which our
traditional logic - called Verstand by Hegel - created on the surface of
dynamic reality.
This sheds an altogether new light on the first dialectical triad. Hegel calls
becoming the first concrete concept; this means that the two antithetical
concepts, Being and Non-Being, are mere abstractions. Or in Croce's words,
"becoming is not a concept added to or derived from two fust concepts,
taken separately, but is a unique concept which outside of itself has only two
abstractions, two unreal phantoms, Being and Non-Being, mutually separated
and as such united not by their struggle, but by their common vacuity." 17
'The struggle of the opposites' has clearly a Heraclitean ring, and as such it
shares a certain obscurity characteriZing the highly metaphorical language of
the 'dark philosopher'. I am convinced that becoming is a too fundamental
and all-pervasive fact to be expressed adequately by the metaphors borrowed
from our limited sensory experience, whether visual, kinesthetic, or aUditory.
The images of 'Fire' and 'Flow' or 'Tension' or 'Harmony' or 'Struggle', no
matter how suggestive, are necessarily misleading precisely because of their
specificity. The full meaning of becoming transcends each of its illustrations
or instantiations. Heraclitus was aware of this, at least implicitly when he
spoke of "ever-living Fire," omnipresent and everlasting and distinct from the
visible fire which is mortal and sporadic; it is the latter, which according to
Fragment 25 "lives the death of air and air lives the death of fire.,,18 The
distinction between universal Becoming and its particular and visible
116 MILlC CAPEK
manifestation is clearly indicated. Heraclitus used also the metaphor of the

flowing stream - another metaphor which never disappeared from the
language of process philosophy. It reappeared two thousand years later in the
vocabulary of Newton at the beginning of his Principia, and thanks to William
James's term "stream of thought," it became a familiar term in contemporary
introspective psychology. Yet, when Heraclitus spoke of Becoming on a more
general and more abstract level, he consciously and pointedly indicated the
inadequacy of any concrete imagery. This is clear when we compare
Fragment 41 with Fragment 81. The first one is famous and very suggestive
by its concreteness: "You cannot step twice into the same river; for fresh
waters are ever flowing upon you." The second fragment is much less
frequently quoted, probably because of its apparent obscurity: "We step and
do not step into the same river; we are and we are not." The first part of this
fragment defies any consistent visualization, since it consists of two conflict-
ing and incompatible images. The clue to this contradiction is in the second
part, when Heraclitus moves up to a higher level of generality in saying: "We
are and we are not." It would be difficult to anticipate more fully Hegel's
view that becoming synthesizes being and non-being.
This point, I think, is crucial. As I said above, the imagery of Heraclitus,
by the opposition of two incompatible images, suggests the presence of
contradiction in the very nature of becoming; and that it is so, is shown in
the second part where the opposition of two concepts - instead of two
images - suggests it: "We are and we are not." More accurately, we neither
are nor are not since we become and Becoming transcends both mere Being
and Non-Being. Using Bergson's language, we may say that both Being and
Non-Being are merely two static snapshots of the continuity of Becoming.
Thus I must correct myself: the contradiction does not inhere in the nature
of becoming, but in our language; it arises out of the opposition between two
exclusive and artificially separated aspects. But why does our thought have
the tendency to assume such exclusive and mutually antagonistic aspects?
More specifically, why this tendency to resolve Becoming into two aspects
- that of Being and that of Non-Being? Two answers have been given in the
history of Western thought and they are incompatible. The first was given
by Plato in Timaeus: Becoming is something less than the true Being and
more than a sheer nought; it is an eternal oscillation between these two. Its
status is inferior to that of Being, yet it still possesses a shadowy sort of semi-
reality; it is not flatly negated, as it was by Parmenides. The major part of the
Western philosophical tradition sided with Plato; from Aristotle, who con-
trasted the immobility of Supreme Being with the realm of "generation and
corruption," up to those interpreters - or rather misinterpreters - of

contemporary physics who claim that the relativity theory eliminated
becoming from the physical world.
The second answer is just the opposite: becoming is ultimate and it is more
real than Being, which is nothing but an abstraction, a static snapshot of
becoming artificially arrested by a fictitious, instantaneous cut made by our
perception and thought. This answer underlies the dark metaphors of
Heraclitus, and, apart from some ambiguities, is present in Hegel's own
thought, at least in its dynamic aspects. In our temporal awareness we intuit
Becoming in its full concreteness and we experience vividly the extreme
difficulty of conceptualizing its structure. In trying to do so, we begin to
understand the meaning of the obscure metaphors of Heraclitus and of some
peculiarities of Hegel's language. In particular, we find at least a partial
justification of his claim that becoming is the unity of opposites, the
synthesis of Being and Non-Being. Ever since William James wrote his in-
comparable chapter on the perception of time, we know that the minimum
temporal awareness "from the outset is a synthetic datum, not a simple one;
and to sensible perception its elements are inseparable, although attention
looking back may easily decompose the experience and distinguish its
beginning from its end.,,19 It is a perpetual fading of the vivid present into
the penumbra of the past, and, as Bergson showed, it is illusory to draw a
sharp line of demarcation between them and to indicate the precise point-like
instant when perception ceases to be actual and is converted into the
virtuality of recollection. This indivisible continuity of the past and the
present or, as Lovejoy said, this perpetual fading of cogito into memini,20 is
a vivid exemplification of the unity of opposites, of the continuity of
becoming. What Hegel call~d 'being' corresponds to the actuality and vivacity
of the present, while 'non-being' designates the quality of pastness; these two
aspects must not be taken separately since they are experienced as an un-
divided, synthetic whole, an indivisible, though complex temporal Gestalt. In
this sense we truly "are and are not" as Heraclitus said.
Even Hegel's apparently mysterious term 'negation of negation' becomes
intelligible in the example above. Every present moment is in a sense a
negation of its immediate ancestor and it will be in its turn negated by
the immediately subsequent moment. In truth, William James, who in his
early years was sharply critical of Hegel and, more specifically, of Hegel's
monistic idealism, in his last work, A Pluralistic Universe, while still critical
of Hegel's "vicious intellectualism" and "intolerable ambiguity, verboSity,
and unscrupulousness" ,21 made a sympathetic comment on the Hegelian
118 MILlC CAPEK
idea of "being its own other" ,22 which characterized the way perceptual data
interpenetrate each other. No psychological atomism, no doctrine of external
relations can do justice to the mutual immanence of parts which is character-
istic of immediate experience, sensory as well as introspective. This was
systematically stressed by Gestalt psychology, in opposition to the atomistic
and additive approach of associationistic psychology.
The emphasis on the unitary, Gestalt-like and dynamic character of
organic life is probably the most valuable feature of Hegel's philosophy of
nature. From the mechanistic standpoint, 'life' is a mere collective name for
all living organisms; there is no supraindividuallife in the sense of a concrete
universal present in its different individual manifestations; in the mechanistic
scheme, widely prevalent today in English-speaking countries and in Russia,
life is nothing but a peculiarly complex case of lifelessness. In any organic
view of nature just the opposite is true: life is the primary category and what
we call 'lifeless' or 'inorganic' is merely a very rudimentary form of life or
proto-life. The mechanistic view of life was a logical consequence of the
mechanistic view of the universe; it remained justified as long as no serious
flaws in the classical Newton-Laplacean view appeared. But anybody even
superficially acquainted with the physics of the twentieth century, whose
attention is not diverted to irrelevant problems of methodology, is well aware
that the mechanistic view of the universe belongs to the past. The mechanistic
view of life has been deprived of the basic premises which made it so plausible
in the relatively recent past. But a detailed discussion of this would lead us far
beyond the scope of this article. 23
Hegel's philosophy of nature, together with the whole German Romantic
movement of which Goethe and Schelling were the outstanding representa-
tives, was the first revolt against the classical Newtonian physics. The main
reason for its failure was that it was premature and was to a considerable
degree merely a revolt of imagination and feeling against the depressing
mechanistic view of reality. There were valuable insights in it, and Whitehead,
in the fifth chapter of his Science and the Modem World (1925) did full
justice to the English counterpart of the Romantic reaction, as he called it.
But these valuable insights were fragmentary, and, in Hegel's philosophy of
nature at least, wrapped in confusing jargon and pervaded by hasty general-
izations, superficial and vague analogies, and even by weird and irresponsible
guesses. When the course of time swept away the debris, little was left of
Hegel's philosophy of nature; but what was left resembled, if I may use this
metaphor, a few golden grains found after the mass of sand is washed away.
There is no space left for me to show how Hegel's central idea of the related-
ness of nature was fruitfully applied by his former disciple, Johannes Bernard
Stallo, in his prophetic criticism of the mechanical theory of nature.
Stallo's criticism of Newton's rotating bucket experiment anticipated both
Mach's criticism and Whitehead's much later criticism of the fallacy of simple
location, as I tried to show some time ago. 24 It is true that Stallo, when he
wrote his Concepts and Theories of Modem Physics (1882), was not a
Hegelian any longer. He referred to his early Hegelianism as "the metaphysical
malady which seems to be one of the unavoidable disorders of intellectual
infancy."25 Yet, an attentive reader of Stallo's intermediate writings as well
as of his final work would find that the most fruitful of his insights - the
inadequacy of the mechanization and fragmentation of nature - can be
traced to Hegel's intuitive anticipation of the organic view of nature.
Boston University
NOTES
1 John N. Findlay, Hegel: A Re·examination (New York, Humanities Press, 1958),

p.268.
2 Cf. Ce qui est vivant et ce qui est mort de la philosophie de Hegel (Paris, Giard and
Briere, 1910), 136. [Translation of Cia che e vivo e cia che e marta della filosofw de
Hegel (Bari, Laterza, 1907), p. 161. Translated into English by D. Ainslie as What is
Dead and What is Alive in the Philosophy of Hegel (London, Macmillan, 1915), p. 167.]
3 My own translation does not differ substantially from that of A. V. Miller (PN, § 267,
Remark, p. 59) and that of Michael Petry, (Hegel's Philosophy of Nature (London, Allen
and Unwin, 1970), I, 255.
4 Here is Hegel's 'proof (PN, § 270, p. 66):
The abstract derivation is simply this: in Kepler's third law the constant is A 3/']"2.
If this is put in the form A 2 A/T2 , and we call A/T2 with Newton, universal gravita·
tion, then we have his expression for the action of this so-called gravitation, in the
inverse ratio of the square of the distance.
Hegel's blunder consists, first, in forgetting that T in Kepler's formula means time, more
specifically, the period of revolution, whose square Hegel incredibly confuses with the
square of the distance; second and equally incredibly he overlooks the fact that A in
Kepler's formula means the distance and not the mass as in Newton's law. It is true that
Newton's law of gravitation can be proved, if we assume jointly the third law of Kepler
and the formula discovered by Huygens for centripetal acceleration, v 2 /r (which Hegel
does not mention): it is this fact to which Hegel refers when he says vaguely that "it is
admitted by mathematicians themselves that the Newtonian formulae may be deduced
from Kepler's laws." Hegel's third mistake was to believe that a certain formula can be
proved when it is a part of another formula: he obviously confuses 'it contains' with
'it implies'. Thus one can understand Whitehead's remark about Hegel: "I have never
been able to read Hegel: I initiated my attempt by studying some remarks of his on
120 MILIC CAPEK
mathematics which struck me as complete non-sense." (Cf. 'Autobiographical Notes'

in The Philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead (Evanston and Chicago, Northwestern
University, 1941), p. 7.)
5 A. S. Eddington, The Nature of the Physical World (Cambridge, Cambridge University
Press, 1933), p. 147. Eddington adds, rather jokingly, that Hegel, in a sense, unsuspected
by him, was right since according to the relativistic theory of gravitation, there is no
distinction between the natural ('free') and constrained motion (pp. 147-53).
6 J. N. Findlay in his Foreword to Miller's translation of the Philosophy of Nature
(p. xx) says that "the phenomena of magnetism were for Hegel as for Schelling, of
inexhaustible import, and it would be a pardonable exaggeration to see in the whole
of Hegel's philosophy an interpretation of magnetism."
7 Harald H¢Jffding, A History of Modem Philosophy (New York, Dover, 1955), Vol. 2,
p.183.
8 Emile Meyerson, De ['explication dans les sciences (Paris, Payot, 1921), Vol. 2, p. 23.
9 PN, § 269, § 276, § 270, § 316; Croce, op. cit., Ch. IX.
10 Hegel regretfully admits that
the conception of four elements which has been general since the time of Empedocles
is nowadays rejected as a childish belief, because, forsooth, the Elements are com-
posite. No physicist or chemist, in fact no educated person, is any longer permitted
to mention the four Elements anywhere (PN, § 281, Z, p. 106).
11 Loren Eiseley, Darwin's Century. Evolution and the Men Who Discovered it (Garden
City, N.Y., Doubleday, 1961), Ch. I.
12 John M. E. McTaggart, Studies in the Hegelian Dialectics [1922], 2nd. ed. (New
York, Russell and Russell, 1964), Ch. V, 157-69.
13 J. N. Findlay,op. cit., p. 272.
14 F. A. Trendelenburg, Logische Untersuchungen (Berlin, Bethge, 1840), Vol. 1, p. 25;
V. Cousin, Fragments et souvenirs (Paris, Didier, 1857), p. 183; Paul Janet, Etudes sur la
dialectique dans Platon et Hegel (Paris, Ladrange, 1861), p. 352; Meyerson, op. cit., Vol.
2, p. 62.
15 H¢Jffding, op.cit., Vol. 2, p. 182.
16 Findlay, op.cit., p. 158.
17 Croce, op.cit., p. 22.
18 John Burnet's numbering in his Early Greek Philosophy. On the distinction between
the visible flame and the 'metaphysical Fire' cf. F. M. Cornford, From Religion to
Philosophy. A Study in the Origins of Western Speculation (New York, Harper, 1957),
p.188.
19 W. James, The Principles of Psychology, 2 Vois. (New York, Holt, 1890), Vol. 1,
p.61O.
20 A. O. Lovejoy, The Revolt Against Dualism (Lasalle, Ill., Open Court, 1955), p. 381.
On this problem cf. my article 'Memini ergo fui?' in Memorias del XIII congresso inter-
national de filosofia, 10 vols. (Mexico, Universidad Nacional Aut6noma de Mexico,
1963-1966), Vol. 5, pp. 415-26.
21 W. James, A Pluralistic Universe (London, 1947), p. 107.
22 Ibid., p. 109:
If, however, the conceptual treatment of the flow of reality should prove for any
good reason to be inadequate ... then an independent empirical look into the con-
stitution of reality's pulses might possibly show that some of them are their own
others, and indeed are so in the self-same sense in which the absolute is maintained to
be so by Hegel.
Whitehead's view on the combination of self-identity and self-diversity of each actual
occasion has a truly Hegelian ring. Cf. Process and Reality (New York, Macmillan, 1930),
p.38.
23 Cf. my books, The Philosophical Impact of Contemporary Physics, 2nd ed. (Prince'
ton, Van Nostrand, 1969) and Bergson and Modern Physics. A Re-Interpretation and
Re-Evaluation, Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol. 7 (Dordrecht, Boston,
D. Reidel, 1971).
24 Cf. mY'articles, 'Two Critics of Newton Prior to Mach: Boscovich and Stallo' in Actes
du XII congres international de l'histoire des sciences, Paris, 1968 (Paris, Blanchard,
1971), Vol. IV, pp. 35-37; and 'Johann Bernard Stallo' in Dictionary of Scientific
Biography, ed. by C. C. Gillispie (New York, Scribner, 1975), Vol. XII, pp. 607-10.
2S The Concepts and Theories of Modern Physics, ed. Percy W. Bridgman (Cambridge,
Mass., Harvard University Press, 1960), p. 6.
DIETRICH VON ENGELHARDT
HEGEL'S PHILOSOPHICAL UNDERSTANDING OF ILLNESS
In the course of time the understanding of illness has changed profoundly;

however, many 'moments' have been preserved throughout this change. Even
within a historical period the understanding of illness has by no means been
uniform. Especially varied is the spectrum around 1800, in the decades of
German Idealism and Romanticism. Hegel's philosophy of nature and of man
is a speculative metaphysics of nature. In this period a metaphysical concep-
tion of nature had first been developed in systematic form by Schelling. The
Romantics had allowed themselves to be essentially influenced by this
system; their highly varied concepts stand somewhere between empiricism
and metaphysics. Not infrequently the Romantics were natural scientist and
philosopher or physician and philosopher in one person. Platonic, neoplatonic,
Spinozist and Leibnizian currents also influenced the Romantics directly, just
as Schelling himself was affected by these. Hegel also based himself in part on
Schelling, but at the same time he differs from him as well as from the
Romantics. Schelling furnished the essential precondition of the Romantic
as well as the Hegelian view of nature; speculative as well as Romantic aspects
can be found in his work. Empirical medicine, its investigation of man, his
health and his illness, is clearly to be distinguished from these tendencies.
Hegel's conceptions about illness and the world of medicine could fmd no
interest until the present.! In this study, we begin with Hegel's position
between empirical and Romantic medicine. Then we clarify Hegel's philo-
sophical understanding of illness in terms of several fundamental 'moments'
of his concept of illness, and the stages of illness and of therapy.
II
A systematic presentation of the concept of illness around 1800 will thus

have to take into consideration quite varied points of view. These differences
also determined the self-understanding of the Romantics and the idealist
philosophers. In his understanding of illness, as well as fundamentally in his
philosophy of nature, Hegel, the dialectical philosopher, takes issue above all
123
with both views toward research into nature and medicine, empirical and
romantic. Especially complex is his relation to Schelling. The differences
among the innumerable Romantic proposals on the one hand, and the
difference between these and Hegel's philosophy of nature on the other,
remained unnoticed by the physicians of his time. Hegel's ideas about illness
were basically disregarded,2 his philosophy of nature sharing the general fate
of the Romantic philosophy of nature.
Already.during Hegel's lifetime a pronounced resistance to metaphysical
conceptions of illness was to be found in medicine. According to Hufeland
(1800), for medicine during these years of crisis there was only "the middle
road between fruitless speculation and blind empiricism" 3 ; an enduring and
practice-oriented doctrine of illness will be especially careful not to "impute
to nature some sort of speculative system".4 In 1805, Hecker warns of the
"slippery ice", of the "thorns, cliffs and rushing forest streams of the most
recent philosophies", which "climb at once to the highest viewpoint of all,
while lacking any path to get up there."s On the contrary, it was the task
of empirical medicine to find a path between the "mania for systems, hair-
splitting dogmatism and blind empiricism.,,6 Especially in an age of anarchy
- in political as well as scientific respects - it was essential to have solid
foundations; the imperative of the hour was a "rational scepticism.,,7 Even
if such scepticism also had an eclectic character, the interest of the patient
was to be preferred to any system. In the year 1816, a physician, using the
pseudonym 'Candidus', published a critique of philosophy of nature, under
the title 'Not an Accusation, But a Complaint'.8 According to this Candidus,
philosophy of nature of a Romantic-speculative character led to absurdities;
to be sure it was "famed only in Germany, in France and England it was
either unknown or held in contempt."9 One could only wish that all the
"fantasies and errors of young and old which philosophy of nature had
caused in Germany would be forgiven and as soon as possible forgotten."lO
But not only are erroneous concepts of man and of illness due to this
philosophy of nature, it also makes the individual human beings who follow
it unhappy; the death of Reil is oppressive, as is his melancholy, his despair,
his dreary views of man and the world. Hufeland devoted an Mterword to
Candidus's critique. Above ali, medicine must defend itself against this,
"because it is just the medical world where this view can most easily gain
admission, and the physical world is the enchanted forest through which
the spirit is led to moral eclipse."ll Around 1830, the preceding decades
were condemned by the anatomist Hartmann because during these times
philosophy of nature "subjugated medicine and transformed it to accord with
HEGEL'S UNDERSTANDING OF ILLNESS 125
its basic views" ;12 fortunately this time had now been superseded forever.
Hegel repeatedly separated himself from the empiricist and Romantic
conceptions of his time. Just as he was against the natural scientists, so he
also fmds himself in a dual opposition to medicine: on the one hand against
the Romantic designs for medicine, and on the other against the fact·centered
form of contemporary empirical medicine. Still with this, Hegel considers
a combination of empirical work and speculation as a thinking and compre-
hending [begreiJend] examination of nature to be in principle both possible
and necessary (PN § 246, p. 6). According to him philosophy of nature is
not an alternative to natural science, nor is it to be defended or rejected as
a preparatory stage or a menace to natural science. However, Hegel sees the
medicine of his time surrendering to the effect of the Zeitgeist, making
everything shallow, just like all the other sciences. In a letter of April 11,
1824 he thanks Windischmann for sending him his latest work, "Ober etwas,
das def Heilkunst Noth thut [About something that is needed by medicine] ",
which, according to Windischmann, should fall like "a bomb into the vile
junk and apothecary rubbish of medicine.,,13 In his evaluation of this work
Hegel remarks:
Your attack is disordered at its root, and even if those who are sunk in this morass can
no longer hear, still on the other hand, for those whose confidence cannot attain force
in the face of the universal climate, these words will prove fruitful for their power and
their sentiments, and the courage of knowing will grow in them. To begin with, you have
turned to medicine, and the presentation will be most convincing when it presents the
particular distress and need of a special field. However, other fields deserve equal
attention, especially theology, from which all confidence and intrinsic worth issue for
the others. But the state of this science almost justifies that of the others, for the sacred
realm is not entrusted to them, and if the priests (and among these I also include the
philosophers and in its way also the government) allow the people to fall into such
superficiality, then medicine too will be forced to conceive of their illnesses and
suffering in such an external manner, for then it finds no point of support for an intellec-
tually deep activity that both enters inward and acts from within.1 4
According to Hegel, mind and nature are torn apart by the thought of the
time; but what is required is their combination, to be sure, a specific
combination of concept and reality, which, according to him, the Romantics
(who have turned against the dominant medical science) have by no means
achieved. ls Their conceptions are familiar to him. Hegel criticizes the
formalism in all the Romantic attempts, the external analogizing, the
involution and uncritical application of the concept of metamorphosis.l 6
Hegel also speaks of a "wild forest stream that threatens to sow confusion in
reason and science,,;l? a philosophic critique must decisively oppose these
tendencies, in order that the attitude toward philosophy of nature, which had
fallen from astonishment into indifference could be changed back again to
respect and recognition. The external manner which had already been at work
in Schelling'S philosophy had been carried still further by Oken, Troxler and
other Romantics, who had lapsed "completely into an empty formalism"
(PN § 359, Zusatz, p. 388); their method of comprehending nature and the
living organisms was "crude and thoroughly unphilosophical" in spirit
(PN § 359, Remark, p. 386), and this because ofa thoroughgoing confusion
of logical categories and the categories of natural science:
... this ignorance and contempt for the Notion which, in general, gives rise to the facile
formalism that, in place of the determinations of the Notion, makes use of sensuous
materials such as chemical substances, as well as relationships belonging to the sphere
of inorganic Nature, such as the north and south poles of the magnet, or even the
difference between magnetism itself and electricity, a formalism which, in its appre-
hension and exposition of the natural universe, attaches externally to its various spheres
and differences a ready-made schema compounded of such material (PN § 359, Remark,
p. 387).
Conceptuality and phenomenality, according to Hegel, are developed with

special sharpness among the Romantics, because of this incapacity to distin-
guish the dimensions between idea and sensibility and to relate them
immanently to each other: "the crudest empiricism embellished with a
formalism of substances and poles and with analogies empty of reason and
drunken lightning-stroke insights.,,18
Thus Hegel's critique of Romantic medicine aims in two directions: its
handling of phenomena, its empirical work, is found just as lacking as its
philosophic procedure. For example, in his judgment Hegel rejects Gbden's
Romantic conception of illness:
Fine philosophers these, who fancy that in essence they have the truth, and that if only
they keep on saying 'essence', then this makes it the inner truth of the matter! I have not
the slightest respect for their talk of essence, for it is nothing but an abstract reflection.
To explicate essence, however, is to make it appear as a real existence (PN § 371,
Zusatz, p. 430).
The essential concepts and convictions of Romanticism cannot be found in

Hegel. The widely held esteem in which the Romantics hold Dr. John Brown
is rejected by Hegel; however, Brown's achievement will remain, for he had
gone beyond the view of the "merely particular and specific both in diseases
and remedies" and had committed himself to recognize "the universal in
them as the essential element". However, to see in Brownianism "a complete
system of medicine" (PN § 373, Remark, p. 437) and to try to explain illness
with the categories of sthenia and asthenia [strength and weakness] alone,
cannot convince Hegel: "A theory of medicine built on these arid determina-
tions of the Understanding is complete in a half dozen propositions; it is no
wonder that it spread rapidly and found many adherents" (PN § 359,
Remark, p. 386).
Nor will Hegel accept the historization of illnesses, according to which
the taxonomic system of illness is at the same time supposed to be the law of
their appearance in history. 20 Hegel also does not follow the natural history
approach to illness, which induces Oken to designate "pathology" as the
"physiology of the animal kingdom", and illnesses as the "life-processes of
animals",21 and which leads Hoffmann to the conception that rickets is a
sinking-down to the condition of mollusks, arthritis a regression to animal
regeneration by means of the joints, and epilepsy a coming-to-life again in
human beings of the natural stage of the Oscillatoria [algae].22 Hegel also
does not agree with the religious view of illness as set forth by a Heinroth, a
Windischmann, a Ringseis. 23 With all his interest in illness and its significance
in nature and in the realm of the spirit, the philosopher Hegel cannot agree
with the emphatic judgments of the Romantics about illness and the
pathological. Instead he sees the Romantic preoccupation with illness as
dangerous to the equanimity of soul and mind of human beings; above all
from such confrontations with mental illnesses, psychic damage may result.
He is very eager, Hegel writes to Windischmann on May 27, 1810, to see his
work on magic; he himself does not dare to draw near to "this obscure side
or mode of mental nature or of natural mind", for "health and a merry, and
indeed ruggedly merry, disposition" was needed for this work more than for
any other. Without doubt, the deplorable state of his feelings, of which
Windischmann had reported, was to be blamed on this work:
... this descending into dark regions, where nothing shows itself to be firm, definite
and secure, where shimmering lights flicker everywhere, but beside chasms, still more
obscured by the brightness, misled by the surroundings that cast false reflections rather
than illuminate - where the beginning of every path breaks off again or dwindles away
into the indeterminable, is lost and tears us away from our destiny and our direction. 24
From his own experience he knew that state, where one had steeped one-
self in the "chaos of appearances" and had not yet arrived at "clarity and a
detailed view of the whole"; he himself had "suffered several years from this
hypochondria to the point of debilitation." Probably every human being had
"such a turning point in his life, the dark point of contraction of his being,
through the narrows of which he is squeezed to be strengthened and con-

firmed in his self-assurance. One must surmount this state, and if the
"security of ordinary every-day life" could no longer give one fulfillment,
seek the "security of an inwardly nobler existence."25 And so Hegel follows
the classical rejection of the Romantic idealization of weakness and sickliness.
To these phenomena, he gives a deeper significance in his speculative
philosophy of nature than he does to a positivistic view of nature - but to
elevate them to the norm or bring them near to the ideal, from these he was
prevented by his commitment to a well-considered and unpretentious
conception of reality.
III. THE IDEA OF ILLNESS
In Hegel's philosophy, illness is integrated into a world of nature and of mind

that is articulated within itself and at the same time coherent. The doctrine of
health and the doctrine of illness are immanent 'moments' in the series of
phenomena ranging from inanimate matter to the highest forms of spirit: art,
religion and philosophy. The organic follows upon mechanics, physics and
chemistry; it is the most concrete and most differentiated part of nature -
here nature ends, here begins the world of mind, and here illness has its place.
Illness receives its significance in just the same degree as the death of the
living individual has its significance, too, for the interconnection of nature
and spirit. Illness, for Hegel, is an essential characteristic of the organic, the
organic is original illness, it bears within it the "germ of death" (PN § 375,
p. 441) - in illness human beings can fmd "the manner of their death"
(PN § 374, p. 440). Illness is a "transitory disharmony" (PN § 367, Zusatz ,
p. 411); the "general inadequacy" (PN § 374, p. 440) oflife is natural death.
Through the phenomena of individual illness, and the death of the individual,
and in terms of these, the species maintains itself in the philosophic perspec-
tive, and spirit originates. With the discord between individual integrity and
totality on the one hand and the various bodily functions and dimensions of
consciousness isolating themselves on the other, the individual makes real
within itself the relation between individual and genus: "the individual is,
both in its own self and in its opposition to itself, genus; it is itself alone the
genus, and has it within itself" (PN § 371, Zusatz, p. 428).
As the individual human being fundamentally cannot transfer the spiritual
universality possible for him into his bodily individuality, cannot let it appear
in sensual reality, he must die, and ever again becomes ill. Spirit is eternal.
In illness and in death, the aliveness and mental character of human kind
manifest themselves; pain is the privilege of the higher developmental stages

of nature. All processes of illness ultimately pass over into a process that can
no longer be recovery:
The organism can recover from disease; but disease is in its very nature, and herein lies
the necessity of death, i.e. of this dissolution in which the series of processes becomes
the empty process which does not return to itself (PN § 375, Zusatz, pp. 441-442).
Illness documents the power of nature over the individual; in the sexual
relationship, man relates to nature in another person, in taking nourishment
he relates to external nature; but in becoming ill he has to carry out this
confrontation within himself. Sexuality, as the foundation of the species and
illness are philosophically related phenomena. [In German, gatten means to
mate or to copulate, and Gattung means species - Ed.] In the perspective of
Hegelian philosophy, nature and mind must necessarily fall asunder for a
positive interpretation of reality, man must become estranged from his
material environment and also from his own body.
For Hegel illness is a disturbance of the organism, a falling apart of the
capacities and body systems which are maintained in a unity in a state of
health. At the same time, Hegel rejects Brown's proposal to understand illness
as the consequence of too strong or too weak a stimulus - fundamentally
illness is a discrepancy between the individual as a living ego [Ich] and his
bodily reality:
Disease does not consist in an irritation (Reiz) being too great or too small for the
susceptibility of the organism, rather is its Notion a disproportion of its being and its
self (PN § 371, Zusatz, p. 428).
A stone is destroyed by a strong external action; but this destruction is not

illness, because a stone "is not the negative of itself which overlaps (ubergrei!t)
its opposite" (PN § 371, Zusatz, p. 429); it cannot reconstitue itself, cannot
become healthy again. Illness is to be distinguished from other states in which
a lack is perceived, for instance that of desire (or appetite). Here the feeling
of the negative is directed toward something alien, not toward one's own
existence:
Appetite, too, the feeling of a lack, is to its own self the negative, relates itself to itself
as a negative: is itself and is also in relation to itself as a being feeling a lack; but with
this difference, that in appetite this lack is something external, that is, the self is not
turned against its structure (Gestalt) as such, whereas in disease the negative thing is the
structure,itself (PN § 371, Zusatz, p. 429).
In an equally fundamental way the psychic illnesses are thought of as a

falling apart of consciousness; aside from these illnesses, Hegel emphasizes
contagious diseases and epidemics, in which the level of the individual is
exceeded. The three kinds of illness, under which the multiplicity of the
phenomena of illness can be ordered, are to be understood as a transition of
the logical categories of the universal to the particular and the individual.
Just as the Romantic view of nature, so too Hegel's philosophy of nature
has been reproached with a fundamental hostility to empirical research; this
reproach must be examined for every natural philosopher individually, and
better still in terms of specific passages. According to Hegel, a philosophy of
nature and of man cannot forego natural science and empirical medicine, but
must base itself on empirical knowledge; it presupposes it (PN § 246,
Remark, p. 6). As part of this contempt for empiricism, an alleged basic
rejection of the principle of causality is also listed. But Hegel by no means
disregards etiology; besides the somatic conditions of disease, the philosopher
explores the psychological, social and political-cultural determinants offalling
ill. But the significance of illness is not exhausted within the perspective of
concrete causation. Dimensions of reality are manifested in illness which are
not only also present in the state of health, but even possess outstanding
significance for life. Illnesses show the structure of reality in especially sharp
relief, more so than does health. As a form of negativity, illness has a con-
stitutive function in the transition from one domain of reality to the next -
a function always assigned to the negative in Hegel's philosophy. In the health
state those fixations occurring in illness are constantly being overcome, for
health too is related to those dimensions which assume independence in
illness.
Hegel's philosophy of illness is neither nosology nor concrete therapeutic
doctrine; it does not describe the self-perceptions of the patient, the mani-
festations of illness in his self-consciousness, in his experience of the world
and in his relations to other human beings, nor does it treat the social
mooring of illness, or the relation of the physician to the patient. But these
'moments' do not confront the philosophic perspective as something irrecon-
cilable. According to Hegel, philosophy comprehends being and essence and
not "preconditions which present themselves in psychological, anthropo-
logical and other forms" (WL [M] p. 761). Hegel wants to give a deduction
of nature and of man which is at once conceptual and real; to this belong the
illnesses, their genesis and how they are overcome. Empirical investigation
and theory, phenomena and concepts, all are accorded their rights to an equal
degree. How open the conceptualization is to the phenomena can be made
clear by the weight carried by the multiplicity of both the concrete and
chance in Hegel's philosophy.26 Hegel by no means claims to deduce all
forms of illness, their causes and their courses, the possibilities of treatment,
therapeutic methods, and the limits of therapy. According to him that cannot
be the task of philosophy.
Typology of Illness
According to Hegel the disproportion of subjectivity and the somatic-psychic

world of the individual appears in three general kinds of illness: contagious
diseases and epidemics, physical illnesses and psychic illnesses.
Even though illnesses are always bound to an individual human being, not
infrequently their true character is only revealed within a superindividual
perspective. Here Hegel is thinking of contagious diseases and epidemics, of
syphilis, typhus and yellow fever. In these diseases, the harmful aspect
appears to be set by the organism and by external nature; both aspects belong
to these illnesses, they are falling ill of living nature as such, which also
includes the individual organism. As general elementary disturbances, these
illnesses manifest themselves "chiefly in the skin, the lymph, and the bones"
(PN § 371, Zusatz, p. 431). In their general nature, they are bound to supra-
individual vicissitudes of history; they are "not only climatic but also
historical, since they appear at certain periods of history, and then disappear"
(PN § 371, Zusatz , p. 431). In the same way they can also arise when a
human being is removed to a climate to which he is not accustomed.
In the more individual physical illnesses, the organism is overpowered by
inorganic nature
when one of its systems or organs, stimulated into conflict with the inorganic power
(Potenz), establishes itself in isolation and persists in its particular activity against the
activity of the whole, the fluidity and all-pervading process of which is thus obstructed
(PN § 371, p. 428).
The ideal nature of organic life is destroyed:
Whereas in health, all the vital functions are held in this ideality, in disease the blood,
e.g., is heated, inflamed; and then it is active on its own account (PN § 371, Zusatz,
p.429).
Gallstones are to be understood as excessive activity of the gall bladder,

illnesses of the stomach as an isolation of the stomach, which ceases to be a
'moment' subordinated to the whole, but instead elevates itself to become the
central activity on its own. According to Hegel these illnesses have two modes
of manifesting themselves: acute and chronic. In acute illnesses, the disease
of one region of the body spreads to the whole organism, while in chronic
illnesses the disease cannot become illness of the whole organism; the
essential vital functions remain unbroken: "In such diseases, appetite and
digestion remain quite unimpaired, and the sexual instinct retains its
strength" (PN § 371, Zusatz, p. 432). Cirrhosis of the liver and consumption
are typical examples of chronic illnesses for Hegel.
The third kind of illness relates to the subject in its subjectivity - these
are the "diseases of the soul (Seele)" (PN § 371, Zusatz, p. 432). Just like the
physical illnesses, these can be so acute that death takes place. In the psychic
illnesses, according to Hegel, the psychic dimensions absolutize themselves
against the unity of the mind and destroy the identity of the individual,
which is now no longer capable of remaining itself through all its different
feelings and affects:
so, too, in the psychical life illness results if the merely psychical side of the organism,
freeing itself from the power of the mental or spiritual consciousness, usurps the latter's
function and mind or spirit, in losing control over the psychical element belonging to it,
no longer retains its self-mastery but itself sinks to the form of psychical life and in
doing so surrenders that relation to the actual which to the sound mind is essential and
objective, that is, the relation resulting from the reduction to a moment of what is
posited as external (PM § 406, Zusatz, p. 106).
Sorrow and fright can be the immediate precondition for the onset of
psychic illness, but also general conditions - above all "religious and political
exaltation". During the war of the Cevennes, such complexes appeared;27
another famous example was Joan of Arc in whom "patriotic enthusiasm ...
and ... a kind of magnetic state" were combined (PM § 406, Zu sa tz , p. 107).
The climate, and also the time of day or year could also have damaging effect,
and could find expression "in morbid states (including insanity) and at
periods when the self-conscious life suffers depression" (PM § 392, p. 37).
Romantic conceptions about a cosmic dependence of life are explicitly
rejected by Hegel: "The history of the world is not bound up with revolutions
in the solar system, any more than the destinies of individuals with the
position of the planets" (PM § 392, pp. 36-37).
Sickness and health, in their origins and their development, are not deter-
mined by the movement of the planets (PM § 392,Zusatz, p. 38); Hegel does
not support any sidereal concept of illness. Animals and plants are bound to
such a common life joined with nature; modem man, however, has freed
himself from these bonds. Psychic illnesses and those of the body according
to Hegel, are linked concretely with each other and dependent on each other,
since in the dissociation of consciousness, the "corporeity which is as
necessary for the empirical existence of mind as it is for that of soul, is
divided between these two separated sides and accordingly is divided within
itself and therefore sick" (PM § 406,Zusatz, p.106).
The division of illnesses in three basic kinds finds its confirmation in
reality, according to Hegel; but this distinction is also justified (onto-)
logically. The philosophic systematization would be legitimized on the one
side by a dialectic of the transition from concept [Begriff] to phenomenon
and phenomenon to concept, which should be capable of being carried out
subsequently in empirical work; but on the other side this mediation of
notions and phenomena has its foundation in logic. From the principle of this
double perspective - empirical research and logic - comes the decisive
methodological difference between Hegel's speculative understanding of
illness and the Romantic conceptions. According to Hegel, the first kind of
illness - epidemics and contagious diseases - are to be traced back to "a
general determinateness lying in the non-organic nature as such" (PN § 371,
Zusatz, p. 430). The second kind is caused by "particular, external harmful
influences" (PN § 371, Zusatz, p. 432); in these illnesses above all, specific
parts of the body are affected. The third kind of illness, fmally, originates
"in the universal subject" (PN § 371, Zusatz, p. 432). In the three kinds of
illness, for Hegel, a transition from the universal to the individual, by way of
the particular, is carried out, a transition that is developed in the logic and
receives its justification there. However, at the same time Hegel's conviction
of the possibility of a logical foundation of reality is combined with insight
into the limits of such a foundation; Hegel considers a deduction of all forms
of illness to be impossible.
Stages of the Course of Illness
Hegel's philosophical doctrine of illness does not stop at a general concept of

illness and a phenomenal differentiation of three kinds of illness. The
developmental character of illness is fully presented. In the process of
becoming ill and recovering, the individual runs successively through the
states of sensibility, irritability and reproduction - in these Hegel sees the
three basic functions of form and formation which during health act together
harmoniously, but separate in illness; the succession of these constitute being
ill, an essential part of which is the phenomenon offever:
1be characteristic manifestation of disease is, therefore, that the identity of the entire
organic process displays itself as the successive course of the vital movement through
its distinct moments: sensibility, irritability, and reproduction, i.e. as fever, which,
however, as process of the totality in opposition to the isolated (vereinzelte) activity,
is just as much the effort towards, and the beginning of, cure (PN § 372, pp. 432-433).
Accordingly illness develops through three stages; in these, illness also

unfolds its significance for the self-perception of the subject. In the first stage
the illness is only present in itself [an sich] , the beginning of the physical
disturbance does not cause one to 'feel ill' - the individual is unaware of it; in
the second stage the illness is perceived consciously, and as a part of the
organism, making itself independent, it turns against the organism's subjec-
tivity. The organism, as Hegel says, is "irritated beyond its capacity to
respond" so that "one particular part, a single system, gains a foothold in
opposition to the self" (PN § 371, Zusatz, p. 433). The third stage, following
upon the sensibility of the first and the irritability of the second, is that of
reproduction. With an antiquated expression, Hegel designates this stage as
'coction' [a stage of digestion prior to elimination of morbid matter - Ed.] ;
here it "consists in the affection of the one system becoming an affection of
the whole organism" (PN § 372,Zusatz, p.434). But with that, the possibility
of a cure is given at the same time. Fever is a symptom of this state, this
complete embarrassment of the organism by an illness and at the same time
a sign of overcoming it; fever is the "pure life of the diseased organism", it
is the 'fluidization' of the shattered basic functions of the living being, it
stands between illness and health - it is the high point of the illness, and it is
also the beginning of recovery: "Therefore, even if fever is, on the one hand,
a morbid state and a disease, yet on the other hand, it is the way in which
the organism cures itself' (PN § 372, Zusa tz , p. 434).
Fever is also development, and this too passes through the three basic
organic functions. It appears to begin with
shivering, heaviness of the head, headache, twinges in the spine, twitching of the skin,
and shuddering. In this activity of the nervous system, the muscles are left free and
consequently their own irritability functions as an uncontrolled trembling and powerless-
ness. Heaviness of the bones sets in, tiredness of the limbs, withdrawal of the blood from
the skin, a sensation of cold .... The organism dissolves all its parts within itself in the
simplicity of the nerve, and feels itself withdrawing into the simple substance [of its
being] (PN § 372,Zusatz, p. 435).
Then this development will be a transformation into "heat, negativity, where

the blood is now the dominating factor" (PN § 372, Zusatz, p. 435). Simul-
taneously this is now the time of delirium. Added to this is sweating and
secretion of perspiration. According to Hegel, this secretion cannot be

regarded as the expelling of diseased matter, which would only have to be
"emptied out with a spoon" (PN § 372, Zusatz, p. 435) in order to overcome
or shorten the illness. Rather, in this act, which is an act of production, of
formation, the organism regains its healthy identity and wins back the
capacity of self-formation:
The significance of this product is, that in it, the isolation, the single system (das
Einzelne), the determinateness, ceases, for the organism has produced itself as a whole,
in general, has digested itself; sweat, to use an expression of the ancient physicians, is
cooked morbid matter - an excellent notion. Sweat is the critical secretion; in it, the
organism attains to an excretion of itself, through which it eliminates its abnormality
and rids itself of its morbid activity. The crisis is the organism which has gained the
mastery over itself, which reproduces itself, and exercises this power by sweating
(PN § 372, Zusatz, p. 435).
Therapy
In illness the organic succumbs to the inorganic, the unity of consciousness

succumbs to a single psychic dimension; organs and organic functions, drives
and fields of consciousness, make themselves independent. This perspective
gives therapy its orientation - it must remove and transcend [aujheben] the
particularization. This happens in three ways. Either the organism is inten-
sified and strengthened in its activity, as due to the medication it "must
direct itself outwards" or through therapeutic means "the activity of the
conflict is weakened" (PN § 373, Zusatz, p. 439). Finally there is magnetic
hypnotherapy and other psychic forms of treatment. For Hegel therapeutic
remedies are inorganic substances; by confronting them the body can more
readily pull itself together than when it confronts inorganic forces or sub-
entities within itself that have made themselves independent:
The medicine provokes the organism to put an end to the particular irritation in which
the formal activity of the whole is fixed and to restore the fluidity of the particular
organ or system within the whole (PN § 373, p. 436).
lliness can also be called a "hypochondria of the organism" - the

organism must be pulled away from the state of sinking down into itself and
rejecting the external world, and set back again "into the general activity of
assimilation" (PN § 373, Zusatz, p. 438). The organism is led back to itself
from outside, it is bewitched, transformed by magic. Under the influence of
the healing remedy, it is restored to itself, gains strength in the confrontation
with this remedy, and now can also overcome the process of illness within
itself. The relation between a specific medication and a specific illness, to be

sure, was still scarcely understood, according to Hegel; as yet "experience
alone is supposed to decide this" (PN § 373, Zusatz, p. 439). Here a future
research task is sketched for empirical medicine, which, for Hegel, cannot fall
within the province of philosophy. A fundamentally different action of
medication is to weaken the organism: "Its purpose, then, is to depress the
activity of the organism so that in eliminating from it all activity, that of the
diseased system, too, is eliminated" (PN § 373, Zusatz, p. 439).
Fasting, diet, but also bleeding and severe chilling for inflammation,
should be effected in this direction. If until now medicine has enjoyed greater
success in treating acute rather than chronic illnesses, for Hegel the reason is
that in acute illnesses the entire organism suffers, while the specific fixations
of chronic illnesses can only be overcome with difficulty, and this difficulty
becomes greater the more "this organ or system is affected" (PN § 371,
Zusatz, p. 432). Finally psychic diseases are to be treated by magnetic
hypnotherapy and other psychic or physical therapeutic procedures. Just as
the medication from outside overcomes the isolation of the diseased body
region again, so the hypnotizing physician overcomes the independence that
certain fields of consciousness have established for themselves. The conscious-
ness of the patient is 'fluidified', in the artificial sleep the disturbed self [Ich]
is to reconstitute itself, is brought back "to the feeling of its inner
universality" (PN§ 373, Zusatz, p. 440). The sleep of hypnosis is related to
natural sleep, and it can be replaced by the latter as well:
But instead of this magnetically induced sleep, a healthy sleep, too, can produce this
turning-point in an illness, i.e. the organism can then spontaneously gather itself
together into its substantiality (PN § 373, Zusatz, p. 440).
'Animal magnetism', its empirical background and theoretical conse·

quences, as well as the controversies around this approach, are known to
Hegel; there is no unconditional approval in his work?8 Psychic therapy is
frequently combined with physical methods. But the physical aspect of the
cure cannot be understood philosophically: "The medical remedies employed
are, on the contrary, for the most part empirical and are therefore uncertain
in their action" (PM § 408, Zusatz, p. 136). However, the psychic is decisive.
Hegel considers an essential presupposition for every psychic therapy to be
the insight that psychic disease is not a complete loss of rational mental
power, but rather "only a contradiction in a still subsisting reason" (PM
§ 408, p. 124). This fundamental principle also remains valid for therapy of
physical illnesses; here, too, one cannot proceed from a total loss of health,
but only from a contradiction within health. Treating a sick human being
from this perspective, according to Hegel, is to be designated as humane

[menschliche] treatment:
This humane treatment, no less benevolent than reasonable ... presupposes the patient's
rationality, and in that assumption has the sound basis for dealing with him on this side
- just as in the case of bodily disease the physician bases his treatment on the vitality
which as such still contains health (PM § 408, p. 124).29
IV
To take into consideration other dimensions of the understanding of illness

besides the perspective of natural science seems to have been a continuing
human interest Aside from the sociology, psychology and anthropology of
illness, and investigation of the relationship between art and illness, a philo-
sophical conception also fmds recognition. In the history of the confrontation
of philosophy with the nature of man, of health, of illness and death, Hegel
occupies a special place. Hegel's speculative concept of illness differs from the
Romantic conceptions of his time; it is also distinct from the interpretation
of illness in Schelling's philosophy. Hegel's conceptions are not to be under-
stood as an alternative to empirical medicine; he is convinced of the possibility
of linking speculation and empirical work in a unity and in recognition of the
difference between them. For Hegel, illness is understood as a phenomenon
of organic life, which can occur only on this level, and only within this level
can insight be gained into it. The multiplicity of illnesses is ordered in three
kinds of illness, a taxonomy that is to satisfy logical principles as well as find
confirmation in reality. Universal and individual physical illnesses as well as
psychic illnesses are the processes of organs and functions making themselves
independent, whereas in the healthy state these are subordinated to the unity
of the body and the identity of consciousness. The process of falling ill and
recovering health is a falling apart of the essential vital functions, which,
during the stages of this process, successively predominate and then, in
health, return to their harmonious combination. Recovery is not always
possible; illnesses anticipate death, organic life must die. Therapy corresponds
to the original arising and the phenomenal character of illness; in it the drive
toward independence of the diseased body systems and psychic domains is
again eliminated and transcended [aufgehoben] . Hegel's philosophy of illness
is determined by the interrelation between nature and mind; in therapy the
viewpoint of humaneness is emphasized; treatment has a moral aspect.
Ruprecht-Karl-University
Heidelberg
NOTES
1 After completion of work on this manuscript there appeared W. Jacob's brief descrip·
tion 'Der Krankheitsbegriff in der Dialektik von Natur und Geist bei Hegel' in Hegel-
Studien, Beiheft 11 (1974), pp. 165-73; and also T. J. Bole: 'John Brown, Hegel and
Speculative Concepts in Medicine', Texas Reports on Biology and Medicine 32 (1974),
287-97. Previously to that only W. L. Leibbrand had presented Hegel's conception of
illness in quite detailed form (see below Notes 15, Leibbrand (1956),187-90,263-70).
In the comprehensive works on the history and systematics of the concept of illness,
Hegel has not been included: H. Ribbert, Die Lehren vom Wesen der Krankheiten in
ihren geschichtlichen Entwicklung (Bonn, Cohen, 1899); T. Meyer·Steineg, 'Der Gang der
Krankheitslehre in ihren wichtigsten Phasen',peutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift 50
(1924), 31H., 347f., 380f., 412; H. MUller, 'Uber den Krankheitsbegriff im Wandel der
Zeiten, mit besonderer BerUcksichtigung neuerer Anschauungen und Foigerungen',
Diss. Berlin 1939; A. Dietrich, 'Die Entwicklung des Krankheitsbegriffes', Hippokrates
12 (1941), 122·-26; E. Berghoff, Entwicklungsgeschichte des Krankheitsbegriffes, 2nd
ed. (Vienna, Maudrich), 1947 (Here alone a quotation from the Philosophy of the
Subjective Mind is to be found.); W. Riese, The Conception of Disease, Its History, Its
Versions and Its Nature (New York, Philosophical Library, 1953); L. J. Rather, 'Zur
Philo sophie des Begriffes Krankheit', Deutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift 83 (1958),
2012-18; also: 'Towards a Philosophical Study of the Idea of Disease', in The Historical
Development of Physiological Thought, ed. C. C. M. Brooks and P. F. Cranefield (New
York, Hafner, 1959), pp. 351-73; O. Temkin, 'The Scientific Approach to Disease;
Specific Entity and Individual Sickness', in Scientific Change, ed. A. C. Crombie,
(London, Heinemann, 1963), pp. 629-58; P. Diepgen, G. B. Gruber and H. Schadewaldt,
'Der Krankheitsbegriff, seine Geschichte und Problematik', Handbuch der Allgemeinen
Pathologie, (Berlin, Heidelberg, New York, Springer, 1969), vol. I, pp. 1·-50; K. E.
Rothschuh, Zwei Beitrdge zur Allgemeinen Krankheitslehre (Stuttgart, 1973).
2 H. A. Goden published a totally negative account in 1819 in his essay 'Uber Hegel's
Begriff vom Wesen der Krankheit und der Heilung' in Okens Isis, vol. 2 (1819), col.
1127-38; in 1829 K. H. Scheidler reviewed the 'GrundzUge der Hegelschen Philo sophie
in Beziehung auf die Medizin [The Basic Principles of the Hegelian Philosophy in
Relation to Medicine]" within the treatise 'Uber das Verhaltnis der Philo sophie
iiberhaupt and der Psychologie insbesondere zur Medicin', Minerva Medica, 1 (1829),
211-48; he regretted the widespread disinterest in philosophy among physicians;
this disinterest has brought about "that not even the system of Hegel, recently epoch·
making in the focal point of North German scientific culture, and already applied in
many ways to theology, jurisprudence, history in general, as well as to the history of
philosophy especially and to aesthetics, has not been considered or noted by them."
(p.245f.)
3 C. W. Hufeland, System der practischen Heilkunde (Frankfurt and Leibzig, 1800),
vol. 1, p. VIII.
4 Ibid., 1802, vol. 2, p. VIf.
5 A. F. Hecker, Kunst, die Krankheiten der Mensch en zu heilen (Erfurt, Henning, 1804;
4th ed., 1813), p. V.
6 Ibid., p. VI.
7 Ibid., p. 298.
DIETRICH VON ENGELHARDT 139
8 Candidus, 'Nicht Anklage, sondern Klage', Journal der practischen Heilkunde, 33

(July 1816), 110-16.
9 Ibid., p. 113.
10 Ibid., p. 116.
II Hufeland, 'Nachwort zu Candidus', op. cit., p. 119.
12 P. C. Hartmann, Theorie der Krankheit (Vienna, Gerold, 1823), p. 60.
13 C. J. Windisch mann to Hegel, 13 October 1823 in Briefe von und an Hegel. 3rd ed.
Ed. by 1. Hoffmeister. 4 vols. (Sdmtliche Werke. Neue kritische Ausgabe, 29, 1959),
Vol. III, p. 34.
14 Hegel to Windisch mann, 11 April 1824, ibid., p. 40.
15 For Romantic medicine see. the more general studies: Fr. v. MUller, Spekulation und
Mystik in der Heilkunde. Ein Uberblick uber die leitenden Ideen der Medizin im letzten
Jahrhundert (Munich, Lindauer, 1914); P. Diepgen, Deutsche Medizin vor hundert Jahren.
Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Romantik (Freiburg and Leipzig, Spever and Kaerner,
1923); w. Fischer, Die Krankheitsanschauungen der Romantik (Rostock, Hinstorff, 1926);
E. Hirschfeld, 'Romantische Medizin', Kyklos 3 (1930), 1-89; F. H. Garrison, 'The
Romantic Episode in the History of German Medicine' (1931) in Contributions to the
History of Medicine (New York and London, Hafner, 1966), pp. 115- 40 W. Pagel,
Virchow und die Grundlagen der Medizin des XIX. Jahrhunderts (Jena, Fischer, 1931);
P. Diepgen, 'Alte und neue Romantik in der Medizin', Klinische Wochenschrift 11
(1932), 28-34; W. Pagel, 'The Speculative Basis of Modern Pathology. Jahn, Virchow
and the Philosophy of Pathology', Bulletin of the History of Medicine 18 (1945), 1- 43;
K. Schober, 'Die Vorstellungen der A.rzte der Romantik von der Wirkung der Heilmittel',
diss. med. Mainz 1950; G. Rosen, 'Romantic Medicine: a Problem in Historical Periodiza-
tion', Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 25 (1951), 149-58; W. Leibbrand, Die
spekulative Medizin der Romantik (Hamburg, Claassen, 1956); E. Heischkel,
'Pharmakologie in der Goethezeit', Sudhoffs Archiv 42 (1958), 302-11; K. E.
Rothschuh, 'Ansteckende Ideen in der Wissenschaftsgeschichte, gezeigt in der
Entstehung und Ausbreitung der romantischen Physiologie', Deutsche Medizinische
Wochenschrift 86 (1961), 396-402; O. Temkin, 'Basic Science, Medicine and the
Romantic Era', Bulletin of the History of Medicine 37 (1963), 97-129; G. B. Risse,
'Kant, Schelling, and the Early Search for a Philosophical 'Science' of Medicine in
Germany', Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 27 (1972), 145-58;
H. Sohni, Die Medizin der Frilhromantik (Freiburger Forschungen zur Medizingeschi-
chte, N. F. vol 2. Freiburg, Hans Ferdinand Schultz, 1973). -- There is a series of specific
concepts and groupings within Romanticism, as well as about the concept of illness in
literature; thus, for example: W. Milch, 'Zum Problem der Krankheit in der Dichtung der
deutschen Romantik', Sudhoffs Archiv 23 (1930),213-35; K. E. Rothschuh, 'Joseph
Garres und die romantische Physiologie', Medizinische Monatsschrift 5 (1951), 128 -31;
E. Seidler, 'Entwicklung naturwissenschaftlichen Denkens in der Medizin zur Zeit der
Heidelberger Romantik', Sudhoffs Archiv 47 (1963),43-58; H. H. Lauer, 'Krankheit
und 'Heilung' bei Windischmann', Sudhoffs Archiv 47 (1963), 59-72; W. Artelt, Der
Mesmerismus in Berlin (Mainz, 1965); H. Schipperges, 'Krankheit als geistiges Phiinomen
bei Novalis', Der Horizont 8 (1965), 116-29.
16 For Hegel's relation to Romanticism, see: O. Paggeler, Hegels Kritik der Romantik
(Bonn, Bouvier, 1956).
17 Hegel, Maximen des Journals der deutschen Literature, 1806. Siimtliche Werke
(Jubildumsausgabe) 1, 4th ed. (Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt, 1965), p. 545.

18 Hegel, 'Aphorismen aus der Jenenser Zeit', in Dokumente zu Hegels Entwicklung, ed.
J. Hoffmeister (Stuttgart, Frommann, 1936), p. 355.
19 J. N. Neubauer, 'Dr. John Brown (1745-88) and Early German Romanticism'
Journal of the History of Ideas 28 (1967),367-82; G. B. Risse, 'The History of John
Brown's Medical System in Germany during the Years 1790-1806', diss. Chicago 1971.
20 Such a view was reported to Hegel, for example, by C. D. v. Buttel on Dec. 16,
1829: "So among other matters I can report with joy how one of my friends in Jever,
Dr. Med. Pinner, continually ascertains results, which I am convinced can be incorporated
by philosophy almost without further effort Among other matters he has found in the
history of medicine, that the periodically dominant and changing forms of illness are
simply based on the trilogy of vital functions, and as in the present day the decaying
(of reproductivity), under the emergence of carbon, imparts to the constitution of
illness a consistent character, as previously (only a few years ago) the inflammational
(irritability), under the predominance of oxygen, and still earlier the nervous (sensibility)
under the potentiation of nitrogen was the dominant constitution" (Hegel, Briefe von
und an Hegel. 3rd ed. Ed. by J. Hoffmeister. 4 vols. (Sdmtliche Werke. Neue kritische
Ausgabe 29, 1959), Vol. III, p. 290f. The historical character of the illnesses was main-
tained around 1800 repeatedly and in different ways. Hufeland sees an evolution of
illnesses in the history of mankind, which arises solely "through mechanical causes by
way of violent external interventions," to nervous diseases "not only in the cities and
among the higher social ranks, but this nervous character is also noticeable in the
countryside, and what was unheard of in Antiquity, there are now peasants who are
hypochrondriacs, and peasant women who suffer from vapors just as much as ladies in
the town." (Chr. W. Hufeland, Geschichte der Gesundheit nebst einer physischen Karak·
teristik des jetzigen Zeitalters (Berlin 1812), p. 13 and 19 f.).
21 L. Oken, Lehrbuch der Naturphilosophie, 2nd ed. (Jena, Frommann, 1831), § 3063,
p.388.
22 K. R. Hoffmann, Vergleichende Idealpathologie (Stuttgart, Balz, 1834). Other
important representatives of this tendency are: K. W. Stark, Pathologische Fragmente
(Weimar, Landes-Industrie-Comptoir, 1824-25); Allgemeine Pathologie oder allgemeine
Naturlehre der Krankheit (Leipzig, Breitopf and Hartel, 1834 -44) who is regarded as its
founder; R. W. Volz, Medizinische Zustdnde und Forschungen im Reiche der Krankheiten
(Pforzheim, Dennig, 1839) and F. Jahn, Die Naturheilkraft (Eisenach 1831); for the
natural history school see W. Karst, 'Zur Geschichte der natiirlichen Krankheitssysteme',
Abhandlungen der Geschichte der Medizin und der Naturwissenschaften 37(1941).
23 J. c. A. Heinroth (Lehrbuch der St6rungen des Seelenlebens oder Seelenst6rungen
und ihrer Behandlung, Pts. 1-2 (Leipzig, Vogel, 1818); Lehrbuch der Seelengesund-
heitslehre, vols. 1-2 (Leipzig, Vogel, 1824); C. J. Windisch mann, Uber etwas, das der
Heilkunst Noth thut. Ein Versuch zur Vereinigung dieser Kunst mit der christlichen
Philosophie (Leipzig, Gnobloch, 1824) ;J. N. v. Ringseis, System der Medizin (Regensburg,
Manz, 1841); for this point of view see W. v. Siebenthal, 'Krankheit als Folge der
Siinde', Heilkunde und Geisteswelt, vol. 2 (Hannover 1950). It is this conception which
is involved in the fundamental difference between them, of which Hegel speaks repeatedly
in his correspondence with Windischmann, and which is also mentioned by Windischmann
in his replies.
24 Hegel to Windisch mann, Letter of 27 May 1810 in Briefe von und an Hegel. 3rd ed.
Ed. by J. Hoffmeister. 4 vols. (Siimtliche Werke. Neue kritische Ausgabe 29, 1959),
Vol. I, p. 314.
25 Ibid.
26 See D. Henrich, 'Hegels Theorie tiber den Zufall', Kantstudien 50 (1958/59), 131-
148; reprinted in Henrich, Hegel im Kontext (Frankfurt, Suhrkamp, 1971).
27 [The Cevennes, a mountain range forming the southern and eastern fringe of the
central plateau of southern France, was the locale of an early eighteenth century uprising
of Huguenot Protestant peasants - the Camisards - against the Church and the King.
The Camisards carried on organized military resistance for some years after 1702,
following nearly two decades of violent repression of their movement after the revoca-
tion of the Edict of Nantes (1685). Their religion was marked by visions, ecstasy,
miracles and other spiritual manifestations, as well as by prophetic and mystical
witnessing, and the leadership of young children. - Ed.]
28 Hegel expressly points to the observations of P. G. van Ghert who studied with him
and who formed a positive judgement of Hegel's philosophy; a 'Tagebuch einer
magnetischen Behandlung' (Diary of a magnetic treatment) (Holland 1814) by van Ghert
appeared in German translation in the Archiv fur den thierischen Magnetismus 2 (1817)
St. 1, pp. 3-24,55-188, St. 2, pp. 3-51; also a 'Sammlung merkwiirdiger Erscheinungen
des thierischen Magnetismus' (Collection of Remarkable Phenomena of Animal
Magnetism) (Holland 1815) appeared in translation in the same journal, vol. 3 (1818)
St. 3, pp. 1-97. Hegel calls van Ghert a "reliable physician who is at the same fertile in
ideas and educated in the most recent philosophy" (see PM § 406, Zusatz, p. 118).
29 In this relation Hegel recalls to mind Pinel and his commitment to a humane, moral
treatment of mental illness (see PM § 408, p. 124; Zusatz, p. 137). Pinel himself is
convinced that "the moral treatment of insanity is one of the most important parts of
observational medical science and one that has till now received little attention." His
residence in the Hospital Bicetre, his communication with the insane patients, his obser-
vation of the "regular order" of their behavior and well as of "changeable and often
bizarre scenes" led him to the insight, how frequently it would be possible in these
"cases of misled reason to restore its use either by means of mild remedies or an energetic
but wise and humane discipline". P. Pinel, Philosophisch-Medizinische Abhandlung
tiber Geistesverirrungen oder Manie. A. de Fr. (1801) tr. by M. Wagner (Vienna 1801),
p. 112. [This is a translation from the original French work: Traite medico-philosophique
sur l'aliimation mentale, au la manie ... (Paris, 1801). The English version is A Treatise
on Insanity, trans. by D. D. Davis (London, 1806; reprinted New York, Hafner, 1962).
- Ed.]
RUDIGER BUBNER
ON HEGEL'S SIGNIFICANCE FOR THE SOCIAL SCIENCES
After the breakdown of the Hegelian encyclopedic system, the individual parts
suffered different fates. One set of questions seems to have survived better
than the others: Hegel's social philosophy has continued to incite contro-
versies in the social sciences, the humanities and philosophy from the nine-
teenth century to the present. German sociology with its so-called 'Positivism-
dispute' has been the most recent scene of debate.! This controversy between
Popper's philosophy of science and a Neo-Marxist defence of the dialectic
reiterates motives and prejudices with a long-standing tradition. However, a
true appraisal of Hegel's significance for the social sciences must renounce the
established chain of prejudices on both sides. In my opinion the fecundity of
Hegel's philosophy for fundamental questions of history and society first
becomes clear in the light of a full understanding of the famous thesis in the
Preface to the Philosophy of Right: "Philosophy is its own epoch compre-
hended in thought".2
The recourse to Hegel himself does not arise out of a purely historical
interest in textual exegesis. To the contrary, the attempt to reconstruct
Hegel's original dialectic independently of traditional controversies reveals its
Significance and fruitfulness for dealing with problems of our day. Conse-
quently, my paper traces the contemporary discussion. back into the nine-
teenth century and ultimately to its source in Hegel. The first section reviews
pertinent aspects of the recent Positivism-dispute (1). I then sketch out the
tradition of Hegel's influence on the methodology of the social sciences.
These historical remarks should serve to clarify some commonplace ideas
(II - The impatient reader may skip that section). An analysis of Hegel's view
of the inescapable tension between philosophy and its epoch completes the
argumentation (III). Finally, I draw some general conclusions on the role of
dialectics for social thought (IV).
Professor Popper places Hegel, as we know, among the most dangerous

enemies of an Open Society. 3 He is just as ready to cast him out of the ideal
state of classical liberalism as once Plato was to cast the Sophists and the
143
144 RUDIGER BUBNER
poets out of his Republic. 4 Instead of recognizing the individual's freedom

of decision and moral responsibility, Hegel, according to Popper, believes in
objective laws of history which permit predictions about social developments.
This prophetic historicism is criticized for excluding rational and critical
discussion which is constitutive of all scientific progress, in the natural as
well as in the social sciences. Popper's political objection to Hegel is thus
based on a methodological argument, and the plea for democracy represents
the obvious political consequence of the fundamental insights of the Logic
of Scientific Discovery.
And yet, Popper often concedes that his methodological approach of "trial
and error" has much in common with dialectical procedure. 5 He argues as
follows. Growth of knowledge originates from problems which emerge in
science or life outside the realm of philosophy. These problems present them-
selves as difficulties or contradictions between our prior knowledge and the
facts. The epistemological method suggested by Popper to remedy this
situation has as its goal the permanent elimination of future contradictions.
Human knowledge can only advance by seriously taking such contradictions
into account and by critically dissolving them through a search for a better
theory. This approach bans historicist claims of all-embracing laws of history.
Popper's position was challenged by dialecticians. During the last two
decades in Germany there has been an animated dispute between sociologists
and philosophers of Hegelian and Popperian persuasions. It commenced with
an attack by the Neo-Marxists of the Frankfurt School on Popper's concept
of methodology in the social sciences. Although Popper's critics have
employed Hegelian arguments, they use these arguments in the spirit of
Marxist social theory and critique of ideology. They assert that contradictions
do not simply arise in the course of scientific research but are objectively
given in the character of current capitalist society. Hence, the prime concern
is not to eliminate the contradictions but to understand the historical necessity
of their existence.
The appropriate method for this task is not to be found in critical discus-
sion among researchers, because this discussion is carried out in the socially
detached sphere of institutionalized science. According to the Neo-Marxists,
Popper's methodological concept harbors the danger of ideological obfusca-
tion, since it necessarily can not grasp all of the relevant contradictions. The
critical discussion of contradictions must consequently be expanded from
the methodological realm to a material critique of socio-historical reality
itself. The political model of liberalism favored by Popper then falls victim to
such a critique because it represents the illusion of individual freedom in the
HEGEL'S SIGNIFICANCE FOR SOCIAL SCIENCE 145
midst of actual bondage and inequality. The Neo-Marxist position aims not
at true knowledge of existing society, but at knowledge of the falsity of
existing society viewed against the background of a projection of another
truer, though not yet actual, society.
In response to this position Popper's followers simply repeated the old
arguments against the dialectic, detecting again what they call an irrational
myth of totality which Popper had discarded as historicism. The positions
hardened to a kind of stalemate and at the level of this controversy no
satisfactory solution has been reached. This dispute, however, represents
only the most recent phase of the discussion of Hegel's significance for the
social sciences. It will be useful to recall this tradition of Hegel's influence
in order to remove some persistent misunderstandings and to evaluate the
enduring significance of Hegel's legacy.
II
Philosophy comprehends its own time in thought - this might be considered

the motto of the left-wing movement of Young Hegelians. 6 Arnold Ruge 7
as well as the early Marx 8 understood it as a radical encouragement to
criticism. The Young Hegelians established a strict opposition between
philosophy and reality. They prescribed for philosophy unconditional
confrontation with the political, social and economic conditions of its time.
Since philosophy fmds itself ab origine in opposition to reality and since its
own claim to reason seems to be well founded, the duty of the critic is clear:
to expound the prevailing irrationality theoretically and to attack its
supporters practically.
The fust critique of this sort was directed against Hegel himself, who,
according to the Young Hegelians, constrained the critical power of thought
in a speculative system that existed only for itself and possessed no further
relationship to its time. Hegel was accused of an "accommodation" to the
political situation; his philosophy of right, which had formulated the task of
philosophy with regard to its epoch, was regarded as the most extreme
ideological glorification of the Prussian state.
In his famous 'Introduction to the Critique of the Hegelian Philosophy of
Right'9 Marx developed a program which included both a critique of the
ideological function of pure philosophy and the foundation of revolutionary
practice. If philosophy is to comprehend its time, then it camiot merely
capture it in thought and sublimate it theoretically while the wretched reality
of the age continues to exist under this ideological cover. The full sense of
146 RUDIGER BUBNER
Hegel's dictum implies more than Hegel himself recognized. The "task of
philosophy for its time" means overcoming isolated theory and practically
changing reality.
In contrast to such a critical application of the dialectic Dilthey's
hermeneutical theory of the humanities (Geisteswissenschaften) represents a
more conservative line of Hegelian influence on the social sciences.! 0 This
theory seeks to found the method of the humanities on Hegel's concept of
the objective mind (Geist), in the attempt to circumvent the hubris of an
absolute system of encyclopedic philosophy. Dilthey's central category, 'life'
(Leben), designates the inner connection of historical phenomena, and can
be considered a terminological translation of Hegel's concept of objective
mind. l l
According to Dilthey, the unitary stream of life not only inexhaustibly
manifests itself in innumerable concrete phenomena, but also enables us
to understand these phenomena. If the phenomena of the objective mind are
expressions of the all-embracing stream of life, then these phenomena are
immediately accessible to the understanding, for he who understands, parti-
cipates in that very stream of life. The object of the humanities is historical-
social reality, and if it is to be grasped it must be ontologically distinct from
nature. It must neither be artificially objectivized nor alienated through
analogy with the method of the natural sciences.i2 The appropriate method
of the humanities is the identification of the given object as a manifestation
of life. Thus an act of anamnesis occurs in which the subject recognizes
himself, as it were, in the object. The comprehensive stream of life to which
both the subject and the object essentially belong mediates between the two
sides of one whole. Dilthey calls this process 'Verstehen'P
As a natural consequence of his conception of the humanities, it was
impossible for Dilthey to accept Hegel's idea of an absolute mind, under
which art, religion and philosophy are subsumed. The realm of absolute mind
should be abolished as a metaphysical dogma. Dilthey complains of Hegel's
approach: "The plan of construction of the 'Geisteswissenschaften' is reversed
from the outset. Historical understanding is sacrificed to the metaphysical
schema".!4 In fact, Dilthey is guided by a thoroughly un-Hegelian epistemo-
logical intention which he conceives analogously to Kant as a "critique of
historical reason". His central concern is to clarify the possibilities for know-
ledge of historically limited, fmite reason; in his view this means rectifying
Kant's transcendental abstractions by focusing on the living individuals'
concrete acts of reason, thereby at the same time avoiding the speculative
extravagance of Hegel's absolute system.
Thus Dilthey had to challenge the Neo-Kantians as well, who strictly in

the Kantian spirit developed a merely methodological distinction between
the natural sciences and the humanities. The first of these was Wilhelm
Windelband. ls He declared that the ontological distinction between nature
and mind was obsolete since the sciences of nature and mind are both to be
conceived as sciences of experience. The distinction between them lies only in
the sphere of methodology, that is in the logic of the. different ways of
experiencing reality.16
Windelband asserted: "The principle of division is the formal character of
the goals of their knowledge. The one seeks general laws, the other particular
historical facts". He coined the designations 'nomothetic,l? and 'idiographic'
for the two methodologically distinct branches of science. The nomothetic
sciences strive for general laws, under which all particulars can be subsumed.
The idiographic sciences try to grasp and describe individual significant
events, persons or phenomena. 18
For the purpose of characteriZing particulars as meaningful or significant,
Windelband employs a concept introduced by Hermann Lotze, and which
later, through Heinrich Rickert and Max Weber, decisively shaped the
methodology of the social sciences - the concept of 'value' (Wert). The term
was obviously borrowed from economics. Interestingly, however, Lotze first
applied this notion to problems of aesthetics in order to explain what a
judgment about beauty signified. Lotze wanted to express in realistic
sounding terms what German idealism, not least that of Hegel, conveyed with
the concept of "idea", namely the reality of reason in contrast to the merely
empirical reality of multifarious facts.19
Heinrich Rickert adopted Windelband's methodological distinction and
developed it through use of the concept of value so that it assumed the most
influential position in the philosophy of science at the beginning of our
century.20 He bases his approach on the logical distinction between the
general and the particular. Since, as he argues, the natural sciences strive only
for general laws, they must systematically neglect the specific qualities of
individual occurrences and they can never adequately come to terms with the
elusive concreteness of empirical phenomena. Precisely this ungrasped con-
creteness remains as the object of the historical or cultural sciences. Hence his
characterization of the object of the cultural sciences is derived negatively
from the shortcomings of their counterpart.
However, Rickert also offers a positive definition by means of a so-called
'theoretical reference to value' (Wertbeziehung). The 'reference to value' does
not involve practical value-judgments but is theoretical and value-free. It
148 RUDIGER BUBNER
selects out of the abundance of details the specific individual fact which is
related to a value and therefore is of general significance in the historical-
social realm. As is well known, Rickert's notion of value-reference was
adopted by Weber as a useful tool for sociological understanding. This aspect
of the social sciences continues to remain controversial. 21
Rickert's treatment of historical-social reality as the object of an indivi-
dualizing and value-referring science does not suggest Hegel's speculative
idealism as much as Dilthey's. He spoke of Kulturwissenschaften rather than
Geisteswissenschaften. However, he did admit they and their subject-matter
essentially rested on Hegel's provocative and ambiguous principle stated in
the introduction to the Philosophy of Right that what is rational is real and
what is real is rational. 22
There are yet two further examples of Hegel's influence on the social
sciences which should be considered: the work of Hans Freyer and Karl
Mannheim. Freyer could easily appeal to Hegel when he charged that the
sociology of his day, which was methodologically oriented towards the
Kulturwissenschaften, was too removed from life. He maintained that a
sociology which is primarily concerned with methodological questions tends
to forget its actual duty vis-a-vis history. He reminded the sociologists of the
legacy of Hegel's philosophy and Marx's socio-economics. Sociology should
deal with the reality of changing society and not with the constructs of
Kulturwissenschaften.
Sociology must therefore consciously recognize its ties to its time and
seek to maintain this connection. Only after recognizing the essential
dependence of theory on its time can sociology become aware of its genuine
object. Freyer's formulation of the task confo:-ms completely to the Hegelian
dictum that the epoch must be comprehended in thought. 23 "A sociology is
the scientific self-understanding of a given society. In the nature of its
problems and in the inner form of its thought, a sociology is inescapably
determined by its time .,,24
This program of sociological realism differs from Karl Mannheim's
sociology of knowledge, although it too has roots in Hegelian thOUght.
Mannheim begins as well by postulating the crucial bondage of theory to its
time. But instead of deducing the present duties of sociology from this
postulate, he formulates a thesis which, he believes, rests securely on the
methodological basis of the Kulturwissenschaften. He raises the historical
limitation of all manifestations of mind to the universal principle that all
thought is bound to its time and place. The research of the sociology of
knowledge takes individual, historical phenomena which Hegel described as
manifestations of objective mind and then sets them into a deterministic

relationship with .the given social conditions which Hegel's speculative
idealism had overlooked. 25 The "relative synthesis", the link between every
idea and its historical point of origin, becomes the modest, un-speculative
truth which a sociology of knowledge retrieves from the principle of the
comprehension of an era in thought. 26
Mannheim mediates between Hegelian philosophy and Marx's objections.
Marx classified Hegel as an ideologist insofar as he neglects the political
relationships of his time by concentrating on pure thought. Marx saw the need
to criticize this secret endorsement of the status quo. However, Mannheim
neutralizes the practical, revolutionary import of the concept of ideology,
since he treats it as a general, theoretical category of knowledge which a
value-free, scientific sociology can then employ as a tool.
. Of course, he must take into account the significance of the concept of
ideology for the position of the sociology of knowledge itself; he must
consider how his own theories are bound to their historical situation. For this
purpose he falls back on the notion of a pseudo-class of socially detached
intellectuals (freischwebende Intelligenz) who are not bound by their
particular circumstances. In this way Mannheim is able to rescue the method-
ological consistency of the sociology of knowledge while maintaining the
concept of ideology. Moreover, he can defend his answer to Max Weber's call
for a link between value-free research and the political engagement of the
researcher: 27 The pseudo-class of intellectuals serves as a rational guide for
decisions in current politics by virtue of its better overview of the social
whole.
The Marxists very early reiterated the reproach of ideology against this
neutral re-interpretation of the concept of ideology in the sociology of know-
ledge. They suspected an unconscious political partisanship behind the retreat
to theoretical self-certainty.28 And even Popper, who stands in opposition to
the Marxist camp, objected to the easy answers of the sociology of knowledge
on the grounds of his logic of scientific discovery .29 The process of critical
discussion among scientists necessarily presupposes the subjection of the
researcher to his situation. The assumption of the sociology of knowledge
- that scientists belong to a special group of socially detached intellectuals -
seems to eliminate the necessary social aspect of scientific method. It there-
fore represents an unfruitful abstraction, indeed an illusion.
We have thus returned to our starting point - the controversy between

Popper and the dialecticians 30 and the as yet unclarified role of Hegel's
150 RUDIGER BUBNER
approach. I am afraid this short survey of the forms in which Hegelian

thought guided the development of the social sciences has been, more than
one might have wished, a German affair. If the excursus appears all too
provincial, I think it does nevertheless reflect the course of his influence.
Although Hegel did exert a rather intense influence on English thought at the
end of the previous century, he was expelled from the Anglo-Saxon world
like Beelzebub himself by the great English philosophers of this century,
Russell and Moore. The main object of their criticisms was, perhaps, the
reception of Hegel by Bradley and McTaggart. Nevertheless, Hegel suffered as
well under their attacks. Mterwards he remained unfamiliar to the positivists
and the philosophers of science.
If they know something about him at all, it is often that he is not worth
knowing and they even maintain that lucid thinking, clear ideas and exact
methods must be immunized against the evils of Hegelianism. I consider
this an unjust treatment of Hegel which unfortunately overlooks his po-
tential contribution to the social sciences. I do not believe that the current
value of Hegelian thought for the social sciences lies in a renewal of the
category of objective mind, which Dilthey and Neo-Kantianism tried to
render serviceable .31 Nor do I think that the lesson which the contemporary
social sciences may learn from dialectics consists only in the critical confront-
ation of theory and reality, initially proposed by the Young Hegelians and
recently repeated by the Neo-Marxist school. The following offers an alter-
native evaluation of the tension between philosophy and its age which can
provide a framework for the interrelationship of social theory and practice.
III
The introductory chapter of Hegel's fIrst publication, the Differenz des

Fichteschen und Schellingschen Systems der Philosophie (1801)32 reflects on
the relationship of philosophy to its historical situation. Hegel sees his point
of departure as a stage which "has such a great number of philosophical
systems behind it as its past", that philosophy must inevitably develop a
historical consciousness. From this standpoint he makes the straightforward
general observation that every philosophical conception and every system
originates in a specific time, "arises out of its age" .33 He does not rest
content with showing an external parallelism of philosophical systems and
trends, compared with dates and epochs in the style of customary histories
of philosophy. On the contrary, he defmes the relationship more deeply, not
as a mere doxographic model, but as the duty of philosophy itself.
One may ask why such value is placed on the relationship of philosophy to
its age, since, after all, emphasis on the historical epoch seems extrinsic.
However, the problem is embedded within the notion of philosophy itself.
One speaks of philosophy and means something defmite and unitary. But in
reality there are only philosophies, differing systems, alternating tendencies.
Philosophy as such is not a visible entity; one sees only attempts to realize the
essence of philosophy, attempts which have followed upon each other
throughout history.
So considered, the central problem of philosophy's self-understanding
becomes how to grasp the unity of the intended idea of philosophy in con-
junction with the multiplicity of its historical manifestations. Philosophy
cannot begin at all before it has solved the paradox of the single idea and its
many realizations. The paradox is that of philosophy itself and does not
reside somewhere outside of philosophy. He who begins to philosophize and
wants to be clear about what he is doing encounters the difficulty that that
which he intends exists only in multifarious historical forms even though he
does not mean these various forms when he thinks of philosophy. What then
does he mean?
The question cannot be referred to the propaedeutic preliminaries of
philosophy. It is impossible to decide the question before beginning to
philosophize, in order thus to be able to proceed undisturbed with
philosophy itself; for, in order to be able to say what precedes philosophy, it
is necessary to know first what philosophy itself is. Otherwise there is no
criteria to draw the desired boundary. But what philosophy itself is - that
was exactly the question at issue. It is obvious that one cannot begin to
philosophize without knowing what philosophy itself is and that one can
only arrive at a defmition of philosophy through the history of philosophy.
Hence, the task of philosophy is primarily to come to terms with its
own history. The elucidation of that history represents the first step in
philosophizing and, at the same time, philosophy thereby provides its own
secure foundation.
Within the fully developed Hegelian system, the Phenomenology of Mind
takes up this task of a philosophical clarification of the historical constella-
tions of thOUght. As the first part of that system the Phenomenology serves
as a preparatory stage 34 for everything that follows. Today we no longer
believe in the philosophy as emphatically as did Hegel. Nevertheless, the unity
of philosophical thinking still represents a philosophical problem of un-
deniable and fundamental import. One tends to ignore the search for this
unity in favour of an unarticulated aggregate of independent disciplines and
152 RUDIGER BUBNER
highly sophisticated special techniques. And yet, the question remains: What
holds this aggregate together?
Of course, this question can be avoided if one attempts -like the positivist
philosophers - to equate a particular theoretical discipline (i.e. the logic of
scientific research) with philosophy per se. Those who believed in the logic of
scientific research denied the name of philosophy to anything not corres-
ponding to their own tradition. However, this kind of dogmatism has never
been able to survive for the simple reason that its self-assuredness is dependent
upon the denial of its factual relativity in the historical context of a plurality
of existing philosophical orientations. In the long run, the absolutist claim of
a philosophical dogmatism necessarily becomes historically relativized. Its
intentional blindness to its historical position is bound to give way in the
course of philosophical debate. The recent history of the philosophy of
science from the orthodoxy of the Vienna Circle to the pragmatism of the
community of researchers and finally to the quasi-hermeneutic historicism of
paradigm-change it fa Kuhn offers an instructive example of the significance
of this process.
Philosophy cannot abstract from its own historicity. TIlis does not mean,
however, that philosophy is nothing more than an intellectual expression of
given circumstances that change from one epoch to the next. Rather, the
awareness of historical conditions is the only way to escape the dominating
influence of those conditions. Philosophy must continuously insist on its
theoretical autonomy, but such an autonomy cannot be secured by assum-
ing a position high above the relativity of the hic et nunc. A philosophy
that is not jolted out of such a dogmatic slumber is bound to fall prey to the
unexpressed presuppositions of what the actual tendencies in the social and
intellectual world prescribe. It will unconsciously bear the mark of what goes
without saying in the existing paradigm of theoretical activities. Only by
reflecting upon these historical conditions can philosophy defend its legiti-
rna te claim to truth, a claim which reaches beyond historical relativity.
Paradoxically, then, this transhistorical claim is better supported by taking
the undeniable historicity into account than by neglecting it. Cynical fatalism
that believes in nothing but historical change is not the lesson to be derived
from Hegel's perspective on philosophy through history. What can be learned
is that the claim to truth is no inherited privilege, but can only be raised in
a productive critical exchange with those variable conditions that are given in
a broader historical context and that would seem to hinder autonomous
philosophizing. Thus, the main presupposition of the autonomy of philosophy
is the recognition of its limitations.
When effectively clarified, the historical conditions lose their strictly

determining character. This does not imply that reflection liberates philo-
sophy once and for all from its limitations. For, however great the penetrative
power of philosophical reflection may be, what is in fact reflected upon is
never a matter of free choice. The object is simply given and this givenness
must be taken into account by every serious interest in philosophical
autonomy. Despite continuous reflection upon a potentially infmite series of
conditions, we shall never be able once and for all to break out beyond the
boundaries they present.
Up to this point, I have discussed the historical factors and the dominating
character of an epoch as the given conditions which initiate the work of
philosophical reflection. However, this is but one aspect of the problems
inherent in the dictum from which we set out: "Philosophy is its epoch com-
prehended in thought." If it is to be expected that a philosophy constituted
by reflection upon its epoch can attain deeper insights than are otherwise
available, one must still ask: What, then, does one come to know of an epoch
once it has been comprehended in philosophical thought?
Clearly, this cannot be something already expressed in the common-sense
interpretation of everyday life. Every epoch develops a certain self-under-
standing through which it gives itself a specific identity in relation to the past
and to the future. An epoch is more than the sum of natural, economic,
political and cultural data. It is the result of a more or less vague collective
process of interpretation. At this level, nothing new is to be expected from
philosophy. A philosophy that limits its activity to this level and which is
thus reduced to a conceptual justification of the commonly held character
of an epoch can be of no great theoretical value. Philosophical thinking has
to bring forth insights other than those already held by current opinion. On
the other hand, philosophical insights have to be clearly related to the epoch
in question. They must formulate an aspect of an epoch that cannot be
expressed in terms of the common self-understanding of that epoch.
The recognition of how the dominating factors of an epoch affect the
philosophy emerging in it allows for a differentiation inaccessible to everyday
understanding. Philosophical reflection is able to distinguish surface-
phenomena from underlying structures, whereas the common understanding
normally mixes them together in the melting-pot of popular opinion. More
precisely, the differentiation between surface-phenomena and fundamental
structures is non-sensical, as long as one moves within the sphere of the self-
understanding of a given epoch. That which appears to be a predominant and
essential trait at a certain historical moment may later be exposed as having
154 RUDIGER BUBNER
been a mere vogue. Conversely, historical factors that are prima facie held to
be of less importance may, in the course of philosophical reflection, be found
to have a primary significance. The immediate view is not necessarily the
most penetrating one.
The physiognomy of an epoch is in no sense evident and easy to grasp.
Mere involvement in a historical situation is not a sufficient basis for a com-
prehension of that situation. The conceptual articulation of what is truly
substantial in a manifold of historical phenomena presupposes more than
contemporaneous participation in the general consciousness of an epoch.
What is required is the view from a distance, whereby the observer is not
ahistorically removed from the situation but is also not involved in its details.
Only from such a standpoint is one able to uncover what is essential under
that which is commonly held to be real. Only from such a standpoint is it
possible to comprehend the essential traits, the long-range tendencies, in
short, the actual make-up of a given society. Hegel entrusts this task of com-
prehension to philosophy. The question still remains open: Why philosophy?
Since philosophy is interested in its own paradoxical autonomy within the
framework of an historical epoch, it is not interested in that epoch as such.
Although its historical conditions are fetters which philosophy cannot cast
off, they are only seen as contingencies that must be relativized. Of course
the reduction of those factors to the status of mere contingency cannot
dispose of history. It does, however, put an end to the exaggerated role
ascribed to seemingly essential factors that temporarily eclipse other
characteristics before they, too, yield to change. In other words, change,
looked at as mere contingency, no longer has the power to influence the
comprehension of an epoch, since it no longer obscures the fundamental
structures that are of true historical relevance behind the veil of superficial
phenomena.
The result of disinterest in the contingency of the moment over against
the genuine philosophical interest in reason is that those factors in any given
historical situation which resist the activity of rational elucidation prove to be
the fundamental structures of an epoch. What philosophy is unable to
relativize to any greater degree, it must recognize in the name of reason itself.
This is precisely the meaning of Hegel's provocative motto of the actuality of
the rational and the rationality of the actual. 35
IV
I have not undertaken a rigorous philological exegesis of all the texts of Hegel
that are relevant to our question. This could easily be carried out and would
provide a coherent picture of the genesis of Hegel's idea of the task of philo-
sophy vis a vis its epoch. 36 Rather, through a reconstruction of the argument
underlying Hegel's claim for philosophy, I have attempted to demonstrate its
plausibility.
We have finally arrived at the point where we can readdress the main
question at issue: What is Hegel's significance for the social sciences? I am
well aware of the difficulties of making Hegel's mode of philosophical
thinking acceptable. A first step in this direction would be to cast doubt upon
the self-assured objectivity of the methods of the social sciences. I have, with
intentional indefmiteness, characterized the prevailing opinions in everyday
consciousness, or the immediate picture of an epoch, as a reality that
philosophy can and has to take into account. Science on the other hand, far
from escaping this reality, is intricately bound to it. Science exerts a strong
influence upon the formation of our everyday opinions, just as common
opinion has an indirect effect upon the general orientation of scientific
research. The process of 'scientification' of common, or public opinion
becomes ever more pervasive, while, reciprocally, the obligation of science to
be 'socially relevant' is increasingly emphasized. It would be simple-minded to
believe that scientific research proceeds according to independent standards
of rationality and methods of self·evident legitimacy.
Especially the social sciences have gained the authority of being a per-
manent and definite source of knowledge concerning all those questions
everybody is interested in. No wonder, therefore, that sociologists, political
scientists, economists, psychologists, psychoanalysts constantly throw them-
selves upon the market of public opinion. Privileged by their reputation as
scientists, they are busy contributing to the picture every epoch constructs
of itself. This symbiosis of the social sciences and common opinion is quite
natural and should by no means be denounced in the name of some false
purism. Instead one must turn, so to speak, to a higher court of appeal. Since
the days of the sophists, philosophy has had to deal with this very problem.
Philosophy has thereby learnt that it does not, in supposed contrast to the
social sciences, enjoy a kind of splendid isolation. That was the impulse
behind my effort to destroy the fiction of a philosophia perennis that
purports to hover above the sphere of common life.
What in fact distinguishes philosophy from the social sciences although
both are entangled in the self-understanding of an epoch is that the philo-
sophical interest of reason is not primarily oriented towards the epoch and
its immediately evident features. Philosophy does not so much aim at a
156 RUDIGER BUBNER
knowledge of those economic, political and social factors relevant to the

social sciences, but uncovers the structures of an epoch that, under given
conditions, can be called rational. In other words, philosophy brings to
light that which, independent of the historical moment, is worth considering
on generally valid grounds. This philosophical claim to insight and compre-
hension can only be substantiated by the lasting significance of those
structures which appear in a perspective that reaches beyond the contingency
of historical change.
To summarize, then: even if one at first believes it is possible to circum-
vent the controversy between philosophy and the social sciences, one can
hardly deny the importance of the philosophical accomplishment of reasort
that distinguishes the essential from the inessential within the framework of
socio-historical reality. Furthermore, if one admits that the social sciences
are thoroughly integrated in the self-understanding of an historical period,
then the task remains of conceptually elUCidating the character and lasting
features of an epoch. Given the entanglement of the social sciences in what
they should elucidate, philosophy has to playa critical role in the effort of
discovering the essential structures of socio-historical reality. Even if philo-
sophy can not appear on the scene as a Deus ex machina, she can help with
the directing.
Titbingen University
NOTES
1 T. W. Adorno, H. Albert, R. Dahrendorf, J. Habermas, H. Pilot, K. Popper: Der

Positivismusstreit in der deutschen Soziologie (Neuwied; Berlin, Luchterhand, 1970).
[The Positivist Dispute in German Sociology, tr. G. Adey and D. Frisby. London,
Heinemann, 1976.] For the theories of the 'Frankfurt school' cf. one of the principal
documents: M. Horkheimer, Eclipse of Reason (New York, Oxford University Press,
1947), and the more recent works by J. Habermas, Knowledge and Human Interest
(Boston, Beacon Press, 1971); Theory and Practice (Boston, Beacon Press, 1973). See
also P. Lorenzen, 'Szientismus vs. Dialektik, in: Hermeneutik und Dialektik (Festschrift
for H.-G. Gadamer) ed. Bubner, Cramer, Wiehl (Tiibingen, Mohr, 1970).
2 "Philosophie ist ihre Zeit in Gedanken erfafH" (GPR). A similar thesis can be found
in GP, p. 85 and WL [L, 1951] 2, p. 226.
3 The Open Society and its Enemies [1945]. 4th ed. rev. 2 vols. (London, Routledge
and Kegan Paul, 1962).
4 Interestingly enough, at the same time as Popper wrote his book which branded Hegel
as a precursor of Fascism, Herbert Marcuse sought to defend Hegel, from a Marxist stand-
point, against exactly this charge, presenting him as a progressive theorist of freedom and
critical reason in Reason and Revolution (New York, Oxford University Press, 1941).
5 'What is Dialectic?', Mind, N. S. 49 (1940); reprinted in Conjectures and Refutations

(London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1976, pp. 312-335); Open Society, Vol. 2, p. 39;
Objective Knowledge (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1972) p. 126, 297. See my essay:
'Dialektische Elemente einer Forschungslogik', in: Dialektik und Wissenschaft, 2nd ed.
(Frankfurt, Suhrkamp, 1974).
6 Cf. Karl Lowith, From Hegel to Nietzsche (New York, Holt, Rinehart and Winston,
1964); D. McLellan, The Young Hegelians and Karl Marx (London, Macmillan, 1969).
7 Der Liberalismus und die Philosophie (Siimtliche Werke. Vol. IV, Mannheim, 1847 2 ,
p. 291); Was wird aus der Religion? ibid., p. 250); Ober das Verhiiltnis von Philosophie,
Politik und Religion (ibid., p. 273 ff.)
8 Leading article of the Rheinische Zeitung of 14th July 1842; An exchange ofletters
from 1843 in the Deutsch-franzosische Jahrbiicher (both in: K. M., Friihe Schriften, ed.
Lieber (Stuttgart, Cotta, 1962, Vol. 1, p. 188, p. 450).
9 Cf. L. D. Easton and K. H. Guddat (Eds.) Writings of the Young Marx on Philosophy
and Society (Garden City, N.Y., Doubleday, 1967).
10 See the interesting evaluation, from an analytic point of view, by G. v. Wright in
Explanation and Understanding (Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 1971), chapters 1
and 4.
11 Der Aufbau der geschichtlichen Welt in den Geisteswissenschaften (1910), Gesam-
melte Schriften 7 (Stuttgart, Gottingen 1958 2 ), pp. 148 ff. See the English translation by
Rickman (Dilthey, Selected Writings, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1976,
Parts III and IV).
12 Dilthey's target in this respect is J. S. Mill (System of Logic, Part VI, London, Parker,
1843) and H. T. Buckle (History of Civilization in England, Vol. I, Chap. 1, London,
Parker, 1857-61).
13 Einleitung in die Geisteswissenschaften (1883), Gesammelte Schriften, Vol. 1
(Leipzig Teubner, 1922), pp. 93 ff.
14 Gesammelte Schriften, 4 (Leipzig, Berlin, Teubner, 1921), p. 249. - This volume
contains Dilthey's 'Jugendgeschichte Hegels', which had the merit of stimulating the
Hegel research of this century.
15 Geschichte und Naturwissenschaft (Strasbourg, Heitz, 1894).
16 Dilthey immediately protested against reducing the difference to the purely method-
ological, emphasizing instead the disparity between manifestations of the historical mind
and facts of external nature (Gesammelte Schriften, Vol. 5, pp. 242 ff, 253).
17 A Kantian concept. Cf. Critique of Pure Reason, A 424; Critique of Judgment,
Introduction, 1st version (end), A 415.
18 Because of his disavowal of 'historicistic' laws of history, Popper could only affirm
Windelband's division. (Cf. Der Positivismusstreit, p. 118; Open Society, Vol. 2, pp. 264,
364; The Poverty of Historicism (London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1957) § 30).
Historical sciences offer interpretations on the basis of a so-called 'logic of situations'
which is contrasted with laws.
Philosophers of science such as E. Nagel and E. Zilsel deny that there is a clear
differentiation and assert that one type blends into the other. (Nagel, 'Some Issues in
the Logic of Historical Analysis', in: P. Gardiner (ed.), Theories of History (Glencoe,
Ill., Free Press, 1959), p. 373 ff.) From the historian's point of view, Louis O. Mink
makes a similar criticism (,The Autonomy of Historical Understanding', in: W. Dray
(ed.), Philosophical Analysis and History (New York, Harper and Row, 1966), 165 ff).
158 RUDIGER BUBNER
As a matter of fact, Windelband himself referred to interference between historical

description of individual occurrences and the use of general laws; thus, the objections
prove nothing new.
19 Ober den Begriff der Schonheit (1845), in: H. Lotze, Kleine Schriften I (leipzig,
Hirzel, 1885), pp. 300 ff.; p. 333 f.; Seele und Seelenleben (1846, ibid., Vol 2), p. 175.
20 Die Grenzen der naturwissenschaftlichen Begriffsbildung (1896) (Ttibingen and
Leipzig, Mohr, 1902).
21 Max Weber, Die Objektivitiit sozialwissenschaftlicher und sozialpolitischer Erkenntnis
(Tiibingen, Mohr, 1904); trans. by W. J. Goode as The 'Objectivity' of Sociological and
Socio·political Knowledge (s. 1., 1941). Der Sinn der 'Wertfreiheit' der soziologischen
und okonomischen Wissenschaften, 1917/18. Trans. by E. A. Shils and H. A. Finchas as
Methodology of the Social Sciences (Glencoe, Ill., Free Press, 1949). Cf. W. Runciman,
A Critique of M. Weber's Philosophy of Social Sciences (Cambridge, Cambridge Uni-
versity Press, 1972).
22 Rickert, Grenzen der Naturwissenschaftlichen Begriffsbildung (Tiibingen, Mohr,
1921), XVII, 139, 398. The proclamation of a Hegel·renaissance already appears in:
Kulturwissenschaften und Naturwissenschaften (Freiburg, Mohr, 1899), p. 13; cf. W.
Windelband, 'Erneuerung des Hegelianismus', Sitzungsberichte der Heidelberger Akademie
der Wissenschaften, 1910. The kulturwissenschaftliche interpretation of Hegel is also
clear in the work of Rickert's student, Emil Lask: Fichtes Idealismus und die Geschichte
(1902) in: E. L. Gesammelte Schriften I (Tiibingen, Mohr, 1923), p. 17 passim (esp.
the Introduction: Die Logik des Wertens in der Geschichtsphilosophie des deutschen
Idealismus); Hegel und sein Verhiiltnis zur Weltanschauung der Aujkliirung (1905), ibid.,
p. 340 ff.
23 Soziologie als Wirklichkeitswissenschaft (Leipzig, Berlin Teubner, 1930), p. 211.
(Reprinted Stuttgart, Teubner, 1964.)
24 Ibid., p. 5; cf. p. 11.
25 Ideologie und Utopie (1929). (Frankfurt, Schulte-Bulmke, 1965) p. 62 ff. (Ideology
and Utopia, trans. L. Wirth and E. Shils. London, K. Paul, Trench and Trubner, 1936.)
26 Ibid., p. 132 f.
27 Ibid., p. 142.
28 M. Horkheimer, 'Ein neuer Ideologiebegriff?', Archiv fUr die Geschichte des
Sozialismus und der Arbeiterbewegung 15, 1930; T. W. Adorno, 'Das Bewu1l.tsein der
Wissenssoziologie', in: Prismen (Frankfurt, Suhrkamp, 1955);bothreprintedinK. Lenk
(ed.),ldeologie. 2nd ed. (Neuwied, Berlin, Luchterhand, 1964).
29 Open Society, Chap. 13.
30 Cf. the critical remarks of Popper and Adorno on the sociology of knowledge: Der
Positivismusstreit, p. 111 ff.; p. 136 f.
31 Compare, however, K. Popper, 'On the Theory of Objective Mind', in Objective
Knowledge.
32 Werke I, ed. H. Glockner (Stuttgart, Frommann, 1927-30).
33 K. L. Reinhold's reflections on time and philosophy provided the occasion for this
discussion: Beitriige zur leichteren Ubersicht des Zustandes der Ph ilosophie beim Anfang
des 19. Jahrhunderts (Hamburg, Perthes, 1801-3); Der Geist des Zeitalters als Geist der
Philosophie, in: Neuer Teutscher Merkur (ed. C. M. Wieland) 1801.
34 Phiin [H, 1952], Preface, p. 31;Phen [B] p. 95. Cf. my study, 'Problemgeschichte
und systematischer Sinn der Phiinomenologie Hegels' in Dialektik und Wissenschaft
(Frankfurt, Suhrkamp, 1974).
3S PR, Preface.
36 Cf. J. Ritter, Hegel und die franzosische Revolution (Frankfurt, Suhrkamp, 1965);
J. Habermas, 'Nachwort' to: Hegel, Politische Schriften (Frankfurt, Suhrkamp, 1966);
S. Avineri, Hegel's Theory of the Modern State (London, Cambridge University Press,
1972), Chap. VI.
MURRAY GREENE
HEGEL'S CONCEPTION OF PSYCHOLOGY
The present paper seeks to understand Hegel's notion of a philosophical or

'scientific' psychology, these terms being synonymous for him. First the
paper notes Hegelian criticisms of various approaches to psychology, whose
diverse failings, Hegel often says, derive from a proceeding through "external
reflection," or the "reflective understanding."l External reflection, according
to Hegel, is a philosophizing from the standpoint 'outside' the Sache selbst,
and we may say that in Hegel's view, external reflection constitutes the main
obstacle toward a philosophical psychology. With regard to such a psychology,
external reflection takes on an especially problematic form in post-Cartesian
philosophy as a philosophizing from the subjective consciousness. For when
such a philosophizing turns to consciousness itself, should not its procedure
be eo ipso immanent to the Sache selbst? In fact, says Hegel, it is not; rather
its procedure in dealing with the soul or mind or consciousness is but a special
form of external reflection. It is this post-Cartesian form of external reflec-
tion, particularly in its most challenging embodiment in the Kantian Critical
philosophy, that Hegel's approach is designed to overcome. The attempt to
elucidate the nature of the problem here forms the second part of our paper.
In the third part we try to show how Hegel purportedly overcomes the
barrier of philosophizing from the subjective consciousness by placing
consciousness itself within a deeper principle of subjectivity, the notion of
'subjective spirit.' Psychology is presented by Hegel as the third and cul-
minating science of subjective spirit, following the sciences of anthropology
and phenomenology. We thus have a triad of sciences corresponding to the
three moments of subjective spirit in its notion. While each science has its
own province and to a certain extent its own principle, the three sciences are
internally linked. The science of anthropology demonstrates an 'emergence'
of consciousness through the working of a principle prior to and deeper than
consciousness. Through this same principle - namely, spirit as identity in
opposition of substance and subject - the science of phenomenology
demonstrates the overcoming of the subject-object dualism in consciousness
by a necessary movement within consciousness itself. Only at this vantage
point of the third moment of subjective spirit, only now that the subject-
object dualism has been overcome, is a psychology possible that is not an
161
R. S. Cohen and M W Wartofsky (eds.), Hegel and the Sciences, 161-191.
162 MURRA Y GREENE
external reflection but a philosophic science of "spirit as such." The fourth

and last part of our paper will attempt to indicate the nature of the treatment
in Hegel's philosophical psychology.
Our paper is based mainly on Hegel's doctrine of subjective spirit as
presented in the third part of the Encyclopedia of Philosophical Sciences. 2
Since we view Hegel's effort especially in terms of resolving a particular
problem, we shall deal with the psychology itself only in its general plan and
idea. A more detailed exposition of specific features must await another
occasion.
According to Hegel, a philosophical psychology had not emerged prior to his

own presentation of subjective spirit in the Encyclopedia. Virtually dismissing
all modern approaches as unscientific, Hegel tells us that the Aristotelian
treatises on the soul remained up to his own day the sole works of merit in
psychology, and that he hoped to rekindle the Aristotelian speculative
approach by his own Philosophy of Spirit (PM, p. 3). Hegel's sweeping
rejection of all post-Cartesian efforts in this field indicates that for him some
principle was at issue, and not merely that the great moderns - Descartes,
Spinoza, Locke, Hume, Kant - happened to be poor psychologists. Despite
the advance of thought in modern times, despite the acuity of these thinkers,
a false tack had somehow been taken that set psychology back to a position
not even equal to its status in Aristotle. What was this false tack?
While modern philosophy's proceeding through the subjective conscious-
ness marked a great advance, nevertheless, according to Hegel, this procedure
had to result in an impasse as long as the method native to its principle of
subjectivity remained external to that principle itself. As long as subjective
philosophizing continued unconscious of its proper methodology, its principle
that nothing is to be accepted as true which does not possess inward evidence
in consciousness turns into the very barrier that separates consciousness from
a knowledge of itself. But had not the very birth of the new philosophy
meant a new stress on method, a new insistence on demonstration according
to the inward evidence of consciousness?
According to Hegel, all the new methods that were put forward beginning
with Descartes were modes of external reflection. The Cartesian 'new
beginning', notes Hegel, was born in the abstract resolve of the subjective
consciousness to accept no outer authority but "produce everything oneself
and accept only one's own deed as what is true" (Phen [M] , p. 50). But this
HEGEL'S CONCEPTION OF PSYCHOLOGY 163
approach, says Hegel, had not yet "equipped itself" even to grasp truly its
"own deed." In proceeding straightway to criticize and test, it employed
canons that were uncritical and untested - such as its standard of "clear and
distinct," which, says Hegel, is a "psychological" (in the unphilosophic sense)
rather than a "logical" criterion. 3 The fact that one's opinions come from
one's self does not mean that truth has taken the place of error. lacking the
proper method of showing how its certainty becomes truth, Descartes' pro-
ceeding through the inner certainty of the subjective consciousness turns out
to be but a form of external reflection.
The post-Cartesian methods of synthesis and analysis, or composition and
resolution, Hegel maintains, are likewise modes of external reflection.
Analysis dissolves the concretum of experience into lifeless abstractions.
Synthesis presents the universal in defmitions that have no "constraining
necessity" for the content, and is a "purely subjective cognition which is
external to the object" (L [W, 1892], p. 366). The method of demonstration
taken from mathematics is unsuitable to philosophy in general and particularly
inappropriate to a science of mind (Phen [M] , p. 24ff). Spinoza's demonstra-
tion more geometrico, according to Hegel, is the "fundamental defect in the
whole position" (HP 3, p. 283), and Spinoza tells us that substance is the unity
of thought and extension "without demonstrating how he gets to this distinc-
tion, or how he traces it back to the unity of substance" (L [W, 1892],
p. 275). Leibniz was perhaps the only pre-Kantian thinker who put forward
a claim which, as we shall see, is also central to Hegel's own notion of subjec-
tive spirit: namely, that self-consciousness arises as an internal development
of the preconscious subjectivity. But here too, says Hegel, the philosopher
demonstrated no immanent necessity. While the Leibnizian monad evolves its
representations "out of itself," says Hegel, "they arise in the monad like
bubbles; they are indifferent and immediate over against one another and the
same in relation to the monad itself' (SL [M], p. 396). In the so-called
"method of construction" - the method that "construes its notions" - there
is, Hegel grants, a "dim consciousness of the Idea, of the unity of the Notion
and objectivity" insofar as, in demonstration, the subjectivity "shows itself
a modifying and determining principle" (L [W, 1892], p. 371). But in con-
struction the demonstration is "ruled by an external end." The proof is not
truly a "genesis of the relationship that constitutes the content of the
theorem," and therefore it too is "an external reflection" which proceeds
"from without inwards," "infers from external circumstances the inner
constitution of the relationship" (SL [M], p. 812).
While these Hegelian criticisms of external reflection apply to philosophic
164 MURRAY GREENE
method generally, Hegel offers a number of criticisms directed specifically to

certain approaches to psychology. The so-called "knowledge of man" that
supposedly probes the secrets of the human heart, says Hegel, is a symptom
of the modern preoccupation with the self in its particularity (PM, p. 1).
Where it does not indulge in self-analysis, it tends to view men in general in
terms of how they 'react' under different circumstances, and, as in the
pragmatic view of history, points out how great historical figures were after
all motivated by petty passions. This sort of Menschenkenntnis, says Hegel,
does not deserve serious attention as science. Because it has no inkling of the
Notion, it cannot attain to the universal and substantial in man; its effect is
rather to reduce him to a bundle of motivations and reaction patterns.
At least the old pneumatology or rational psychology sought to view man
in terms of universal determinations. This metaphysic of the soul proceeded
by inquiring. whether the soul is 'simple', 'selfsame', a 'substance'. Kant
rightly rejected this kind of psychology, says Hegel. But Kant was right for
the wrong reasons (L [W, 1892], p. 97). The defect of the old metaphysical
psychology was not, as Kant maintained, that it argued paralogistically from
empirical phenomena to pure thought categories. Rather, says Hegel, its
categories themselves were of such a kind as "neither can nor do contain
truth" (L [W, 1892], p. 66ff). The old psychology approached the soul as
a thing, and Kant did well to rid philosophy of the soul-thing. But this
metaphysic deserved to be cast out not because its categories 'soared beyond'
the powers of reason but because it never attained to reason's speculative use.
Far from being a static ens, says Hegel, the soul is absolute restlessness, pure
activity, "the negating or ideality of every fixed category" of the under-
standing (PM, p. 3). The soul is not abstractly simple but self-differentiating
in its simpleness; it is not a selfsame essence hiding behind its manifestations
but only actual in its manifestations. Hence in inquiring whether the soul
is simple or composite, immaterial or material, selfsame or not selfsame,
pneurnatology was not so much arguing paralogistically in Kant's sense but
rather employing the rigid dichotomies of the reflective understanding in
a way that can never comprehend spirit as displaying "contradiction in its
extreme form," as the "absolute unity of opposites in the Notion" (SL [M],
p.776).
As against the empty abstractions of the old metaphysic, the empirical
psychology that accompanied the rise of the sciences sought a 'solid footing'
in experience. But in its relating itself passively to a "prefound existent
confronting it" (ein vorgefundenes ihm gegenuberstehendes Seiendes)
(L [W, 1892] ,pp. 364-365), empiricism bars itself from a genuine knowledge
of spirit, whose essence as ideality is such that it does not let itself be thus
'found,.4 In its analysis of the 'given', empiricism means to introduce nothing
but its own act of separating. But its breakdown of the concrete object of
experience only leaves it with abstract universal attributes, and thus brings in
again a metaphysic of the "thing and its properties" (See Phen [M] p.77ff).
Yet empiricism remains all the while oblivious to its own metaphysical pre-
suppositions and employs its thought categories in an "utterly thoughtless
and uncritical" fashion. In separating the given into "simple ideas" and the
mind into 'faculties' and 'forces,' empiricism renders the living totality an
aggregate of "parts" and the mind a "skeleton-like mechanical collection"
(PM, p. 189).
In reconstructing the concretum of experience and arriving at the higher
connections of mind, empiricism proceeds essentially by showing a 'natural
evolution' of what happens in "pictorial and phenomenal thinking" (SL [M],
p. 588). But philosophy, says Hegel, is not meant to be a 'narration' of what
happens but a cognition of 'what is true' in happenings. This sort of genetic
method, whether showing an origin of ideas or of faculties, Hegel argues,
carries a built-in limitation of knowledge to sensuous experience. For when
there is a question of history rather than truth, then the "substrate of feelings
and intuitions" from which understanding abstracts its universals need not be
seen as sublated in conceptual thinking but "remains for representation in the
same complete reality with which it first presented itself". 5 In the so-called
laws of association of ideas as employed by empiricism, some principle is
assumed, such as a "force of attraction" of like images. But such 'attraction,'
Hegel points out, would just as well have to be a 'repulsion,' a "negative
power of rubbing off the dissimilar elements against each other" (PM, p. 208).
Hegel also rejects any procedure through the 'facts of consciousness',
whether employed by empiricism or some form of intuitionism, as in Jacobi
or Fichte. If the criteria of truth are to be taken in "the immediacy, or self-
evident way, in which a fact or body of truths is presented in consciousness,"
says Hegel, then "every alleged truth has no other basis than the subjective
certitude and the assertion that we discover a certain fact in our conscious-
ness." What I find in my consciousness, I can exaggerate into a "fact of the
consciousness of all" and even pass off "for the very nature of consciousness"
(L [W, 1892] , p. 134). If indeed we are to examine the nature of conscious-
ness, says Hegel, then we must be able to strip it of its particular and
accidental elements and "by the toilsome operation of reflection" disclose
"the universal in its entirety and purity."
If we are not then, like the old metaphysic of the soul, to speak of the
166 MURRAY GREENE
mind in abstract thought categories; if we are not to be deceived by empirical

psychology's spurious concreteness, how do we obtain the categories proper
to the nature of mind? If we are not to employ forms of demonstration alien
to the subject matter, or philosophize directly from the so-called facts of
consciousness, where do we discover the method proper to mind in its
notion? According to Hegel, the method that can grasp mind as at once
"absolute restlessness" and abiding self-identity, that can demonstrate the
development of spirit as an immanent self-unfolding, is the "speculative
method." This method proceeds according to the "logical Idea" and derives
its categories from the "form of the Notion," which is immanent to the
Sache selbst (SL [M], p. 830; p. 826).
But what sort of enterprise will yield the "form of the Notion" and the
"logical Idea"? To answer this question adequately would require a lengthy
excursus into Hegel's overall conception of the philosophic sciences as a
system. For the purposes of understanding Hegel's overcoming of the kind of
post-Cartesian external reflection that bars the way to a philosophical
psychology, perhaps our most direct route is through Hegel's criticism of the
Kantian critical enterprise.
II
Hegel's criticism of those approaches which wield their thought categories in

a "thoughtless and uncritical" manner has the ring of the Critical philosophy's
critique of dogmatism. In Kant's view the dogmatists were engaged in
external reflection inasmuch as the "dogmatic procedure of pure reason"
advances straightway upon its subject matter "without previous criticism of
its own powers" (CPR, B xxxv; B xxxvi). To make use again of a Hegelian
expression, we can say that the dogmatists were unaware that "subjectivity
shows itself a modifying principle" (see p. 163 above). But if any approach
oblivious to the role of subjectivity must remain dogmatic, what is the proper
critical approach to subjectivity itself? In Hegel's view, Kant's critique of
subjective cognition as an 'organ' of knowledge is itself a form of external
reflection. By fIrst investigating cognition as an 'instrument' or 'medium'
through which the truth reaches us, says Hegel, this form of critique already
presupposes a distinction of ourselves from this knowledge. 6 The demand
that thought examine its capacity for knowledge is a "fair enough" demand,
says Hegel. But the problem is, how shall this examination proceed? We can
test an ordinary instrument before we put it to use. But with what can we
criticize cognition except another cognition (L [W, 1892], p.l?)? If thought
is to investigate itself, says Hegel, the action of the forms of thought must be
their own criticism. The forms of thought must "examine themselves," and
the critical work of thought, "instead of being brought to bear upon the
categories from without," must remain "immanent in their own action."
Hegel's flrst application of this method of immanence - or, as he terms it, the
"speculative" or "absolute" method - was in the Phenomenology of Spirit
of 1807.
The Phenomenology of 1807 was not meant by Hegel - the mature Hegel
at least (see below, p. 175) - to constitute an absolute beginning of
philosophy or indeed of his own system as such. It is not a beginning without
important presuppositions. In commencing with the 'natural consciousness,'
for example, the notion of consciousness is in a sense presupposed. We might
also say the commencement is historical, inasmuch as the very term 'natural'
or 'empirical' consciousness is hardly conceivable prior to the empirical
thinkers and Kant's own distinction of the empirical and the pure conscious-
ness. Kant wanted to go behind the empirical consciousness to its a priori
forms, but his presentation of the forms of the a priori, according to Hegel,
was "solely based upon psychological and historical grounds" (L, [W, 1892],
p. 84). Hegel in the Phenomenology purports at once to take the empirical
consciousness on its own terms and allow it to unfold its pure forms in the
concrete context of its movement of 'experience.' In this way the forms of
thought are seen to "test and examine themselves." Each form of thought, as
a shape of experience, succeeds its predecessor as its "determinate negation,"
while the philosophic observer need only "look on" (Phen [M], p. 54). In
fact the philosopher does more than look on. 7 He assembles and organizes
the shapes of consciousness so as to bring out their necessary movement from
the natural to the philosophic consciousness (Phen [M], p. 55; p. 480). But
insofar as the philosopher thereby demonstrates the necessity of his own
emergence in the movement of consciousness, he may be said to overcome
the standpoint of external reflection.
Through the pathway of experience demonstrated'in the Phenomenology
of 1807, consciousness has purportedly attained to the standpoint of pure
science. In this sense the Phenomenology is an introduction to the system of
philosophic sciences and in the flrst instance to the science of logic. What is
most important for our purposes is to note Hegel's stress on the fact that the
Phenomenology, by traversing the shapes of experience of consciousness, has
made possible that 'liberation' from consciousness which is the precondition
of all philosophic science. 8 The standpoint of consciousness as such, we can
now say, is a standpoint of external reflection. For reasons both historical
168 MURRAY GREENE
and systematic, it had to be overcome .. but not by another external reflec-

tion. The great truths of transcendental philosophy, which were only
expressed by the transcendental thinkers in forms of external reflection, have
been concretely demonstrated in the Phenomenology: that self-consciousness
is the truth of consciousness (Phen [M] ,p. 102), that ego is Notion (SL [M],
p. 583); that the category is not merely subjective but rather thinking
actuality (Phen [M], p. 142). The Phenomenology has hereby yielded the
'notion' of the science of logic (SL [M], pp. 68,49). In the overcoming of
every shape of experience where thought and Being are held separated, the
Phenomenology has led to that science of "pure essentialities," the forms of
the Notion, which are at once determinations of substance and subject, Being
and thought. Henceforward in the system of philosophic sciences - in logic as
well as the concrete sciences of nature and spirit - the movement of thought
in demonstration is no longer in terms of "specific shapes of consciousness"
but in "specific notions" and as the "organic self-grounded movement" of
these notions (Phen [M], p. 491).
The speculative method, which is the overcoming of external reflection,
obtains its first application in the Phenomenology of 1807 and its first
exposition in logic (SL [M], p. 53). In the realm of consciousness the
Phenomenology brought forward the simple ,logical principle "necessary to
achieve scientific progress": that "the negative is just as much positive." In the
succession of shapes of consciousness demonstrated in the Phenomenology,
each "has for its result its own negation - and so passes into a higher form."
Hereby the supremely important principle emerges that "what is self-con-
tradictory does not resolve itself into a nullity" but is rather a "negation of
a specific subject matter" and therefore a "specific negation" and "has a
content." In this way, each succeeding determination is "higher and richer
than its predecessor" inasmuch as it "contains it but also something more,"
and is "the unity of itself and its opposite." Where the Phenomenology
showed this movement in the realm of consciousness, the science of logic
shows it in "the simpltmess of knowing." Logic demonstrates the movement
of the Notion "in this pure ether of its life."
In the science of logic, all those thought categories wielded in a "thought-
less and uncritical" manner by external reflection obtain elucidation in their
aspect as pure thought forms. Their intrinsic limits are exhibited so that they
may receive their proper roles in the concrete sciences. The categories 'parts'
and 'whole,' for example, are shown to express the "external and mechanical
relation" appropriate to mechanism, while they are seen to be unsuitable to
organism and even more inappropriate to mind or spirit. 9 The same holds true
for 'thing' and 'property' (SL [M], p. 498), for 'quality' (L [W, 1892], p.171),
'force' (L [W, 1892), p. 247ft) and other categories uncritically employed

by external reflection in the realm of mind. At the same time such categories
as identity and difference, substance and accident, appearance and essence
are shown to be appropriate to spirit as reflecting into one another in their
opposition, and not - as they were taken by Verstand - as fixed opposites.
Since the categories of the logic are shown to derive from the immanent
movement of the Notion as inner self-differentiation, the speculative method
combines analysis and synthesis. It does so, however, not in "bare juxtaposi-
tion or mere alternating employment" (L [W, 1892), p. 376) but by showing
that difference is nothing other than the necessary opposition contained in all
determinate thought. Hence the true arthra, which were demonstrated by the
methods of analysis and synthesis in a movement of thought external to the
demonstrandum, now emerge as a movement of thought immanent to the
Sache selbst. This movement of the pure Notion or logical Idea is at once a
self.externalization and inwardization, a 'forthgoing' (jfussersichgehen) that
is simultaneously a 'withdrawal inwards' (In-sich-gehen) (SL [M), pp. 840-
841). The movement in the logic, as in the system of philosophic sciences as
a whole, is a circle, a coming back to self of the Notion. Each step away from
the 'beginning' is also a 'getting back to it,' so that the "retrogressive
grounding of the beginning" and its "progressive further determining of it,"
in truth "coincide and are the same" CSL [M), p. 841). This principle,
demonstrated in the logic in the "simpleness of knowing," will prove to be
important in the concrete sciences of subjective spirit. In the science of
psychology, for example, such determinations as intuition, imagination,
memory will not appear as 'parts,' 'faculties,' or 'forces' but as 'moments,'
each of which is also a definition of mind in its living totality, just as in logic
each form of the logical Idea "is only a closer determination and truer defini-
tion of the Absolute" (L [W, 1892), p. 162). In the doctrine of subjective
spirit as a whole, we shall see spirit as 'natural soul' in the anthropology
dividing itself into ego and object in the phenomenology and returning to
itself in its higher unity and truth as reason in the psychology. It is this
speculative method alone that is appropriate for a science of psychology,
Hegel claims, since it "does not behave like external reflection" but "takes
the determinate element from its own subject matter, since it is itself that
subject matter's immanent principle and soul" CSL [M) , p. 830).
But if the speculative method shows us the proper categories and method
of demonstration for the sciences of mind, how specifically does it overcome
the external reflection built into a philosophizing from the subjective
consciousness and its subject-object antithesis? Here again we may begin with
Kant, whose denial of the possibility of a pure science of psychology in a way
170 MURRAY GREENE
sums up the 'false tack' taken by post-Cartesian philosophy even while its
notion of the subjective consciousness marked the great advance of modern
thought.
While, according to Kant, the original identity of self-consciousness is the
highest principle of knowledge, the pure ego or self as it is 'in itself' must
remain for us a 'transcendental x.' All our certain knowledge is a knowledge
of "objects" and requires the possibility of a sensible intuition. Since I can
have no such intuition of myself as pure ego, I can have no knowledge of the
"identity of the subject" whereby it can be "given as object" (CPR, B 408).10
Further, "I cannot know as an object," says Kant, "that which I must pre-
suppose in order to know any object" (CPR, A 402). The pure ego, which
is ever the subject in judgment, cannot make its own self the object of its
judgment without an awkward circularity. For these and other reasons, Kant
says, "the hope of succeeding by a priori methods" in a science of the soul
must be "abandoned" and psychology "banished from the domain of meta-
physics" (CPR, A 849-B 877). Kant relegates psychology to a position within
anthropology, where it can play a role as "the pendant to the empirical
doctrine of nature" (CPR, A 849-B 877). Such a psychology would deal, for
example, with the empirical laws of association in the reproductive imagina-
tion (CPR, B 152). In his own writings and lectures on anthropology, educa-
tion, and applied ethics, Kant offers such empirical psychological material.
But by the critical philosophy's own canons, these treatments do not rank
as theoretical science in the sense of apodictically certain knowledge, and do
not belong to the science of the a priori principles of knowledge. 11
According to Hegel, the Kantian notion of a 'transcendental x' is an
external reflection that derives from a philosophizing from the standpoint of
consciousness as an absolute. The Kantian philosophy, in Hegel's view, is a
phenomenology, since it takes spirit only in its aspect as consciousness (PM,
p. 156). For this reason it does not even do justice to the truth of conscious-
ness. That Kant's restriction of knowledge to sense experience is untenable,
Hegel claims to have demonstrated in the first three chapters of the
Phenomenology of 1807. We shall pass this discussion by in order to focus
on Hegel's critique of the supposed circularity of a knowledge of the
'transcendental x.'
It is ridiculous, says Hegel, to stigmatize as circular - as though it implied
a fallacy - "this nature of self.consciousness, namely, that the 'I' thinks
itself, that the'!' cannot be thought without its being the'!, that thinks"
(SL [M], p. 777). It is not as though, says Hegel, we "must already make
use" of the ego whenever we want to judge about it. The ego does not 'make
use' of something like an instrument - even its own self - in judging. Ego is
the subject-object relation (PM, p. 15lff), is judgment. And its actively
performed judgments in the theoretical, practical, and other realms are
precisely what render it concrete and knowable. For its every judgment of
and relation to an other is at the same time a self-relation. It is in just this
self-relation in all relating to other, says Hegel, that ego reveals itself as
Notion, as "the absolute relation-to-self that, as a separating judgment
(Urteil) , makes itself its own object and is solely this process whereby it
makes itself a circle" (SL [M], p. 77). In this statement, I believe, we have
the key to Hegel's organization of the sciences of subjective spirit and the
possibility of a philosophical psychology.
According to Aristotle, the soul attains truth in affirming or denying a
predicate of a subject, that is to say, in judgment. But in Aristotle the
problem of judgment can hardly be said to be viewed in terms of subjectivity
and objectivity in the modern sense. One may measure the Kantian revolution
in philosophy by Kant's defmition of 'objective judgment.' Such a judgment,
Kant says, "is nothing but the manner in which given modes of knowledge are
brought to the objective unity of apperception. This is what is intended by
the copula (Verhiiltniswortchen) 'is'" (CPR, B 142). Hereby Kant makes
'objectivity' a function of the subjective consciousness: apperception. This, as
we shall see more specifically later, may also be said to be the case for Hegel.
In Hegel, however, it has a different sense. In the first place, according to
Hegel, the copula 'is' is not to be understood only as a function of the subjec-
tive consciousness as apperception. "The copula 'is' springs from the nature
of the Notion, to be self-identical even in parting with its own" (in seiner
Entaiisserung) (L [W, 1892], p. 298). It is not only consciousness but 'the
Notion' that distinguishes itself into subject and predicate; and it is the forms
of this distinguishing that provide the logical categories. Hegel makes use of
the German word Urteil. Ordinarily in judgment, says Hegel, we view subject
and predicate as independent extremes which we somehow connect by the
copula 'is.' However, "the etymological meaning of the judgment in German
goes deeper, as it were declaring the unity of the Notion to be primary,
and its distinction to be the original partition." And that, says Hegel, "is
what the judgment really is" (L [W, 1892] ,p. 297).
But while the science of logic demonstrates the pure forms of the
Scheidung in sich of the Notion, it is up to the concrete sciences of subjective
spirit to show that ego is this very Urteil. In the doctrine of subjective spirit,
Hegel demonstrates consciousness itself to be the 'original partition' whereby
subjectivity comes to hold itself 'in relation' to its content as a self-subsistent
172 MURRAY GREENE
object and thereby to speak of the latter in terms of the Verhiiltniswortchen

'is'. In the science of anthropology, Hegel purportedly shows the 'emergence'
of consciousness and the subject-object 'relation' as an Ur-teil of a primary
unity, that of soul and body. In the course of the movement of consciousness,
this split is healed and, as demonstrated in the science of phenomenology,
spirit returns to itself and knows itself as reason. Hereby Hegel overcomes the
Kantian argument against circularity - the argument that the 'I think' cannot
make itself object of its own judgment. If Hegel is successful, we can discard
the notion of a 'transcendental x' as a figment of an external reflection. Thus
in Hegel's approach, the initial possibility of a philosophical psychology
consists in showing the emergence of the subject-object dualism as an Urteil
of the original soul-body unity.
III
Anthropology, the first of the three sciences of subjective spirit, deals with
the natural foundation of man, spirit as first arising out of its 'immersion'
in physical nature. A main theme of the anthropology is the soul-body
relationship. The demonstration in the anthropology shows how the soul
(Seele) as preconscious subjectivity comes to power in its corporeality
(Leiblichkeit). Having permeated the latter and rendered it the outer 'sign'
(Zeichen) of the soul's own spiritual inwardness, the psychical subjectivity
'lets go' (entlassen) the pre-objective content of sensation and feeling to
become an objective outer world. This development, according to Hegel, is
the genesis at once of the ego of consciousness and of its content as an
independent externality to which the ego relates itself in its knowing.
In discussing the question of how a soul-body unity is possible, Hegel says
the problem remains unanswerable for any standpoint on which the object as
such already has the shape of a prefound existent standing opposite it (PM,
p. 30). As long as the subjective consciousness is related to its outer object -
or the immaterial to the material - as one particular to another, says Hegel,
the mind-body relation must remain a mystery. But the posing of the
question of a 'community' of two such particulars is an external reflection.
In the Philosophy of Nature, Hegel has purportedly shown how natural
materiality sublates itself to spirit. In the sentient animal soul, which feels
itself a one at every point in its corporeality, and in the sublation of the
singular animal life in the abiding genus, says Hegel, nature has overpassed
itself as self-externality and the realm of the partes extra partes. 12 But in this
spatial and temporal asunderness consists the very essence of materiality in
its notion. Spirit, as individual natural soul, has emerged as the 'result' of
nature and at the same time as nature's own 'truth' and 'absolute prius'
(PM, p.8).
The individual soul in its identity with its corporeality, according to Hegel,
is the 'microcosm' in which the macrocosm of universal nature is
'concentrated' and sublated in its asunderness (PM, p. 36). My body, says
Hegel, is the "mean" (Mitte) whereby I "come together with external nature
in general.,,13 This is exhibited in Hegel's treatment of sentience
(Empjindung). Hegel seeks to show that the five senses comprise a system of
specified 'bodiness' (Korperlichkeit) which contains the essential moments
of external body or materiality in its notion. 14 Thus sight reveals materiality
in its moment of "pure ideality," light; touch, the moment of "solid reality."
The transient content of the 'sentient soul' attains a higher form in the
'feeling soul' (fiihlende Seele), whose manifold as a feeling-life comes to it in
the form of dream and presentiment. Hegel here deals with a realm of the
psyche that later came to be explored by depth psychology. The psychical
subjectivity is termed by Hegel a self-enclosed 'monad,' since its content does
not yet come to it in the form of an objectively structured outer world. The
'immediate' knowing of this inner subjectivity is evidenced in forms of trance-
like 'gazing-knowing' (schauendes Wissen) of an inner content not yet
mediated by such objective categories as space and time, cause and effect.
The phenomena of 'animal magnetism' are seen as displaying a psychical
union (Seeleneinheit) of two subjectivities where the passive feeling selfhood
of the patient is permeated by the dominating subjectivity of the hypnotist,
as in a kind of foetus-mother relationship. Sicknesses of insanity are discussed
by Hegel as forms of 'self-feeling' (Selbstgefiihl) where a particular content of
passion has taken on the spurious objectivity of a fixed idea, thus forming a
self-sunderance and 'blocking' (Hemmung) of the psychical subjectivity in its
fluid universality. In 'habit', which is the concluding moment of the feeling
soul, the subjectivity sublates the particular corporeal determination and
comes back to itself in its fluid universality. Here by the soul wins release
from its immediate corporeal affections and frees itself for occupation with
other things. In reducing the corporeality to an 'instrument' of its 'subjective
purpose', the soul has raised itself to 'subjective substance' and developed
itself as the 'foundation' of consciousness.
The soul 'actualizes' itself as ideality of the body by so 'informing'
(einbilden) it with its subjective inwardness that the body is but the soul's
own outer 'sign'. In stance and attitude, in gesture, demeanor, and mobile
play of features, the body has become the soul's own 'work of art.' The
174 MURRAY GREENE
body stands not for itself but is the externality wherein the spiritual inner
"feels itself and makes itself felt," the Dasein of the inner subjectivity. Having
attained to its being·for·self as actual soul, the subjectivity 'separates' itself
from its immediate being, sets itself opposite (gegenuberstellen) its own being
as corporeality while sublating it and determining it to its own. In its very
externality the soul is hereby 'inwardized' (erinnert) within self and infinite
self·relation. This being·for·self of the free universality, says Hegel, is the
'awakening' of the soul to ego: to the "abstract universality insofar as it is for
the abstract universality" (PM, p. 151). Subjectivity is no longer immersed
(versenkt) in the immediacy of 'feeling' but is now 'thinking' and subject
'for itself.' More particularly, says Hegel, it is subject of the Urteil in which
ego excludes its formerly monadic content as an 'object.' To this the subject
now relates itself in such a way that in it, it is directly "reflected within
itself," is consciousness (PM, p. 151).
Thus where modern philosophy from Descartes to Kant began on the level
of consciousness, Hegel demonstrates consciousness as a 'result.' This means
that a deeper principle has been exhibited than that of consciousness and its
subject·object relation. Indeed it is a principle that first makes that relation
possible. In the anthropology the body was 'object,' the soul 'subject'; the
body was the 'in itself,' the soul the 'for itself; the body was substantiality,
the soul subjectivity. In its rendering the body an 'outer' of its own spiritual
'inner,' the subject has posited itself opposite itself and in this its very
opposite is reflected back into itself. It is this that constitutes the subject an
'ego' and its content 'objective.' Thus we can say that for Hegel as for Fichte,
ego is the act of positing itself. But to exhibit this, Fichte called upon an
'intellectual intuition' and needed the Anstoss from without, while Hegel
demonstrates it in the form of an immanent development of the soul's
relation to its corporeality as its natural substantiality. The demonstration of
the emergence of consciousness as an Ur·teil (see above, p. 171), in which each
side is implicitly reflected into itself in its relation to its opposite, provides
the notion of consciousness:
Ego, as this absolute negativity, is implicitly the identity in the otherness: the ego is
itself that other and stretches over the object (as if that object were implicitly cancelled)
~ it is one side of the relationship and the whole relationship ~ the light, which mani·
fests itself and something else too (PM, p. 153).
This identity in opposition of subject and object constitutes the principle of

the science of consciousness: phenomenology.
In the doctrine of subjective spirit, says Hegel, phenomenology "stands
midway between the sciences of natural spirit [anthropology] and spirit as

such [psychology]" (SL [M], p. 781). Phenomenology, for Hegel, is the
science of consciousness that makes possible science's liberation from
consciousness. Consciousness, according to Hegel, is spirit in its 'appearance,'
spirit as subjective 'certainty' (Gewissheit) of itself. It is in this onesided
subjectivity that the transcendental philosophies essentially remained and
what they could not overcome .15 But the 'aim' of spirit as consciousness is
"to make its appearance identical with its essence, to raise its self-certainty
to truth" (PM, p. 157). Neither Kant nor Fichte could show this.
Subjectivity, it has been shown in the anthropology, has first raised itself
to ego, to reflection. For this reflection, the content formerly belonging to
the natural life of the soul has been 'let go' and is now an 'independent
object' to which the ego 'relates' itself. The object is thus implicitly the
subject's own substantial being as the negative of the subject and something
lying beyond it. Hence, says Hegel, consciousness is a contradiction: it is at
once the independence of both sides and their implicit identity. This contra-
diction provides the dialectic of consciousness in its movement to sublate
its own diremption. For the subjective consciousness in this movement,
alteration seems to come wholly from the side of the object. Nevertheless,
ego as pure universality is 'thinking' (Denken), and the progressive logical
determination of the object is "identical in subject and object" (PM, p. 156).
Hence the demonstration in the phenomenology deals with the 'logical
Fortbestimmung' at once of subject and object.
In a treatment of subjective spirit the question cannot but arise as to the
relation of the phenomenology as the second science of subjective spirit and
the Phenomenology of1807. While we cannot offer a detailed comparison of the
'two phenomenologies', there are certain considerations we may briefly note.
The Phenomenology of 1807, we suggested, has a historical starting point
and also a starting point in the 'natural consciousness,' whose nature is there
presupposed. In the Heidelberg Encyclopedia of 1817, Hegel refers to the
Phenomenology of 1807 as "the scientific history of consciousness," which
was originally intended as the "first part" of philosophy "since it would
precede pure science as yielding its notion. 16 But "at the same time," Hegel
goes on to say, "consciousness and its history, like every other philosophic
science, is not an absolute beginning but rather a link in the circle of
philosophy." This role of phenomenology as 'link,' as we now have noted,
consists in its comprising the science 'midway' in the doctrine of subjective
spirit. As having this place within 'the circle of philosophy,' phenomenology
is preceded by anthropology, which has brought forth the notion of
176 MURRAY GREENE
consciousness and thereby demonstrated what the Phenomenology of 1807

began with as a presupposition.
In the Encyclopedia the aspect of phenomenology as a 'history of
consciousness' appears to recede in favor of phenomenology in its systematic
role in the doctrine of subjective spirit. The demonstration in the 1807 work
was explicitly and thematically in terms of a notion of 'experience.' Yet the
word 'experience' hardly occurs in the Encyclopedia treatment.! 7 The
apparent de-emphasis of the historical may account for the fact that the stoic,
sceptic, and 'unhappy' forms of consciousness are omitted in the pheno-
menology of the Encyclopedia. Instead of an explicit treatment in terms of
consciousness's 'experience,' the demonstration emphasizes the movement in
terms of the thought categories already explicated in the logic as 'pure
essentialities' of knowing. In these categories now expressed concretely as
forms of consciousness's subjective certainty, the object is successively
determined as a singularity that just 'is,' a 'thing' as container of 'properties'
and 'matters,' an 'inner' and an 'outer,' 'force,' 'law,' and 'life.' These cate-
gories more or less recur where ego as self-consciousness moves to actualize
its certainty of self in 'desire' (consumption of the object as singularity,
thing), in 'struggle for recognition' (inner and outer, law, life), and the
resulting emergence of the universal self-consciousness as reason.
In the treatment of the sense consciousness there occurs an important shift
in the discussion of space and time. Without elaborating on the significance
of the shift - whether it means a correction or perhaps betokens some
difference in approach from the Phenomenology of 1807 - Hegel tells us in
the Encyclopedia:
the treatment of the 'here' and the 'now' which in the 1807 work appeared in connection
with the sense-consciousness, "properly (eigentlich) belongs to intuition," which takes
its object not as external to consciousness, as in phenomenology, but as self-external
(PM, p. 156).
Intuition, as we shall note shortly, is reserved for psychology, and the reason
why this is so will be an important indication of the nature of organization of
the sciences of subjective spirit.
After these few remarks on the nature of the demonstration in the pheno-
menology as the second science of subjective spirit, we are finally in a position
to view in broad outline Hegel's conception of a philosophical psychology.
IV
We have argued that, in its organization and conception, Hegel's doctrine of

subjective spirit is designed to overcome the kind of external reflection

inherent in post-Cartesian philosophizing from the standpoint of conscious-
ness. For a philosophic science of psychology to be possible, Hegel declares,
thought must be liberated from the subject-object antithesis of consciousness.
Otherwise we remain in the Kantian position where certain knowledge can
only be of phenomenal 'objects' external to the subjectivity that can only
look outside itself in order to make apodictic judgments. The Kantian
position is in effect restated by William James, when he says, "the psycho-
logist's attitude towards cognition" must be a "thoroughgoing dualism" that
"supposes two elements, mind knowing and thing known, and treats them as
irreducible."18 This "irreducible" dualism has been shown by Hegel to be in
fact derivative, a dualism that fIrst emerged with consciousness itself as an
Urteil of the soul-body unity. On the basis of the implicit identity of the two
sides, Hegel's science of phenomenology shows the sublation of the dualism
and the restoration of the identity of subject and substance as reason. Freed
from this dualism that claims absoluteness out of ignorance of its own origin,
philosophy is in a position to investigate the concrete determinations of
cognition as identity of subject and object. The standpoint of external
reflection has been overcome, and in psychology the intelligence has
consciousness itself as its object.
Psychology is thus for Hegel the third and culminating science of subjec-
tive spirit. In psychology, says Hegel, spirit "has determined itself to the truth
of the soul and of consciousness." In this science we deal with "spirit as
such," spirit as rational intelligence and will. As intelligence, spirit no longer
stands "in relation" to its content as subject toobject but begins with its "own
proper being" and relates itself only "to its own proper determinations."
Every content from the outset has the twofold determination that it "is" and
is spirit's "own" (die des Seienden und die des Seinigen) (PM, p. 184). The
course of the movement of theoretic intelligence consists in that what spirit
'fmds' in itself as seiend it 'posits' as das Seinige.
Spirit's "own proper determinations" are intuition, representation,
memory, desire, etc., which are its universal modes of activity as "spirit as
such." Their demonstration will not proceed as a "natural evolution" in the
individual of various faculties and powers but as a necessary unfolding of
spirit's modes of activity according to its inherent notion as intelligence. Each
new determination will mean a further step in spirit's overcoming of its own
immediacy and its 'show' of being determined by a content 'found,' until
spirit freely and explicitly determines itself through its self-creation as
rational thought and will.
178 MURRA Y GREENE
Although intelligence has emerged as the truth of soul and consciousness,

and psychology is possible as a result of the demonstrations in anthropology
and phenomenology, the science of psychology, Hegel points out, contains its
own principle and must not be mixed with forms from consciousness or soul.
In the anthropology, the psychical subjectivity could not yet say, 'I think'
and was only implicitly for itself; the modes of its being-for-self were made
explicit by the philosopher. In the phenomenology the subjectivity could
think itself and put forward successive claims to a knowledge of the object as
the nonself; nevertheless, for this 'appearing' knowing, alteration seemed to
come about wholly on the side of the object, and it was the philosopher who
pointed out that in the altering of the object, consciousness itself was altered.
The special principle of psychology consists in that the relation of spirit to its
determinations is a self-relation that is explicitly 'for' spirit itself. We have
thus attained to a relation of pure transparency and immanence that is im-
possible to an external reflection.
But what now does this mean specifically in terms of the treatment in
psychology? What does it mean to say that intuition, representation,
memory, etc., are the 'proper' modes of activity of intelligence? Do not these
forms of mental activity also belong to consciousness, and perhaps even in a
measure to the soul? Is not 'attention,' for example, a determination of
consciousness? Why then is attention only first treated by Hegel in psycho-
logy and not in phenomenology or anthropology? Why should intuition, with
its forms of space and time, only first come up in the third and concluding
science of subjective spirit? As a matter of fact, intuition has in a way been
treated earlier - as the sensuous consciousness of the phenomenology, and
even as the sentient soul of the anthropology. Why then the three levels, and
what marks the difference in treatment?
With these questions we approach directly the notion of subjective spirit
and its demonstration in the form of a triad of sciences. What in anthropology
was 'sentience' and in phenomenology 'sense consciousness' becomes in
psychology - as the intelligence itself in its 'immediacy' - 'intuition.' We see
other forms recur. What in anthropology was the permeation of the corporeal
Dasein by the soul as subjective purpose in 'habit,' becomes in psychology the
permeation of the 'inner' Dasein - the stock of images and representations -
by the intelligence in 'sign' and particularly language. What in anthropology
was intersubjectivity on the psychical level as 'animal magnetism,' and in the
phenomenology the master-slave relation and 'recognition,' becomes in
psychology the ethical unity of free rational wills. In these and other
instances, what determines the difference in treatment on the respective
levels? In anthropology, as we saw, the determinations of the 'monadic'

subjectivity were those of its natural corporeality and its self-enclosed feeling
life. There was as yet no question, properly speaking, of an 'object.' In
phenomenology, on the other hand, the ego is 'thinking' and determines its
object according to thought categories in which it puts forward its claims
to a knowledge of the object as an "other." But such an 'objective' knowledge
was in truth but a one-sided subjective certainty. Hence the Fortbestimmung
of object and subject in the phenomenology can only be called a 'constitution'
in a purely logical sense. The Fortbestimmung consists in that the forms of
Gewissheit are sublated to Wahrheit, while the 'appearing' ego is sublated to
ego in its 'essence.' Only once the logical status of object has been clarified
and established as identical with that of subject is psychology possible as a
science that is not an external reflection. Only now can psychology
demonstrate the constitution of the object - not in terms of a onesided
subjective certainty of an 'other' but in the object's explicit identity with the
subject as but the latter's own modes of activity. The first form of this
explicit identity, according to Hegel, is not sense consciousness, for which
the object is an other, but 'intuition.' For this reason, intuition is treated for
the first time in psychology.
Intuition, according to Hegel, is intelligence's 'fmding' itself determined
and for this reason a mode of intelligence in its self-externality. At the same
time the content intuited has the form of self-externality as determined in
the universal modes of externality as such: namely, space and time. Space and
time are indeed forms of intuition, as Kant maintained. But in the first place,
says Hegel, they are not simply picked up by an external reflection on the
part of the philosopher, but demonstrated from the very notion of intuition
as intelligence's own form of self-externality. Secondly, they are not 'merely
subjective.' Since the one-sided subjectivity of consciousness has been over-
come in phenomenology, the spatial and temporal asunderness of the intuiting
intelligence's object are the very forms of the object as 'external to itself' -
though the object is so, of course, only 'for' the intelligence. The intuiting
intelligence, according to Hegel, is thus the truth of nature's own .ifussersich-
sein as a realm of the partes extra partes.
Here we may say a word about attention as a moment of intuition. Of
course attention is also a determination of consciousness. In the pheno-
menological demonstration, however, attention as such is taken for granted
in the ego's unself-conscious outer directedness. For the purposes of the
phenomenology, the matter of attention is simply not relevant to the logical
claims of the subjective certainty. Now that in psychology consciousness
180 MURRAY GREENE
itself is the object of intelligence, attention becomes relevant to the constitu-

tion of the subject-object identity.
Attention, according to Hegel, is the moment of spirit's making a found
content 'its own,' the moment of spirit's 'active inwardization' (Erinnerung).
As against this inwardness, the necessary opposite moment is spirit's positing
the content found as a 'something that is' (Seiendes) - but whose very 'being'
is at the same time a 'negative' or 'abstract other of itself.' This marks the
distinction between the intuiting intelligence and the sense consciousness,
whose object is merely an 'in itself.' In attention tht intelligence determines
its content of feeling as 'self-external' (ifusser-sich-seiendes), projecting it into
time and space, the forms in which intelligence is intuitive. Thus, unlike the
phenomenology, the present standpoint shows intelligence conferring on the
material the 'rational determination' of being 'the other of its own self' -
space and time being the most primary and abstract modes of this self-
externality. Attention is thus at once intelligence's determining the 'found' as
separate from itself (spatial and temporal) and positing it precisely in that
separateness as intelligence's 'own.'
Hegel's dialectical treatment of attention offers a beautiful example of the
simultaneous going-outwards and going-inwards that is the mark of spirituality
in all its development (see above, p. 169). Only through attention, says Hegel,
does spirit come to be 'present' in the subject matter, and hence this spiritual
activity is the necessary beginning of all mental cultivation and knowledge.
Attending is a simultaneous separating and uniting of subject and object, a
self-within-self reflecting of free mind and "an identical turning of mind
toward the object" (PM, p. 196). Though attention is in some measure a
matter of my free choice, it is not for that reason something easy. It may
mean the effort of selective concentration whereby I suppress all sorts of
inclinations and distractions, even 'abstract myself from my self' by keeping
back those particular interests and prejudices that prevent the Sache from
coming into its own. In attending, I must hold the object away from myself
in order to be closer to it. I must forget myself in order to immerse myself
in the other - and in this very self-forgetting I must enter all the more deeply
into myself to bring into play my fullest resources. Attending is thus at once
a going outward and a going inward. But it is precisely the nature of spirit to
unite these opposites in itself. If I am distraught, I cannot fix the object in
my attention; but if I am held fascinated by the object in its brute presence,
I cannot bring into play all my experience of its ties, references, and possi-
bilities, which first make it the concrete object that it is. How spiritual an
activity is 'mere' attending in a philosophical psychology! Intuition, in
Hegel's treatment, is not one 'part' or 'faculty' of the mind, not even 'one
stem' of knowledge that has to be united synthetically with another 'stem.'
For this reason, Hegel experiences no difficulty in linking his meaning of
intuition with the sense we give the word when we speak, for example, of the
deep intuition of a Goethe. Intuition, for Hegel, is conceptual thinking in
germ; intuition is mind, is spirit in its living totality, though as yet in un-
developed or deficient form.
Spirit as intelligence, however, cannot remain immersed in this form of its
immediacy. In the various stages of representation, intelligence inwardizes
the externality of intuition and imagination in memory, and finally over-
comes its last vestige of se1f-externality in conceptual thinking. We can hardly
go beyond a bald summary of Hegel's presentation of theoretical spirit in the
psychology. A few points of special interest must suffice.
As initially 'recollective' of intuition, says Hegel, intelligence posits the
intuited content in its own inwardness, "in its own space and time." Thus
taken up into the universality of the ego, the content becomes an image,
abstracted from the fullness of the original intuition and isolated from the
directly experienced place, time, and context of the intuition. The image thus
seems to be but a residue and a loss from the determinate singularity of the
intuition. But it is not the case for Hegel, as for Hume, that the image is but
a faded copy of the impression. For Hegel, no manifestation of spirit in its
activity can be explained merely in terms of loss. In Hegel the intuition is
eclipsed as Singularity by the actively inwardizing intelligence in transposing
the content into its own universal ideal medium. This greatly extends the
range of the representing, as against the intuiting intelligence, since I no
longer require the immediate presence of the object. Further, in abstracting
the intuition from its original setting, says Hegel, representation divests it of
what are frequently but the contingent connections of time and space.
Of itself the image is transient, and intelligence as inner attention is its
sole 'where and when.' But intelligence is not merely this Dasein as but a
present awareness of this determinate content; and the image, while
inwardized in the intelligence and thus no longer 'existent', has not vanished
into nothingness. The image is "unconsciously retained," says Hegel in the
"night-like pit" (niichtlicher Schacht) of the intelligence. Here are preserved
a "world of infinitely many images and representations without their being in
consciousness." This preservation of the no longer existent can only be
understood, says Hegel, if spirit is grasped in its essence as "ideality" - which
means "negation of the real, but a negation in which the real is aufbewahrt,
retained virtualiter, although it does not exist" (PM, p. 92). The representing
182 MURRAY GREENE
intelligence is the power which, of itself, can bring forth the image to
existence from its 'simple night.' In so doing, the intelligence has 'subsumed'
the singular intuition under the image as 'the universal in point of form.'
Recollection (Erinnenmg) is thus a merging in the form of a 'recognizing.'
In being brought forth from the 'simple night' of the intelligence, the image
acquires a Dasein and the intuition simultaneously a generality. Through such
repeated 'recognitions,' the image obtains the 'liveliness' and 'presentness'
of a Vorstellung, inasmuch as I can 'set it before' myself without the aid of
intuition.
While in imagination I am no longer restricted to the sensuously present,
nevertheless as long as my thinking continues to be in images, according to
Hegel, I am not yet free. To the extent that my imagining is a kind of roving,
I n~main subject to contingencies external to my essential being as intelligence.
But in imagination itself, says Hegel, intelligence proceeds to sublate this
unfreedom and contingency, and the moments of imagination display spirit's
advance toward the freedom of conceptual thinking. This advance is marked
by the movement from (1) the more or less automatic evocation of images by
the 'reproductive' imagination, to (2) the relating of images to one another
through general representations by the 'associative' imagination, and finally
to (3) the positing of general representations by the 'creative' imagination or
Phantasie in the sensuous Dasein of symbols and signs making up the store-
house of memory.
While Kant poses the problem of knowledge as the "subsumption of an
object under a concept," or the "subsumption of intuitions under pure
concepts" (CPR, B 177-A 138), Hegel takes such terms as 'subsumption' and
'synthesis' as indicating an external conjoining (Verkniipfung)19 that plays a
role on the level of representation but is out of place in the notion of pure
conceptual thinking. Here, according to Hegel, the determinations are not
united in 'syntheses' but "produced by the inherent movement of the
moments tending back into this unity" (SL [M], p. 75). But such conceptual
thinking, Hegel endeavors to show, only first arises in an overcoming of the
synthetic connectings of the representing intelligence.
In the reproductive imagination the images are brought forth from the
ego's own interiority, thus providing a universal representation for the asso-
ciative connecting of images. The activity of the associative imagination, says
Hegel, is not to be explained in terms of some "force of attraction" (see above,
p. 165), but as the intelligence's own power of subsuming and synthesizing
its content in its very act of "setting it before" itself in its universality.
Association, says Hegel, is a subsumption of singular representations under a
universal representation that constitutes their connection (PM, p. 209). As

the identical power over its 'stock' of images and representations, the asso-
ciating intelligence informs this stock to its own purport and interest; it
permeates the material of representation just as the soul permeated its
corporeal determinations with its own subjective purpose in habit. In thus
informing its material with its own inner purport, says Hegel, intelligence is
symbolizing, allegorizing, poetizing imagination. It is no longer merely
reproductive or associative but 'creative' imagination, which Hegel terms
Phantasie. Inasmuch as the material still comes from intuition, the creations
(Gebilde) of the Phantasie are still syntheses. The essential activity of the
Phantasie consists in that the Verbildlichung of the universal representation
is at the same time the Verallgemeinerung of the image (PM, p. 210). The
universal, or inner, permeates the image, or outer, as its very soul, so that the
image is rendered but the outer expression of the universal wherein the latter
recollects itself and is for it~elf. This takes place most especially in the
imagination as the "signmaking" Phantasie.
The Phantasie, according to Hegel, is that form of the intelligence's self-
externalization in which it brings its inner import and purport (Gehalt) to the
outer form of image and intuition. In this way the intelligence makes itself
seiend, as the soul made itself 'being' in permeating its corporeality. The
movement proceeds in three stages. The image initially produced by the
Phantasie is only 'subjectively intuitive.' In the 'sign,' it acquires 'intuitability
proper.' Finally in mechanical memory the intelligence completes its bestowal
of the form of Sein on its hitherto merely inner Gehalt.
The 'sign' (Zeichen), says Hegel, is some immediate intuition that stands
for a "wholly different content" from that which it has on its own account.
The sign is "the pyramid into which a foreign soul has been conveyed
(versetzt)" and preserved (PM, p. 213). Hegel here notes the difference
between sign and symbol. The latter, in its own proper character as an
intuition, has been more or less carried over into the content of the represen-
tation, as where the eagle as 'strength' served as a symbol of Jupiter. In
symbolization the intelligence is still conditioned by the sensuous, the
particular imagery still largely subjective. In the sign, on the other hand, the
intuitive content is so removed from its signification that the intelligence is
free in its choice and employment of the intuition. But it is only through
simile, metaphor, and symbol that the intelligence first raises itself to this
freedom in its signmaking. To be sure, in the intuited particular, the symbol-
izing intelligence has also returned to itself in its universality, if not so
completely as in the sign. In identifying the intuited eagle with this invisible
184 MURRAY GREENE
god, the Phantasie has in effect dissolved the intuition in its sensuous con-
creteness and taken one essential attribute which is thus raised to an abstract
universal: Jupiter as strength. But in such pure signs as the cocarde, flag,
gravestone, says Hegel, the intelligence has so infused the intuition with its
own inner purport that the intuition serves as but the incidental occasion for
the intelligence's own self-reminder.
In thus taking the intuition out of its immediate spatio-temporal context
and positing the image in intelligence's own space and time, the signmaking
Phantasie, says Hegel, annuls (tilgen) the immediacy of the intuition and
infuses it with its own soul and meaning, within intelligence's own ideal
space and time. In this way, says Hegel, intelligence's sign-creating activity
becomes the 'productive memory.' In the annulling of the immediacy of its
being, the original intuition now only 'is' as an Aufgehobensein. This subla-
tion of the intuition provides Hegel's deduction of language.
Since the negative power that annuls the intuition in its immediacy is the
intelligence itself - which is responsible for intuition's forms of space and
time in the nrst place - the more determinate shape of the intuition-become-
sign is that of a "being-there in time" which is just as well the "vanishing of
the being-there in that it is." As an external psychical positedness deriving
from the intelligence's own natural being, the sign is now a vocal note (Ton),
"where the inward idea manifests itself in adequate utterance" (PM, p. 214).
Articulated in speech and language, vocalization endows feelings, intuitions,
representations, with a second Dasein, spiritually enhanced and higher than
before - an 'existence' wholly within the realm of representing.
Language, for Hegel, is the highest product of the signmaking intelligence,
the mediator between intuition and pure thinking (SL [M], pp. 31-32). In
sublating the intuition in the verbal sign, the intelligence is the inner spiritual
'time,' which, like time in general, sublates the asunderness of space (PN,
p. 33ff). In its creation and employment of language, the intelligence is
engaged in that going-outwards that is simultaneously a going-inwards: an
investing of its spiritual inner with the form of an outer Dasein whose very
being is straightway a vanishing. Thus, for Hegel, signmaking is not some
specialized function of imagination in 'cognition,' which is mainly the role it
obtains in the Kantian schematism. Its role for Hegel is indeed that of a
mediator - but one that is the ego itself in its totality as a spiritual life.
Language for Hegel is "divine" (Phen [M], p. 66). The sublation of the
spatial intuition to the vanishing temporal Dasein of the vocal sign entails the
whole inner spirituality of the intelligence as negative power over its natural
being as well as its representations.
In a digression on language, Hegel argues that alphabetical writing is the

more appropriate expression for the signmaking intelligence than hiero-
glyphic. The former has 'dissolved' the concrete signs of vocal language into
their phonemes, which are now represented by visual marks. Thus as 'signs of
signs,' phonetic writing is a further sublation of the spatially sensuous and
hence a more 'inwardized outerness' than picture writing. No matter how rich
the content, the 'name' renders it simple for the mind, so that the sign, as a
Dasein on its own account, offers neither halt nor pause for thinking. In
fluent reading, alphabetical writing itself becomes a hieroglyphic but one that
retains the pure simpleness of the vocal sign. Nevertheless the word as such,
says Hegel, is still an 'outer' that must be wholly taken up into the 'inner' of
the intelligence. The E-rinnerung of the word as sign, says Hegel, is memory
(Gediichtnis ).
In memory the word as such is negated and at the same time preserved, as
was the case with the image. As memory, says Hegel, the intelligence in-
wardizes the sign, thereby raising the single connection of name and represen-
tation to a universal one. Since the sign as spoken word is a temporality, its
singularity is its transitoriness; through its universalization in memory, it
obtains permanence. In thus becoming universal, says Hegel, the name and
the meaning are connected for the intelligence; the intuition, which is what
the name in the fIrst instance is, is itself made a representation. Meaning and
sign are hereby united in one representation. Without need of intuition or
image, the reproductive memory now "has and recognizes the Sache in the
name and the name with the Sache." Given the name 'lion,' I need neither an
intuition nor an image of the animal; the name alone serves me as the "image-
less simple representation."
In thus uniting name and Sache, the reproductive memory is even less
dependent on the intuition than the Phantasie. In the "image-less simple
representation," says Hegel, intelligence is self-intuiting. Hence, Hegel main-
tains, memorization is not a "reading ofP' of something from a supposed
mnemonic tableau of imagination. Learning "by heart" (auswendig), as the
phrase implies, is rather a bringing forth "from within outwards," from the
"deep pit" of the ego. As between memory and imagination, memory is the
higher spiritual activity, according to Hegel, since it is no longer dealing with
an intuition but with a Dasein that is intelligence's own product: with "such
a without-book (Auswendiges) as remains locked up in the within-book
(Inwendiges) of intelligence" (PM, p. 220).
Although in reproductive memory, name and Sache are united, this
connecting is of itself no guarantee of the truth or necessity of the Sache.
186 MURRAY GREENE
Despite the advance from imagination, in reproductive memory the ego as

intelligence is not yet freely with itself in that 'outer' that is such "only
inside the intelligence itself." This very defect is posited in mechanical
memory or rote, where the limitedness of memory discloses itself as the last
remaining gap between word and meaning. At the same time the disclosure as
such constitutes the possibility for the overcoming of the defect. Hereby we
come to Hegel's notion of rote as the consummation of the representing
intelligence - a notion whose seeming oddness is in fact no odder than the
superiority of phonetic to hieroglyphic writing.
In memory, the linking of the meaning as such with the 'being' (Sein) as
name is still a synthesis, and the intelligence does not freely return to itself
as simple self-identity in this its externality. As the universal and the 'simple
truth' of its externalizations, intelligence moves to sublate the synthetic
connection of words and meanings. It does so through a final and highest
'inwardization' that is simultaneously a highest 'outwardization.' Intelligence
here, says Hegel, "posits itself as the Being, the universal space of the name as
such" - that is to say, the "Being of meaningless words."
Thus the completion of memory in its notion, according to Hegel, is rote.
In rote, or 'mechanical memory,' the synthetic connection of word and
meaning is in the first place dissolved; for that Verknupfung was itself an
'externality' incommensurate with the universality of intelligence in its
notion. But the dissolution of the Verknupfung in rote is a making way for
something higher; it is the opening up of a 'universal space' in which uniting
need no longer be synthetic, as it is in all representation as such. Since the
meaning of a synthesis is a uniting of elements that have a subsistence on
their own, the overcoming of synthesis can take place only in one way:
namely, that the very Sein of what is united be divested of its last tinge of
externality or self-subsistence, so as to be able to derive internally from
nothing but the intelligence itself. Intelligence must therefore make itself to
Sein - indeed lower itself· to the sheer externality and abstractness of a
'universal space.' But at the same time this 'space' is but its own self. In
rendering itself an abstract universal space in mechanical memory, intelligence
posits itself in its universality as the power over the representation. Rote is
despiritualization, but the act of spirit itself: it is the intelligence's way of
making the particular outer wholly its own inner by making itself the univer-
sal outer in which the particular first obtains subsistence.
Thus mechanical memory, according to Hegel, is spirit's positing itself as
objectivity. In intuition, we recall, spirit was external to itself in its 'fmding'
of itself as determined. In representation it recollected the 'found' within
itself and made it its 'own.' In memory it makes itself an externality so that
its 'own' once again appears as a 'found': now, however, the rmding is a
rmding of what is intelligence's express creation. In mechanical memory, says
Hegel, one of the moments of thinking, "objectivity, is here put in intelli-
gence" as the quality of the intelligence itself (PM, p. 222). The movement
here recapitulated may be seen as a movement from space to time and from
time back to space; or, since space and time are, respectively, the abstract
forms of objectivity and subjectivity, from objectivity to subjectivity and
back to objectivity. The spatiality of the original external intuition is subia ted
in the temporal Dasein of the vocal sign; now, going back, the transience and
contingent subjectivity of the name is itself sublated in an objectivity that is
- indeed not that of sensuous space - out the 'inner outerness' of the spirit's
universal spatiality: the mechanical memory. As mechanical memory, intelli-
gence puts the stamp of 'being' on all its productivity of representation.
The objectivity which the name acquires in mechanical memory, however,
is in the first instance but abstract. If the Seiende as name is to be the Sache
as genuine objectivity, says Hegel, it is in need of the 'meaning' coming from
the representing intelligence as the inner. But memory as such, as we have
seen, has fallen heir to the inner of representation with its treasury of names
and meanings; and as mechanical memory the intelligence contains at once
the two moments: outer objectivity and inner meaning. The intelligence, says
Hegel, is now posited as 'existence' of this identity. Spirit is now explicitly
'for itself the identity which it is 'in itself as reason. The inwardness of
intelligence is now 'to itself being' (an ihr selbst seiend), subjectivity explicit-
ly one with objectivity. Hereby, says Hegel, intelligence as memory passes
over into the activity of thought.
The kinship of memory and thought (Gediichtnis and Gedanken) is
recognized even in language, Hegel claims. Memory as such is thinking in its
'existence,' i.e., thinking in its merely outer aspect or onesided moment.
Reason is implicitly identical with this mode of thought's existence, and this
means that reason now exists in the subject, that reason 'is' as the individual
subjectivity's own activity of thinking.
With the attainment of thinking, spirit has completed its development as
theoretical intelligence. Thinking is the explicit and consummated unity of
subjective and objective in the sphere of cognition. The movement in the
psychology began with spirit as implicit identity of 'being' and its 'own,'
and the course of spirit's movement through intuition, representation, and
thought has been to posit this identity as 'for' itself. For this reason, Hegel
tells us, intelligence has proved to be 'recognitive' (wiedererkennend).
188 MURRAY GREENE
Spirit's knowing now means that what it finds in itself it knows both as its
own and as being.
Beginning with the formal determinations of 'category' and 'judgment,'
thought in 'syllogism' discloses the necessity of the content and sublates the
last distinction of content and form. Whereas in understanding the intelli-
gence still deals with a content other than itself, in reason the content as such
derives from the thinking intelligence's own distinctions of form. In concep~
tual thinking (begreifendes Denken) the Notion evidences itself in its own
proper shape. The universal as form is no longer external to the content but
produces the determinations of the latter from itself and is thus the
immanent self-developing notion of the Sache. The entire movement of
subjective spirit has been the demonstration that "the Notion as such can
only be apprehended by spirit, of which it is not only the peculiar property
but the pure self' (SL [M], p. 618).
That the intelligence now knows that "what is thought, is; and what is,
is only insofar as it is a thought," constitutes the transition from the
theoretical to the practical sphere. In knowing itself as the "determinant of
the content" which at the same time is determined as 'being,' the intelligence
is will (PM, p. 227). The development of subjective spirit as will comprises
the second part of the psychology: practical spirit. This division, however, is
not absolute. The will is nothing separate from reason. In man, says Hegel,
"there is only one reason, in feeling, volition and thought" (fM, p. 231).
As will, spirit enters the realm of actuality. Actuality in subjective spirit,
however, has to do with the individuality as fulfilling itself, and will viewed
psychologically is that of the finite subjectivity. The fmitude of will here,
says Hegel, consists in its 'formalism'; its self-fulfilling is in the first instance
an abstract insistence on its own satisfaction that is not yet "identified with
the developed reason."
The pathway of the will in overcoming its formalism consists in its raising
itself to a 'thinking will' that has freed itself of its own narrow particularity
and now posits itself in its free subjectivity as at the same time objective and
universal. The course of the movement displays the three moments of the
Notion. As (1) 'practical feeling' the will 'finds' itself determined by its
manifold - often contradictory - inclinations and passions, whose contin-
gent and isolated content is lacking in the form of universality that would
render it objective and substantial. The would-be harmony of irmer feeling
with the objectively valid is 'posited' in (2) impulse and choice as a harmony
to be established by the will itself through subordination of the manifold
impulses to a universal aim. Initially this is (3) 'happiness,' which, however,
as a universal, remains only externally related to the particular through the

will's arbitrary choice. The genuine unity of individual and universal becomes
possible when 'enjoyment' passes over into 'deed' and 'act,' wherein the
'actual free will' knows its object to be but its own autonomous selfhood.
With this emergence of 'free spirit,' the doctrine of subjective spirit is
completed. The necessity has arisen that the individual subjective will in deed
and act fulfill itself in an objective and universal content. In attaining to free
rational will, spirit has actualized its unity as theoretical and practical intelli-
gence. Spirit has thereby fulfilled its notion as subjective spirit and passes
over into objective spirit: the realm of right, ethical community, and state.
Hegel's doctrine of subjective spirit above all presents the development of
spirit as a Befreiungskampf: to permeate its natural corporeal being as its
ideality in the anthropology; to overcome the separation of itself and its
object in the phenomenology; to sublate its own modes of self-externality in
the psychology. The freedom struggle is thus against no foreign overlord but
against itself in its own natural being as its limit. The Befreiungskampf of
spirit marks subjective spirit as finite - but also infmite. This struggle with its
own fmitude, says Hegel, "constitutes the stamp of the divine in the human
mind and forms a necessary stage of the eternal mind" (PM, p. 182).
Hegel has purported to demonstrate this movement of spirit scientifically.
Indeed he claims that it can only be shown scientifically and, conversely, that
only that presentation will be scientific which shows spirit in its inherent
truth as a struggle toward freedom. For such a demonstration to be possible,
however, there must be an overcoming of that modern form of external
reflection which holds that science can only consist in a knowledge of exter-
nality. To overcome this external reflection, Hegel advances his 'speculative
method,' which, in every philosophic science, is the form of demonstration
immanent to the Sache selbst. In the realm of spirit, according to Hegel, the
Sache selbst is spirit's own knowing of itself - to which no external reflection
can obtain 'access.'
Hegel sees the overcoming of external reflection as a liberation from the
subject-object dualism of consciousness. In post-Cartesian philosophy through
Kant, the dualism remained absolute. Thinkers such as Hume said that they
made no pretense to a knowledge of the soul or mind in its essential nature
but only to what they could observe of its operations?O But in this supposed-
ly detached observation, the observer imported such categories as 'force' and
'attraction' from his view of the external world. Thus at one moment the
observer separated the realm of the internal from that of the external, and in
the next moment he approached the internal with categories from the
190 MURRAY GREENE
external. Kant demanded a critique of the forms of thought in general,

including those suitable for a knowledge of mind. But while uncritical cate-
gories were hereby barred from a knowledge of mind, the nature of the
critique was such as to do away with the very enterprise. For Kant, the ego
cannot know itself because it can only be subject, never object of its judg-
ments. For consciousness, apodictic knowledge can only be of spatial exter-
nality as a realm of phenomena.
Hegel, as we have seen, overcomes these approaches of external reflection
by demonstrating that the standpoint of consciousness and its subject-object
dualism is a derivative one. Consciousness first comes to be as an Ur-teil. The
development of the soul-body relationship demonstrated in the anthropology
culminates in the subjectivity's act of oppositing to itself its corporeal deter-
minations as an objectively structured external world. Through this move-
ment, subjectivity has first come to be ego. In its relation to its object, the
ego of consciousness has the subjective certainty of the object as an indepen-
dent other. Proceeding immanently in terms of consciousness's own claims,
the phenomenology takes up those very categories - thing, property, force -
in which uncritical thinking had moved, and demonstrates their sublation as
modes of thought in which subject and object are separated.
Only at this point, where the genuine status of object and subject has
been established, is a philosophical psychology first possible. Now there is no
question of approaching mind with categories imported from elsewhere, or of
knowing the mind only in the flux of empirical consciousness. The triad of
sciences: anthropology, phenomenology, and psychology, is the overcoming
of external reflection and the demonstrated notion of subjective spirit. By
virtue of the disclosure of the origin of the subject-object dualism, and by
the phenomenological critique of the forms of thought deriving from the
standpoint of that dualism, the dualism itself has been overcome. A philoso-
phical psychology that knows finite subjectivity as spirituality in its struggle
toward freedom is now possible.
Bernard Baruch College, CUNY

New York
NOTES
1 For one statement of Hegel's meaning of external reflection, particularly as contrasted

with dialectical thinking, see L [W, 1892], p. 147.
2 Hegel intended to write a separate full-scale work on subjective spirit but did not live
to do so. See FriedheIm Nicolin, 'HegeIs Arbeiten zur Theorie des subjektiven Geistes'
in J. Derbolav and F. Nicolin, eds., Erkenntnis und Verantwortung. Festschrift fUr
Theodor Litt (DUsseldorf, Schwann, 1960), pp. 356-374.
3 L [W, 1892], p. 296; SL [M], p. 613.
4 "What merely is (das Seiende), without any spiritual activity," says Hegel, is so little
the essence of spirit that consciousness is rather the very opposite of it and is only actual
for itself by "the negation and abolition of such a being" (Phen [M], p. 205).
5 Referring to Condillac's model of the mind, Hegel says, it shows a successive emer-
gence of mental faculties in a "solely affirmative manner" that misses the "negative
aspect" whereby the sensible material is "transmuted into mind and destroyed as a
sensible." (PM, p. 183).
6 Ph en [M], p. 47; L [W, 1892], p. 17.
7 On the question of the role of the philosopher, see Kenley R. Dove, 'Hegel's Pheno-
menological Method', Review of Metaphysics 23 (1970), 627 ff.
8 SL [M] , pp. 51, 60, 63;Phen [M], p. 491.
9 "Psychologists may not expressly speak of parts of the soul or mind, but the mode in
which this subject is treated by the analytic understanding is largely founded on the
analogy of this finite relation." (L [W, 1892], p. 246; see also p. 365).
10 See R. C. Solomon, 'Hegel's Concept of "Geist" " Review of Metaphysics 23 (1970),
642-661.
11 See Kant's Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, tr. J. Ellington (Indian-
apolis, Bobbs-MerriU, 1970), p. 8; Theodore Mischel, 'Kant and the Possibility of a
Science of Psychology' in Kant Studies Today, ed. L. W. Beck (La Salle, ill., Open Court,
1969) pp. 432-455.
12 PN, p. 442 ff;L [W, 1892], p. 362; PM, p. 9ff.
13 PM, p. 146; see also SL [M], p. 766.
14 PN, p. 382 ff;PM, p. 76 ff.
15 See Ernst Bloch, Subjekt-Objekt: ErltJuterungen zu Hegel, 2d ed. (Frankfurt am
Main, Suhrkamp, 1962), pp. 188-189.
16 Siimtliche Werke, ed. Glockner (Stuttgart, Frommann, 1958), Vol. 6, p. 48.
17 In fact the term 'experience' only occurs thrice, each time in a polemical context
incidental to the main exposition of the conception of the phenomenology. (See PM,
pp. 161, 162).
18 William James, The Principles of Psychology [1918], 2 vols. (New York, Dover,
1950), vol. 1, p. 218 (cited by Aron Gurwitsch, 'Towards a Theory of Intentionality,'
Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 30 (1970),359.)
19 SL [M], p. 96; L [W, 1892], p. 344.
20 See Hume's Introduction to his A Treatise of Human Nature, ed. L. A. Selby-Bigge
(Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1964), p. xxi.
PART TWO
PHILOSOPHY AND METHODOLOGY

OF SCIENCE
ERROL HARRIS
THE DIALECTICAL STRUCTURE OF

SCIENTIFIC THINKING
One of Kant's major contributions to modern philosophy was the recognition

that genuine knowledge is never a mere patchwork of items of information,
whether gathered from empirical sources or from intellectual, whether
inductively inferred or deductively derived from flrst principles. "If each and
every single representation were completely foreign, isolated and separate
from every other", he declared, "nothing would ever arise such as knowledge,
which is a whole of related and connected elements".l Of this fact, Hegel was
unshakably convinced. "The Truth", he maintained, "is the whole"; but it is
no undifferentiated, featureless whole, no Schellingian night in which all cows
are black. "The true form in which the truth exists can only be the scientific
system itself' (Phiin [G], p. 27).
Further, he did not conceive the system as a static or invariable pattern,
but as a dynamic system; a system of activity and development inherent in
the very relationship of part to whole, or of the rudimentary to the fully
fashioned. The relationship is involved in the most elementary physical
entities and develops continuously to its fullest self-manifestation in living,
mental and spiritual totalities. In its explicit form it is self-conscious, and of
the self-conscious mind he says that it is absolute restlessness - a constant
activity of thinking the essential principle of which is dialectic. Moreover, it is
only in the fully explicit self-conscious form that the whole is adequately
realized as a self-maintaining system. "The Truth", he says, "is the whole, but
only that essential reality which has fulfilled itself through its own self-
development is the whole" (Phiin [G], p. 24). Moreover, the whole, when
fully realized, transpires as the entire dialectical scale through which it has
developed itself, and it is to this and the manner of its progression that we
must look for the clue to understanding precisely what Hegel means by
system.
The whole of which Hegel speaks is not one that can be broken up into
mechanically separable parts, and the system that constitutes it is not a mere
spatial or mechanical arrangement of such parts. Neither is it a purely formal
set of relations between ideas or formulae. It is a continuous scale of forms
195
196 ERROL HARRIS
and categories which generates itself by the dynamic of its own inherent
principle of activity, from the most vague, abstract and indefmite to the most
complete, articulate and explicit elaboration of absolute reality. Each form,
at every level, is, he asserts, the Absolute in some partial, and in some degree
inadequate, manifestation of itself. Each logical category, which has a place in
the system, is a provisional definition of the Absolute. It is that definition
which is characteristic of a particular phase in the process of dialectical
development. Hence the progression is not simply from the fragmentary to
the complete (though any such progression is one aspect of the process), but
is from the vague and confused to the more precise and discriminate. At every
stage the whole is in some sense, or manner, or degree, present, for at every
stage we have what Kant called a whole of related and connected elements.
But the whole is not at every stage explicitly articulated, and the series of
forms is constituted by the successive stages of explication engendered from
the less to the more adequate self-manifestations of what is ultimately real
and true.
The movement is generated by the very inadequacy of the primitive forms.
For every entity strives to become self-sufficient; and in those which are
finite, incomplete, or in other respects deficient, their very shortcomings give
rise to internal conflicts and oppositions that can be resolved only by further
self-development and explication. Similarly at the level of development at
which consciousness arises and this process becomes explicit as knowledge,
fmite objects are found wanting just so far as they do not satisfy the mind's
demand for, and nisus towards, coherent wholeness; and contradictions arise,
oppositions are generated, and resolutions are achieved by synthesis and
reconciliation. The progression is consequently one that proceeds by the
generation of contradictions and their resolution. It is the continual assertion
of the negative aspect involved in finiteness and insufficiency and its superses-
sion by a more adequate form in which the particular defiCiency is supplied
and the negation is negated.
For this reason Hegel calls the principle of the dialectic one of absolute
negativity; and it is because of the generation of internal contradiction
through inadequacy of the fmite form, the generation of consequent opposi-
tion to an other which is constituted by what is lacking from the original,
that the triadic appearance of the dialectical stages results. 'Thesis, antithesis
and synthesis' was not Hegel's own formula for the dialectical movement, but
it does summarize what results from it, even though it is not always apparent
and by no means always rigidly exemplified in Hegel's exposition.
System, then, is a series or scale of dialectically related forms, each
DIALECTICAL STRUCTURE OF SCIENTIFIC THINKING 197
automatically generating the next, by its inherent nisus to overcome its own
shortcomings and the contradictions to which they give rise. It is system of
this kind that constitutes what Hegel calls 'science' or Wissenschaft, and it is
to this that he is referring when he writes: " ... knowledge is only real and
can only be expounded as a science or system" (Phiin [G] ,p. 27). Each form,
because the whole is implicit in it, is itself a whole of some sort. Thus the
logic of the dialectic is a logic of development and what develops is always a
totality.
The gamut of categories that results from the dialectical process is a scale
of forms in which each is a specific exemplification of the totality which
is developing, but an exemplification at a particular level of adequacy (or
inadequacy) or degree of explicitness. At the same time the successive forms
are I]1utually related as opposites because of the difference in adequacy
between them: the first as relatively false to that which it is its purport to
present, and the other as relatively true. As Hegel puts it, the later is 'the
truth of the earlier. Every category of the Logic is an exemplification of the
Idea at a specific level of explicit thought; every category of Nature-philo-
sophy is a specific natural form at a particular level of realization of integral
wholeness; and every form of sentience, feeling and consciousness is a specific
form of mind (Geist) at a definite level of self-development. Yet each of
them, as well as each major division of philosophical reflection, is in some
respect, or in some sense, opposed to its neighbour, and in some degree to
every other. I believe that this can be demonstrated in detail, but my present
purpose is only to bring out the fact that the dialectical system is a scale of
forms such as R. G. Collingwood describes in his Essay on Philosophical
Method, in which the forms are mutually related in three ways at once, as
degrees of realization of a universal principle, as specifications of that same
universal, and as opposites. Such a logical structure Collingwood finds
characteristic of all philosophical thinking, and typical of every philosophical
system. My object is to show that it is not confmed to philosophy but is also
the form of scientific theory and scientific advance.
II
Among contemporary philosophers of science there would be general agree-

ment that a scientific theory is a system of some kind. Commonly it would be
designated an explanatory system. But the form and character of a scientific
system are matters on which there might be more difference of opinion. At
least until recently the accepted view was that of a scientific theory as a
198 ERROL HARRIS
deductive system constituted as an interpreted calculus. The calculus consists

of initial formulae made up from defined and undefined terms from which
other formulae are derivable according to specified transformation rules. The
interpretation of the calculus is effected by substituting for its variable
elements empirical terms indicative, or descriptive, of observable entities; and
such substitution converts the formulae into propositions making assertions
about the observable facts. When so interpreted, the transformation rules
function as rules of inference; but according to the current theory of deduc-
tive inference, no new factual information can be derived by its means because
all transformations are between logically equivalent statements, and every
deduction will therefore be purely analytic.
The source of all synthetic statements included in a scientific system must
accordingly be observation and any inference of a synthetic factual nature
can be only inductive. The validity of the traditional form of inductive
inference has, however, never been established, and serious doubts have
been voiced about its use in the sciences which have not been allayed by its
proponents? Some writers argue that inductive inference needs no more
justification than does deductive, on the ground that validity requires no
more than adherence to the stipulated rules. But this argument fails on two
counts. First, the rule of induction is a direct violation of the rule of deduc-
tion that universal (or general) conclusions cannot validly follow from
particular premisses - not even probability estimates3 - thus induction is
allegedly 'justified' simply by arbitrary legitimation of its unjustifiability.
Secondly, the only rule ever stated is to the effect that generalization is
warranted whenever a constant conjunction between specific events or
objects has been observed. The simple observation of an object (let alone an
event), however, involves the belief or acknowledgement that certain groups
of sensible qualities are constantly conjoined, and thus inductive inference is
already implicit in the mere recognition of an identifiable object. Moreover,
the assertion that sensible qualities are constantly conjoined involves the
placing of events in a time scale, which is impossible without the identifica-
tion of objects. It follows that the very enunciation of the rule and the
knowledge that it is being followed require its prior application, so that even
in this form the 'justification' of the inference presupposes the inference
itself, the rule for whose validity has not been, and cannot be independently
pronounced.
Inference in the natural sciences is accordingly reduced by current doctrine
to analytic deduction, which can produce no new knowledge and inductive
generalization, which cannot be validated. In that case, the superiority of
scientific procedure, over other methods that claim to achieve knowledge of

the world - let us say, clairvoyance, divination or feminine intuition -
cannot be established by the currently advocated philosophic theories. Nor
can these theories be supported by the superior success of science, which is a
patent fact, because that by itself is no evidence that the method adopted has
been inference by enumerative induction. If it had been, past successes could
not justify it as a method, because the only arguments by which the justifica-
tion could be sustained would have to be inductive and so would inevitably
beg the question.
Examination of the actual practice and procedure of scientists will expose
the falsity and ineptitude of the above theories of scientific method and, at
the same time will reveal a progression of conceptual systems, which answers
closely to the account previously given of a scale of forms. Scientific proce-
dure proves, accordingly, to be dialectical, to the demonstration of which
fact I shall devote the rest of this paper.
III
A scientific theory, it was said above, is an explanatory system. The current

view of explanation is that it consists simply of deduction, within a deductive
system, of the fact or hypothesis to be explained, from a higher level
hypothesis couched in theoretical terms. The meaning of these terms is
specifiable (according to the doctrine) only by translation into the empirical
terms descriptive of the observable facts. This is an odd view of explanation,
for we normally mean by that word the setting of the explicandum in a
context that will make it more intelligible. But if the facts to be explained
supply the meaning of the explicatory terms, it is difficult to see how the
latter can render the former more intelligible. It is sometimes alleged that
explanation is the same as analysis; but analysis is itself a vague term with
several applications and meanings, not all of them intuitively obvious. If it is
taken literally to mean dissection or separation into elementary parts, it is
unlikely to provide what explanation demands, especially when the explican-
dum is something whose nature is determined by its structure, for the pattern
of structure would be destroyed by such analysis.
If, however, we take our cue from Kant and see knowledge always as a
whole of related and connected elements, we are more likely to hold that
explanation involves both analysis and synthesis: analysis to lay bare and
expose the elements, synthesis to reveal the relations and connexions. And if
these again are determined by some general principle of organization, the
200 ERROL HARRIS
synthetic view will be more important than the analytic. The psychologist
J. J. Gibson is probably nearer the truth when he writes, "The progress of
learning is from indefinite to definite, not from sensation to percept" (where
'sensation' may be correlated with atomic element and 'percept' with struc-
tured object). If the progress of learning is the same as, or analogous to, the
advancement of knowledge, we should then say that it moves from the vaguer
and more confused to the more defmite and integrated, and this is, in fact,
what we fmd.
The most satisfactory accounts of perception that we have, whether
psychological or epistemological, show it to be an activity of structuring
vague and confused sentient elements to form coherent and systematically
ordered objects,4 and these again are recognizable and significant to the
extent to which they fit into a wider context of mutually related objects. Our
awareness of individual entities in our environment develops pari passu with
our comprehension of that environment as a world of objects ordered in
space and time, as well as in other respects. The ordering principles are
concepts without which, as Kant taught, there is no coherent perception of
objects. This presupposition of a conceptually ordered world implicit in the
perception of ordinary material things is prior to, and is involved in, all
scientific observation; so that there is no observation wholly free from
theoretical presupposition. s Science, moreover, is the fruit of an intellectual
effort to render the world of common perception - what we call 'the world
of common sense' more intelligible. It arises out of puzzling experiences and
develops as the resolution of initial problems gives rise to further questions.
Human knowledge, in short, is always a system of some kind, but is never a
fixed system established for all time. It is a constantly developing process -
a continuing activity of discovery and enlightenment.
From what has been said it will follow that the logical character of this
process of discovery will be that characteristic of the development of a whole.
Ordinary perception - the common sense awareness of the world - is already
a whole of related and connected elements. Incoherences in this structure give
rise to problems that stimulate the scientific enterprise; and this consists in
successive efforts to discover the coherent structure underlying the apparent
discrepancies, and generates a series of theories of increasing explanatory
power. Let us look at examples of this process in more detail.
Common sense accepts the familiar fact of motion as natural and un-
problematic, and yet does not reject the conception of a static world as a
possibility. We perceive things at rest and also things in motion and transfer
the resulting ideas of them at will without undue shock. The Biblical poet
speaks of the mountains skipping like lambs and hills like lambkins, and his
reader, while he may be incredulous, does not fmd the image impossible.
Further our own sense of effort in moving both our own bodies and others
gives rise to a conception of a cause of motion. It seems obvious that some-
thing should act on a body at rest in order to move it; for rest seems to be the
more natural condition which calls for no explanation, while motion carries
with it the idea of activity.
Common experience seems to show that to be moved a body must be
pushed or pulled, but falling bodies move without apparent impulsion. Here
is a discrepancy in the manifest behaviour of things which demands explana-
tion. Such an explanation was devised by the Ancients and set out systema-
tically by Aristotle. It was to the effect that all bodies have a natural place in
the universe from which, if they are to be moved, they must be violently
dislodged, and to which, if they are dislodged, they will naturally return. The
motion of falling bodies is, therefore, their natural motion in returning to
the centre, which is the natural place of earth, whereas forcible impulsion is
required to move them from rest in their natural setting. We are all aware
that, far-reaching as it was, Aristotle's theory led to contradictions when
applied to the behaviour of projectiles, and the subsequent efforts to resolve
these conflicts gave rise to the theories, first of impetus and later of inertia
and gravitation. A projectile like a flying arrow apparently moves indepen-
dently of push or pull, so Aristotle's theory provided no explanation of its
continued motion after its initial propulsion. The theory of antiperistasis,
which was proposed to account for this, led to immediate contradiction for it
presumed a rush of air behind the projectile to prevent a vacuum, which,
while it might keep it moving, would provide no cause for its eventual cessa-
tion. This was likewise attributed to air pressure, so that one was committed
to an appeal to the same process and the same force acting in diametrically
opposed directions. To resolve this difficulty Buridan introduced the theory
of impetus - a kind of induced natural motion originated by the original
impulsion, which, like the loss of heat in a glowing body, gradually died out.
This conception was still in use, though in suitably modified form, by Galileo
in his attempts to explain the motion of falling bodies, and it merges, as we
shall see, into that of inertia.
Thus a common sense notion leading to contradi~tion stimulates a theory,
in which, as it is applied, new conflicts arise; and these in tum are resolved
by successive theories, each applying to the same domain of facts, each
ordering the facts by means of laws, but successively doing so more cohe-
rently.
202 ERROL HARRIS
As another example, the familiar experiences of permanence and change

among things and their qualities prompt the ideas of underlying permanent
substance with ephemeral qualities. But these are immediately in conflict, for
if a substance is permanent in character, how can (and why should) its
properties vary with time? Various hypotheses were advanced by the earliest
scientists. Anaximander suggested a vibrant motion that separated opposites
from the boundless substrate, opposites later to combine in varying ways and
proportions; Anaximenes proposed condensation and rarefaction of the
original substance, leading to a quantitative explanation; Anaxagoras con-
ceived the basis of change as mixture in varying proportions of innumerable,
infinitesimal seeds; and so we proceed to the atomic theory which explains
all appearances in terms of aggregation and separation of minute elementary
particles.
In this outline I have skimmed over the intervening contradictions, to
which Zeno, in particular, drew attention. If rarefaction and condensation are
to be intelligible, equal spaces must be conceived as occupied by different
amounts of matter or substance. Matter must then be assessable quantitative-
ly in units, which must either be divisible in infinitum or consist of ultimately
indivisible parts. Both alternatives, as Zeno showed, lead to intractable
paradoxes, a solution to at least some of which the atomic theory seems to
offer. But the atomic theory will explain qualitative change only if atoms are
constantly, or at least commonly, in motion; and motion is explicable only in
terms of impulsion. Accordingly impact between atoms has to be envisaged as
the mutual cause of their movements. But unless they are elastic, how could
impact cause them to move, except while in mutual contact? And if a moving
atom coming into contact with another does impart its own motion to the
second, what is the cause of motion in the first? Elasticity, however, implies
compressibility, which again involves contraction between parts and so
requires a further division of atoms, contrary to their defming character, into
lesser parts. So the effort at explanation, beginning from contradictions in
common sense conceptions of things, proceeds by hypothesis, via new contra-
dictions, to further hypotheses.
Whether an assumed explanation be termed an hypothesis or a theory
usually depends on one or both of two considerations. If the fact, or facts,
which it claims to explain, are few and of restricted scope, it may be regarded
as an hypothesis rather than a theory; if it concerns a wide range of pheno-
mena, the reverse. Or, alternatively, if it is a mere conjecture, as yet unproven,
it will be called an hypothesis, but if it has been confirmed by numerous tests
and is considered 'established', it is a theory. Nevertheless, no theory is fmally
established, and some writers (like Karl Popper) maintain that none can be
established at all, though they may be falsified. So there is good reason for
holding that all scientific theories are in this sense no more than hypotheses.
The function performed by hypothesis, by virtue of which it explains, is
to organize the experienced phenomena into a system, and the degree of its
success depends on the range of phenomena to which it can consistently be
applied and the absence of conflict in the results of its application. The long
hegemony of the Aristotelian system resulted from the eminent success with
which it coherently ordered the common experience of movement, change,
growth, sensation, thinking and moral conduct, in terms of a single principle
of organization: the matter-form relationship. The collapse of Aristotelian
physics resulted, nevertheless, from the contradiction which arose in the
attempt to apply its theory of motion to the flight of projectiles.
Likewise, most of the visible phenomena of movement in the heavens were
very successfully organized by the conception of spheres revolving around a
central earth, except that the aberrations of planetary motion could not be
consistently included. First Eudoxus worked out a model of spheres each
revolving on a different axis, which carried the different heavenly bodies,
each of which communicated its motion to the next. Callipus elaborated this
system, increasing the number of spheres and introducing some revolving in
opposite directions. This system was adopted by Aristotle, and later Ptolemy
modified it still further by introducing epicycles between the spheres to
account for aberrations which still defied explanation. Each successive
correction of the system to overcome the discrepancies was a new effort at
organization, each succeeded in some measure, but none completely, until the
hypothesis of Aristarchus of Sam os that the sun and not the earth be taken as
central was adopted. The heliocentric theory was delayed by fourteen cen-
turies because the Aristotelian system, with which it conflicted, was so
comprehensive and explained so many fields and departments of common
experience, that theorists could not afford to abandon it without a better
alternative. In the Middle Ages it even became the philosophical support for
Christianity so that a challenge to its authority threatened the very dogmata
of the prevailing religion. It was eventually despair of accurate calculation
of the annual occurrence of religious feasts and festivals which prompted
Copernicus to revert to the hypothesis of Aristarchus in the hope of a more
coherent theory.
This change was not prompted by the empirical discovery of new pheno-
mena, either in ancient times or in the fifteenth century, but was the
fruit of an intellectual endeavour to unify and integrate the system. As a
204 ERROL HARRIS
consequence of its adoption, in Copernicus' words, "not only do their phen-

omena [of planetary motion] presently ensue, but the orders and magnitudes
of all stars and spheres, nay the heavens themselves, become so bound together
that nothing in any part thereof could be moved from its place without pro-
ducing confusion of all the other parts of the universe as a whole'. 6 Each
theory is a whole of related and connected elements; it relates and connects
the factual elements by principles of order so that they constitute such a whole.
The common-sense view of the world is already a more or less systematic
totality, but is rather less so than more. The conflicts which become apparent
in it on reflection lead to the scientific endeavour to explain what is puzzling.
This produces more consistent and more tightly knit systems ordering the
observed facts in an intelligible way. But these systems again are partial, being
restricted in scope, and (frequently for that very reason), as their implica-
tions are developed they evince new contradictions. The efforts to resolve
these lead not only to more coherent, but also to more comprehensive and
more widely interconnected systems, uniting the lesser ones and removing
their inner conflicts. The effect of this progressive integration is the develop-
ment of an hierarchical structure in scientific theory. Thus Newton's system
united the areas of celestial and terrestrial mechanics, Maxwell's system
united optics and electro-dynamics, Einstein's combines all these in a single
system of physical geometry. The sciences, as they structure and elaborate
their own fields, tend to unite and to constitute a single system. In each case
we have a whole of related and connected elements, and knowledge advances
through a series of such wholes, each at a higher level of integration, articula-
tion and clarity - each successive system being more widely and more
penetratingly efficient as a means of explanation.
The next point we must notice is that the establishment of a new hypo-
thesis is not effected by a search for (or discovery of) a large number of
similar confirmatory observations, but is achieved by the construction of a
body of varying evidence, the diverse factors in which are interdependent and
mutually supporting. The term 'corroboration' is more applicable to such
mutual support of diverse phenomena than to the mere repetition of similar
cases. The true empirical method actually practised by scientists is that of
marshalling diverse pieces of evidence which dovetail into one another to
form a system, and it is better described as construction than as induction. It
may be carried out by a series of mathematical calculations based on empiri-
cal records, as Kepler constructed the orbit of Mars; or by a series of observa-
tions prompted by pertinent questions, like those Harvey made to work out
the function of the heart and the circulation of the blood; or by a series of
experiments directed towards proving a specific relationship of processes, as

were conducted by Lavoisier in his discovery of oxidation in combustion and
his disproof of the phlogiston theory.
In none of these examples do we find the scientist accumulating like
instances of a general rule. Kepler worked with calculated positions of the
planet none of which could strictly be observed, for nobody can directly
observe the position of a planet in space relative to the sun, and Kepler could
only work this out from angular measurements made of appearances in the
heavens. When he had done so he had to construct the orbit more or less as
one constructs a jig-saw puzzle out of displaced pieces. The various calcula-
tions did not give a collection of similar instances of a frequent conjunction
of objects or events, but a range of differences among which a pattern had to
be found. Similarly Harvey did not simply observe a number of like instances
of vascular activity. He examined the anatomy of the heart and its valves, the
position of the vessels and the valves in the veins, the action of the heart in
living creatures, the behaviour of the blood in a ligatured limb, and numerous
other diverse phenomena. He calculated the rate of flow and the quantities of
blood passing through the heart in a given time. And all the varied evidence
so gathered he welded into a structure of interlocking parts 'so bound
together than nothing ... could be moved from its place without producing
confusion in all the other parts.' Uranus had been seen twenty times before
Sir William Herschel 'discovered' the planet, yet the repetition of observation
led to no recognition of a new planet. It was only after its position had been
charted over a period and its orbit calculated that the 'discovery' became an
established fact - only, in short, when the phenomena had been fitted into
the astronomical system.
The method of science, then, is one of constructing systems. A scientific
theory is a systemization of empirical facts according to one, or a few,
principles of organization (cf. Newton's laws of motion), and it is established
by the marshalling of a system of evidence, diverse in its details, which are
interlocking and mutually corroborative. The history of scientific advance is
a progression from one such system to another, each structured by a concep-
tual scheme that orders the facts, and which, in large measure, by ordering,
constitutes them - makes them what they are. The supersession of one
system by its successor is occasioned by the discovery of conflicts within the
former, as its implications are developed and its details worked out, and by
the consequent attempts of thinkers to devise a modified conceptual scheme
that will organize the phenomena more coherently.
The special conceptual schemes may be of narrower or wider scope, but at
206 ERROL HARRIS
anyone time they fit (more or less loosely) together into one system covering
the entire world and involving definite conceptions of its elementary con-
stituents and substances as well as of the laws that govern their movements,
combinations and changes. The process of scientific advance is thus a succes-
sion of wholes or systems, like the Hegelian dialectical system, and the series
of conceptual schemes that emerge in it are related to one another as the
Hegelian forms and categories are related. Like them each is a conception of
the universe - a provisional definition of the Absolute.
The progress of scientific ideas further conforms to the dialectical pro-
gression in ways we have already listed as typical. In the first place, the
development, despite appearances in some cases, is continuous. Secondly,
the consecutive systems are specifications of a universal - each is an example
of a general type of scientific theory. And thirdly, each system comes to be
in opposition to the one it supersedes. They are thus at once degrees in a scale
of progressively more satisfactory explanations, species of a special kind or
area of explanatory theory, and opposite or rival theories of a certain range of
phenomena. The progress of science thus constitutes a scale of forms in a
manner comparable to that demonstrated by Collingwood in the case of the
history of philosophy. I shall attempt to give some illustrations of this thesis.
(i) Continuity
It is common to represent the transition from Aristotelianism to Coper-

nicanism as a volte face or revolution, and likewise the transition from
Newtonian cla&sical dynamics to Einsteinian relativity; and, as I shall present-
ly show, the changes are in a significant sense revolutionary. But the transi-
tion process is nevertheless continuous and each step leads naturally to the
next. The Copernican revolution was no sudden renversement. Not only was
the heliocentric hypothesis a revival from Aristarchus of Samos, which had
forerunners among the Pythagoreans, but the Copernican system itself was
full of Aristotelian and Ptolemaic survivals, of which it took more than a
century of successive adjustments to purge it. Copernicus followed Aristotle
in making the planetary orbits circular and Ptolemy in retaining some
epicycles to keep the resulting motions close to observation. The notion of
natural motion persisted and Galileo maintained that the Earth being spheri-
cal would naturally rotate on its axis. 7 The conception of inertia, which
became a cornerstone of Newtonian mechanics was anticipated by, and
developed from the Aristotelian notion of natural motion by way of the
conception of impetus put forward in the thirteenth century by Buridan and
his Parisian colleagues. The view that the earth rotated on its axis was
anticipated by Nicole Oresme. Even after the heliocentric hypothesis had
been advocated by Copernicus, it took much time and labour to develop
it by stages into a system that could account for all the facts with sufficient
comprehensiveness and coherence to persuade scientists to abandon the
Aristotelian and Ptolemaic system in its favour. Kepler had to work upon the
laws of planetary motion and Galileo on those of falling bodies. Descartes had
to develop the notions of vortical rotation and conceive the idea of inertia,
and Gilbert had to develop the conception of magnetic attraction, before
the genius of Newton could combine all of these discoveries into a single all-
inclusive explanatory system conceptually whole and self-consistent.
Despite superficial appearances, the Einsteinian revolution grew in like
manner from seeds planted long in advance. The introduction into physics, by
the mid-nineteenth century, of the concept of the field, was already the
beginning of revolutionary change. It shifted the focus of attention from
mass-points and forces to the space between charged particles and the time of
propagation of electro-magnetic waves. Thus space, time and velocity became
prior in importance to particles and impressed forces. Philosophers like
Berkeley and Kant had even earlier called in question the absolute character
of space and time, and later difficulties which increasingly beset the notion of
an aether stimulated new theories. Mach, whose influence Einstein acknowl-
edged, had already propounded relativistic concepts, and asserted in particular
the relativity of gravitational, corio lis and centrifugal forces, and the Principle
of Relativity itself was enunciated by Poincare prior to the exposition of the
theory by Einstein.
Similar continuity can be illustrated in the cases of other scientific revolu-
tions - Harvey's in physiology was continuous with Galen's through a series
of stages from Vesalius, who doubted the permeability of the septum,
Colombo, who discovered the lesser circulation from the heart through the
lungs, and Fabricius who first revealed the presence of the valves in the veins;
Lavoisier's in chemistry followed the work of the British pneumatic chemists
and their discoveries of 'fixed air' (C0 2 ), 'dephlogistigated air' (oxygen), and
hydrogen, identified by Cavendish with phlogiston. Darwin's revolution in
biology, likewise, was a continuous growth from the leads of his grandfather,
Erasmus Darwin, of Cuvier, Buffon, Geoffroi St. Hilaire and Lamarck, as well
as from those of von Baer and of Charles Lyell. 8 And Heisenberg's quantum
mechanics has grown from the progressive development of theories put
forward by Max Planck, Niels Bohr, the de Broglies and Schroedinger. 9 Space
does not permit a proliferation of detail here, nor does my present purpose
208 ERROL HARRIS
warrant it. What is important, however, is not just the demonstrable fact of
continuity but its nature and direction.
(ii) Graded Specification
Each successive hypothesis is an attempt to explain the same range and class
of facts, so that each is an example of the same general type of theory:
(a) one of celestial mechanics: Ptolemy's geocentric theory with circular
orbits, deferents and epicycles; Copernicus' heliocentric theory with circular
orbits and epicycles; Kepler's heliocentric theory with elliptical orbits, and
fmally Newton's gravitational celestial mechanics. (b) one of vascular
physiology: Galen's implied doctrine of oscillating blood flow with the heart
as a cooling mechanism, its main action in diastole; Vesalius'implied modifica-
tion of this in the denial of the permeability of the septum; Colombo's theory
of the lesser circulation; Fabricius' demonstration of the valvular obstruction
in the veins to the flow of blood away from the heart; and then Harvey's
coordination of all these in De motu cordis into a theory of general blood
circulation, with the heart functioning as a pump, its principal action in
systole. (c) one of combustion: Stahl's theory of phlogiston; the theory of
'fixed air' put forward by Hales and Black, Priestley's theory of 'dephlogis-
ticated air', and finally Lavoisier's demonstration, following upon Guyton
de Morveau's of augmentation, of the process of oxidation.
In each case we have progressively more adequate examples of the same
universal type of principle of explanation. Later theories explain (i.e. fit into
the coherent system) facts which in the earlier theories gave rise to conflicts
and remained intractable, and they do so with fewer discrepancies of their
own. They may, therefore, be regarded at the same time as degrees in a scale
and also as specifications of a universal concept.
(iii) Opposition and Reconciliation
But because it is from initial contradictions that the new efforts arise, the
successive theories are in mutual opposition, the later being corrections of the
earlier, which by contrast appear as errors. The newer theory embodies a new
principle of order and establishes a new conceptual structure. It is, therefore,
genuinely revolutionary. Moreover, not merely is the new synthesis in opposi-
tion to the old, it reconciles oppositions within the old. Aristotle had argued
that the heavenly bodies must move in a circle because it was the perfect
figure, but to accommodate the motions of the planets Ptolemy had to
introduce epicycles. The path of a planet turning on an epicycle which

simultaneously moves along a deferent is not, however, circular and may well
turn out to be elliptical. Here is a conflict within the conceptual scheme.
Kepler indeed found the orbits to be elliptical and Newton's laws explained
this fact coherently: but the circle itself, as a special case of the ellipse, was
not wholly rejected. Moreover, the heliocentric system still entailed, now
without contradiction, the apparent circular motion of the heavens, for this
is the result of the earth's rotation on its axis - in short, a genuinely circular
motion.
This is but one of innumerable possible examples of the way in which
supervening theories, though in opposition to their predecessors, nevertheless
preserve within themselves the elements of truth that their predecessors
contained. In Hegelian terms, the earlier theory is aufgehoben, both annulled
and at the same time preserved and sublated. In this way, the Aristotelian
conceptions of natural and violent motion reappear in the Newtonian system
in the guise of inertial and accelerated motion despite the obvious opposition
between the two sets of concepts. Aristotle's natural motion was purposive,
whereas inertial motion is purely mechanical, but the intervening concept of
impetus is a kind of natural motion imposed by impulse. Though it was
originally conceived as short-lived, it was also easily conceivable as persistent
so long as not opposed by countervailing forces. Buridan suggested that God
might have set the heavens in motion with a primordial shove, and that they
could then have continued to revolve indefmitely by their own impetus.
From such an hypothesis it is but a short step to the concept of uniform
inertial motion in a straight line as Galileo's reasoning reveals. Aristotle's
accompanying idea of violent motion is then seen as accelerated, and the
opposition is resolved in the notion of a body moving under the influence of
impressed forces.
The Ptolemaic system was geocentric, the Copernican in contrast was
heliocentric, but for Einstein the choice between the two becomes no more
than one between alternative co-ordinate systems and the opposition is
reconciled. The classical (Newtonian) conception of the physical world was
particulate; Maxwellian electrodynamics, in contrast, concentrates on fields
and wave-motion. In contemporary physics the wave and the particle are
complementary concepts and are combined in the notion of the wave-packet.
Looking to another branch of science, Lamarck believed in the inheritance of
acquired characteristics; Darwin, Mendel and their modern successors, in
chance mutation and natural selection. Contemporary geneticists like
Waddington give an organismic account of the genome and of genetic activity
210 ERROL HARRIS
which preserves the Mendelian theory modified in the direction of Lamarck. 1 0

Also, Jacques Monod, who insists on the Darwinian account of evolution as
natural selection of chance variations, nevertheless maintains that a free
choice of the animal in pursuing a certain line of habitual behaviour may
determine the direction of selective pressures and so orient the course of
evolution towards the development of characteristics increasing the efficiency
of the chosen behaviour .11 This is Lamarckism in modern form - admission
of direction of evolution by acquired habit.
The history of science thus presents us with a progress which is genuinely
continuous, but in which successive main theories relate to each other as
opposed and revolutionary, yet at the same time the later sublates (aufhebt)
the earlier by preserving and transforming significant elements in it. The next
succeeding revolution tends to unite these sublated elements so as to resolve
the opposition that was most strident in the earlier theories. Consequently,
we have an Hegelian triad, but this structure need not be, and should not be
regarded as, rigid; for the actual candidates for the places of thesis, antithesis
and synthesis may well be varied. Newton synthesizes Aristotle and Buridan,
Einstein synthesizes Ptolemaic Aristotelianism and Newtonianism. It is not
the triadic relation that is fundamental but the successive negation of
negation involved in the generation of oppositions (through inadequacy) and
their resolution in more coherent systems. The triad is the natural result, but
it is incidental. 12
The progress of science, therefore, generates a scale of forms, each being a
theory of some field of experience whose function is to organize the relevant
phenomena into a self-consistent system. In the first instance the principle
(or principles) or organization are enunciated more or less in the abstract, or
in a general form which requires articulation and development. This it
receives in the course of application, in the attempt to iron out minor
difficulties, during the period that Thomas Kuhn calls 'normal science', or the
period of 'puzzle-solving'. Some of these difficulties can be removed with
relative ease and without serious modification of the syst,em. But others are
more stubborn and if they are overcome it is usually at the cost of consider-
able revision. Frequently this sort of change reveals a crack in the fabric of
the theory, which, in the course of time, brings to light intolerable contradic-
tions. It is at this point that scientists cast around for new hypotheses. They
are usually variations of the old ones suggested by the discrepant facts 13 (as
Kepler's ovoid orbit was a variation on the circle produced by means of an
epicycle turning in the opposite direction and prompted by the discrepancy
of 8 minutes of arc), and they succeed when they bring to light a new pattern
in which the formerly recalcitrant phenomena fmd harmonious place. This

new pattern is the next in the scale of forms, related to its predecessor, first
as an alternative theory, secondly as a more adequate explanation of the facts
and so a higher degree of truth, and thirdly as a correction of errors (hence a
theory opposed to the faulty one), yet a correction that does not totally
reject what was earlier accepted, but preserves, modified and improved, the
elements of truth contained in the prior view.
A scale of this kind is dialectical and the logic that impels it from one stage
to the next is a dialectical logic - a logic of construction and of development
appropriate to a continuous movement of evolution. It is that principle of
absolute restlessness of which Hegel speaks, inherent in rational self-reflection
and critical thought. In short, it is the prinCiple of that systematic self-
development which is science, "the true form in which the truth exists"
(Phan [G], preface, p. 27) - though we must remember that, for Hegel,
empirical science is but a part of the total system, an essential part, no doubt,
but one that leads on through the same perpetual drive of self-reflection to
the philosophical sciences of logic, philosophy of nature and philosophy of
mind. The last-named presents natural science as a stage, which it undoubted-
ly is, of the development of consciousness - a phase of our awareness of the
world, in which we view it as an external object to be observed and described
in terms of coherent categories of rational understanding.
IV
Hegel's own account of the scientific process in the Phiinomen%gie shows

observant reason as reflecting upon the common-sense view of the world
(gesunde Menschenverstand), progressing from indiscriminate observation and
minute description to classification, thence to the notions of cause and law,
and so to ideas of unobservable imponderables that are the precise opposite
of the material objects with which the investigation began. The opposition is
resolved in the conception of organism specified in the processes of living
functions, which are teleological. Mechanism and teleology are then further
sublimated in mental functioning, and empirical science, which began with
physics and mechanics, ends with formal logic/ 4 empirical psychology,
physiognomy and phrenology.
Much of this analysis is still applicable to, and true of, science in general,
even as we view it today. But Hegel's account is naturally limited to the
evidence that the science of his own day provided, much of which is outdated
and obsolete. Hegel, however, was treating scientific ideas as typical of
212 ERROL HARRIS
specific forms in the development of consciousness and not the actual history
of scientific discovery. He comes nearer to doing this in the Naturphilosophie,
but there he is more concerned with the conception of nature as such; and, of
course, the only reliable source of that is empirical science, viewed now from
the philosophical viewpoint, after reflection upon both the forms of con-
sciousness and the categories of experience (in the Logic).
What I have tried to do in this paper is to show that the methods of dis-
covery, confirmation and advance in the empirical sciences, both of his day
and of our own, are dialectical in the Hegelian manner, rather than cumula-
tive of empirically derived factual information coupled with merely formal
deduction. Philosophy of science, if it is to give a faithful account of its
subject matter as the scientific disciplines are actually pursued and conducted
by practising scientists, must, it seems to me, return to Hegelian notions of
logic and abandon the narrow empiricism to which it has hitherto been
addicted.
NOTES
1 Kritik der rein en Vernunft, A 97.

2 Cf. my discussion in Hypothesis and Perception (London, Allen & Unwin, 1970),
Chs. II and IV.
3 Cf. ibid. pp. 32-42.
4 Cf. Sir Frederic Bartlett, Remembering (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press,
1961), Ch. II; Floyd Allport, Theories of Perception and the Concept of Structure
(London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1955) passim; Merleau-Ponty, The Phenomenology
of Perception (London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1962) and The Primacy of Percep-
tion (Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1964); Brand Blanshard, The Nature of
Thought (London, Allen and Unwin, 1939), Bk. l.
5 Cf. Harris, Hypothesis and Perception, Ch. VII.
6 De revolutionibus orbium coelestium, Prefatory letter to Pope Paul III.
7 Vide: Dialogues Concerning the Two Chief World Systems (Berkeley, University of
California Press, 1953), p. 134. Cf. also pp. 31 ff.
8 Cf. Harris, Hypothesis and Perception, pp. 220- 223.
9 Cf. Louis de Broglie, The Revolution in Physics (London, Routledge and Kegan Paul,
1954).
10 Cf. C. H. Waddington, The Strategy of the Genes (London, Allen and Unwin,
1957), Ch. V, and The Nature of Life (London, Allen and Unwin, 1961), pp. 96-
97.
11 Cf. Le hasard et la necessite (Paris, Seuil, 1972), pp. 141-142.
12 Hegel does not himself make this point, but it is no less true of his triads. For in-
stance, the opposition of Being and Essence is reconciled in the Notion, yet that, as
concrete, is opposed to either of the other two as abstract, and abstract and concrete are
united and reconciled in the Absolute Idea. Again, Organism synthesizes Mechanism with
Chemism, but the organic is opposed to the inorganic and finds synthesis with it in the
psycho-physical.
13 It must, however, be borne in mind that there are no 'facts' independent of, or
neutral with respect to theory.
14 For Hegel 'the natural history' of thinking.
ERNAN McMULLIN
IS THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE DIALECTICAL?
The claim that science advances according to a dialectical logic is not an

unfamiliar one. It has always been a staple of Marxism-Leninism. And now
that the empiricist account of scientific change in terms of the gradual
accretion of law-like generalizations of ever wider scope has been discredited,
Marxist philosophers are wont to say, somewhat smugly, that their dialectical
principles prevented them from falling into the logical empiricist trap in the
first place. Long before Kuhn and Toulmin came along with their talk of
revolution and evolution, Marxists knew that change in science is dialectical.
They did not need the critiques of empiricist theories of meaning, the appeals
to the history of science, the analyses of theory-replacement, that now
propelled others to new accounts of scientific change. Dialectical materialism
had assured them, on antecedent grounds, that all development, whether of
matter or of knowledge, must be dialectical in character. The dialectical
model, in consequence, could resolve the deep differences that separate
Kuhn, Lakatos, Popper, et al. So the story goes, at least.
The trouble here is with the notoriously vague term 'dialectical', and with
the methodological structure of the argument for the dialectical thesis. We are
fortunate, then, to have a detailed essay from Errol Harris in which this thesis
is presented and defended.! Fortunate too that Harris takes Hegel rather than
Marx for his inspiration, since Hegel is the source of the thesis and Marx has
very little to say about it?
Harris concludes his paper in these words:
... the methods of discovery, confirmation and advance in the empirical sciences, both
of [Hegel's] day and of our own, are dialectical in the Hegelian manner, rather than
cumulative of empirically derived factual information coupled with merely formal
deduction. Philosophy of science ... must ... return to Hegelian notions of logic and
anbandon the narrow empiricism to which it has hitherto been addicted (p. 212).
In point of fact, Harris has little to say about the questions of discovery and
of confirmation. And indeed there is very little in Hegel's work that would be
of help in addreSSing the quite specific issues that philosophers of science
have been debating in recent years in these two areas. It is not clear what a
'dialectical' mode of confirmation would be like, much less a 'dialectical'
method of discovery.3 Harris concentrates his attention, instead, on the more
215
R. S. Cohen and M. W. Wartofsky (eds.), Hegeland the Sciences, 215 -239.
216 ERNAN McMULLIN
tractable question of scientific change. Progress in science, he says, consti-

tutes a "scale of forms" (p. 206), a "succession of wholes or systems like the
Hegelian dialectical system". The successive theories in a given scientific
domain are "related to one another as the Hegelian forms and categories are
related" (ibid.). This is the claim I want to investigate in this paper.
But first, one preliminary. Harris writes as though logical empiricism were
still in possession of the field. He several times describes it as the 'current'
view. He has little difficulty in locating the shortcomings of some of its
characteristic doctrines, such as its dichotomy between theoretical and
observational statements, for example. 4 But it is not the current view; its
inadequacies were pointed out long ago. And this was done, it should be said,
not by defenders of dialectical logic, whether Hegelian or Marxist-Leninist,
but by philosophers of language like Quine and Wittgenstein, by philosophers
of science from within the empiricist tradition like Popper and Feyerabend,
and by historically-minded critics like Kuhn and Toulmin.
A Hegelian looking at the demise of logical empiricism in the 1960's would
be likely to say that it generated its own contradictions. But if there has been
a dialectic at work here, its outcome can scarcely be described as itself a
'dialectical' philosophy of science, as Harris takes it to be. The 'sublating' of
logical empiricism has not left a single orthodoxy, whether dialectical or
other, in possession. It has left us with choices to make between Kuhn and
Popper, between Lakatos and Toulmin, between Feyerabend and everybody.
And these choices have quite far-reaching consequences, for epistemology, for
example. It seems doubtful that all the above-named would accept the generic
title, 'dialectical', for their philosophies of science. And if they would, the
term would have to be extended to near-vacuity to accommodate such radical
differences about the manner and Significance of scientific advance. But
perhaps Harris would say that dialectical logic constitutes an alternative to
all these other views, and one which is preferable to them as an overall
philosophy of sciences? If this is his position, we shall require a fairly detailed
specification of what constitutes a change as a 'dialectical' one, distinguishing
it, for example, from the sorts of evolutionary and revolutionary changes
proposed by Toulmin and Kuhn respectively. And we shall need some con-
vincing arguments for preferring the 'dialectical' account to those given by
other contemporary non-Hegelian, non-positivist philosophers of science.
Let us begin with those aspects of the Hegelian dialectic that would seem
most relevant to recent developments in philosophy of science. Hegel
emphasized the historical and the systemic character of knowledge and
reality. True, his claims in these regards cannot be separated from the
IS PROGRESS OF SCIENCE DIALECTICAL? 217
uncompromisingly idealist metaphysics in which they were embedded, a

metaphysics which would fmd little support today. But the directions he
took in reacting to a dominant empiricism may prove to have some analogies
with the directions taken by the critics of logical empiricism in recent
decades.
l. SCIENCE AS HISTORICAL
There is a trivial sense in which science, like any other human product, is
historical. It appears in history; it is constructed by historical individuals in
ways that are contingent. Furthermore, it does not remain the same. It
advances, accumulates, progresses, changes, whatever one's favorite verb here
may be. No one has ever denied these claims. Eighteenth-century science
contai!led elements both of earlier deductivist views (which would make
scientific change something like the derivation of new theorems or the dis-
covery of new intuitively necessary axioms) and of inductivism (making
scientific change primarily an addition of new empirical generalizations or an
extension of older ones). In either case, science would proceed in a cumula-
tive manner. Earlier states would be conserved in the later ones. The addition
of new elements (laws or theories) would leave the 'established' earlier ones
untouched.
Hegel's views on how thought and reality develop suggests a much more
radical account of scientific change, one which may be called 'historicist' or
'transformationist'. At the level of what he calls 'understanding', precise and
determinate concepts are developed in order to grasp the structures of
experience. But these are inevitably inadequate; in the overcoming of the
ensuing tensions, revisions of the conceptual system are made. 5 The system is
never defmitive then; no part of it is immune from challenge. Its warrant lies
in its overall coherence, not in the priority of some foundational statements,
whether axiomatic or observational. Its 'scientific' character lies neither in the
intuitive necessity of its principles nor in its empirical basis but in the degree
to which it has attained the status of reason. "The goal is this, that Spirit
came to consciousness of itself or made the world congruent to itself - for
these come to the same thing". 6
In the empiricist climate of eighteenth-century science, it had been
assumed that the concepts corresponding to the primary properties of matter
(length, mass, and so on) were anchored safely in pre-scientific experience
and were thus unproblematic. Since these were the concepts on which
Newtonian mechanics was built, this system seemed to be immune from basic
218 ERNAN McMULLIN
conceptual reVISIOn. It could be added to, of course, and could fmd new
applications in areas like chemistry. But its grasp of the fundamentals of
motion appeared to be completely adequate. A dialectical account of knowl-
edge, on the other hand, would presumably imply that an irrevisable science
of mechanics is not attainable, that contradictions are bound to be generated
at all stages. Thus, Hegel can readily be made to appear the forerunner of the
sort of historicism that has become the accepted view in recent philosophy of
science.
Unfortunately the matter is not so simple. Nowhere in his writings (to the
best of my knowledge) does Hegel explicitly treat the sciences of nature as a
continuously evolving conceptual system. Nowhere does he attack the
empiricist assumption that the basic observational concepts of length and
time are already definitely grasped. Though the implications of his dialectical
logic for the system of the natural sciences are clear to us, he did not (so far
as I can see) think of them himself in the transformationist terms we might
be tempted to attribute to him. Society, yes; organisms, yes; the life of mind,
yes. But the science of nature: no.
It is important to see why this was so. For Hegel was not at all a historicist
in the modern style. The function of dialectic was to reveal the necessary
connections between elements. And once these came to light, no further
contradiction could occur. It is instructive to recall what he has to say about
Newton's laws of motion. They:
are immortal discoveries which redound to the greatest honour of the analysis of the
Understanding. The next step concerns their proof independently of empirical methods;
and this proof has also been furnished by mathematical mechanics, so that even a science
based on empirically ascertained facts is not satisfied with the merely empirical pointing
out (demonstration). The a priori proof in question rests on the presupposition that the
velocity of a falling body is uniformly accelerated; the proof, however, consists in the
conversion of the moments of the mathematical formula into physical forces, into an
accelerating force . . . and a force of inertia ... determinations utterly devoid of
empirical sanction and equally inconsistent with the NotionfPN, p. 57).
So Hegel rejects what he takes to be the a priori proof of Calileo's law given
by 'mathematical mechanics', and goes on to propose his own proof:
The law of descent of a falling body is afree law of Nature, i.e. it involves an element
which is determined by the Notion of body. Since it follows that the law must be
deducible from this Notion, what has to be done is to show the way in which Galileo's
law . . . coheres with the determination of this Notion. This connection lies simply in
this, that because it is the Notion that now determines motion, so time and space (as
determinations of the Notion) become free in regard to each other; that is to say, their
quantitative relationships conform to their notional determinations. Now seeing that
time is the moment of negation, of being-for-self, the principle of the One, its magnitude
... in relation to space is to be taken as the unit or denominator. Space on the contrary
is asunderness, and its magnitude is no other than that of time ... (PN, pp. 58-59).
The proof continues in this vein and concludes: "This is the proof of the law
of descent of a falling body as derived from the Notion of the Thing." A few
pages later he goes on to give equally conceptualist proofs of Kepler's three
laws, proofs which display his dialectical ingenuity at its furthest extension.
Newton's formulation of mechanics he disregards, since despite its admitted
mathematical convenience, it is without physical meaning, being "steeped in
an unspeakable metaphysics" that runs "contrary to the Notion" (PN, p. 67).
Is Hegel's mechanics an a priori one? Not in the Kantian sense, certainly. It
requires experience; it does not dispense with the work of the experimentalist.
Hegel is not saying that Kepler's laws might have been obtained in advance by
a philosopher reflecting on the Notion of the Thing. Rather he is saying that
once they have been obtained empirically, the philosopher must set out to
show their logical necessi ty (taking 'logical' here in the dialectical sense):
The philosophy of nature takes up the material which physics has prepared for it
empirically, at the point to which physics has brought it, and reconstitutes it so that
experience is not its final warrant and base. Physics must therefore work into the hands
of philosophy, in order that the latter may translate into the Notion the abstract
universal transmitted to it, by showing how this universal, as an intrinsically necessary
whole, proceeds from the Notion (PN, p. 10).
Hegel's "absolute mechanics" (as he calls it) is thus a posteriori in the

sense that empirical discovery of its laws must come first. But it is not a
posteriori in the sense that its laws appear as the 'working out' of the Notion
in a necessary way. But it is not analytic in the stricter sense, since the
'working out' is not just a matter of deductive exploration of the implications
of a definition. The connectives are dialectical, not deductive; the philosopher
reconstructs the sequence needed to show a series of dialectical relations
leading from the Notion to the desired terminus. To the non-Hegelian, it
might seem that the constructive imagination plays an important role in
demonstrations of this kind, and that the adjective 'dialectical' severely
qualifies the term 'necessary' in describing the status of the outcome.
Be that as it may, the important thing for us here is to note that Hegel,
despite his emphasis on the historical character of reality and knowledge,
maintains that philosophy of nature has already arrived at scientific truths
possessing the character of 'intrinsic necessity.' Since nature is posited by the
Notion, it displays an inner necessity which can, in principle, be fully grasped
220 ERNAN McMULLIN
by a progressive and careful application of reason to the Notion. When it is

thus grasped, is the resultant piece of necessary knowledge unchanging?
Contemporary discussions of modality have revealed senses of 'necessary'
which would make it possible for 'necessary' truths to cease being necessary
(or truths). And Hegel's notion of sublation might suggest something like a
constant transformation at the conceptual level. 7 But it seems more correct
to interpret what he has to say about the 'intrinsic necessity' of the proposi-
tions of philosophy of nature as implying necessity in the traditional strong
sense. Even if at a later time the philosopher constructs a more comprehen-
sive dialectical sequence with which to show the truth of such. a proposition,
the necessity attributed to the earlier sequence would be such as to exclude
the possibility that the original proposition might have to be modified.
Far from being historicist in the sense in which Kuhn or Toulmin are,
Hegel is still working with something like the classical Aristotelian under-
standing of science (Le. philosophy of nature) as demonstration leading to
necessary and unchanging truth. It is true that for him history, dialectical
development, plays a positive role in science that Aristotle did not envisage.
But his historicism is balanced by his assertion of the inner necessity of the
Notion, of which Nature is the externalization. On this necessity the entire
functioning of his dialectical logic depends. And it leads him to hold that the
philosophy of nature is moving towards the status of necessary truth, and
that at some quite basic levels this status has already been attained. Insofar as
there are barriers to its further attainment, they derive not so much from the
contradictions that history still has in store, as from what he calls the
"impotence of Nature", the fact that it preserves the determinations of the
Notion only abstractly. This "sets limits to philosophy", as he puts it. One
cannot expect the Notion to comprehend the infinite variety of forms which
are the "contingent products of Nature" (PN, p. 23). A proper science of such
products is thus not just difficult or slow in the making; it is impossible (PN,
p. 24). This is closer to the Kantian distinction between a 'pure' (a priori)
science and such empirical quasi-sciences as chemistry, than it is to the his-
torical continuum characteristic of recent discussion.
2. SCIENCE AS SYSTEMIC
One theme that appears again and again in Hegel's writings (Harris reminds
us) is that of the interconnectedness which is constitutive of system. An
element of the system is specified by its relations with the other elements.
Thus there cannot be simple concepts since to conceptualize is to interrelate.
A concept is necessarily bound with other concepts. s In the early empiricist

tradition, it had been supposed that the basic terms of natural science could
be given their significance by linking them directly to sense-contents. These
observational terms were thus unproblematic and independent of one another,
even though they could of course be interrelated in a meaningful way in
scientific laws.
Newton's Principia had already implicitly called this sort of empiricism
into question, although the challenge had not, in fact, been clearly perceived.
The opening Definitions of that work (mass as "quantity of matter" and
momentum as "quantity of motion") strongly suggested that the new
mechanics was still dealing with familiar empirical notions, rooted in our
everyday experience. But this was, in fact, not the case. Not only was there a
sharpening of these notions which carried them quite far from their original
meanings, but this sharpening was done by interlocking them in an intricate
way with the notion of force by means of the three 'Laws'. The warrant for
the new meanings of force or mass was not a direct appeal to some simple
experiences of effort or of stuff. Rather, it was the explanatory success of the
system taken as a whole. To the many who found his notion of force un-
satisfactory, Newton could only point to its crucial role in a system whose
predictive success was admittedly impressive. This answer was unsatisfactory
to a phenomenalist like Berkeley, who insisted on the empiricist requirements
for meaning. But what Berkeley and Hume did not see was that even the
more innocuous Newtonian terms 'mass' and 'motion', and even 'length' and
'time', had also been shifted; they could now be understood only as elements
in a tightly-connected postulational system, the warrant for which had to be
found in the success of the system taken as a whole. 9
Hegel never explicitly makes this point in regard to mechanics. He assails
Newton's concept of force as illegitimate, as we have seen. But he does not
underline the dependence in meaning of each term on the other, and the
consequent shift in meaning that will occur across the system if one element
be changed. Nonetheless, it can be said that this was a consequence of his
treatment of concepts as integral elements in a system, rather than as linked
one-to-one to sense-contents. Further, his emphasis on Reason tends to orient
science to explanation rather than to mere empirical generalization. Thus
there is a shift (in our terms) away from the empiricist concem with law to
a more far-reaching and holistic concern with theory. Since the systemic
character of concepts is much more evident in theory than in law, this is a
further important modification in what we would now take to be the 'right'
direction. 1 0
222 ERNAN McMULLIN
But once again, one has to be careful not to make Hegel too modern in
this regard. Balancing his stress on coherence and integration of disparate
empirical elements is his hostility to explicitly hypothetical reasoning utiliz-
ing atoms, waves, ether, light-rays, or the like. He argues, for example, that
water must not be thought to consist of oxygen and hydrogen; rather these
latter are only "different forms assumed by water". The "greatest contradic-
tion thus appears", he goes on, "when through the abstract thought of
identity, the thing is still held to exist". He rejects the trust in the sciences of
his day to explain the behaviour of a complex entity in terms of the presence
within it of specified real constituents. Further:
It is a similar conception which looks on heat, water of crystallization etc., as reduced to
latency. Heat, for example, is no longer seen, felt, and so forth; yet it is said to be still
there, though not perceptible. But what is not subject to observation does not exist in
this sphere; for to exist is precisely to be for another, to make oneself perc!lptible; and
this sphere is precisely the sphere of existence (PN, § 286, Z, pp. 117-118).11
Hegel goes further than did later positivists in that he opposed the use of
theories employing such elements even as heuristic devices. They are fictions
of the Understanding and cannot but mislead. His preference for phenomeno-
logical or descriptive theories 12 thus leads him to reject Dalton's atomic
hypothesis, notions of latent heat, Newton's theory of color, and so on. He
can see no possibility of Reason's discovering necessity in such postulations,
hence they cannot be regarded as the roots of exteriorization the Notion
could create in its constitution of Nature. Nor do they have a direct empirical
warrant.
Despite the acuteness of his perception of the systemic character of the
sciences, then, Hegel was blocked from an appreciation of the ampliative
power this character bestow.ed on theoretical reasoning. The warrant for the
existence of such entities as atoms, as we know, lies not in the necessity of
the conceptual connections nor in observation directly, but mainly in the
fertility over an extended history of the conceptual system employing
them. 13 The systemic character of science enables it to extend ontology
indefinitely. And this is done, not in terms of constructions that can be made
to take on some sort of necessity after the fact, nor in terms of static
determinations inevitably doomed to be rejected, but by means of tentative
models whose metaphoric power enables them to grow. The organic image
here is one that Hegel could appreciate. But the science of his day still gave
little evidence of the ontological power of retroduction that is so plain in the
structural sciences of the past century. And his idealist standpoint had too
much in it both of phenomenalism and of rationalism to allow him to see just

how great the resources of hypothetical systemic thought could be.
In these two sections, I have argued that Hegel's emphasis on history and
on system suggested some needed correctives for the philosophy of science of
his day, but that his insights cannot be neatly transposed into the context of
contemporary discussions because of the shape given them by the 'necessi-
tarian' character of the Dialectic. It may be worth adding that these insights
of his had remarkably little impact on later nineteenth-century philosophy of
science, in part perhaps because of the difficulties noted above, but for a
whole host of other reasons as well. 14 When tracing the origins of the his-
toricist and systemic theses in contemporary philosophy of science, it would
be easy to overestimate the actual historical influence of Hegel in their regard.
3. THE DIALECTICAL CHARACTER OF SCIENTIFIC ADVANCE
To say that science is a historically-developed conceptual system is not yet to

say that its advance is specifically dialectical. Now we come to the main point
of this paper, which is to investigate Harris's claim that science advances
dialectically, according to the prescriptions of Hegelian logic. The weakest
version of the 'dialectic' thesis would be that science advances by conceptual
transformation and systemic revision, rather than by straightforward accumu-
lation, as the original empiricist account suggested. If science consists of
empirical generalizations of ever wider scope, the earlier generalizations are
directly incorporated in the later ones and science is descriptive rather than
explanatory in any stronger sense. This view still prevailed in Hegel's time (in
part because the paradigm of science was assumed to be mechanics); one sees
it in Comte, Ampere, Herschel, and Mill.
As we have seen, Hegel's logic directly opposed this sort of inductivism,
although it was Kant's critique of it (especially as furthered by Whewell) that
proved the more effective. Insofar, then, as the 'dialectic' thesis amounts to
a rejection of the view of scientific change as accumulation, it would be
accepted by Kantians and by most theorists of science of our own century,
including the logical positivists, who were well aware of the importance of
theoretical terms and of the fact that they are often modified, even drastical-
ly modified, in the course of time. This is clearly too broad a notion of
'dialectic' to be of much service, so we must see whether a more specifically
Hegelian theme can be isolated.
Harris suggests three criteria of a properly Hegelian notion of dialectic in
this context. Scientific change is continuous; the consecutive systems are
224 ERNAN McMULLIN
specifications of a universal; each system comes to be in opposition to the

one it supersedes (p. 206). It is the third of these on which I intend to focus,
but a word about the other two first.
Continuity: On the face of it, it seems simply false to claim that the develop-
ment of science is continuous. Instances of discontinuity are everywhere: the
Wegener continental drift hypothesis, which, in its plate-tectonic form, has
revolutionized geology in the past decade; the Planck-Einstein quantum
hypothesis; Lavoisier's oxygen hypothesis - the list could be extended
indefinitely. What, then, can Harris mean? He maintains that "despite the
appearances in some cases", scientific change is continuous. But then he goes
on to say that many of the major changes in science "are in a significant sense
revolutionary" (p. 206). So that his criterion (which at first might seem to
lean to Toulmin, say, and away from Kuhn) begins to seem rather elastic.
'Continuous' for him appears to mean (1) that there are hints in advance of
even the most novel-seeming hypotheses, and (2) that "each step leads
naturally to the next" (ibid.). I would want to argue that neither of these
alleged requirements can, in fact, be maintained, in anything other than the
vaguest senses of the key terms.
It would be agreed by all that scientific discoveries do not occur in a
vacuum, that even the most creative thinker makes use of ideas of which he
was not the discoverer. He may modify them or juxtapose them in new ways,
but no system is entirely new, if by that is meant that it makes no use of
elements previously available. Is But surely this is trivial, and is not enough to
constitute continuity in any meaningful sense. There was no hint in advance
of the Planck quantum hypothesis; it did not develop out of some 'more-or-
less' quantum views held before-hand. To describe Aristarchus' heliocentric
hypothesis as an antecedent of Copernicus' is perfectly correct. But to
generalize from this that 'hints' of this explicit sort must always be available
is to misunderstand the creativity of the scientist. Of course, there are
anticipations of Galilean mechanics in earlier thought. But it is risky to say
that Galileo used a 'modified' conception of Buridan's notion of impetus in
his account of falling motion, one that 'merged' into the concept of inertia
(p. 201).16 This is to diminish unduly the basic shifts that occurred in early
mechanics, though there were undoubtedly analogies at work of the sort
Harris suggests. Likewise, to say that "the Einsteinian revolution grew ... from
seeds planted long in advance" (p. 207) is in one sense trivially true, but it is
nonetheless a dangerous formulation if this is taken to imply that there was
nothing in the Einsteinian formulation that did not have a specific antecedent
in earlier thinkers. Even more dangerous, if this be proposed as a generaliza-

tion covering all discovery.
The notion that each step in science leads 'naturally' to the next is equally
open to question. It becomes either trivial or false, depending on the sense
given the term, 'naturally'. There is a sense in which each stage sets the
problems for the next and suggests parameters for the kinds of solutions that
are likely to be effective. Once again the scientist requires a very considerable
continuity of language and method, even for the most creative leap ahead.
There is no disagreement about this (although the extent and nature of the
continuity has been vigorously debated of late, Feyerabend in particular
limiting it quite sharply). But it would be wrong to suppose that there is some
sort of 'natural' path from stage to stage, a 'logic of discovery', as it has been
called, that would allow one to say, after the fact, that, for example, the
situation in spectroscopy in the early 1900's led 'naturally' to the Bohr
hypothesis.
What Hegel himself had in mind might rather better be described as a
progression in which each stage contains the earlier ones implicitly; they are
'subIa ted' and their truth is manifested in the manner of their retention. This
is reminiscent of the logical empiricist thesis that each successive theory must
be able to explain all that the earlier one it replaced did, plus something
more. But for Hegel, the 'sublation' supposes a transformation that is in-
compatible with the simple retention the empiricists had in mind. And Kuhn
and Feyerabend have challenged the empiricist continuity thesis, pointing out
that not infrequently there is a loss of explanatory power, something which
the earlier theory did handle but the later one cannot. 1 7
The trouble with the 'sublation' notion lies in the vagueness of the phrase,
'contains implicitly'. It can be trivialized as: "there must have been some
hints in earlier thought", so indefinite as to be incapable of test. Or it can be
put in terms of empirical predictive power, in which case it runs into the
'Kuhn-loss' objection. Or it can be made to correspond with a substantial
retention of theoretical entities, of the sort that most construals of scientific
realism seem to demand. But this encounters the familiar objection of the
phlogiston/caloric sort. And more seriously, it is incompatible with the
Hegelian refusal to allow ontolOgical significance to such entities. In short,
until the 'sublation' idea is spelled out in quite specific terms, it is difficult to
know what it would amount to in the context of scientific change, as we
know it.
Specifying a universal: The effect of the dialectic is to make a universal

226 ERNAN McMULLIN
become progressively more specific. Harris puts this as follows: "Each succes-
sive hypothesis is an attempt to explain the same range and class of facts, so
that each is an example of the same general type of theory" (p. 208). The
familiar charge: 'vacuous or false' can once again be made. To say that the
progression of theories belongs to the same general 'concept', e.g. mechanics,
is analytically true, since if it counts as a 'successor' of T 1 , T2 would auto-
matically be described by the same very general category; it presumably
explains most (at least) of the facts that Tl explained. But in an important
sense, the supposed requirement cannot be admitted. Very often T2 will
unite classes of 'facts' hitherto seen as disparate; 'interfield' theories (as these
have been called) are of enormous importance in the history of science, and
the manner of their 'linking' to form a new type of theory is significant in
any general account of scientific advance. IS If 'specifying a universal' be
taken to be a gradual process of focussing on a domain whose boundaries are
more or less set from the beginning, then it is an inadmissible requirement.
Yet Harris can scarcely have intended the 'specification' of a universal to
be taken as restrictively as this. He elsewhere counts it a merit of the Hegelian
scheme that it suggests a "progressive integration" in which previously un-
related areas (like optics and electrodynamics, for example) would be brought
together in a single scheme, thus organizing wider and wider sets of observa-
tions (p. 204). It is hard to reconcile this with his statement of the 'specifica-
tion' principle as requiring successive theories each to apply to the "same
domain of facts"; the progression would then (as he says) be one of 'coher-
ence' in the laws by which the domain is organized (p. 201).
Hegel himself has relatively little to say on this topic. But he certainly
does envisage some Rind of progressive integration. He criticizes Berzelius's
unification of the disparate domains of electricity and chemistry, not because
such unifications are misguided in principle, but only because Berzelius's
'electro-chemistry' has (in his view) outrun the facts. He shows himself here,
as elsewhere, fairly knowledgeable about the empirical details of galvanic
electricity and chemical action as they were known in his day. And he
admonishes the chemists not to overlook the distinctions between the
electrical and chemical aspects of the galvanic process:
Perhaps this higher demand, addressed to the instinct of Reason, to grasp the course of
the galvanic and the electrical process as such, conceived as a total of natural activity, is
responsible in part for the fact that the lesser demand, viz., simply to take notice of
empirically demonstrated facts, has up till now met with scant compliance (PN, § 330,
p. 246, see also § 313).
But could the unification of the chemical and electrical aspects of
nature be brought about under a single universal, a universal that had been
inchoately present from the beginning of the scientific inquiry? Hegel's
system oversimplifies the resources for conceptual innovation that science
possesses. The unification in this case occurs through the postulation of
underlying structures which are characterized by means of newly-developed
complex concepts. These are validated retroductively not primarily by the
internal properties of coherence' and simplicity of the resultant system but
rather by the success of the system in prediction and more especially in the
guidance of research into new areas. The process here simply cannot be
characterized as the specification of a single universal, dimly grasped from the
beginning.
Progress through contradictions: The most characteristically Hegelian feature

of a dialectical movement is that it progresses by generating contradictions
whose resolution carries the movement onward stage by stage. In the Logic,
Hegel tries to show that contradiction belongs to the very nature of our most
basic categories. The positing even of such a category as being already in-
volves one in an incoherence that forces one to a further level (determinate
being in this case), and that in turn to a further (infinity). The new concept
resolves an internal contradiction in the original category; one is forced to it
by an attentive consideration of that category. It is not a question of empiri-
cal conflict with the facts. Rather, it flows from the internal logic of the
concepts themselves, and thus determines the ontology, which for Hegel is
the embodiment of Spirit rather than something over against it.
A second sort of dialectic is found in the historical development of
society, which also is powered by internal contradictions. The historical
civilizations are successive realizations of Spirit, each stage being a fuller
expression of reason than the previous one. At each level, a people labors to
develop a particular social and political form. In doing so, they expose its
internal contradictions, and thus prepare the way for its demise and the
origination of a new form which will incorporate that which is worth retain-
ing of the earlier one. It is the "cunning of reason" that the Idea should thus
make men, all unknowingly, work for its progressively fuller embodiment.
But the philosopher, looking back at the sweep of history, can see the
internal logic that carried it in the pattern of concept, contradiction, and
resolution from one stage to the next.
Hegel does not, however, make explicit use of this pattern to illuminate
the history of natural science. Was this simply for want of time or oppor-
tunity? Or because the historical development of the sciences had not
228 ERNAN McMULLIN
progressed very far by his day? The reasons, to my mind, go deeper than this.
They derive, I would suggest, from two fundamental optimisms in the Hegel-
ian program, both of them based on pervasive ambiguities in his thought.
One is the assumption (rooted in his powerful analysis of political forms) that
a historical dialectic must follow the dialectic of the reconstructive reason.
The other is the assumption that the empirical is the occasion for, and not in
any ultimate way the warrant of, the assertion of the theoretical scientific
reason. He writes:
To the observing consciousness, the truth of the law is found in experience, in the same
way that sensuous being is [an object] for consciousness; is not in and for itself. But if
the law does not have its truth in the Notion, it is a contingency, not a necessity, not in
fact a law. The fact that it is essentially in the form of Notion, not only does not conflict
with its being accessible to observation, but rather for that very reason gives it necessary
existence, and makes it [an object for] observation (phen [M], § 249).
This view of the role of the empirical in the development and warranting
of theory would make it very difficult indeed for him to make sense in
anything other than a very selective and schematic way of the history of the
natural sciences between Calileo's day and his own. This is where Harris
boldly takes the plunge and asserts that the Hegelian dialectic can, in fact,
be successfully applied to the illumination of the history of science, just as it
can to the history of civilizations. "My object is to show that [the dialectic]
is not confined to philosophy but is also the form of scientific theory and
scientific advance" (p. 197). Let us see whether he can bring this off.
How, in his view, does scientific change occur? Each theoretical system
"automatically [generates] the next, by its inherent nisus to overcome its
own shortcomings and the contradictions to which they give rise" (p. 197).
These "internal conflicts and oppositions ... can be resolved only by further
self-development and explication" (ibid.). When scientists continue to explore
a theory, "intolerable contradictions" invariably appear (p. 210) which force
the abandonment of the theory and the formulation of a new and more all-
embraCing hypothesis, the successive theories being "related as opposites"
(p. 197), "related as opposed and revolutionary" (p. 210). This certainly
sounds like Hegel. But how well does it respect the history of science?
Change in science 'can be of many sorts. First it can be nomothetic: a new
empirical law is proposed, an older one extended or sharpened. Such advance
is crucial to science and constitutes by far the largest part of day-to-day
scientific work. Harris himself mentions (p. 204) that the "true empirical
method" involves this kind of patient accumulation of skillfully varied
observational evidence; he alludes to the work of Harvey and Lavoisier as
examples. What he does not seem to see is that the motive force behind
advances such as these is not contradiction in previously known empirical
law, i.e. something a theorist would recognise as a discrepancy. When the
experimenter extends the gas laws to even lower temperatures or higher
pressures, for example, he is not responding to any sort of perception of
incoherence in these laws as they stand.
Harris adopts two different strategies in the face of this obvious objection
to his thesis. The first is to weaken it by using terms like 'inadequacy' instead
of 'contradiction', and to propose that a change in science can occur only
when some inadequacy is perceived. This is true, but is of course vacuous.
The scientist will presumably not move from stage A to stage B unless he has
some reason to suppose stage A incomplete, inadequate, in need of change or
supplementation. Once again, we are back to the objection of vacuity. But
even apart from the fact that this would deprive the thesis of any interest, it
should be obvious from what we have seen of Hegel's views above that this is
not at all what he was saying. His notion of contradiction had much more
'bite' to it.
Harris' second strategy is to suggest a Kuhnian distinction between 'revolu-
tionary' changes in science and those that occur in the process of 'normal
science', only the former qualifying as properly 'dialectic' (pp. 210-211).
Apart from the fact that this could restrict the scope of the dialectic thesis to
a rather small number of developments in the history of science, the objec-
tion that Kuhn himself would be likely to put is the important role played by
the accumulation of empirical anomaly in such 'revolutions'. But might these
not be called 'contradictions' in only a slightly extended use of the Hegelian
term?
Before answering this, let us look at some other sorts of changes in science.
There can, as we have just seen, be 'revolutionary' ones where a theory that
articulates an entire domain is replaced by a substantially different theory.
Or there can be less shattering changes where a set of empirical laws for the
first time receives some sort of theoretical unification, or where conflict
between a number of competing theories in a relatively restricted domain
(e.g. origin of the moon, nature of capillary attraction) is fmally resolved.
This latter case seems to involve 'contradiction' of a sort; there is surely a
sense in which alternative theories put forward to account for the same set
of empirical regularities 'contradict' each other.
But here again, vacuity lurks nearby. It is perhaps worth saying (sincethe
early empiricists so often missed this point) that the acceptance of a theory
entails in some sense the rejection of the earlier one, if there was an earlier
230 ERNAN McMULLIN
one in regard to roughly the same domain. Harris puts this by saying that
"the successive theories are in mutual opposition, the later being correc-
tions of the earlier, which by contrast appear as errors" (p. 208). But this
notion of a 'rejection' has to be taken carefully here, as critics of Feyera-
bend's use of 'refutation' in this same context have pointed out. Newtonian
physics is still used for the vast majority of physical problems today; to say
that it has· been 'rejected' is to say that as an overall explanatory system it
has been proved to be inadequate. But a relation of inadequ!!cy of a theory
in regard to its successor is, as we have just seen, hardly an interesting sense
of 'contradiction', and is certainly much weaker than the relation claimed by
Hegel.
There is one important type of change in science to which the notion of
dialectic contradiction is peculiarly inapplicable. Sometimes a theory proves
unable to predict some domain of phenomena which the scientist believes it
should be able to predict. Thus, for example, the original Bohr theory of the
H-atom proved unable to explain the fine-structures of the spectroscopic lines
produced when the emitting hydrogen was subjected to a magnetic field
(Zeeman effects). It was not so much that it predicted them wrongly as that
it did not predict this cluster of effects at all. It would be entirely misleading
to describe this as a 'conflict' or 'contradiction' within the theory; it would
also be wrong to describe the relationship between successive theories (or
successive versions of the theory) here as one of conflict or opposition.
Quite the opposite, in fact. A good theoretical model is expected to have
the resources of a good metaphor. That is, it is expected to guide research,
not just by the predictions it makes, but by further conceptual innovations it
may suggest in the face of anomaly or a range of phenomena (like the Zeeman
effects) which ought to prove tractable. The original gene theory of heredity
was quite vague about where and what the gene was. But it provided a
research program within which the gene came to be more and more closely
linked with a location on the chromosome, on the basis of very sophisticated
experimental testing of alternative sub-hypotheses. The primary impetus here
was provided not by contradiction nor even by anomaly but by the imagina-
tive resources of the original model which at each stage pointed the way to
the alternatives that had to be explored in order that the structures of the
model itself might be progressively more sharply defined.
One might want to say with Hegel that in cases like this one a universal is
being progressively specified. But what the Hegelian system does not account
for is just why this happens. It is not contradiction or incoherence in the
original concept that leads to the formulation of an opposed alternative.
Rather, it is an unresolved set of choices within the original metaphor (a

'neutral analogy', in Hesse's terms) that provides the way ahead. Harris's flat
statement that "the supersession of one system by its successor is occasioned
by the discovery of conflicts within the former" (p. 205) cannot finally be
admitted.
Internal contradictions do, of course, occasionally lead to the abandon-
ment of a theory. Harris mentions several such cases: the contradictions that
kept cropping up within Aristotelian physics throughout the Middle Ages,
which gave Galileo part (but only part) of the ammunition he used so effec-
tively in his Dialogue on Two Chief World Systems; 19 the contradictions that
from the beginning were noted within the Newtonian formulation of the
'absolutes' of space and time and which might be said to have pointed the
way for Einstein. But one cannot properly generalize from cases such as
these, which are characteristic of the most general formulations of mechanics,
to a claim about scientific change generally.
In practice, however, Harris seems quite often, in his references to history,
to be settling for a lesser claim. It is empirical anomaly that forces the
scientist to reconsider his theory, some observational datum that just does
not fit. The history of early astronomy, for example, is one of successively
more complex systems of epicycles, equants, and the like, the motive for each
stage being some "observations that still defied explanation", 'discrepancies'
between the theoretical scheme and the observations (p. 208).20 It is of no
importance (as Harris seems to think in this context) whether the aberrant
phenomena were 'new' ones or not. What is important is that the 'contradic-
tion' in such cases was not in any sense an internal one. It was not generated
by the internal logic of the system, but by the 'phenomena', new or old.
This is really the crucial point. The anomalies that so often decide the
direction of theoretical change cannot be anticipated. And when that change
has occurred, it cannot, after the fact, be made to seem like the inexorable
march of conceptual dialectic. It is plausible enough to suppose that the pure
position of the philosopher may generate its opposite, and that the ensuing
dialectic will carry inquiry forwards. It is plausible that, in some cases at least,
the embodiment of a particular political form in a society will provoke its
opposite, and that in the resultant clash, through the efforts of individual
men, a synthesis embodying something of both may emerge. But it is not
plausible to represent in this manner the challenge of empirical anomaly to
theory. The theory does not generate the anomaly, as anomaly. It is observa-
tion, theory-impregnated of course, but nonetheless observation that does
this. Internal criteria of coherence and simplicity are important, and often
232 ERNAN McMULLIN
decisive. But by themselves, they are not sufficient to account for the kinds
of change that occur in natural science.
Harris himself appears to recognize this when he says that "the establish-
ment of a new hypothesis ... is achieved by the construction of a body of
varying evidence", leading to "corroboration" from the "diverse phenomena"
(p. 204). Unfortunately, he then goes on to construe the notion of construc-
tion as a means of ordering the facts, "which in large measure, by ordering,
constitutes them, makes them what they are" (p. 205). This enables him to
return to the Hegelian internalist thesis: theories change as their "implications
are developed and their details worked out". What must be done (he con-
tinues) is to "devise a modified conceptual scheme that will organize the
phenomena more coherently" (ibid.). It is as though the set of phenomena is
somehow already there, and the criteria of the successive theories are those of
coherence only. Theory does not simply constitute fact; if it did, empirical
anomalies would never arise. Theory shapes the way in which fact is express-
ed. But that is not nearly enough to allow the primacy of reason that the
Hegelian dialectic demands.
In this connection, it is important to notice that Hegel did not recognize
the importance of retroductive patterns of inference. There were, on the one
hand, the empirical inductions of the inorganic, and on the other the most
general laws of mechanics and the general interrelations of the organic world.
It was only in the latter that he could trace the lineaments of the Idea. The
structural sciences of chemistry and geology were only beginning to display
their power and range. The ability of structural models to stretch out beyond
the necessities of the rationalist or the empirical generalizations of the
inductivist was still not plain. So that Hegel, to the extent that he saw the
inadequacy of the inductivist model, could be forgiven for assuming that his
own rationalist alternative was the only other one which could account for
the onward march of science.
Harris can less easily be pardoned. He rejects the inductivists' account of
scientific change in language sufficiently ambiguous, for the most part, to
count as an endorsement either of rationalist dialectic or of retroductive
inference. But he cannot have it both ways. If empirical anomaly and corro-
boration by the variety of empirical evidence play the role he allows them to
do, he has opted for retroduction. To retain the language of Hegel is at the
very least misleading once the substance of the rationalist metaphysic under-
lying it has been compromised.
4. THE WARRANT FOR THE DIALECTIC THESIS
This raises one last issue. On what did Hegel's claim for the dialectic rest?
Taylor has pointed out a fundamental ambiguity at this point in Hegel's
argument between the 'contrastive' sense, in which we cannot have the
shape-concept square without contrasting it with other concepts like round
which 'negate' it, and the 'interactive' sense in which beings struggle to
maintain themselves in the face of others and hence 'negate' each other in an
active way.21 It is essential to Hegel's argument for dialectic as a universal
pattern that he elide the differences between these two senses. A determi-
nate being can only be defined by reference to another with which it is
contrasted. This other is its negation. But Hegel then goes on in a way which
(as Taylor says) "arouses our suspicion", to suppose that this negation is to
be understood not merely in its contrastive sense but also in that of interac-
tion. Thus the determinate being has to struggle against its negation; the
outcome can only be the modification of both.
The confusion here is manifest. It is true that everything does have a
contrastive frontier with others. Its frontier is constitutive of it:
Hence in containing it, each contains what negates it as well as what essentially con-
stitutes it. If we now shift to the other sense of frontier, that of interaction, we can give
this "negation" a concrete as well as just a contrastive logical sense, and it looks as
though each entity essentially contains the seeds of its own destruction. But, of course,
however much we may be tempted to speak of something as "containing its frontier" in
the contrastive sense, when we move to the frontier at which things "negate" each other
by interaction, it is just false to say that each contains its own negation. Quite the
contrary, to the extent that they maintain themselves, they hold their "negations" off. If
they fail to do so, of course, they go under, but they are not essentially determined to
do so by the very way in which they are defined. 22
There is another difficulty, ;tlready alluded to, facing anyone who attempts
to apply the dialectic thesis to the history of science. Hegel assumes that the
historical dialectic follows the same path as the logical (or ontological) one.
This may have some plaUSibility in the politico-social realm. But why should
one expect it to be the case that scientists in their work retrace the lines of
the necessary dialectic of Reason? Hegel makes a sharp distinction between
empirical science (which he identifies with the systematic observation of
nature) and philosophy of nature (which takes empirical science as its
presupposition, reflects on it and shows how nature is an externalization of
the Idea). This distinction is inadequate on several scores, but leaving this
aside, how is Hegel to show that the gradual development of empirical science
itself follows a dialectical pattern? This in no way follows from the logical
234 ERNAN McMULLIN
dialectic which the philosopher of nature may be able to discern in his

reflection on the results of the scientist.
A couple of examples of this latter dialectic may help to make this point:
Darkness, as immediately the negative of light, is the opposition to light's abstractly
identical ideality; it is this opposition in itself. It has material reality and falls apart into
a duality: (1) corporeal difference, i.e. material being-for-self, rigidity; (2) opposition as
such which ... is merely sunk within itself and is thus a dissolution and neutrality: the
former is the lunar, the latter the cometary body (PN, § 279, p. 99).
Thus, moon and comet are both dialectically derived from darkness.
Their "peculiarity as relative central bodies" in the solar system "is based on
the same Notion as their physical peculiarity: they do not rotate on their
axes". They are two logical sides of an opposition, so that their presence in
the solar system is not a chance matter once we have grasped the nature of
the Notion. "They constitute the self-subsistent moments of the dissolving
earth: the moon is the earth's hard interior, the comet is the earth's atmos-
phere which has acquired independent existence, an enduring meteor".
later, he rejects the chemical notion of an element as an 'abstraction' and
proposes instead a four-element theory based on an intricate set of opposi-
tions:
Air corresponds to light; it is passive light which has sunk to the level of a moment. The
elements of opposition are Fire and Water. Rigidity, the lunar principle, is no longer
indifferent, existing by itself alone; but as an element entering into relation with
another, namely the individuality, it is an active unstable being-for-self which is in
ceaseless process, and thus is liberated negativity: Fire. The third element corresponds
to the cometary principle and is Water. The fourth is the earth again ... (PN, § 281,
p. 106).
From oppositions of this imaginative sort, light and darkness, active and
passive, rigid and unstable, magnetisim and electricity of opposite polarities,
and so forth, he constructs an immensely complex logical dialectic. My
purpose here is not to comment on the validity of this dialectic as an explana-
tion of nature. Rather, it is to make the simpler point that it has no bearing
whatever on the manner in which the empirical scientist develops his laws and
theories. The oppositions on which Hegel bases his dialectic of moon, comets,
physical elements, are not reflected in the history of astronomy nor of
chemistry. Nor, indeed, does Hegel claim that they should be. But if the
history of empirical science cannot be represented by the logical dialectic
revealed in the philosophy of nature, what grounds are there for supposing
that this history is in fact dialectical?
We have earlier questioned the validity of Hegel's argument for the
universality of the dialectical process. The suggestive analogies which carry his
analysis of history and of ontology are not available in the history of science.
Is there any other source of evidence for the dialectical character of this
history? Harris spends much of his time pointing to episodes in the history of
science which he takes to exemplify the dialectical principle. We have argued
at some length above that most of them do not do so unless the notion of
'dialectical' is extended to the point of near-vacuity. But suppose they did
exemplify it. Are they then being presented as the warrant for our accepting
it? Harris nowhere develops Hegel's own argument for the dialectic, and the
impression the reader might easily receive is that the reason for accepting his
thesis is that it does in fact describe the realities of the history of science so
exactly.23
If this is the case, it is of course an a posteriori inference of a rather un-
Hegelian sort. One would then have to ask (which he does not) whether there
might not be other alternative modes of description that might not do the job
better. But perhaps the references to history are intended only as illustration,
not as evidence? It is hard to be sure. But either way, it would seem that the
dialectic thesis is in trouble.
We began this paper with a reference to the Marxist version of the dialectic
thesis, so perhaps it is appropriate to turn once more, very briefly, to this
before ending. What kind of warrant can Marxism-Leninism produce for its
dialectical claim for the history of science? Because it rejects the idealism of
Hegel, it is deprived of the central argument he could call on: that nature is
an externalization of mind and thus the same structures must govern the
processes of both. For Hegel, as Taylor puts it, "the motor force of move-
ment is contradiction, that between the external reality and that which it is
meant to realize".24 But in a materialist metaphysics, this tension does not
exist, since nature is not meant to realize anything. Only a teleology that
verges on the (forbidden) idealist one would seem to justify the reimposition
here of a dialectical scheme on nature.
Marxist-Leninist writers make much of the presence in nature of 'contra-
dictions'. Leaving aside the question of the appositeness of such a term to
describe such polarities as that between electrical attraction and repulsion,25
the more pressing question for us in this context is: how is one to get from
such 'contradictions' to the claim that thought about nature, because of the
inevitable occurrence of internal 'contradictions', must follow a progressive
dialectical pattern? It would be just as much a fallacy to infer from the fact
(if it is a fact) that material nature is dialectical to the dialectical character of
the history of science, as it was for Platonism to argue from the unchanging
236 ERNAN McMULLIN
character of true science to the (necessarily) unchanging character of the

objects of science.
Marxism-Leninism cannot point to the kind of coherent presupposition for
the dialectical quality of mind and nature alike that Hegelianism can. It
cannot, therefore, undertake the sort of ambitious logical dialectic of cate-
gories in terms of which Hegel tried, in the Philosophy of Nature, to construe
the science of his day as the embodiment of dialectic reason. Marxist-
Leninists must then depend either on the results of an analysis of cognitive
development generally, or else on direct evidence for the dialectic thesis
drawn from the history of science. Both ways have been tried,26 but it would
take us too far afield to analyze these efforts in the detail they deserve.
Suffice it to say that the same tendency to broaden the notion of 'dialectical'
to cover all sorts of scientific change, evolutionary and revolutionary,
cumulative and transformational, which we have already seen in the case of
Harris, can be found among Marxist-Leninist writers also.
To describe the history of science as a 'dialectical' process can be a
legitimate shorthand way of repudiating the inadequacies of the classical
empiricist account of this history. But as an analytic instrument which would
be of service in the complex debates now going on around the exact nature
of scientific change, this term seems, finally, to be of very little use.
University ofNotre Dame
NOTES
1 'The Dialectical Structure of Scientific Thinking', in the present volume.

2 In his introduction to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (1857)
and in his Preface to the German edition of Capital (1873), Marx discusses the dialectical
character of science. He refers his views on this to Hegel, and argues that the specifically
idealist cast Hegel gives the topic can be disregarded as unnecessary and unacceptable
'mystification'. But he declares himself in full agreement with Hegel's dialectical model
of how theoretical science proceeds.
3 He speaks of a dialectical logic which 'impels' science from one stage to the next, a
"logic of construction and of development appropriate to a continuous movement of
evolution" (p. 211). But this is not at all a 'logic of discovery' in the sense in which this
has recently been debated. It would give no hint, for instance, of the sorts of strategies
that would be used by scientists when faced by anomaly or when seeking to generalize a
result. To call it a "logic of construction" or a "logic of development" is misleading,
since it might suggest that it specifies how constructions are made or how development
occurs. But 'dialectical logic' does not, in fact, do this, as will become clearer below.
4 But he is much too rapid and schematic in his discussion of Carnap's proposal to treat
"theory as a deductive system constituted as an interpreted calculus" (pp. 197 -198). In
particular, it is not correct to render thus the 'correspondence rules' which played such
a vital role in this proposal: "The interpretation of the calculus is effected by substitut-
ing for its variable elements empirical terms, indicative, or descriptive, of observable
entities". Were this to be the case all reference to unobservable entities would have
to be eliminated, which was very far from Carnap's intention. Harris' conclusion that
"inference in the natural sciences is accordingly reduced by current doctrine to analytic
deduction, which can produce no new knowledge and inductive generalization, which
cannot be validated" (p. 198), is too sweeping. The main fault with this Humean charac-
terization is that it lumps under 'induction' a number of modes of confirmation that have
to be taken separately. But to explore this would lead us too far afield. See E. McMullin,
'Structural Explanation', American Philosophical Quarterly 15 (1978), 139-147.
5 "'The understanding' is the name of the attitude of mind in which notions are regard-
ed as being fully determined, with a precise meaning and with a precise and restricted
range of extension so that they can be applied rigidly and clearly to the differentiation
of experience ... It is part of the abstract and formal function of the Logik to show that
to stick to such fixed notions involves contradictions which can be overcome by the
development of more adequate, less rigid notions. This generation of contradictions
which shows up the inadequacy of the understanding is the process of dialectic" (R.
Plant, Hegel (London, 1973), pp. 140--1).
6 Reason in History, trans!. R. S. Hartman (New York, Liberal Arts Press, 1953), p. 74.
7 M. J. Petry in the introduction to his three-volume translation of the Philosophy of
Nature (London, Allen and Unwin, 1970) asserts both that Hegel seems to suggest that
a science of nature is open to constant revision, and that it also is ultimately rooted in
absolute and unchanging principles (I, pp. 33, 90). He reads perhaps more of the 'infinite
revisability' theme into Hegel than the text will actually bear. See G. Buchdahl, 'Hegel's
Philosophy of Nature', British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 23 (1972), 257-
266; see p. 262.
8 C. Taylor notes that to put it in this way is to give it a more contemporary expression
than is actually found in Hegel's text, but he argues that it is a fair rendering of what
Hegel had in mind (Hegel (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1975), p. 305).
9 For a fuller discussion of this issue, see the Introduction to The Concept of Matter in
Modern Philosophy, ed. E. McMullin (Notre Dame, Ind., Notre Dame University Press,
1978), especially pp. 47-52.
10 See E. McMullin, 'The Ambiguity of 'Historicism' ',New Directions in the Philoso·
phy of Science, ed. P. Asquith and H. Kyburg (E. Lansing: PSA, 1979).
11 SeealsoPetry,op. cit. l,p.l08.
12 The philosopher of nature must 'submerge his freedom' in the content and let it be
moved by its own nature. Though the object of study follows a dialectic movement, the
philosopher (scientist) must stay as close as he can to a purely phenomenological
method, and intrude no purely hypothetical entities. See K. Dove, 'Hegel's Phenomeno-
logical Method', Review of Metaphysics 231970, 615-64L
13 See E. McMullin, 'The Criterion of Fertility and the Unit for Appraisal in Science',
Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science [Lakatos Memorial Volume] VoL 39
(Dordrecht, Reidel, 1976), pp. 395-432.
14 Much historical work remains to be done on the development of philosophy of
science in the fIrst half of the nineteenth century. In Larry Laudan's detailed review of
the sources for this period, it is interesting that Hegel is not even listed among the several
238 ERNAN McMULLIN
score who are counted there as having contributed to the philosophy of science during
this time. See 'Theories of Scientific Method from Plato to Mach', History of Science 7
(1967),1-63.
15 See E. McMullin, 'Creativity and Scientific Discovery', Freedom and Man, ed. J. C.
Murray (New York, Kennedy, 1965), 105-130.
16 This issue is treated by several authors in New Perspectives on Galileo, ed. R. Butts
and J. Pitt (Dordrecht and Boston, Reidel, 1978).
17 P. Feyerabend, 'Explanation, Reduction and Empiricism', Minnesota Studies in the
Philosophy of Science 3 (1962), 28-97.
18 See, for example, 1. Darden and N. Maull, 'Interfield Theories', Philosophy of
Science 44 (1977),43-64.
19 It is incorrect nonetheless to say that "the collapse of Aristotelian physics resulted
... from the contradiction which arose in the attempt to apply its theory of motion to
the flight of projectiles" (p. 203). The matter was far more complex than this. It involved
not merely the inability of Aristotelian physics to handle the phenomena of (relatively)
free fall but also the direct anomalies that were revealed by the telescope.
20 Harris, oddly, goes too far in this direction when he says that "it was eventually
despair of accurate calculation of the annual occurrence of religious feasts and festivals
which prompted Copernicus to revert to the hypothesis of Aristarchus in the hope
of a more coherent theory" (p. 203). All the most recent scholarship in the tangled
Copernican story would indicate that this was one of the cases where the perception of
empirical anomaly did not, in fact, play the crucial role.
21 Taylor,op. cit., p. 234.
22 Ibid., p. 236
23 Elsewhere Harris utilizes an argument of an interestingly different, and more com-
plex, kind. In 'Hegel and the Natural Sciences' (Beyond Epistemology, ed. F. G. Weiss
(The Hague, Nijhoff, 1974), 129-153), he claims that it was Hegel's "conviction of an
immanent dialectic in nature" which enabled him "to see, at times, in the forms and
phenomena of nature, what the science of his day had not yet discovered, but what has
since become sound scientific doctrine" (p. 151). Thus, for example, Harris continues,
he anticipated both the theory of evolution and the theory of relativity in his concep-
tual dialectic of nature. This utility to anticipate later developments furnishes (in
Harris's view) an impressive additional warrant for the validity of his metaphysical
insights.
It could, however, be objected that a great many of the dialectical constructions in
the Philosophy of Nature were not borne out by later developments in science, so that
this is a rather vulnerable strategy of argument. And Hegel's opposition to the theories of
evolution of his own day cannot be explained away by claiming (as Harris does) that it
was because these theories were unduly speculative and that "his faithful adherence to
what in his time was scientifically respectable led him to reject the notion of biological
evolution, convenient though it would have been for him to adopt it", thus leading to a
"discrepancy" between his "metaphysical insights and what he accepts as scientifically
supported fact". Hegel is not slow elsewhere to enter into a critique of the sciences of
his day, on the grounds of their inability to structure the facts along lines that he
considers acceptable.
His objection to evolution came from within his own system, as he makes clear in the
Philosophy of Nature:
A thinking consideration must reject such nebulous, at bottom, sensuous ideas as

in particular the so-called origination, for example, of plants and animals from water,
and then the origination of the more highly developed animal organisms from the
lower, and so on . . . . The Notion timelessly and in a universal manner posits all
particularity in existence. It is a complete empty thought to represent species as
developing successively, one after the other, in time. Chronological difference has no
interest whatever for thought (PN, § 249 andZusatz, p. 20).
It would seem to require some degree of partisanship to claim as a warrant for the
validity of Hegel's dialectical analysis that he anticipated the modern theories of in-
organic and organic evolution. One might at least as readily claim the reverse.
24 Taylor,op. cit., p. 39l.
25 See N. Lobkowicz, 'Materialism and Matter in Marxism-Leninism', The Concept of
Matter in Modern Philosophy, ed. E. McMullin (Notre Dame, Ind., University of Notre
Dame Press, 1978), pp. 154-188.
26 See, for example, the essay by V. A. Lektorsky, 'Dialectic of the Subject and Object
and Some Problems of the Methodology of Science', Philosophy in the USSR, trans!.
R. Daglish (Moscow, 1977).
HERMAN LEY
SOME 'MOMENTS' OF HEGEL'S RELATION

TO THE SCIENCES
Hegel's dialectic seems to possess the property of provoking again and again
either adherence or vehement rejection. In this the question whether the
philosopher had a troubled relation to the exact sciences, or, on the contrary,
exercised a stimulating influence, remains just as much at issue as the possi-
bility of reaching an adequate understanding of his intentions. At the 15th
World Congress of Philosophy in 1973 at Varna, at least four positions
emerged in the sessions of the Institut Internationa1e de Philo sophie alone.
Mario Bunge assured the meeting, in essence, that science was present only
where the last vestige of dialectics had been eradicated in order that the
principles of exact philosophy might be complied with. Paul Ricoeur related
dialectics solely to human practice, differing in this evaluation from Mihailo
MarkoviC. In an interpretation drawn from Marx and Engels, I. S. Narski
accepted the validity of objective and subjective dialectics, to be interpreted
materialistically. Under these circumstances, it seems advisable to consult
Hegel's texts on the various points in order to recall to memory how his ideas,
which refer mainly polemically to Kant, are to be understood. That it is
worthwhile to seek to complete Hegel's methodological and epistemological
structure at this late date results from a fact that simply cannot be neglected:
in recent times a turning back to Hegel's ideas has begun within predominant-
ly empirical disciplines, which has confirmed an unmistakable relationship
to the most modern problems.
In a controversy by correspondence with William James, Charles S. Peirce
professes to a kind of thinking in which three modes of consciousness are
contained, which he classifies as feeling, experience and awareness of the
future.! The theoreticians, alluded to but not named by Pierce in this corre-
spondence, are characterized as Thomists, Hegelians and intellectualists. In
this connection only the absence of an aversion to Hegelian intentions is of
interest. One of the more recent editors of Pierce, Karl-Otto Apel, places the
'objective logic' of evolution, already postulated in 1868 and worked out
explicitly after 1890, within a framework of influences that extends from
Hegel and Schelling to Darwin and Lamarck?
That an influence of Hegel on Charles S. Peirce definitely exists can
be concluded from, for instance, Peirce's Lectures on Pragmatism. In the
241
242 HERMAN LEY
tradition of Aristotle, Kant and Hegel, a category is understood as an element

of the phenomena having the highest rank of universality. Peirce cites the list
of Hegel's particular categories drawn from the structure of the Encyklopddie.
Hegel's three stages of thought are designated by Peirce as universal cate-
gories, and he considers them quite generally as the correct table of universal
determinations of thought. 3 As will be seen, while thinking through the
categories as Hegel understands them, Peirce adopts an epistemological
position that at least in part finds itself in agreement with Hegel: "We should
hardly find today a man of Kirchhoffs rank in science saying", Peirce
attempted to prognosticate, "that we know exactly what energy does but
what energy is we do not know in the least.,,4 Peirce does not use the
expression, which has become current since, that we have to test the hypo-
thesis in experiment; he confines himself to pointing to the application of,
say, the dynamical equations, where the application is conceived as an
instance of testing. In Peirce's considerations the acceptance of a real
universality of the laws of nature is combined with the real possibility of
experimental knowledge, and this is one of the transmissions of Hegel's
critique of Kant, concerning the so-called unknowable character of things-in-
themselves.
How far-ranging is the evidence for Hegel's confidence in rational theoreti-
cal thought can be shown in a field to which it is usually assumed that Hegel
had hardly any concrete relation. This is the field of biology and, in a
narrower sense, genetics. A few years before winning the Nobel Prize for
Medicine together with Fran90is Jacob and Jacques Monod, Andre Lwoff
began his catalogue of the discovery of hereditary laws and genetic informa-
tion with a remark from Hegel's Lectures on Aesthetics, which he presented
in various forms during the third decade of the nineteenth century. As
Lwoff mentions, determinants are spoken of in the French test, published in
1835, which exist in the seed as extremely simple forces and determine living
reality. There is nothing in the tree which has not been previously in the seed
[Keirn 1.5 Hegel already clearly uses the same image in the Preface to the
Phenomenology of Spirit. Particularities "slumbering as if in a still enclosed
seed" first appear in the Aesthetics, which completely derives the aesthetic
value of nature's beauty from the natural substructure, which will by no
means seem paradoxical today. For Lwoff the birth of the modern concept
[of genetics 1 begins with Hegel, and in this he recognizes that Hegel dis-
cusses the problem of life in a penetrating way. Thus, the differing points
of departure, which eventuated in the ideas of Peirce and Lwoff, are philoso-
phically relevant and rooted in Hegelian philosophy. We find side by side the
HEGEL'S RELA nON TO THE SCIENCES 243
relation both to the logic of evolution, and to the categories, which for Lwoff
. retains the constancy contained in the seed throughout the various stages of
existence of ontogenesis. Without actually discussing it, Lwoff seems to sense
the paradox, that the dialectician Hegel finds it necessary to emphasize the
constancy of living organisms more than, say, Kant, who points to a possible
hypothesis of the evolution of animals and plants. In contrast to Kant, the
evolution of nature is absent in Hegel's philosophy, while for society an
evolutionary trend is worked out in consciousness and in the economic-
technical infrastructure, one that does not relate solely to the phenomena of
mind. While nature is considered to be the realization of absolute spirit
without its own immanent evolution, i.e., for nature as a whole, yet Hegel
was able to seize upon the constancy of the determinants and of the simple
forces which condition the individual development of the objects of the
species whose change of form is visible. Even though a not inconsiderable
indefiniteness attaches to the dialectic, this does not hinder Hegel from
emphasizing the constancy of the relation between the seed and the fully
formed object. In the references to Hegel which have become relevant in
more recent times, these opposing sides contained in the dialectic gain in
significance. The relatively constant is related to a process of well-defined
change of form, and belongs in the domain of the phenomena of the empiri-
cally accessible reality within an objectively understood multiplicity; Hegel
conceives of this domain as dialectical.
Perhaps the most enthusiastic advocacy of Hegel's evolutionary thought
comes in more recent times from the biologist Adolf Meyer-Abich, who
designated phylogeny as an essentially historical science indebted to Roman-
ticism, and especially to the historical thought of the Hegelian school. 6 As
a dialectical synthesis he mentions, among others, the vitalism-mechanism
problem. This kind of problem is characterized by Niels Bohr as ideals of
knowledge, as deep truths, of which Bohr says that "their opposite also
contains deep truths.,,7 If Meyer-Abich deals too boldly in some respects
with Hegel's dialectical triad of thesis-antithesis-synthesis, which is hardly
rigidified into woodenness in Hegel, still, in any case the holistic theoretician
is able to link his views to Bohr. The compensations of phylogenetic epochs
are conceived as complementaries in statu nascendi. The emergency of
antinomical states of affairs is seen to be the result; these have their domain
in the history of society, but are extrapolated by Meyer-Abich to the natural
sciences, whose structures as developing sciences he sees as approaching
human history.8 Whereas Helmholtz saw the Hegelian identity philosophy
founding on natural science,9 Meyer-Abich assures us that the natural
244 HERMAN LEY
scientists of that time thought in a completely unhistorical manner, so that

this decisive misunderstanding is comprehensible. Historical reality (with
respect to nature) first begins with complementarity. I 0 If Meyer-Abich
considers Hegel's logic to be the logic of phylogenetic thought, still the
paradox remains that Hegel recognized no evolutionary development in
nature, and sought to diagnose the dialectic supposed to exist there, solely
synchronistic ally as it were. In Hegel's dialectic, the diachronic structures
found their place, strictly speaking, only within the successive configurations
of consciousness, from which deductions back to nature were made, while in
the meantime, evolutionary development asserted itself in nature's various
domains. As Kant, in contrast to Hegel, had already sought to present evolu-
tion in society and nature, and had assumed the presence of antagonisms as
the driving force in the latter, going back to Hegel for the understanding of
evolution can hardly be understood in terms of anything other than Hegel's
relatively well elaborated state of dialectical categories. But by no means least
important, the ancient outlook, construed as pantheistic and monistic, seems
to have conferred renewed credit upon the Identity Philosophy. To begin
with, Hegel derived the laws of his dialectic exclusively from society, and
made them independent in a doctrine of categories understood as logic of
development, the possible generalization of which was not to be interpreted
as within things, but had to find its possible confirmation in the empirical
material. Since Hegel considered that evolution had not been proven for
nature, he confmed himself to the synchronic aspect of patterns, whose
epistemological value he expressly reassessed, in opposition to Kant. Thus far,
however, the systematization of the dialectical categories retained their
significance as heuristic determinations. They are also understood as such by
C. F. von Weizsacker, who refers expressly to Hegel. 11
C. West Churchman directs attention to the necessary tension between
formal logic and dialectics. Due to the needs of operations research, ways of
posing questions became current that had already ripened in the philosophical
debate revolving around problems emerging in natural science and techno-
logy. In the first place they concerned the reduction of multiplicity to
models, the interpretation of existing models with respect to previous,
present and future movement of their contents, but, also, together with this
the prediction of fields of probability, as well as decisions about goals and
measures to be taken. The criterion for the quality of decisions never lay
solely in the logical stringency of an inference, but in the material fulfillment
of purposes and assigned goals. As the representation of the processes to be
treated in terms of mathematical structures, whether of a material or an ideal
HEGEL'S RELATION TO THE SCIENCES 245
nature, is carried out in anything but an automatic fashion, but instead has its
precondition in subjective activity, Churchman, to begin with, goes back to
Kant's thesis: data are not movements of nature, but partially our own
movements, created by our judgment. 1 2 In any case, that is how Churchman
formulates the state of affairs, and he emphasizes the objective and subjective
participation in the production of data, which corresponds to Kant's con-
frontation of Platonism and Epicureansim in his Critique of Pure Reason.
Churchman regards the production of data as a creative process. Since he
cannot receive sufficient enlightenment about the inner structure of this
process from either Berkeley or Kant, and also knows that he cannot receive
sufficient information from contemporary philosophy, he falls back to the
point of departure of recent discussion, which he recognizes as the content of
the confrontation between Kant and Hegel. It is astonishing that this resump-
tion of a discussion that is generally assumed to be concluded comes from a
theoretician who, together with others, organizes 'teamwork' through which
applied mathematics and the most modem techniques are placed at the
disposal of processes of management and production. Also to be noted, aside
from this, is the state of controversy in which at least two positions confront
each other: the assumption that future events can be precisely predetermined
and carried through on the basis of a stringent calculus; the other assumption
being the prediction of transitional probabilities, the concrete fulftllment of
which unconditionally involves human activity, and must keep open any
system of human beings or of human beings and machines. 13 Churchman
related his theoretical generalizations to the domain of empirical research,
and confirms that in their effective execution these go in principle beyond
the boundary set by the strict rules of formallogic. 14 The procedure of those
philosophers like Hegel, who subsume under 'logic' the whole process of
developing an understanding of world, as well as of those natural scientists
who use the term 'logic' to cover all the methods by which they reach their
conclusions in empirical research, may be understood as parallel modes of
thOUght. Accordingly, it becomes understandable that Churchman includes
Karl R. Popper's logic as an argument for the validity and justification of
Hegel's logic, although Popper can also be considered as the antipode of the
Hegelian dialectic. In another passage Churchman calls Hegel's result a
dialectical theology. However, it is possible to use the dialectical method
more significantly in order to describe a SOCiological, materialistic process
without God. IS What deserves to be especially noted is that the dialectical
method can be applied to nature and to society, and, as we may see from
Churchman's own account of the state of affairs, actually is being applied
246 HERMAN LEY
within the sciences. Whereas Hegel constructed a teleology of the entire

world-process, the dialectical method can be confined to an area within this
world. Insofar as in society, by contrast to nature, goals are set for which the
precondition is human action, these reach ahead into the future, but do not
transcend the world. The transcendence of formal logic and its present status
has another significance for society than it does for natural objects. However,
in both cases synchronic and diachronic schemata and corresponding patterns
have to be taken into consideration, as far as the state of affairs requires.
Once it has been shown that there is renewed interest in Hegel, we may
investigate those of Hegel's thoughts which furnish the precondition for the
renaissance of his ideas. First of all, some material from the Preface to the
second edition of his Science of Logic, which was formulated, so to speak, as
the last word on November 7, 1831, may serve this purpose (SL [M], pp.
31-42). Hegel emphasizes the function and the objective content of the
categories,16 which he treats as 'moments' of the development of the sciences
and makes the object of analysis. This Preface and the earlier Introduction to
the Logic (SL [M], p. 43ff) must be considered an authoritative statement of
his most essential thoughts. Abstraction from opposition and transition to
universals mean something similar for Hegel. The categories or determinations
of thought are not considered to be a merely subjective product. There is no
difficulty for the idealist Hegel to insist on the unity of the objective and the
subjective, since mind externalizes itself in the objects, and a correspondence
must necessarily be considered possible. When Hegel speaks of categories,
then, it is not merely instruments of thinking which are meant, but also
specific properties of objects to which the processes that take place within or
between them, or which become possible, are considered to belong. In this
Science of Logic Hegel wants to represent "the realm of thought philoso-
phically, that is, in its own immanent activity or what is the same, in its
necessary development" (SL [M], p. 31). It is thinking that distinguishes man
from the animals for Hegel (SL [M], p. 31). But to give logical determina-
tions a merely subjective significance, Hegel calls fear of the object. l ?
If Hegel occupies himself with thought, then the world of objects is always
also included. If Hegel forces object and subject together into the mystifying
externalization process of the absolute world-spirit, then it is also granted to
thinking to be able to reverse the process. The development of object and
subject is mirrored in thinking and its categories. If the categories are still
grasped merely subjectively, then the result is, in Hegel's view, that the object
continues to be attached to them in a merely external way, because it appears
to them as something beyond thought. If, to understand consciousness, the
subjective categories include the objective in their determinations, then they

have incorporated the substantial content within themselves. That means that
consciousness has fused the concrete into itself in the process of appropria-
tion, and with that lacks the stuff and substance of sensuousness and the
concrete, because, in a dialectical sense, it has abolished - and transcended
[aufgehoben] - both in itself. With that, the self-evidently existing difference
between object and subject, as the world of objects and the world of con-
sciousness, becomes identical in its very differentiation. Naturally, this does
not mean the concept of identity of formal logic, but rather the fusion of
what belongs to content with the determinants of consciousness, which
thereby become appropriate for making statements about contents and make
possible the capacity for applying the categories, For Hegel fear of the object
means an unfinished standpoint in the epistemological process. Only if we
assume that it is by means of concepts that the thing-in-itself is overcome as
something beyond, and appropriated, can the categories of the purely-
rational, as Hegel calls it, be known. Since the categories are comprehended in
their relation to content through a dialectical identity with the object, they
belong to science. Hegel assumes that science overcomes opposition to the
object. Accordingly, Hegelian logic and the special content of the sciences
belong together, a product of development. Hegel's dialectic wants to be
assured of the object and of the epistemological competence of the cate-
gories. IS
The existence of universal laws in the objective world means for Hegel the
existence of understanding and reason, with which the bridge to the cate-
gories has been erected. Laws and categories are recognized to have objective
value and existence through which, at the same time, the difference between
objective and subjective is to some extent attenuated. Since Hegel uses the
existence of evolutionary development at least within consciousness as the
starting point of his reflections, the laws also refer to the change of categories,
and thereby they quite defmitely are not considered to be limitations upon
knowledge, as Kant believed must be assumed.
Hegel does not concern himself with the question, how knowledge can be
gained. He assumes that knowledge is to be gained by the procedures under
formation in the various disciplines in question, and instead he investigates
what it is that is thereby made available to human consciousness. Hegel
objects to any underestimation of thinking and theoretical work; he sees such
underestimation as arising from bare empiricism and from the doctrine of the
unknowability of real objects, on whatever basis this may be founded. For
Hegel, the objectivity of concepts which emerge from the development of
248 HERMAN LEY
thought consists in the limitation imposed on human beings at that time, but
in the sense that thereby there can be actual knowledge corresponding to the
current stage of development. If, for Hegel, the categories and the concepts
of objects are delimited with respect to each other, on the other hand they
are congruent with respect to their reference to contents, the range of which
goes beyond merely formal correctness. Hegel arrives at a formulation which
formally French Structuralism could lay claim to for its use, but which
receives a different evaluation in Hegel's context. 19
So also Francis Bacon's "natura non nisi parendo vincitur" receives a
corresponding modification in Hegel when applied to the process of knowl-
edge. By setting object and subject as approximately equal, it would seem
obvious that the thesis of the domination of nature by man or the purely
instrumental function of concepts should be accepted. But quite the con-
trary: Hegel emphasizes the objectivity of object and subject as confronting
man, whose product is explicitly conceived of as the achievement of con-
cepts. In the categories and concepts of objects, what Hegel calls the universal
presents itself, with which man, for his part, has to comply. It is far removed
from Hegel to conceive this dialectic between man, the products of thought
and the confronting objects in an indefinite manner; the objectivity of the
products of thought achieved by man, even with regard to man himself, is
maintained with all definiteness. 2o Not to go beyond the nature of things
means for Hegel not to be able to elevate oneself above the understanding of
things. If Hegel says the objective concept of a thing constitutes the thing
itself, then philosophically a limit is given which is practically effective, but
which also must be understood historically. With such a term as 'the objective
concept of things', taken by itself, it appears that philosophy is proclaiming
a closure of knowledge in its own time. But just as Hegel sets about the
determination of the categories historically, so the concept of things is no less
historical. Forms of thought and knowledge are conceived as determining and
dominating man, because in them, as it were, the horizon is revealed which
contemporary man of each period has created, and which only he will be
capable of transcending when the forms of thought and the rest of his
cognitive activities have absorbed other contents.
While Kant insists on absolute original 'root' concepts of pure understand-
ing, Hegel insists on their changing character, which appears as a 'moment' of
becoming and therefore signifies a limitation that continually strives to go
beyond itself. The dialectical method seeks to grasp the historical process but
surely not as history, not only because it comes after the fact like the owl
of Minerva and begins its flight in darkness, but because it universalizes
becoming itself. Hegel saw himself placed in a position to thematize evolu-

tionary development, because it had come to be visibly underway. The
creation of higher relations of thought, as Hegel expresses himself, is traced
back directly to the "advance of culture generally, and of the sciences in
particular. "21 As the empirical disciplines were only at the beginning of their
ascendancy, while mathematics was already at hand as a developed science,
Hegel explicitly raises the question of the relationship with them. Dialectical
philosophizing should not replace the other disciplines, but generalize the
visible process which spreads over a broad field, and, in his view, is ready for
conscious comprehension.
There will be polemics against any scientific viewpoint that would select
one or several among the special sciences and make the others appear
dependent upon it. Hegel's 'logic' tries to point to common features that are
delineated within the various phenomena and requires an interpretation that
goes beyond the opening up of a partial field of objects and domains that
have become accessible to consciousness. With that, every existing special
science is recognized, without consideration of its possible ramifications;
while at the same time their common influence on the so-called higher
relations of thought is also recognized. But with that, Hegel postulates,
without reservation, the dependence of the phenomena of the mind that are
becoming manifest, and thus also the dependence of philosophy, on the
complete understanding of nature, of the relations of human beings with each
other, of the externalization of these in the world of objects, as well as of
their reincorporation into consciousness.
In his reflections, Hegel in fact mentions physics, within which the category
a
of polarity had recently come to playa role, and incidentally was being, tort
et a travers, forced into everything, even into [the phenomena] of light (SL
[M] , p. 32). Hegel demands that opposition be reflected if it is articulated in
the sciences; it should not be down-graded. What remains worthy of note is
that Hegel warns against seeking to insert this polarity into everything at all
cost; and in keeping with this, he opposes the forced construing of categories
into things, for in his understanding this comes with the thing itself.
Consequently, objectivity is taken seriously, as is the relation between the
sciences and the dialectical method, the determinations of which are them-
selves subordinated to further development. Not to tailor the determinations
of thought according to our arbitrary decision or freedom is one of Hegel's
foremost requirements and insights. If some modern theorists fmd that
Hegel's categories have only become relevant in the twentieth century,
that only means that Hegel's analysis was able to discover aspects in the
250 HERMAN LEY
undeveloped material of his time, which only achieved broader validity with
delay, and which suggest modification of the philosophical generalizations
widely held and considered valid until then.
As an identity philosopher and philosophical idealist, Hegel hesitates to
simply accept the 'nature of things' which he considered. He does not
subjectivistically deny the existence of things, but sees in the "object ...
nothing else but our notions of it" (SL [M], p. 36). Even if we reject a
relation of our thoughts to the thing, still Hegel seeks to avoid the suspicion
that the concept present in the subject is in any way made independent and
does not permit any distance between the subject and its objects, which
always act only corresponding to the level of consciousness.
With that Hegel seeks to clarify his own position and that of critical
philosophy. Thoughts should not stand between us and things, nor should the
medium [of thought] shut us off from things.22 Insofar as Hegel thinks of a
mediation, it does not shut consciousness off from things but instead "joins
us with them". In Hegel's understanding the identity is mediated by the
concept of the thing and by the categories, and therefore directed toward
something definite. If thinking, in Hegel, belongs to the abstract form of
labor, yet he also occasionally comes to the more concrete means, to which
externality is explicitly ascribed. As against "our very own, innermost, act"
(SL [M], p. 36) the external means is markedly contrasted; precisely through
this characteristic, the external means reaches a meaningful significance which
at first is negligible to Hegel, as it is his main concern to bring subject and
object more closely together, in order to re-evaluate the constructive form of
thought, as well as to bring theoretical thinking into closer contact with
objects epistemologically. With that, Kant's concern to draw closer methodo-
logically to the active operation of the understanding is given adequate scope
philosophically; but precisely in this way the positive and dialectical form of
mediation is emphasized. In Hegel's understanding, the categories, insofar as
they intervene mediatingly into the process of thought, prove to be the
vehicle which permits us to get at the thing itself. But as, in addition, the
development of knowledge also remains to be treated in terms of its own
mechanism, the external means appear as a complement to the categories,
which also contain, as it were, a measuring function, and aside from that also
interveRe in the overall process.23 Hegel sees them entering into the process
in combination with the goal-setting activity of man.
Without moralizing or going so far as to postulate goal-free activity, as the
Preface asserts at least partially with respect to scientific activity, nevertheless
goals belong within the domain of mediation. Of finite content, it inserts
another object between itself and the result, as Hegel expresses it, whereby
the 'cunning of reason' asserts itself. To characterize the total difference
between it and formal logic, and the merely formal function of its content-
determined categories, Hegel's content-determined logic takes this other
object to be the means of the external middle-term of the inference; and the
middle-term is the carrying out of the goal. Since we are concerned with
finite goals, as Hegel presents it, the objects of the external middle-term of
the inference are also not to be understood in any absolute sense. They
change and turn out to be concrete means, without being something rational
in-and-for-themselves [an und fUr sich]. Themselves 'moments' of mediation,
they mediate something higher. If the categories and concepts of the thing
itself were conceived as limits which would not have to serve as means of
domination by man, then, following Hegel's stylized way of speaking, the
case would be different with respect to objects, which are an 'external
middle' term and should properly be conceived as subordinated, if one were
to understand them within the framework of Hegel's understanding.
As contrived as this train of thOUght may seem, and as mannered as the
composition of Hege1's text may appear, so too, with closer explication or
later completion of the stages of thinking, are we far removed from the
exactitude demanded, say, by Mario Bunge. Since Hegel subsumes structures
of various kinds under what he wants to consider included under 'essence',
these structures can, so to speak, be of internal and external configuration. In
the case before us, where Hegel speaks of that mediation which emerges from
finite purposes, in his view rationality asserts itself in externality.2 4 Given
that Hegel has reduced the thing-in-itself to the concept and sees the cate-
gories arising from this, which fundamentally are not restricted to the number
found either in Aristotle or in Kant, and which in their turn again dominate
consciousness, nevertheless, on the other hand, toward the end of the Science
of Logic, human activity is by no means confined to merely inner activity.
Completely in keeping with the understanding of the seventeenth and
eighteenth-century Enlightenment, from the two Bacons through Diderot,
and including Descartes, it is tools that give men power over external nature.
But in contrast to these aforementioned periods of the Enlightenment, Hegel
analyzes a reciprocal relation that unites the position of the world-outlook
with the methodological position, and utilizes analysis for that purpose. The
relationship of the 'thing itself, the categories and consciousness are con-
strued in terms of the world-outlook, while with respect to a dialectical under-
standing, the dialectical identity, which is not that of formal logic , is brought
forth only methodologically. The goals are, as it were, products of the
252 HERMAN LEY
'anthropological' constitution of the individuals and of what Hegel under-

stands as civil [bourgeois] society. With the 'plow', however, Hegel is not
concerned with technical problems nor with the unity of mental and physical
activity. Hegel assumes it to be self-evident that if we speak of human beings,
instruments are required to achieve goals, where we deal with the foundation
of life-supporting activity. And so he means concrete labor with the corre-
sponding tools, and not merely recourse to abstract labor. But for this it is
not simply the objects which we represented by the 'piow' that are addressed,
but the relations posited together with this. As means, the plow relates to
nature and to man. If the plow signifies domination over nature, then through
the consideration of the category as a limiting value, an overarching 'moment'
is reached, which reacts back on man, but as barrier becomes fluid due to the
continually newly set goals. The state of affairs under discussion cannot be
described as a Hegelian triad, or only in a most extremely forced manner, but
it does contain characteristics of structures, conceived as a set of elements,
and aside from this offers patterns of scientific explanation. 25 If more recent
structuralism, in its several variants, exploits its methodological procedures -
used in linguistics and ethnology - to deal with social processes, it must not
be forgotten that first of all Hegel found a sporadically applied approach,
which finally expressed itself in the mathematical procedures of modern
economics right down to the balance of complex interacting interests. Lenin
calls historical materialism "one of the applications and developments of
the ideas of genius - seeds existing in embryo in Hegel."26 Hegel offers a
catalogue of variables which stand related to each other and which, for the
purposes of mathematical analysis, are in each case to be investigated for
transitivity, reflexivity and symmetry, in the logical sense. As Hegel first
discovered the presence of certain parameters and their interconnectedness,
he had to also secure information about the nature of their interconnection.
The purpose set by man remains, preserved as the domain of departure. The
domain of relations determined by each parameter, however, remains both
variable and constant. The arching functions of the plow remain preserved,
although the instruments of production change through human activity, and,
aside from this, the limits of conceptual adequacy for the possibilities of
understanding expand up to the extent that development takes place. Since
theoretical philosophical investigation treats empirical material and secular
experience, the evaluation of various parameters related to each other and
their reciprocal influence signifies considerable progress beyond William
Petty's Political Arithmetic and Quesnay's Tableau economique. We must also
note that, before Hegel, quantification in accordance with probabilities had
already been undertaken by Petty, and the influence of the superstructure

had been admitted, but the conceptual analysis still remained in its begin-
nings. Compared with later conceptions that mathematical representation of
economic expectations should be contemplative and exclude the concrete
subject,27 Hegel offers an analogous but superior position which does not cut
off the course of scientific development. As Hegel postulates the dialectical
unity of quantity and quality, he does escape from the dilemma of selecting
either quantitative or qualitative procedures and making the corresponding
decisions. Hegel's theory of mediation in principle reserves for itself the
choice with which procedures the process of reciprocal involvement of
circumstances is to be treated. As in the understanding of content-determined
'logic', any arbitrary phenomenon can be comprehended as the expression of
quality and quantity, the verbal representations, which are formulated
qualitatively, can also be quantified. Contrary to the conception that Hegel
rejected 'formal logic' or 'mathematics', his theory of knowledge instead
contains the basic structure, from which quantification would be considered
possible if an appropriate technique is available. However, it was only after
the middle of the twentieth century that quantitative approximation of
material and ideal domains of objects was achieved, and in this, evaluation
scales exercised a not inconsiderable influence. In Hegel's understanding these
possess possibly an objective character. In this, Hegel draws on Leibniz. The
second proposition from Leibniz's Dissertatio states that "it is not altogether
improbable that matter and quantity are in reality the same."28 The anti-
nomian 'moment' of quality and quantity is repeated in the relation of
continuity and discreteness, a falling apart into opposing 'moments', which
Kant presented in his cosmological antinomies, but which Hegel considered
demonstrable for every concep't. 29 The practical Significance of such results,
which had been obtained by hard intellectual work only becomes fully
visible, when practical access has actually been created. Hegel's theory of
mediation can be conceived as a model in which consciousness, activity and
the over-arching product of goal-satisfaction manifest themselves; it becomes
possible to represent them together, but the function of the means is brought
out. The state of affairs is understood as conforming to laws by Hegel, but
only under the supposition that an essential relationship is involved,30 which
Hegel assumes to be present in the thing itself and which he seeks to reflect.
What is to be conceived as law for Hegel is not a matter of a specific model
from natural science, to be derived from the disciplines existing in his time. It
remains undecided whether something of the type of Newton's mechanics is
to be taken. Since law is characterized as an relationship which should be
254 HERMAN LEY
subject to the same dialectical categories as the other conceptual determina-

tions, it also possesses, according to Hegel, the property of quantifiability.
In relation to the theory of mediation, Hegel already discussed the problem -
which later is discussed again and again - of the other relationship between
beings, consciousness and extra-human structures. The objection concerning
contemplation relates to those categories, .recognized in each instance, which
are conceived as bonds. One of the phenomena described as alienated in the
modern sense are the parameters put forward by Hegel in the theory of
mediation in which the overarching 'moment' in each case receives a recog-
nized overarching meaning. But in Hegel's understanding this is not a bond,
but rather a 'moment' of freedom. On the other hand, given the objections
that have been raised, the viewpoint is brought forth, that it is just in
becoming conscious of the determinations of relationships "that the subject"
is transformed "into a mere organ of conception of the known chances of
lawfulness." However, in confrontation with later polemics, Hegel's other
thought content is made plain and begins to draw near to future rationality in
a mystifying language which is considered to belong to Romanticism. Under
the presupposition of a dialectical identity philosophy, Hegel transcends the
'moment' of agnosticism present in Kant's philosophy, and does so in every
phase of the development of the entire system of consciousness, categories
and means, without allowing the human being to be worn out by the struc-
tures. Differing here from more recent philosophy, there is in the means an
alienation that can always be overcome. What is later called pervasive
rationalization of reality, in Hegel belongs to the human products that are at
the same time the transforming and overcoming [Aujhebung] of alienation.
For that reason they are a necessary stage, they can neither be eliminated nor
neglected. As Hegel formulates it: "the movement of essence is in general the
becoming of the Notion" (SL [M], p. 526). By way of the means and media-
tion, concrete confrontation with reality is included under this. The formula,
which sounds idealistic and scientistic, subsumes under the [so-called]
"becoming of the Notion" not only the action of thought but also its realiza-
tion in reality. In this context, 'notion' does not mean only the end of a
process, but at the same time refers to the beginning from which reality is
to be traversed. Identity philosopher that Hegel is, he appears hostile to
subjective idealism, and sees in the materiality of things the realm through
which human beings must pass. Accordingly, Hegel expressly praises the
scepticism of antiquity, which demonstrated the antagonisms within concepts
and with that discovered an objective phenomenon. Therefore the concept by
itself means only "immediate, passive existence.,,31 As the means is included
in the concept, Hegel also points to the contradiction between the means
inserted between man and nature, which alone let becoming come to totality.
Thereby the merely passive concept appears as one side of the contradiction,
which, when without realization and without retraction, remains an empty
and unfulftlled demand; it thus lacks the other side of the contradiction.
Hegel's dialectic is already confronted with the later critics of technology in
that they, just like the theorists of 'post-industrial society' , fixate on only one
side of reality. But as Hegel speaks of becoming, then knowledge does not
mean the exclusion of history, nor does the domain of means signify the
destruction of humanity. Becoming consists in the unity of the diverse
moments, which are formulated as the task of human beings and of society,
and only evading these tasks can represent withdrawal from this historical
process.
How broadly Hegel interprets the term 'concept' is shown when he points
to natural, scientific and mental development, in which the natural, in
contrast to the others, has been moved to first place. When Hegel speaks of
'concept', the material side, and also that side which is in the process of
becoming accessible to consciousness is included in his meaning. However,
since what is involved is always a becoming that includes the negation and
overcoming of the negation, the structures of what is real develop no less
than their images, and refer to each other. Accordingly, merely to be a
concept also means for Hegel a germinating and embryonic existence, which
must yet make its way to the full concept and complex manifestation. But it
is from this too that Hegel's remark comes about the equality of the whole
and its parts. The parts are accepted as representation of the whole, and the
whole as that of the parts, without the other dialectical category thereby
being revoked or overcome [aufgehoben] , namely, that as against its parts
the whole possesses a special quality. Hegel came to the assumption that a
tautology was expressed by this, which only gains its truth through mediation
(SL [M], p. 51St), and thereby receives an additional meaning. It appears
simultaneously as an inner and an external qlovement, which comes to
expression in things [Sachen] and in instinctual activity.
In the 'Preface' Hegel does not let freedom of the mind be dependent
solely on consciousness. The so-called unmediated unity with the subject
serves as the beginning. Freedom of the mind begins when what is conscious
is brought to objective status before the subject, and no longer remains
merely split up among the categories. In the dual Signification of Hegelian
diction, the logical business, as he calls it, is meant, and the transition into
reality, as well as further knowledge made fruitful by this. What is involved
256 HERMAN LEY
here, side by side, is the fundamental determination of the reality of the mind
and of reality itself, which man appropriates. According to this, it is doubly
efficacious categories that concern Hegel. They are only considered to be
appropriated by the understanding, if they have to the same extent passed
through confirmation in reality.32 The fixed points and nodes are considered
to be the life and consciousness of mind; and in the same way they are
considered to be an essential relation, i.e., law. Since becoming and objec-
tivity have a specific function in Hegel's philosophy, a further dialectical
antinomy appears in this, which belongs to the state of affairs to deny which
means a so-called prettifying of things. If law is defined as essential relation,
then it is not to be demanded o fit , that it be valid always and everywhere in
all possible worlds; rather proof of the existence of certain essential relations
suffices, and the domain of their validity will then follow as a possible further
question from this.
What is brought to consciousness can be the state of affairs as such, as well
as the universality of the claim to validity. In the categories of the dialectic
Hegel finds fundamental determinations of the reality of mind; these have
had to emerge and thus are also a product of development. Becoming itself,
however, appears as the inevitable state of affairs, which can never be dis-
pensed with. If the categories are expressly affected by this, then their
development applies to the domain of overarching mediation, in the first
place, for example, society, and then, natural, scientific and intellectual
development, all of them states of affairs in which development is linked to
the emergence of new conditions.
No matter that one or another discipline may have had a more rigorous
conception of modern science than was available for Hegel, for the discovery
of a logic of development is the achievement of this philosopher. Although
both the natural sciences and social theory could already show the beginnings
of a concept of evolution, the generalization of these attempts has not
appeared till then. As the revolutions of the bourgeoisie and the Third Estate
- now brought more or less to a conclusion - had shown there is develop-
ment in society, it was time for a hypothesis about the course of human
history accomplishing itself in this development, whether contingent or
necessary. Hegel sought for a historical understanding of society, and in this
he encountered the historical character of the determinations of thought, the
reciprocal connections of which he treated, in modern technology, synchroni-
cally and diachronically; and by this he sought to represent the truth in
process, but not in the manner of formal logic. If the formal logicians are
shocked by Hegel's application of a sequential algebra of truth, it must be
remembered that he distinguishes between correctness and truth (SL [M],

p. 38). However one might otherwise determine truth, "it is unjust to fail to
recognize that they (the rules of inference and indeed the main use of the
understanding) are neutral fgleichgiiltig] means, used at least as much by
error and sophistry" (SL [M], p. 38); and so Hegel finds it necessary to
develop the hitherto neglected complexity of content. Truth appears to him
to lie in the transition, in the mediation, in the becoming. As these processes
had till then not been elevated to the rank of determinants of thought, out
of them emerges a heuristic methodology of dialectics, which probably
also had its effects in those disciplines where no obvious indication of the
mediating function of Hegelian philosophy is to be found. Hegel's influence
fans out far beyond Feuerbach to Moleschott and perhaps the [materialist]
Monists, by way of Marx to Lenin, by way of Kierkegaard to the broad field
of the Existentialists, and in addition to those tendencies which were singled
out in their relationship to Hegel at the beginning of this paper. To elevate
transition, mediation and development to the rank of categories, and to label
them as 'contentful' truths, had yet to attain its status as a philosophical
innovation. If it initially met with approval, only then to flow out into
diverse directions, which transformed it, turned it upside down and thereby
subjected it to partial testing in the special sciences, it still remained present.
It can be maintained that dialectics then also enters into the discovered
structures of various disciplines, whenever only 'development' or 'evolution'
is the subject of discourse. Hegel grasped this possibility in his thesis of the
sliding scale of becoming conscious of nodes [of experience] that initially
are tied up in acquired instincts, but which finally become conscious cate-
gories. Understood heuristically, the Hegelian dialectic has the possibility
of being applied to past and future, and can be comprehended as a method
which also contains definiteness and indefmiteness immanently as a dialec-
tical pair of categories. The definite reproach brought forward against the
dialectic, that it is not exact enough, raises the question, whether it is not
precisely its content-determined relation to development which first gains for
it its scientific character precisely through the mediating partial category of
indefiniteness. As the dialectic distinguishes itself from mechanistic thinking
and the exactitude of a philosophically generalized Mechanics, it is not
subject to the temptation to try to prognosticate a point by point prediction
for every future event.
What Hegel conceives to be incompleteness, when considering thought, is
to leave truth "on one side" (SL [M], p. 39). Hegel sees truth not only in the
external form, but also in the content. 33 If the Aristotelian categories of
258 HERMAN LEY
content and form arouse the suspicion of being stuck in medieval scholas-
ticism - although a hardly appropriate judgment is pronounced upon the
schools of the latter in that way - then the assumption of fluid categories
proves to be suitable to pry the categories of content and form loose from
their mutually unrelated confrontation. If content and form were related
to each other as matter and entelechy, or material substance and configura-
tion [Stoff and Gestalt], then Hegel would seem to want to include various
categories in both traditional determinations of thought. Since content is not
to be debased to empty form, and as 'moments' of content are granted to
form, while at the same time a change of content and form should be grasped
in a formal sense as well as developmentally, Hegel can claim an enrichment
of the empirical material that enters into thinking about objective things.
Content and form no longer confront each other dualistically and cease to
incorporate spiritualistic dualistic elements within themselves. The original
root concepts of the understanding do not remain in the transcendent space
of the a priori, nor settle in the same realm as a collection of performed
possible formations. The Aristotelian separation of content and form meant a
dualism, which, Hegel felt, was contradictory to his identity philosophy in its
approach; for the same reason it had already lost its cogency in the tradition
of the young Schelling.
Hegel seeks to approach content and form in accordance with their
structure, by proceeding from the object of investigation, in which content
and form are conceived as fused, and thus no actual separation occurs. From
this Hegel concludes that the separation of content and form is an activity of
the understanding, something worth reflecting upon, and indeed simple self-
reflection can give rise to notable results. The separation of content and form
by the understanding does not create, so Hegel assumes, any content without
form neither in the absolute unformed Aristotelian matter nor in Spinozistic
substance. Since Hegel, without exception, imputes to things a heuristic
dialectic and process of becoming, and thinking thereby is induced to find
such states of affairs, so form must be found in so-called content, a form
whose inspiration and shape, as Hegel figuratively expresses himself, can
always be found in what can be called content. If the categories, as determin-
ations of thought, are to be distinguished from the 'thing' and to be advanced
before consideration in thought, then the result is the definite concept in
which, in fact, dialectically linked content and form are to be found, and
constitute a substantial unity?4
If the manner of expression seems more or less awkward, still Hegel
explains why it is that scientific concepts are capable of conferring knowledge
HEGEL'S RELA nON TO THE SCIENCES 259
and do not come to a standstill beyond the thing. A so-called 'substantial'

shape and form is acknowledged in the concepts. And with the term 'sub-
stantial' we return to the traditional conceptual framework, which, however,
had been pressed into Spinoza's intellectual framework, and there had assumed
an antidualistic position. When Hegel designates concepts as substantial, he
reflects precisely this antidualistic point of view, and notes that no content
and no component of form, which in principle resisted being known and
thereby brought the property of being unknowable from thinking into the
products of thought, could enter into concepts. Then the concept would
be debased and falsified. Hegel reproaches Kant in this respect with haVing
retained dualism.
Since Hegel maintains substantial unity of scientific concepts, then think-
ing and its results always remain within the sphere of its own business, which
is to get at the thing and to act upon the means within its schema, that
attributes to mediation and concept their binding connectedness with the
objective objects. In Hegel's conception, the intellectual objects never lose the
possibility of applying thought to things and of becoming effective in the
process in which the means, which act in an overarching manner, find their
application and have their function.
But with that Hegel draws action and thought closer together. Hegel
explicitly turns to a digression by way of social labor , and the result is his
assumption of a functional correction, by which the concept remains
adequate to the extent that the 'means' permit. To this extent, however, an
impulse comes from Hegel's philosophical idealism which gives a stimulus to
materialism, and can influence the modern development of the methodo-
logical instrumentarium. From that time on, concepts were linked with the
things referred to, even when philosophic reflection temporarily lost its
awareness that scientifically secured concepts, or expressed differently, terms
laden with meaning, have reference to objective processes. The growing
function of conceptual thinking in the progress of the sciences is, otherwise
than Hegel believed, accompanied by a new flowering of work in formal logic.
At the same time, openness to the hypothetical imagination of the creative
scientist, and to the transition from projected structures in thought to nature
isolated in experiments or to structures represented in models which seek to
grasp the relations between man and man or man and medicine, all these
allow Hegel's intellectual approach once more to become relevant. The
[scientific and practical formulas and] abbreviations that work against the
particularity of things are realized as the determinateness of concepts which
makes the indeterminateness and variance of the individual processes accessi-
260 HERMAN LEY
ble to theory and praxis. Along with the emphasis on the determinateness of
concepts, Hegel expressly holds that the indeterminations of the individual
object will not escape thought. Against naked empiricism, Hegel emphasizes
the grasp possible with theoretical thinking. Whether the data and facts
secured by observation or the basic propositions necessary for theoretical
derivation possess absolute validity, or are to be understood as relative,
remains a secondary problem at Hegel's stage of identity philosophy. Deter-
minateness and at least the coming-to-be of the 'means' and of consciousness,
including the categories, are regarded as properties of one thing. As Hegel
subsumes contradiction and [evolutionary] development under dialectic, he
does not come into conflict with his simultaneous respect for freedom of
thinking from contradictions defined by formal logic. In Hegel's under-
standing, the analogical procedure that differentiates various applications of
models already unambiguously signifies the dialectical contradiction within
the same mathematical structure. Hegel sees another dialectical contradiction
in the difference between the individual and the universal, which character-
izes every statement formulated in consciousness, even when it is supposed to
refer expressly to an individual object, but especially when generalized
theoretical discussions are involved, whether these be formalized or not.
Insofar as awareness seems to be intensified, it is seen that methodologically
secured rigor at the same time requires creative imagination, fantasy, within
the domain of fundamentally scientific expertise.
This active experimental approach to concrete objects and domains of
objects, in Hegel's understanding, aims to obtain the corresponding structures
by hard work. How Hegel gets from the multiplicity of empirical objects to
structure is treated with a certain naivete which belongs to a problematic
since then taken up again and again, from time to time. Obviously, for Hegel
the concept stands above the concrete object. If the concepts are what is real,
then Hegel seems to stay completely within classical realism of universals? 5
On the basis of the conception of this identity philosophy, however, the
relation to objects shows itself to have the same import as old conceptual
realism and naive copy -theory [of perception] ? 6
In contrast to the classical conceptual realism, as Hegel sees it, sensuous,
spatial and temporal, palpable existence are just as far from complete as the
concept, because both contain 'moments' that can only be elevated to the
'idea' together. Among these, Hegel understands the unity of the 'concept
and reality'. In connection with this, 'reality' points to that palpable exis-
tence which meanwhile has been conceived as externality, and as far as
Hegel's text is to be understood, contains laws and structures as a field of
internal relations. If, to begin with, Hegel speaks of reality as the external,
he then goes on to relate reality primarily to inner systematic coherence, to
be characterized more or less as the universal, or approximately, say, as a
'white box', as an approach which permits adequate characterization. How
this is to be achieved occupies Hegel because of the obvious denigration in his
time of scientific concept or, as we would say now, of theoretical thought
as against [immediately] palpable existence.
In the opposition of the concrete and the abstract, Hegel offers a quite
simple, but not unimportant delimitation of the two categories. If the
palpable counts as more admirable, as superior to the concept, then the
concept meets with the reproach the "it lacks so much of this kind of
material."37 But Hegel assumes that scientific procedure operates in just that
way. Since concepts are credited with a unified connection with reality, the
various terms utilized at the same time mean something like representation,
or image, but in which the constructive 'moment' of the understanding and
its activity find adequate consideration. Palpable existence is to be found in
the attributes to which reference is made. They do not function under the
criterion of any completeness required by the thing, but only that of being
sufficient. It is assumed that the object or the domain of objects can be
reduced in the multiplicity of its properties and characteristics to a smaller
number, without impairing its worth. Without any particular added specula-
tion, Hegel assumes that scientific thinking omits a greater number of known
properties and characteristics, at least in the formation of concepts, and does
so, indeed, not for subjective reasons, although these can be decisive too, but
for objective reasons which can be derived from the thing itself. It is expressly
attested for the understanding, that it is not a question of its inability to
appropriate the overwhelming multipliCity that confronts it. Rather, it is the
reverse, a property of the understanding to proceed in an appropriate manner,
and thereby just allow that adequacy of thing and concept, which Hegel does
not understand as a literal total mirror-image. Nor is the Aristotelian equality
of thing and concept accepted, for it too is subordinated to the process of
becoming, namely to the development of the scientific concept itself.
Accordingly, which features are of interest is subject to a catalogue of
influences in the Hegelian dialectic, through which the value and dignity of
the object only begin to assert themselves; thereby something is assumed
which is similar to distinguishing the essential from the unessential parameters
in working out structures in systems analysis. As Hegel considers the existence
of things to be given, he does not require any aMitional speculation about
the range of the capacity of the understanding. He considers it sufficient to
262 HERMAN LEY
secure the process of knowledge enriching and developing itself. As criterion

of validity, cogency of theoretical thinking, attention to the thing itself, and
the means as a mediating 'moment' are presupposed once and for all, so that
no stage in the progress of conceptual consciousness, which might have to be
distinguished, would be justified in claiming the world to be something
unknowable. With its observation of properties, empirical work is granted
sufficient significance, but theoretical thinking is considered as of equal value,
if not superior. When Hegel speaks of philosophy he means self-understanding
about the total state of affairs; when oriented toward all intellectually applied
means, we then see that none of the special sciences by itself will be granted
the ability to grasp the thing itself. In any case, Hegel does not equate
knowledge of objects with the transfers of all the features and properties into
the understanding. Intellectual construction receives no direct copy-function,
but rather the representation of structures which are not equated with the
"fleeting and superficial phenomena of the world of sensuous particulars";38
and indeed these do not correspond completely either, but give a more
accurate impression of the thing than is offered by superficial semblance.
F or the beginning of the nineteenth century in which Hegel wrote, the
argument was convincing, that religion held to external appearance just as
little as did the concepts of science. Some objections might be raised about
this reciprocal relationship, but these will not be discussed here. Adhering to
external semblance, to the phenomena, may be useful to religion or not. It is
similar in the sciences. The Copernican revolution contradicted the reigning
conceptions of religion and science. Both are subject to changes in their
principles. The speculative world design of a Genesis, a phantasmagoric
projection of social and natural reality onto a dualistically conceived horizon,
may on occasion be preparatory stages for an understanding of the world, but
may also block access to the world, if petrified into tradition. Hegel is a
Pantheist, and therefore, in his character as identity philosopher, possesses,
effectively and potentially, the entire heretical tradition that was linked
throughout history with mass movements and with attempts at an objective
understanding of nature. As has been noted, this relation is preserved in
Hegel's philosophy but what one must not forget, it is displaced into the
understanding of the becoming of various stages of social phenomena. Since
at that time becoming as process of development of nature and of society was
not accepted, the epistemological reflections provided analyses of these
processes. Incidentally, they contain a historical critique of religion, which
was understood as atheistic by Bruno Bauer.
Historically appropriate, the becoming and developing of scientific
concepts is actually preceded by 'feeling and intuition' ['Gefiihl and

Anschauung'] which have accompanied further development throughout the
long epochs down to the present, and do not necessarily become empty now,
as they continue to'be capable of stimulating access to new fields. However,
it was decisive for scientific concepts to have a non-sensuous mode of
expression which fmds its structures behind the phenomena even when they
derive, say, from the surface phenomena of statistical data. In the hypothesis
of Democritus's atomism, the model of scientific procedure was presented
which conceives the speculatively formed objects of thought, i.e. particles, as
the determining objects of sensually accessible reality. With the same
procedure, Hegel arrives at the 'seeds' which induce the manifestation of form
in biological objects and which struck Andre Lwoff as a modern idea. How-
ever one may look at Jacques Monod's discussions of social philosophy, his
analysis of modern genetics shows that the categories of chance and necessity
have actually changed just as much in the meantime as the forms of intuition,
space and time have changed since Newton and Kant, since Einstein, and
lastly but by no means in conclusion, through Ne'eman, Chew and Gell-Mann,
further developments already appear to be assured.
Churchman's relative sympathy for Hegel appears to be determined by the
'moments' of the objective significance of subjective evaluation and scales of
evaluation. Leaving aside the dialectical character even of micro-<ievelopment,
which itself, with the growth in the magnitude of productive opportunities,
demands a qualitative change of technology (in principle precisely processes
described by Hegel as dialectical), the dialectics of development probably has
the greatest significance. However, what should never be lost in Hegel's
dialectic is that it holds to the objectivity of mental constructions, which on
the one hand do not have to be palpably observable in nature or society, and
thus are not to be brought to immediate perception, and on the other hand
may be a directly material substrate like DNA and RNA. Hegel recognizes
objectivity in both cases which, expressed differently, can be material
substrate and, say, relations expressing themselves in terms of fields of
probability. Access to these states of affairs, Hegel calls overcoming sublation
[Aujheben] and reduction of reality-as-mere-appearance to the essential, and
this manifests itself only in the concept.
Thus Hegel's epistemological ideas put the terms feature [Merkmal] and
sign [Zeichen] not only in concrete phenomena. 39 As they are also results of
theoretical thinking, they lead to the category of synthesis a priori, which
Hegel calls a most important idea of Kant. 40 Once again intuitive thought is
decisively rejected. But for Hegel synthesis a priori does not signify apriorism
264 HERMAN LEY
as a limit to knowledge, but as a form of deductive approach which can have

its basis in empirical reality, but in any case can refer to empirical reality.
Hegel seeks to establish a relationship between nature and thought, inclusive
of social objects, without sacrificing the independence of thought nor of
concrete things [Dinge], nor playing these off against each other. The
synthesis a priori incorporates multiplicity into the concepts without losing
itself in the former. Any regression to ultimate ideal or material objects
continues to be avoided and is even expressly excluded, because bringing the
thing to its concept only requires recourse to a space of structures, through
which the field that is being treated is made pragmatically accessible. For
Hegel it is not the concrete results which the special sciences have furnished
that are of primary concern, but rather 'the nature of the concept', thereby
securing an assurance for human thought, which at the same time is set forth
as a basis for a theory of action. To analyze thinking and acting as two sides
of a thing remains the concern of Hegel's philosophy, in order to surmount
fragmentation into externally separated domains and yet without obscuring
the difference between these. Hegel was able to display in his own work those
multi-stratified structures, which in his own time offered points of departure
to the most diverse and opposite positions, and the possibility for such points
of departure also seems to be offered in our day. It may be surprising, but it
is not incomprehensible that we have newly uncovered access to constella-
tions of problems in fields concerning which it was generally agreed that
Hegel certainly had nothing to say.
Humboldt University
Berlin, C.D.R.
NOTES
1 Charles Sanders Peirce to William James, Oct. 3,1904: "More or less explicitly, some
writers, namely the Thomists, the Hegelians, and other Intellectualists, together with
some scientific thinkers not too much sophisticated by reading philosophy, recognize
with me (until I shall have studied your views, which I don't believe will carry me
entirely away from this anchorage) three modes of consciousness, that of feeling, that
of EXPERIENCE (experience meaning precisely that which the history of my life has
FORCED me to think; so that the idea of a struggle, of not mere twoness but active
opugnancy is in it), and thirdly, the consciousness of the future (whether veridical or
not is aside from the question) ... " Collected Papers of Charles Sanders Peirce. 8 vols.
(Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press, 1931-1958), Vol. VIII. Reviews, Corre·
spondence and Bibliography, ed. by Arthur W. Burks, 1958, p. 202.
2 K.-O. Apel, 'Peirces Denkweg vom Pragmatismus zum Pragmatizismus', in Charles
S. Peirce, Schriften II (Frankfurt a. M., Suhrkamp, 1970), p. 18.
3 Charles Sanders Peirce, Collected Papers . .. Vol. V: Pragmatism and Pragmaticism,

ed. by C. Hartshorne and P. Weiss, 1934. p. 3lf.
4 Ibid., p. 128. Peirce refers to Kirchhoffs Vorlesungen iiber mathematische Physik,
vol. I, Vorrede, Leipzig, Teubner, 1974-76. Apel notes that Peirce goes beyond the
reality theory of the first and second period; he is no longer content with the postulate,
critical of the senses held by the eschatological consensus of all scientists, but demands
beyond that - in the interest to a certain degree of a methodological orientation of the
research process - that the real universality of the laws of nature, which as real possi-
bility is the condition for experimental knowledge, can be 'perceived' already now.
K.-O. Apel, op. cit., p. 388, notes 62 and 64.
5 "The tree is a living reality, says the German philosopher. In its germ the determinants
exist as potentialities. Nothing is in the tree which was not already in the germ, and yet
in the germ one does not see anything, even with the microscope. We can visualize the
determinants as existing in the germ as extremely simple forces" (A. Lwoff, Biological
Order (Cambridge, Mass., MIT Press, 1962), p. 14). Lwoff mentions the English philoso-
pher, Herbert Spencer, as of the year 1864, Ernst Hackel, as of 1866 and Weismann as
of 1892. The quantitative studies began with Gregor Mendel in 1865. A passage similar
to the one mentioned by Lwoff, but not identical, can be found in Hegel's The Philoso-
phy of Fine Art, where Hegel says with respect to the beautiful in art: "There is no end
to the caprice of the human features. Speaking generally, we would associate with this
ground the fact that the beauty of children most arrests us. In their faces we find all pro-
nounced idiosyncracies slumber as it were beneath a quiet veil [Keim]; no dominating
passion as yet ravages their soul; not one of the thousand interests of the grown man has
engraved for ever the expression of its necessity on these mobile features" (The Philoso·
phy of Fine Art, trans. F. P. B. Osmaston. 4 vols. (London, G. Bell, 1920). Vol. I, p. 207.
cf. Vorlesungen iiber die Asthetik. Vol. I, pp. 210-211 (Jubiliiumsausgabe 12,1927».
6 A. Meyer-Abich, Geistesgeschichtliche Grundlagen der Bioiogie (Stuttgart, Fischer,
1963), Vorwort (no pagination).
7 Ibid.
8 Ibid., p. 237: "Corresponding to this completely, the complementarities too of natural
science in physics and biology stand side by side as antinomical theses, they distinguish
themselves from truly historical complementarities, like those of the history of philoso-
phy, already mentioned, only by the fact that in them the clearly defmed synthesis is
lacking. In this sense we regard the complementarity in natural science as weak historical
complementarities that are only beginning. In reality this synthesis can also be found in
the complementarities of natural science. In physics, in the case of waves and corpuscles,
physics as such in its totality. In biology, in the case of the form-function complemen-
tarity the same is true of physiology, in the case of the heredity-adaptation (environ-
ment) complementarity, of developmental physiology, and in the case of environment-
inner world, of ecology."
9 H. v. Helmholtz, Ueberdas Ziel und die Fortschritte der Naturwissenschaft (Innsbruck
1869). InPopuliire wissenschaftliche Vortriige 2, 1971.
10 Meyer-Abich, p. 233: "The philosophers of the time, however, already treated the
natural sciences as if they were dealing with historical structures. From that nothing but
incoherence could result. All that has become fundamentally different today ... and
indeed we have phylogeny as the history of organisms. With that Hegel's logic becomes
the logic of phylogenetic thinking."
266 HERMAN LEY
11 C. F. v. Weizsiicker, Die Tragweite der Wissenschaft (Stuttgart, Hirzel, 1964), p. 145.

12 C. West Churchman, Prediction and Optimal Decisions, Philosophical Issues of a
Science of Values (Engelwood Cliffs, N.J., Prentice-Hall, 1961), p. 168: "This meta-
physical theory is borrowed without benefit of the scrutinies of critics of the intervening
centuries from the empiricism of John Locke. Anyone adopting such a theory must at
least try to answer the devastating theses of Berkeley and Kant: data are not moves of
nature; they are in part our own moves, created by our judgement. What neither
Berkeley nor Kant provided to our full satisfaction is the theory of this creative process;
but the study of such a theory seems far more fruitful than the study of strategies
against an indefirIable Great Mother."
13 See H. Ley and Th. Miiller, Kritische Vemunft und Revolution. Zur Kontroverse
zwischen Hans Albert und liirgen Habermas (Cologne, Pahl-Rugenstein, 1971), pp. 210-
232.
14 C. West Churchman, On the Ethics of Large Scale Systems (Berkeley, September
1966, working paper), Part III, Ch. 1, p. 118: "On the other hand philosophers have
often extended the meaning of logic to cover many things, that the formal logicians do
not consider. Hegel, for example, in his writings in the last century described 'logic' as
the whole process of developirIg an understanding of the world. This idea of logic was
captured in his 'dialectical method.' Similarly scientists often use the term 'logic' to refer
to the methods by which they reach their conclusions in their empirical investigations,
and they frankly confess that these methods go beyond the rigorous principles of formal
logic."
IS "Of course, there were a few diehards in this long process of killing the Age of Rea-
son and its Gods. There was Hegel who suggested a dialectical theology; the end point of
the process of reality is an Absolute Mind. But Marx showed it was far more significant
to use the dialectical method to describe a sociological, materialist process without a
God" (ibid., p. 148).
16 "Because of the fixed reality of natural objects the study of nature compels us to fix
the categories which can no longer be ignored in her, although with complete irIcon-
sistency towards other categories which are also allowed to remairI valid; and such study
does not permit the further step of abstractirIg from the opposition and irIdulgirIg irI
generalities as so easily happens in the intellectual sphere" (SL [M] , p. 33).
17 "The critical philosophy had, it is true, already turned metaphysics irIto logic but
it, like the later idealism, as previously remarked, was overawed by the object, and so
the logical determinations were given an essentially subjective significance with the result
that these philosophies remained burdened with the object they had avoided and were
left with the residue of a thing-in-itself, an infmite obstacle, as a beyond. But the libera-
tion from the opposition of consciousness which the science of logic must be able to
presuppose lifts the determirIations of thought above this timid, incomplete standpoint
and demands that they be considered not with any such limitation and reference but as
they are in their own proper character, as logic, as pure reason" (ibid., Introduction,
p.51).
18 "But inasmuch as it is said that understanding, reason, is irI the objective world, that
mind and nature have universal laws to which their life and their changes conform, then
it is conceded that the determinations of thought equally have objective value and
existence" (ibid.).
19 "Consequently it is much more difficult to believe that the forms of thought which
permeate all our ideas - whether these are purely theoretical or contain matter belonging
to feeling, impulse, will - are means for us, rather than that we serve them, that in fact
they have us in their possession; what is there more in us as against them, how shall we,
how shall I, set myself up as more universal than they, which are the universal as such"
(ibid., Preface to the Second Edition, p. 35).
20 "Or again, to speak of things, we call the nature or the essence of things their notion,
and this is only for thought; but still less shall we say of the notions of things that we
dominate them, or that the determinations of thought of which they are the complex
are at our service; on the contrary, it is our thinking that must accommodate itself to
them, and our caprice or freedom ought not to want to mould them to suit itself. Since,
therefore, subjective thought is our very own, innermost, act, and the objective notion of
things constitutes their essential import, we cannot go outside this our act, we cannot
stand above it, and just as little can we go beyond the nature of things" (ibid., p. 35f.).
21 Ibid., p. 32: "The advance of culture generally, and of the sciences in particular,
gradually brings into use higher relationships of thought, or at least raises them to greater
universality, and they have thus attracted increased attention. This applies even to the
empirical and natural sciences which in general employ the commonest categories, for
example, whole and parts, a thing and its properties, and the like)."
22 "The way critical philosophy understands the relationship of these three terms is
that we place our thoughts as a medium between ourselves and the objects, and that
this medium instead of connecting us with the objects rather cuts us off from them. But
this view can be countered by the simple observation, that these very things which are
supposed to stand beyond us and, at the other extreme, beyond the thoughts referring
to them, are themselves figments of subjective thought, and as wholly indeterminate
they are only one single thought-thing - the so-called thing-in-itself of empty abstrac-
tion" (ibid., p. 36).
23 "Further, since the end is f'mite it has a finite content; accordingly, it is not an
absolute, nor simply something that in its own nature is rational" (ibid., p. 747).
24 "But the means is the external middle term of the syllogism which is the realization
of the end; in the means, therefore, the rationality in it manifests itself as such by main-
taining itself in this external other, and precisely through this externality. To this extent
the means is superior to the finite ends of external purposiveness: the plough is more
honourable than are immediately the enjoyments procured by it and which are the ends.
The tool lasts, while the immediate enjoyments pass away and are forgotten. In his tools
man possesses power over external nature, even though in respect of his ends he is, on
the contrary, subject to it" (ibid.).
2S E. Nagel, The Structure of Science, Problems in the Logic of Scientific Explanation
(New York, Harcourt, Brace and World, 1961), p. 15: "As we shall see, such explana-
tions may be offered for individual occurrences, for recurring processes, or for invariable
as well as statistical regularities."
26 V. I. Lenin, 'Conspectus of Hegel's Book, The Science of Logic' in Philosophical
Notebooks, vol. 38 of Collected Works (London, Lawrence and Wishart; Moscow Foreign
Languages Publishing House, 1961), p. 190.
27 Georg Lukacs, History and Class Consciousness. Studies in Marxist Dialectics. Trans.
Rodney Livingstone (cambridge, Mass., MIT Press, 1971), p. 129f.: "It is important to
realise that if we take action in the sense indicated above to mean changing reality, an
orientation toward the qualitatively essential and the material substratum of action, then
268 HERMAN LEY
the attitude under discussion will appear much more contemplative than, for instance,
the idea of knowledge held by Greek philosophers. For this 'action' consists in predict-
ing, in calculating as far as possible the probable effects of those laws, and the subject
of the 'action' takes up a position in which these effects can be exploited to the best
avantage of his own purposes. It is therefore evident that, on the one hand, the more the
whole of reality is rationalised and the more its manifestations can be integrated into the
system of laws, the more such prediction becomes feasible. On the other hand, it is no
less evident that the more reality and the attitude of the subject 'in action' approximates
to this type, the more the subject will be transformed into a receptive organ ready to
pounce on opportunities created by the system of laws and his 'activity' will narrow
itself down to the adoption of a vantage point from which these laws function in his best
interests (and this without any intervention on his part)."
28 "Non omnino improbabile est, materiam et quantitatem esse realiter idem." See also
SL [M], p. 189f. where Hegel continues: "In fact, the distinction between these two
concepts is simply this, that quantity is a determination of pure thought, whereas matter
is the same determination in outer existence."
29 "But profounder insight into the antinomial, or more truly into the dialectical nature
of reason demonstrates any Notion whatever to be a unity of opposed moments to which,
therefore, the form of antinomial assertions could be given. Becoming, determinate
being, etc. and every other Notion, could thus provide its particular antinomy, and thus
as many antinomies could be constructed as there are Notions. Ancient scepticism did
not spare itself the pains in demonstrating this contradiction or antinomy in every
notion which presented itself in the sciences" (ibid., p. 191).
30 "Thus law is essential relation" (ibid., p. 511).
31 "This makes itself apparent in all natural, scientific and spiritual development
generally and it is essential to recognize that because something is at fIrst only inner or
also in its Notion, the fIrst stage is for that very reason only its immediate, passive
existence" (ibid., p. 526).
32 " ... when the content of the interest in which one is absorbed is drawn out of its
immediate unity with oneself and becomes an independent object of one's thinking,
then it is that spirit begins to be free, whereas when thinking is an instinctive activity,
spirit is enmeshed in the bonds of its categories and is broken up into an infinitely varied
material. Here and there in this mesh there are firm knots which give stability and
direction to the life and consciousness of spirit; these knots or nodes owe their fixity and
power to the simple fact that having been brought before consciousness, they are
independent, self-existent Notions of its essential nature. The most important point for
the nature of spirit is not only the relation of what it is in itself to what it is actually, but
the relation of what it knows itself to be to what it actually is; because spirit is essen-
tially consciousness, this self-knowing is a fundamental determination of its actuality."
33 "The inadequacy of this way of regarding thought which leaves truth on one side
can only be made good by including in our conception of thought not only that which is
usually reckoned as belonging to external form but the content as well. It is soon evident
that what at rust to ordinary reflection is, as content, divorced from form, cannot in fact
be formless, cannot be devoid of inner determination; if it were, then it would be only
vacuity, the abstraction of the thing-in-itself; that, on the contrary, the content in its own
self possesses form, in fact it is through form alone that it has soul and meaning ... "
(ibid., p. 38f.).
34 "But in this connection we can be reminded that there is a multitude of objects

[Sachen]. We have, however, already said how it is that restrictions are imposed on
this multitude, that the Notion, simply as thought, as a universal, is the immeasurable
abbreviation of the multitudes of particular things which are vaguely present to intuition
and pictorial thought; but also a Notion is, first, in its own self the Notion, and this is
only one and is the substantial foundation; secondly, a Notion is determinate and it is
this determinateness in it which appears as content: but the determinateness of the
Notion is a specific form of this substantial oneness, a moment of the form is totality,
of that same Notion which is the foundation of the specific Notions" (ibid., p. 39).
3S "But the truth is that it is not the material given by intuition and representation that
ought to be vindicated as the real in contrast to the Notion" (ibid., p. 587).
36 "In both these actions the Notion is not the independent factor, not the essential
and true element of the prior given material; on the contrary, it is the material that is
regarded as the absolute reality, which cannot be extracted from the Notion.
"Now it must certainly be admitted that the Notion as such is not yet complete, but
must rise to the Idea which alone is the unity of the Notion and reality; and this must be
shown in the sequel to be the spontaneous outcome of the nature of the Notion itself
For the reality which the Notion gives itself must not be received by it as something
external but must, in accordance with the requirement of the science, be derived from
the Notion itself" (ibid.).
37 Ibid., pp. 587-88: "People often say, "It is only a notion,' contrasting the notion not
only with the Idea but with sensuous, spatial and temporal, palpable reality as something
more excellent than the Notion; and then the abstract is held to be of less account than
the concrete because it lacks so much of this kind of material. In this view, to abstract
means to select from the concrete object for our subjective purposes this or that mark
without thereby detracting from the worth or status of the many other properties and
features left out of account; on the contrary, these as real retain their validity com-
pletely unimpaired, only they are left yonder, on the other side; thus it is only the
inability of the understanding to assimilate such wealth that compels it to content itself
with the impoverished abstraction. Now to regard the given material of intuition and the
manifold representation as the real in contrast to what is thought, to the Notion, is a
view, the abandonment of which is not only a condition of philosophizing but is already
presupposed by religion."
38 Ibid., p. 588: " ... how can there be any need for religion, how can religion have any
meaning, if the fleeting and superficial phenomena of the world of sensuous particulars
are still regarded as the truth? But philosophy gives a reasoned insight into the true state
of the case with regard to the reality of sensuous being; it assumes the stages of feeling
and intuition as precedent to the understanding in so far as they are conditions of its
genesis, but only in the sense that it is conditioned by their reality. Abstract thinking,
therefore, is not to be regarded as a mere setting aside of the sensuous material, the
reality of which is not as mere phenomenal appearance to the essential, which is
manifested only in the Notion."
39 "Of course, if what is taken up into the Notion from the concrete phenomenon is
to serve only as a mark or sign, it certainly may be any mere random sensuous particular
determination of the object, selected from the others on the basis of any random external
interest and of a similar kind and nature as the rest" (ibid.).
40 "This original synthesis of apperception is one of the most profound principles for
270 HERMAN LEY
speculative development; it contains the beginning of a true apprehension of the nature

of the Notion and is completely opposed to that empty identity or abstract universality
which is not within itself a synthesis .... It is in keeping with this standpoint, too, that
the Notion without the manifold of intuition is again declared to be empty and devoid
of content despite the fact that it is a synthesis a priori; as such, it surely does contain
determinateness and difference within itself" (ibid., p. 589).
KENLEY ROYCE DOVE
HEGEL'S 'DEDUCTION OF THE CONCEPT OF SCIENCE'
In one of his most memorable epigrams, Aristotle declares it to be the mark

of an educated man to seek in each type of inquiry only as much precision or
exactness as the nature of the subject matter allows. This remark, which
appears at the beginning of his inquiry into 'the practical sciences' (i.e., Ethics
and Politics), is designed to forestall the kind of mistakes made by his great
predecessor, whom Aristotle criticizes for trying to determine the unity of
the polis too precisely. He does not mean to suggest that an educated man
should avoid the study of works such as Plato's Republic; the suggestion is
rather that his time would be better spent if he did not attempt to discover
scientifically demonstrative arguments in them.
The subject matter of the present inquiry is Hegel's Phenomenology of
Spirit. Many have been persuaded that the book should be read in the spirit
of Aristotle's practical philosophy, that one should not seek scientific preci-
sion where it cannot be found, and that Hegel, like Plato, can be read with
great profit without succumbing to 'the Platonic Fallacy'. This manner of
approaching the Phenomenology is extremely attractive, and for at least
two reasons. (1) After a century and a half of scholarly writing about the
Phenomenology, no consensus has been reached either concerning the precise
subject matter or the argument of the book. To the extent that agreement has
been reached, it has tended to be negative, namely, that Hegel himself altered
his intentions about the subject matter or the argument during the course of
his actual composition of the book. (2) The subject matter Hegel takes up in
the second half of the book, whether or not it is continuous with and
develops out of the foregoing subject matter, bears a very strong family
resemblance to the subject matter of Aristotle's practical philosophy. Indeed
chapter VI, 'Geist', begins with a treatment of a form of ethical life whose
basic structure directly parallels Aristotle's juxtaposition of the oikos and
polis in the first book of the Politics. All the more reason, then, for reading
Hegel's Phenomenology in the spirit of Aristotle's practical philosophy.
Readers agree that many of the trees are magnificent; but the wood is dark.
So why get lost?
Probably the darkest saying Hegel ever made about the Phenomenology
is to be found in the opening pages of the Science of Logic. It is especially
271
R. S. Cohen and M. W. Wartofsky (eds.) , Hegel and the Sciences, 271-281.
272 KENLEY ROYCE DOVE
vexing since it is one of his very few utterances about the function of the
work as a whole. He there refers to the book as "the deduction of the
concept of science" and assigns the concept, thus deduced, the formidable
role of being the necessary presupposition for his otherwise presupposition-
less Logic. 1 The Logic, on the other hand, takes up in its first chapter a
subject matter which seems to bear no resemblance to that of the second half
of the Phenomenology. It begins with 'pure being'. And if we ask what this
might be, the immediate context does not seem to be very illuminating, for
we are only told what 'pure being' is not: it is not definite and it is not
mediate. It is "das unbestimmte Unmittelbare (WL [1812] 1, p. 22)". In fact,
it is said to be nothing more nor less than Nothing.
This famous and irritating beginning of the Logic has been the object of a
considerable literature. 2 But, as in the case of the Phenomenology, nothing
like a critical consensus has been arrived at. The Logic continues to be read,
but its beginning remains an enigma.
Given this situation, it would be foolhardy simply to assert that the mysteries
of the Logic might be unlocked by referring all difficulties of its beginning to
the Phenomenology, as its presumptive 'deduction'. For, as we have seen,
the Phenomenology itself is no less problematical than the Logic. But perhaps
some light might be cast on the question of the Phenomenology's subject
matter if the question of its argument were focussed by the problem of the
beginning of the Logic. The aim of this paper is to explore the conjecture that
the Phenomenology, when read as a "deduction of the concept of science,"
will reveal more clearly the nature of its subject matter.
As we have seen, the subject matter at the beginning of the second half of
the Phenomenology, 'Geist', is remarkably akin to that of Aristotle's practical
philosophy. It is also strikingly different from the traditional subject matter
of German Idealism, i.e., the 'Ich'. Now when we look at the pages of the
Logic immediately preceding the treatment of 'pure being', we find that
Hegel explicitly contrasts 'Ich' and 'Geist' with respect to the problem of an
absolute beginning in science. An examination of this discussion, "Womit
muss der Anfang der Wissenschaft gemacht werden?" (with special reference
to the recently republished 1812 edition), will suggest an interpretative
conjecture concerning the Phenomenology.
The section begins with the statement of what appears to be a dilemma.
On the one hand, the result of the Phenomenology, 'pure knowing', is said to
HEGEL'S DEDUCTION OF THE CONCEPT OF SCIENCE 273
be presupposed by the Logic, the pure science (WL [1812], p. 6). On the
other hand, an absolute science must itself be an absolute beginning, and as
such it may presuppose nothing (WL [1812], p. 7). If the Logic is taken to
begin as a science of the absolute, it will therefore be incompatible with the
Phenomenology. Since Hegel has explicitly affirmed that the Logic does
require and must presuppose the "deduction of the concept of science," and
that the Phenomenology is this deduction, the implication seems to be that
the Logic does not and cannot have an absolute beginning.
An explication of this, at first sight, impossible dilemma is to be found on
the next page of the 1812 edition. The paragraph in question has been
discussed only rarely in the Hegel literature; and since it is critical to our
problem, it will be well to cite it entire:
In der ersten so eben gegebenen Darstellung des Seyns als des Anfangs ist der Begriff des
Wissens vorausgesetzt. Somit ist dieser Anfang nicht absolut, sondern kommt aus der
vorhergehenden Bewegung des Bewusstseyns her. Die Wissenschaft dieser Bewegung
[i.e., the Phenomenology of Spirit], aus der das Wissen resultirt, miisste nun den
absoluten Anfang haben. Sie macht ihn mit dem unmittelbaren Bewusstseyn, dem
Wissen, dass etwas ist. - Das Seyn macht so hier gleichfalls den Anfang, aber als Bcstim-
mung einer eonereten Gestalt, des Bewusstseyns; ERST DAS REINE WISSEN, DER
GEIST, DER SICH VON SEINER ERSCHEINUNG ALS BEWUSSTSEYN BEFREYT
HAT, HAT AUCH DAS FREYE, REINE SEYN ZU SEINEM ANFANG. - Aber jener
Anfang, das unmittelbare Bewusstseyn, enthiilt das leh als bezogen auf ein schleehthin
Anderes, und umgekehrt, den Gegenstand bezogen auf leh; somit eine Vermittlung. -
Zwar entha:it das Bewusstseyn die beyden Vermittelnden - die aueh wiederum die
Vermittelten sind, - selbst, weist somit nicht tiber sich hinaus, und ist in sich beseh-
lossen. Aber indem die Vermittlung gegenseitig ist, so ist jedes Vermittelnde auch
vermittelt, somit keine wahrhafte Unmittelbarkeit vorhanden. - Aber umgekehrt,
wARE eine solche vorhanden, so ist sie, DA SIE NICHT BEGRUNDET 1ST, etwas
WILLKURLICHES und ZUFALLIGES (WL [1812], p. 8 - emphasis added).
As in the case of Plato's recollection myth, which is said simply to trans-
port the paradox of learning (Meno, 80E) to another level, Hegel's remarks
concerning the beginning of logical science and its derivation from the
Phenomenology have been seen as a dodge. In the light of this paragraph,
however, we see that Hegel clearly distinguishes between two ways of begin-
ning and two types of subject matter in which these beginnings may be made.
The one kind of beginning is absolute, but not immediate. The other is
immediate, but not absolute. In the former, immediate consciousness begins
absolutely, with the knowledge that something is. It is absolute because
consciousness refers to nothing beyond itself. It simply affirms the absolute
identity of what is 'for it', pure being, and what it takes itself to be, the pure
Ich. As the affirmation of a relation, however, consciousness is not immediate
but rather the reflective mediation of the Ich, identified with what is for it
(the object), and the object, identified with the Ich. Both terms of this
identity are therefore mediating and mediated. And to affirm the immediacy
of either by itself would be to remove it from the absoluteness of the
identity, to declare it fortuitous, arbitrary, and groundless. C:onsciousness is
therefore the subject of the absolute way of beginning. It begins with an
absolute grounding, the identity of its terms: the Ich and pure being. And this
is the beginning of the Phenomenology, the shape of consciousness called
'Sense Certainty'. .
The other way of beginning, which is immediate but not absolute, first
becomes possible as the result of the movement (Bewegung) which begins
absolutely with consciousness and through which 'Geist' is "liberated from
its appearance as consciousness." As such, it is said to be 'pure knowing' and
to have 'pure being' as its beginning. 'Pure being' was also the beginning,
indeed, the absolute beginning of the 'Ich' in the Phenomenology. But, as we
have seen, it was there a term in a relation of absolute identity, the unity of
consciousness. At the end of the Phenomenology 'pure being' becomes a
beginning, the beginning of 'pure knowing', now conceived as Spirit purified
of all relation to an object, pure spiritual unity (geistige Einheit). Here there
is no absolute beginning because there is no absolute ground; spiritual unity is
pure immediacy, immediacy as the result of a process of purification. And
through this process, consciousness, which began the movement described in
the Phenomenology with an absolute grounding, seems to have become
groundless.
These observations suggest that the key problem for a coherent interpreta-
tion of the Phenomenology will be an understanding of how spiritual unity
emerges through the movement of mediation which begins with the absolute
identity of the 'Ich' and its object. Put in its most concise form, the question
is how Spirit emerges - and is not simply introjected - in the' Wissenschaft
der Erfahrung des Bewusstseins'. Is this Science continuous with the
'Wissenschaft der Phiinomenologie des Geistes'?
To this end it will be important to notice that the absolute identity of
consciousness is absolute only from a standpoint independent of conscious-
ness. Hegel makes this point most clearly in his Jena lectures of 1803-04.
"Aber dies Bewusstseiende, und das, dessen es sich bewusst ist, ist nur fUr
einen Dritten diese Einheit des Bewusstseins, nicht fur sie selbst ... ".3 In
the Phenomenology it is clear that this 'third' is the 'Wir', who observe the
entire development of consciousness from its absolute beginning to its
'Aufbebung' in pure knowing. 4 The absoluteness of the beginning of the
Phenomenology must be seen to consist not merely in the identity of the two
terms of consciousness, Ich and object, for this inner reflective unity is an
absolute unity only by means of an 'external reflection', or 'fUr uns' (see
WL [L], 2, p. 18). The 'Wir' is therefore a constitutive element of conscious-
ness from the point of its absolute beginning and because it is an absolute
beginning.
It must be noted, however, that the absolute unity of consciousness with
which the Phenomenology begins is not posited by the 'Wir'. The 'Wir' is
rather pre-thematically posited by consciousness as the necessary condition
of its claim to absoluteness. The development of the argument in the book
may therefore be read as a progressive thematization by consciousness of that
ultimate, but at first abstractly posited ground of its absoluteness: the 'Wir'.
The Ich of consciousness therefore has two objects, the one with which it
identifies itself as a knowing subject, and the other the essential ground on
which its claims of ultimate or absolute identity with its first object are
based. In its relationship to the first object, the Ich takes itself to be absolute-
ly certain of itself. It is absolutely at one with its object. But as the knowing
subject in an absolutely scientific mode of knowing, it must also express the
truth conditions, the grounds, for its certainty. And thus it begins the process
of thematizing its second object. This second object is at first taken to be
simply the Ansich or the essence of the certainty constituting the relation to
the first object. But when consciousness actually expresses what it takes the
absolute ground or essence (Ansich or Wesen) of its certainty to be, the
ground expressed reveals itself to be merely an Ansich or essence for con-
sciousness and not something in itself or absolute. We therefore see that
consciousness, as consciousness, cannot immediately thematize its ground;
it cannot, as Hegel so strikingly puts it, "shoot the absolute out of a pistol."
But it does take the now thematized essence or Ansich to be new ground for
its subsequent truth claims. And this process of mediation in which con-
sciousness progressively thematizes its absolute continues throughout the
Phenomenology.
The movement (Bewegung) of consciousness presented in the Phenomeno-
logy may therefore be understood as a sequence of stages (the 'Gestalten des
Bewusstseins'), each of which is defined by the fundamental truth claim that
consciousness has come to the point of thematizing. But although the
Gestalten are discontinuous, each being defined by a definite Ansich, all share
the form of consciousness as such, all are forms of knowing in which a subject
takes itself to be related to an object. Viewed in this way, we can also see that
this movement will have a terminus, namely, at that stage when knowing no
longer has the form of consciousness, when, as Hegel expresses it in the

Logic,S the "opposition of consciousness" (Le., Ich and Object) will have
been overcome. At the completion of its voyage of discovery, the last Gestalt
of consciousness thus comes to discover what it is in truth, namely' Wir'. But,
as such, the knowing subject is no longer in the form of consciousness, no
longer a subject making truth-claims. For at this stage there is no longer any
ground for asserting the absoluteness of any relation between subject and
object. The 'Wir', purified of its relation to consciousness, is pure knowing
(reines Wissen), no longer a knowing grounded in the absolute, but knowing
knowing itself. And, as such, it is pure immediacy, the pure and unmediated
knowing from which the 'pure science', i.e., Logic, begins.
The problematic beginning of the Logic, 'pure being' characterized as "die
unbestimmte Unmittelbarkeit," does, as we have seen, have the form of a
reflective expression. And Hegel, in the section of the Logic referred to
above, clearly acknowledges this.6 But whether or not such expressions, at
the beginning of the Logic of 'Sein', illicitly presuppose categories yet to be
developed in the Logic of 'Wesen', is a question that might be viewed in
another light if an introductory "deduction of the concept of science"
includes an example of the Logic of Wesen in the development of conscious-
ness' truth-claims. Then "die unbestimmte Unmittelbarkeit" might be read as
a result rather than an anticipation.
II
If we grant the foregoing conjecture with respect to the argument of the

Phenomenology, conceived as a "deduction of the concept of science," what
light is thrown upon the question of the subject matter of the book? How
may this subject matter be understood to undergo a development conforming
to the proof-structure demanded by this argument? More specifically, what
does the conjectured development of consciousness, as a progressive thema-
tization and ultimate manifestation of its absolute ground, suggest about the
significance of the ground posited by consciousness, the 'Wir', for us as
readers of the Phenomenology, on the one hand, and for the concept of
'Geist' on the other?
In the first place, it is clear from the Introduction to the Phenomenology
that Hegel shows his readers why it would be impossible for them to make
any justifiable truth-claims at the beginning of an exposition of science
(Phiin [H, 1937], pp. 63-66). Hegel does not at this or any other point in
the Phenomenology invite us to begin or observe the beginning of pure
science, i.e., Logic, but rather to witness the development of phenomenal

science, that is, a science begun by consciousness and in which consciousness
expresses, gives phenomenal form to, its own absolute truth claims. For it is
the very nature of consciousness to be a consciousness-of, of an object, and,
as a scientifically knowing subject, to set down standards in terms of which
it is prepared to utter warrant statements about its objective knowledge
(Phiin [H, 1937] , p. 71).
Thus we, as readers of the Phenomenology, are explicitly invited to
suspend all judgment, to engage in what might be called an epoche with
respect to our subject matter, knowing consciousness, which by its nature
does make truth-claims. In this respect, we, as readers of the Phenomenology
are from the outset akin to that 'Wir' in which consciousness was above seen
pre-thematically to ground its claim to knowledge of the absolute. But at this
stage, our disengagement, our epoche, is no more than a disengagement from
the standpoint of consciousness. If we, as readers of the Phenomen%gy, are
to come to the actual insight that we are not merely akin to but at one with
the 'Wir', the 'pure knowing' with which the Phenomenology ends, then this
will only come as a result of our detailed comprehension of how conscious-
ness, our subject matter, itself progresses from its absolute beginning to its
fmal sublimation in the 'Wir'. For us readers, the suspension of judgment that
we undertake at the beginning of the Phenomenology is a mere thought-
experiment.
Secondly, let us turn to the question of 'Geist'. At the conclusion of the
Phenomenology (Phiin [H, 1937], p. 564) as well as in Hegel's Jena lectures,?
absolute knowing is described as "der sich als Geist wissende Geist." May this
be regarded as an alternate expression for what we have called the 'Wir'? If so,
then 'Geist' in its fmal form must be a pure structure of interaction in which
all members participate, not in virtue of any determinate characteristics they
have as individuals and not in virtue of any claims that they have to the truth,
but purely and simply as members. But how is such a pure spiritual unity
conceivable? As a unity directly presented to consciousness it is, quite clearly,
incomprehensible. As we have seen, consciousness as such cannot thematize
the 'Wir'; it can only come to a oneness with it. But then isn't this state of
'oneness' with the 'Wir' simply a Hegelian reformulation of the neo-Platonic
doctrine that there is only one nous, or a rational mysticism through which
individual consciousnesses ecstatically come to unity in a transcendental or
meta-consciousness? 8
Hegel's indication of how the ultimate spiritual unity in the Phenomeno-
logy is reached suggests that his concept of 'Geist' is not to be understood in
terms of a supra-individual meta-consciousness. Knowing in such a unity

would still have the form of consciousness. The final unification spelled out in
the last chapter of the Phenomenology suggests rather that 'Geist' is a unity
in plurality and a plurality in unity. The unification in which 'Geist, comes to
know itself as 'Geist' is here presented as a synthesis between the result of
chapter VI, Spirit in the form of consciousness, and chapter VII, Spirit in
the form of self-consciousness (Phiin [H, 1937], p. 553ff). Chapter VI, in
turn, is treated here, and also in the introductions to chapters VI and VII, as
the culmination of chapters I-V in the sense that they show themselves, in
retrospect, to be 'abstractions' from Spirit in the form of consciousness (Phiin
[H, 1937], p. 314). The entire book, viewed from its result, thus assumes the
following three-fold structure:
A. Spirit in the form of consciousness, including the abstracted
shapes of consciousness, Self-consciousness and Reason
B. Spirit in the form of Self-consciousness
C. Spirit knowing itself as Spirit, i.e., as the synthesis of A. and B.
Our question is now whether or not this structure may be seen to corre-
spond to the general argument-structure required for a "deduction of the
concept of science."
In part A, consciousness fmally comes to show itself as the indeterminate
middle term (MUte) of Spirit (Phiin [H, 1937], p. 477). It reaches this stage
in the form of moral consciences that reciprocally recognize each other by
negating the significance of the determinate being (Dasein) in which they
appear to one another. This negation Hegel calls 'forgiveness'. In the 'reconcil-
ing yes' of moral forgiveness, which negates the opposition of consciousness
between the individual moral 'Ichs', 'Spirit' is present in its absoluteness. It
is not, however, Spirit knowing itself as Spirit, because the medium in which
these 'Ichs' are for one another is not merely transparent but void. It is the
fmal stage in the process of negatively purifying the factors mediating
recognition. This process explicitly began in chapter N, when we, as readers
of the Phenomenology, first came to see that the Ich, as self-consciousness, is
actually constituted through its being recognized as an Ich, when we were first
presented with the 'concept of Spirit' (Phiin [H, 1937], p. 140), and began to
view the concept of 'spiritual unity' (Phiin [H, 1937] ,p. 141ft) as it develop-
ed through the movement of recognition, beginning with the radically non-
reciprocal recognition of Lordship and Servitude and culminating in the
negation of that act constituting all forms of servitude, the ascription of
naturally determinate being to the essence of another self-consciousness. 9
For Spirit to know itself as Spirit, this negative process undergone by

Spirit must be complemented by a development through which the
phenomenal medium of reciprocal recognition is retained, but purified of
its natural determinacy and made into a pure receptacle for the generally
arbitrary, but in each instance specific, recognizability of Spirit. Whereas the
spiritual unity in chapter VI came to be constituted by the inward and
subjective acceptance of the inner moral conviction of the other, spiritual
unity in chapter VII is a unity in otherness (Phiin [H, 1937] , p. 544). Here it
is not naturally determinate being as such that is relinquished by conscious-
ness, but rather nature as a form of being, which is known as Evil (Phiin [H,
1937], p. 544), as the absolute other of its own absolute ground. Since Spirit
in the form of self-consciousness has come to experience the defect of
naturally determinate being in the form of knowing, this evil character ofits
phenomenal world is capable of being overcome. But Spirit in the form of
self-consciousness still knows itself by means of representations, it is for itself
still "spiritual essence" (geistiges Wesen),l° spiritual being from the stand-
point of consciousness (Phiin [H, 1937], p. 526), spiritual unity as grounded
in a beyond.
Erst nachdem es [consciousness] die Hoffnung aufgegeben, auf eine ausserliche, d.h.
fremde Weise das Fremdsein aufzuheben, wendet es sich ... an sich selbst, an seine eigne
Welt und Gegenwart, ENTDECKT SIE ALS SEIN EIGENTUM und hat somit den ersten
Schritt getan, aus der Intellektual·welt herabzusteigen, oder vielmehr deren abstraktes
Element mit dem wirklichen Sein zu begeisten (Phiin [H, 1937], p. 559 - emphasis
added) ..
The end of the Phenomenology may thus be interpreted as that point
when knowing in the form of consciousness reaches a Gestalt which is no
longer a "determinate Gestalt of consciousness," when knOWing, as the result
of its own immanent development, no longer reflexively posits an indepen-
dent Ansich as the ground of its knowledge. It thus actualizes through the
dialectical stages of its experience what was, for us at the outset, a mere
thought-experiment, our 'weglassen' (Phiin [H, 1937], p. 72) of all standards
'Or criteria. As readers of the Phenomenology, we thereby come to see that
we are the 'Wir' posited in consciousness's absolute beginning. In the resultant
mode of knowing, pure knowing, nothing is determinate, because the
reflexive determinations of consciousness have been suspended, and all is
immediate, because the medium, the world in which spirit knows itself as
spirit, is no longer postulated in an alien realm, but is discovered to be its own
property (GPR, § § 41 and 62). The indeterminate immediacy which the
Phenomenology issues must not be understood as itself a 'we', what might
be called a transcendental intersubjectivity; but the end of the Phenomeno-

logy, conceived as "the deduction of the concept of science", is to be grasped
as resulting from a unification into the 'Wir', the immediate unity of spirit as
opposed to the absolute unity of the Ich.
If the supra-individual shape of Spirit, that is, the Volksgeist with which
chapter VI begins, were not susceptible of being resolved into pure knowing,
Spirit knowing itself as Spirit, then the only appropriate scientific method for
discussing the subject matter of a book about Spirit, e.g., the Phenomenology,
would be the avowedly imprecise method of Aristotle's practical sciences.
The foregoing exploration of our conjecture that the Phenomenology is a
deduction has by no means 'proved' that the work actually carries out such a
resolution; it has simply outlined a proof-structure suggested by the Logic,
which would entail the resolution of spiritual essence into spiritual unity.
If the implied reading of the Phenomenology also sheds some light on the
beginning of pure science, "das unbestimmte Unmittelbare," then we might
also be assisted in our effort to understand why Hegel regarded science itself
as a freedom from all arbitrary, fortuitous or given determinations and how
he comprehended the emergence of determination as a pure movement of
"die Sache selbst," independent of all reflexive consciousness.
State University ofNew York

College at Purchase
NOTE
1 The question whether Hegel later, i.e., after 1812, retracted this interpretation of the
Phenomenology has been the subject of a considerable literature. In addition to the
reminder that Hegel explicitly reaffirmed this view in the last year of his life (see the
second edition of the first book of the Science of Logic), the reader may be recommend-
ed Hans Friedrich Fulda's masterful survey of the critical literature in his book, Das
Problem einer Einleitung in Hegels Wissenschaft der Logik (Frankfurt, Klostermann,
1965).
2 A critical review of nineteenth century attacks and defenses of the beginning of the
Logic may be found in Dieter Hemich's short essay, 'Anfang und Methode der Logik',
Hegel-Studien, Beiheft 1.
3 Jenenser Realphilosophie, ed. 1. Hoffmeister. 2 vols. (Leipzig, Meiner, 1932), Vol. 1,
p. 201. Cf. Phon [H. 1937], p. 74.
4 For a more detailed discussion of the question of the 'Wir' in the Phenomenology, see
my essay, 'Hegel's Phenomenological Method', Review of Metaphysics 23 (1970), 615-
641.
5 See WL [1812], p. xii; WL [L] 1, p. 30;Phiin [H, 1937], p. 549.
6 "Die einfache Unmittelbarkeit ist selbst ein Reflexions-ausdruck, und bezieht sich auf
den Unterschied von dem Vermittelten" (WL [1812], p. 7).
7 )enenser Realphilosophie, Vol. 1, p. 262.

8 For a systematic exploration of these themes, without special reference to Hegel, see
Philip Merian, Monopsychism, Mysticism, Metaconsciousness, 2nd ed. (The Hague,
Nijhoff, 1969), esp. pp. 114ff.
9 It should also be noted that, before we were presented with the 'concept of Spirit',
the unity of consciousness, in chapters I-III, was mediated by us. SeePhiin [H, 19371,
pp. 8],85,95,103.
10 For further explication of this important category in the Phiinomenologie, see
especially pp. 300,415,446,532.
DANIEL COOK
THEORY AND PRAXIS AND THE

BEGINNING OF SCIENCE
In the Introduction to his Naturphilosophie in the En cyclopiidie , Hegel

begins by examining various 'Ways of Considering Nature' (PN, p. 3). He
starts with man's practical approach to Nature (§ 245), and only after
discussing this approach does he turn to man's thinking or theoretical
consciousness or consideration of Nature (§ 246). The order is understand-
able given that man's first relation to nature is an immediate and external
one, whereas the latter is viewed as containing the means for the satisfaction
of one's own practical urges. Through our practical approach to Nature we
transform the particular objects of Nature into means for our own immediate
physical survival and well-being. Only then does Hegel turn, in the next
paragraph of the Enyklopiidie, to man's theoretical or thinking consideration
of Nature and the Philosophy of Nature per se.
Hegel apparently thOUght it necessary to justify beginning his Natur-
philosophie in this fashion, for he concludes the opening Zusatz with an
explanation of this ordering. He makes his standard methodological appeal
for the need to begin the conceptual analysis of a science with a general
comprehension of the various particular, concrete manifestations of man's
encounter with the natural world. "In order therefore to possess the Idea [of
Nature], we must traverse a series of specifications through which it is first
there for us" (PN, p. 6). If we, nevertheless, claim that we wish to approach
Nature as thinkers, Hegel says
. . . there are, in the first place, other ways of approaching Nature which I will
mention, not for the sake of completeness, but because we shall find in them the
elements or moments which are requisite for a knowledge of the Idea and which
individually reach our consciousness earlier in other ways of considering Nature
(PN, p. 4).
Only in this fashion, Hegel concludes, will we really comprehend what truly
characterizes the philosophical or scientific approach to the realm of Nature:
the need, at the outset, to synthesize properly the practical and theoretical
approaches to Nature.!
In this brief paper, I would like to highlight the relation (dialecti-
cal or otherwise) between the practical and theoretical elements in Hegel's
283
R. S. Cohen and M. W. Wartofsky (eds.), Hegel and the Sciences, 283~286.

284 DANIEL COOK
treatment of the beginning of Science, of Wissenschaft. I take the following

three examples for my purposes:
(1) the beginning of the Science of Nature (Naturphilosophie), as
I began to discuss it above;
(2) the beginning of the 'Science of Logic' (Wissenschaft der Logik);
and, fmally,
(3) the beginning of the 'Science of the Experience of Consciousness'
(Wissenschaft der Erfahnmg des Bewusstseins), the Phenomeno-
logy ofMind.
In discussing the next way of considering Nature - the theoretical or
thinking approach - Hegel sets out to expose the contradictions present in
such an attitude as it is usually exemplified in physics and natural philosophy.
Such an approach claims to apprehend the world as it truly is and as a science,
it does so through the conscious usage of universal and class terms. This is
proper since such a scientific approach "is directed to a knowledge of the
universal aspects of Nature" (PN, p. 6). But in trying to comprehend the
variegated world of Nature, we change its character. The use of theoretical
terms in science..has an immediate practical effect which must be duly noted
by a philosophy of science. As the Zusatz to this section puts it:
... instead of leaving Nature as she is, and taking her as she is in truth, instead of simply
perceiving her, we make her into something quite different. In thinking things, we
transform them into something universal; but things are singular and the Lion as such
does not exist (PN, § 246, Remark, Z, p. 7).
The theoretical language and logic of empirical science negate the particulars
of sense experience as much as the practical approach mentioned above. Only
by properly understanding this negative power of the theoretic stance can we
achieve a proper perspective for our inquiry into the Philosophy of Nature.
This same view of the practical importance of the use of language and logic
is the topic of Hegel's discussion at the beginning of another science - the
'science of logic'. In the opening paragraphs of the Preface to the second
edition, Hegel says,
Into all that becomes something inward for men, an image or conception as such, into all
that he makes his own, language has penetrated, and everything that he has transformed
into language and expresses in it contains a category - concealed, mixed with other
forms or clearly determined as such, so much is logic his natural element, indeed his own
peculiar nature. If nature as such, as the physical world, is contrasted with the spiritual
sphere, then logic must certainly be said to be the supernatural element which permeates
every relationship of man to nature, his sensation, intuition, desire, need, instinct, and
THEOR Y AND PRAXIS 285
simply by so doing transforms it into something human, even though only formally
human, into ideas and purposes (SL [M], pp. 31-32).
Hegel refers in this Preface fo the "natural logic" of ordinary consciousness

"as an instrument and a means" ("als zum Gebrauch und als Mittell") for
corning to terms with the natural world. Ordinary or natural consciousness
view the terms it uses as extrinsic to the world with which it is dealing. Only
later does the intrinsic, universal quality of its pragmatic, unself-conscious
language and logic become apparent. By further analyzing the categories of
Natural thinking, we can then start down the path to scientific or philoso-
phical thinking. What should be noted here, once again, is the practical
dimension always present in Hegel's discussion of the beginning of science -
even when dealing with apparently purely theoretic activities such as thinking
and talking.
If our analysis of Hegel's approach to the beginning of the above 'sciences'
is correct, then it should help us to understand the beginning of the 'Science
of the Experience of Consciousness' - i.e., the first section entitled 'Con-
sciousness'. This section is often neglected by commentators on this 'Science'
on the grounds that it is purely epistemological and theoretical. If it is
discussed at all, it is usually only in preparation for a more exhaustive treat-
ment of later sections such as 'Master-Servant' or 'Unhappy Consciousness'
in the section entitled 'Self-Consciousness.' The latter are taken to be seminal
since they are the first stages in the Phenomenology that develop the practical
implications of Hegel's 'Science of the Experience of Consciousness'. Yet
when we examine the section on 'Consciousness' - 'Sense-Certainty', for
example - we find that Hegel's analysis can be seen as a demonstration of the
practical implications of the theoretic stance of 'Sense-Certainty'. The
universalizing power of thinking and talking of natural consciousness goes
beyond its immediate and external relationship to the natural world. Hegel
explicitly says that such theoretic activities as the thinking and talking 'of
natural consciousness in 'Sense-Certainty' are practical activities that pre-
figure the later stages in 'Self-Consciousness' of desire and the need to negate
the particularity of the external world (Phen [B] , pp. 158-159). Hegel gives
some fanciful examples of this basic universal experience - e.g., dumb
animals gobbling up the sense-particulars confronting them in the natural
world. The use of this analogy to convey the negating power present in
thinking and talking may be strained, but it does show us that Hegel was
intent on having his readers see the practical force of the theoretical activity
of consciousness. Interestingly enough, this same example of the animals is
286 DANIEL COOK
used in the Zusatz to § 246 of the Naturphilosophie, where Hegel exposes

the contradictions present in a view of theoretical consciousness which
affirms the ultimacy and inscrutability of the natural objects confronting it
(PN, p. 9).
Thus, I have tried to show that in three different 'beginnings' of science,
the theoretic stance of consciousness is viewed by Hegel as in fact represent-
ing a very practical relationship between consciousness and the natural world,
and that this theoretic activity is indeed the first genuine practical step in the
Bildung of consciousness. However we may choose to define 'Wissenschaft',
one necessary element in Hegel's general conception of this term is the close
relationship between theory and praxis in the conceptual analysis of any
scientific or philosophical endeavor. To conclude with Hegel's words to his
friend Neithammer:
I am daily convinced more and more that theoretical labor accomplishes more in the
world than the practical; if the realm of thinking is revolutionized, reality itself cannot
hold out. 2
Brooklyn
CUNY
NOTES
1 "In so doing [considering other ways of approaching Nature 1, we shall come to the
point where the characteristic feature of our inquiry becomes prominent. Our approach
to Nature is partly practical and partly theoretical. An examination of the theoretical
approach will reveal a contradiction which, thirdly, will lead us to our standpoint; to
resolve the contradiction we must incorporate what is peculiar to the practical approach,
and by this means practical and theoretical will be united and integrated into a totality"
(PN, p. 4).
2 "Die theoretische Arbeit, iiberzeuge ich mich taglich mehr, bringt mehr zustande in
der Welt als die praktische; ist erst das Reich der Vorstellung revolutioniert, so halt die
Wirklichkeit nicht aus." Cited by F. Nicolin and O. Piiggeler, 'Zur Einflihrung' in G. W. F.
Hegel, Enzyklopiidie der philosophischen Wissenschaften im Grundrisse (1830) (Ham-
burg, Meiner, 1959). p. XXII.
L. D. EASTON
THE FIRST AMERICAN INTERPRETATION OF HEGEL

IN J. B. STALLO'S PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE
Among the Ohio Hegelians - an informal group of writers and social re-
formers who championed Hegel's thought in Cincinnati from 1848 to 1860,
prior to the St. Louis Philosophical Society - John Bernard Stal10 was
outstanding in mastery of philosophy and public influence.! His special
interest was philosophy of science, the underlying principles and assumptions
of physics, chemistry, biology and sociology and the foundations of knowl-
edge in those areas. Pursuing this interest in his teaching and writing, he
concentrated on two main points he found in Hegel: first, the thesis that all
experience and the actualities of nature and society are essentially process,
becoming, development, evolution; secondly, the thesis that the real nature
of things is not to be found in a separate realm, a 'beyond' that transcends
experience, but rather in the phenomena themselves taken concretely in their
verifiable connections and context.
In applying and interpreting these two theses Stallo also criticized Hegel,
thus anticipating his mature philosophy of science that professed to repudiate
Hegel altogether. Stallo's relation to Hegel from the beginning was that of
critical follower. In the preface to his first major writing in 1848, The General
Principles of the Philosophy of Nature, Stallo wrote: "I cheerfully acknowl-
edge that for many of my views I am indebted to the study of Hegel's
philosophy, although, generally, these views are as independent of Hegel as
Hegel is (if it be permitted magnis componere parva) of Schelling."
Stallo absorbed Hegel's views from 1841 to 1848 while he was studying and
teaching mathematics, physics and chemistry at St. Xavier's College in
Cincinnati and St. John's College at Fordham, New York. In his native
Germany his schooling had included mathematics and languages, and at a
teacher's college in Vechta he had been exposed to Kant's view of space and
time and the relation of concepts to sense-impressions. But apparently Hegel's
writings were among the 'forbidden books' in his boyhood home. A few years
after his arrival in Cincinnati in 1839 at the age of sixteen, he began studying
Hegel, Schelling, and Humboldt "with great enthusiasm." These studies came
287
R. S. Cohen and M. W. Wartofsky (eds.), Hegel and the Sciences, 287 -299.
288 L. D. EASTON
to fruition in The General Principles of the Philosophy of Nature, with An

Outline of Some of Its Recent Developments among the Germans, Embrac-
ing the Philosophical Systems of Schelling and Hegel and Oken's System of
Nature. By the time the book was published in Boston in 1848, however,
Stallo had decided to study law, and the following year he was admitted to
the bar in Cincinnati where he became a prominent lawyer and judge.
As a result of the pattern of his studies Stallo's philosophy of science in
The General Principles was more than a literary or library achievement. It
was stimulated and informed by study of current research in physics, chemis-
try, and biology and by first-hand observation or laboratory work. Hence
Stallo was far more concerned than Hegel to control his conclusions by the
empirical data of natural science and increasingly criticized Hegel in this
respect. To be sure, Hegel had carefully and widely studied the natural
sciences. In 1831 he wrote a book on planetary orbits that Stallo quoted at
length, he was an active member of three scientific societies,2 and he kept
up-to-date in his reading in the sciences as shown in the Zusatze to various
sections of his Naturphilosophie. But in comparison with Stallo, Hegel's
philosophy of nature was primarily a literary achievement, a product of his
writing desk. Hence he frequently denigrated experimentation and "merely
sensuous notions" in favor of a purely reflective development of an idea or
prinCiple, the exact opposite of the trend in Stallo's thought.
II
Stallo's appropriation and application of Hegel's thesis that whatever is truly

real or actual is a becoming - process, activity, development - is especially
apparent in the first third of The General Principles where Stallo develops his
own philosophy of science. It is further confirmed in his summary of Hegel's
philosophical system in the second part of The General Principles, a summary
that took up a third of the entire book and twice as many pages as he devoted
to summarizing Kant, Schelling, and Oken.
The underlying premise in Stallo's view was that mind or thOUght is funda-
mentally identical with the forces that actuate the whole natural world. As he
put it:
The fundamental principle upon which, according to my conviction, all true philosophy
of nature rests, is, that the different manifestations of the vitality which bursts forth
in nature's phenomena are comprehensively united, centered in the mind; that the
implacable rigor of cosmic laws, which sways extensive matter, is identical with the
eternal freedom of mind in its infinite intensity. 3
HEGEL IN STALLO'S PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE 289
Such a principle, StaTIo recognized, was opposed to the dominant materialism

and "misconceived Baconism" of the time as well as to the dualism in Kant's
philosophy between matter and spirit, the objective and subjective. It was,
however, the core of 'German idealism' since Kant, and asserted, in contrast
to English philosophy, the 'reality of the Ideal.' But mind, thought, or 'the
Ideal' is not to be viewed as a fixed, rigid substratum of the phenomenal
world. It is, rather, essentially activity, motion, process, development. The
ultimate unity of changing phenomena can lie only in what is self-mediated
and exists by itself - namely, mind or spirit. In StaTIo's words:
Mind is the absolutely Restless in itself the absolutely Creative, the absolutely Free.
Mind is not the blank abstraction, not the caput mortuum of the External. The Deity,
the absolute Mind, is the absolute intrinsic process - the substance which causes, pro-
duces itself, - gazes into its own eye. 4
The source of StaTIo's fundamental principle is apparent in his summary of

Hegel's philosophy. The 'German idealism' he had in mind was partiCUlarly
that of Hegel who had seen that the Absolute is not, as with Schelling, an
abstract identity of nature and spirit but rather a development, generation, or
process whose motive principle is its inherent self-opposition. It is a process
which has itself both for its material and its object or result but in dualizing
itself yet remains an identity. Such activity in and for itself, Stallo held, is
thought wherein the unit enters into self-opposition to achieve self-recogni-
tion, to reestablish its unity, a unity that requires and contains the antithesis.
Hence Hegel 'proved' that the reality or 'constant' of the series of phenome-
nal variations in nature is "the result of the dialectic process of thought." 5
Hegel's view of mind or spirit as process, activity, development was parti-
cularly apparent, Stallo observed, in The Phenomenology orMind. With Hegel
spirit is not to be understood as an entity or determinate substance but rather
"that being which is truly subject, or, what is the same thing is truly realized
and actual solely in the process of positing itself, or in mediating with its own
self in transitions from one state or position to the opposite." Similarly,
'experience' is the process whereby what is immediate in sensation and reflec-
tion leads to something else and then also returns to itself to yield a whole
which is truth for that movement. "The truth is the whole ," said Hegel in a
familiar passage that Stallo repeated. "The whole, however, is merely the
essential nature reaching its completeness through the process of its own
development" (Phen [B], pp. 80-81).6
With such underlying principles StaTIo adopted Hegel's overall position on
the self-development and manifestation of Spirit in three dialectically related
290 L. D. EASTON
phases akin to the major points of The Encyclopedia of Philosophical

Sciences. The three phases of Spirit, Stallo held, are:
1. The Spiritual as the absolute origin of all existences, abstractly taken. 2. The exterio-
ration of the Spiritual as manifestation in existence, abstractly taken. 3. The Spiritual as
thus sustaining itself, regenerated in its exterioration, or the Spiritual taken in its
concrete identity and truth. 7
In support of his view that process, movement or activity is "the absolute-

ly primum, the first principle in existence ," Stallo relied on Hegel's purely
reflective argument in the Logic that being and nonbeing can only be
adequately comprehended through their unity in 'becoming' (Werden), the
model of all subsequent syntheses and thus all other adequate concepts. In
addition, however, he introduced some arguments of his own as he attacked
materialistic conclusions from physics and chemistry. To those who argued
that in the movements of nature there must be absolute rest as the bearer and
source of motion he replied:
It is impossible to conceive rest without the concomitant idea of equilibrium, and there-
fore of motion. It is impossible to construe motion out of rest; rest is an incident to
motion and consequently to be explained from the nature of the latter. 8
"There is," Stallo concluded, "nowhere absolute rest, but motion every-
where." Further, those who hold that there must be some material substance
as a fixed, unchanging substratum behind changing phenomena cannot
possibly square their view with Dalton's law of compression of gases or
Graham's law of diffusion. With such arguments as these Stallo was more
concerned than Hegel to control his conclusions by the empirical data of
natural science.
The fmal and longest section of Stallo's statement of his own philosophy
of science was entitled 'Evolutions.' It provided details on the "phases and
processes" in physical motion, the solar system, light, sound and heat,
chemical combination, electricity, vegetable and animal organisms, recreative
and procreative mind, and the organization of society. This section was the
heart of Stallo's philosophy of science, applying and seeking to confirm his
central thesis concerning process, movement, activity. It also revealed the dis-
tinctive features of his view and thus how he differed from and criticized
Hegel.
Stallo used the word 'evolution' synonymously with 'process,' 'develop-
ment,' 'origination,' and he thought of it as progressive, 'spiral' movement
towards increasing complexity of organization and greater multiplicity of
relations. He was well aware that Hegel had used the term 'Evolution' to
refer to the serial progression in nature from the imperfect and formless
liquid element through fishes and land animals to man. But Hegel had dis-
missed this as "a completely empty thought." It explains nothing and in some
respects is inferior to its correlative opposite, the Oriental idea of 'Emanation.'
For Hegel the only 'development' and 'origination' is in the Notion which
"timelessly and in a universal manner posits all particularity in existence." On
this basis he concluded, in spite of his reading in Lamarck and Kant, that
species do not change, that organic fossils never really lived, and that the
"lightning of life" strikes a complete creature into previously lifeless matter
like Minerva from the brow of Jupiter. "The Mosaic story of creation," said
Hegel, "is still the best in its quite naive statement that on this day planets
came into being, on another day the animals, and on another day man"
(PN, pp. 20-22,284).9
Stallo, on the other hand, regarded "generative modification of certain
species" as empirically substantiated and saw organic fossils as evidences of
"the consecutive advance of vegetable and zoological genera." By implica-
tion he dismissed the Mosaic story as a form of occasionalism that is as
external as the purest materialism to the mediated unity of efficient and final
causation. Stallo agreed with Hegel that temporal succession is inapplicable
to the true ground of all nature, absolute Mind or Spirit as "absolute intrinsic
process." Its relation to its phenomenal manifestations is tenseless as in the
relation of whole or part, and Stallo frequently referred to the Absolute,
following Hegel, as 'the Whole.' But the essential nature of the Absolute is to
manifest and realize itself in the phenomenal and material world characteriz-
ed by spatiality and temporality. "Consequently," Stallo concluded,
"whatever is in the Spiritual as unital intensity is likewise found in material
nature, therefore in time and space as succession and co-arrangement.',lO
Apparently, then, Stallo's use of 'evolution' as a synonym for 'process,' 'deve-
lopment,' and 'becoming' was not accidental. It signalized his differences
from Hegel, integrating process more closely with empirical data of natural
science and providing a more coherent position than Hegel had achieved.
Stallo frequently used 'history' as a synonym for 'process,' 'becoming,'
and 'evolution.' It has been suggested that Hegel temporalized the realm of
spirit in history but generally denied the historical development of nature
because of his conservative temperament in a pre-Darwinian age. ll Stallo also
lived in a pre-Darwinian age but had the audacity and originality to try to
resolve the dualism between a non-historical nature and a historical realm of
spirit in a more coherent, thoroughgoing evolutionism. His exposition of
evolutions widely followed Hegel's Naturphilosophie in its sequence or
292 L. D. EASTON
subject matter, and even some of Hegel's subtitles, from mechanics and
motion through the solar system, light, chemical combinations, and organisms
to end in a discussion of sexuality. But then Stallo went on to elaborate
evolutions in what Hegel had separated from nature as subjective and objec-
tive mind, namely, perception, imagination, memory, reasoning, mental
derangements, the organization of society in family, civil society, and state
and finally the major phases of mankind's history.
In sum, Stallo held that Hegel's position on process, becoming, and devel-
opment was abortive. It was not thoroughgoing but was still infected with
static substantialism, an appeal t6 a fIxed entity or 'thing' as the basis of
explanation. Hegel invited this criticism, Stallo felt, in maintaining that every
true philosophy must stand on the platform of Spinozism. Though Hegel saw
clearly that the existence of things is their becoming (Werden) - hence Stallo
could reverently regard him as 'one of the philosophical saviours of nature" -
he was not consistent and thoroughgoing in the application of this insight. His
construction and his method still belonged to the old school that makes 'the
thing' the basis of its deductions and changeless rest the fundamental fact. As
a result, said Stallo,
His consequences are not infrequently fallacious, and his transitions are arbitrary. He is
like a man who has invented gunpowder; now he wishes to shoot but unfortunately with
the old weapon, the lance, and at the same time to keep the lance in his hand. Hence also
the unintelligibility of his language, the jargon of real and ideal "positing," of being at
itself and for itself (an sich and for sich) etc. 12
Stallc's more thoroughgoing development of the prinCiple of process as

pervasive evolutions was a main factor in his influence on Ralph Waldo
Emerson and American literature. Prior to reading Stallo's General Principles
Emerson was absorbed in the 'grandeur' of the efforts of Schelling and Oken
to unite natural and moral philosophy. Beginning in November, 1849, he
copied into his journals extracts from The General Principles to the effect
that "Every individual existence is but a living history .... The development
of all forms will be spiral .... Animals are but foetal forms of man." In
subsequent published writings he asserted that "nothing stands still in
Nature" and "everything is organic, freedom also, not to add but to grow and
unfold." Though Emerson got little from Hegel's writings except a headache,
Stallo's extension of Hegel's principle of process into evolutions intelligibly
provided him with a foundation suffIcient to his interests. In 1873 Emerson
observed that while Darwin's Origin of Species appeared in 1859, a decade
earlier Stallo had written that "animals are but foetal forms of man" and "the
lines of our ancestry run into all the phenomena of the material world." 13
III
Further interpreting Hegel, Stallo defended a second main thesis for philoso-
phy of science, namely, that the real nature of things is not to be found in a
separate realm, a 'beyond' that transcends experience, but rather in the
phenomena themselves taken concretely in their connections and context. 14
Negatively this thesis involved a rejection of transcendent metaphysics, the
view that 'reality' lies in a separate realm that observed phenomena somehow
copy or reflect. Mfrrrnatively it asserted that reality or truth is to be found in
phenomena, and in this respect it is akin to current philosophies of experi-
ence - empiricism, phenomenalism, positivism - which vigorously criticize
transcendent metaphysics and seek its elimination from responsible thought.
This thesis has already been suggested in the previous discussion of Absolute
Mind or 'the Whole' as process. Such a conception outlaws any fixed,
unchanging substance or entity that might serve as a permanent reality behind
or beneath changing phenomena.
In his General Principles Stallo was especially attracted to the way that
Hegel overcame the dualisms between idea and reality, subjective and objec-
tive, spirit and matter left by Kant's philosophy. By resolutely eschewing
'abstractions' or "some hypostatic notion of universality," Hegel could
provide an effective unification of science and metaphysics. As Stallo put it:
Hegel does not attempt to evolve concrete forms from an abstraction; his "Absolute" is
essentially concrete .... Since truth is apprehended not as something reposing in the
bosom of its own being, but as the "Whole in its development," as the Absolute, not
abstractly taken, but also in its phenomenal existence, in its individual exterioration,
the system of metaphysics, which formerly consisted of nothing but formalities, must
encroach upon the domain of all science. Instead of an establishment of certain forms,
merely for construing the various material, form and material now stand in necessary
relation; the material - nature, etc. - enter as essentially into metaphysical reasoning
as the old formulas. It cannot, therefore, be startling to see that the natural sciences,
history, etc. are an integral part of metaphysics. 1s
Following Hegel in his view of perception and observation, Stallo held that
external objects are not somehow engraved on the mind but rather their
particularities become general qualities and relations. Objects are not some·
thing transcendent to their qualities and properties. Rather, ''the predicates
are the subject; they are not glued, plastered upon it, and torn off when the
subject is idealized. Everything exists in its properties, not beside them."
These properties, moreover, are basically an ensemble of relations. "Objects,"
294 L. D. EASTON
Stallo held, "are thoroughly relative; their being is a complex of relations." 16

He indicated that this conclusion was also Hegel's. Summarizing the section
of The Phenomenology of Mind on 'Observation,' Stallo found Hegel saying
that the observed object is its qualities, and since these qualities as differing
from one another involve relationships, the unity of the object depends on
the observer and "the individual object is nothing more than the relation to
other objects." With such a view of perception and observation Stallo paid
particular attention to Hegel's conclusions on 'Force and Understanding' in
The Phenomenology and saw them as rejecting transcendent metaphysics. In
Stallo's summary in his General Principles:
We look into the interior of things only through the phenomenon; the interior itself is
transcendental, a "beyond" for our consciousness. The transcendental interior, however,
reveals nothing whatever to consciousness; no more, to use Hegel's own simile than pure
darkness or pure light reveals anything to the gaze. But the supersensual "beyond"
results from mediation; it proceeds from the phenomenon, and the phenomenon is its
reality. The Supersensual is but the Sensual taken in its truth, taken as phenomenon and
not as a permanent reality, which it has amply proved itself not to be. We behold the
play of forces, a continual shifting of determinate appearances, whose truth consists
merely in the law which manifests itself there. The law is the permanent image of the
fleeting phenomenon. The supersensual world is the quiet realm of laws, indeed beyond
the world of observation, since this exhibits the law only in continuous change; but it is
nevertheless present in the world of observation and its immediate type)7
But even as he praised Hegel for fusing the Absolute and phenomena and
thus advancing what might be called a 'concrete phenomenalism' in opposi-
tion to transcendent metaphysics, Stallo was critical of Hegel in this respect.
There were, Stallo felt, numerous abstractions in Hegel's view, points where
the Absolute did not exist in and through the phenomena but remained
independent of the empirical data of natural science. In short, there were
numerous points where Hegel held to a "hypostatic notion of universality"
as in traditional metaphysics.
We have already noted how Stallo found an element of static substantia-
lism in Hegel's view and criticized his treatment of process in nature as
abortive, as failing to embody the transitions and movement of phenomena.
In developing his own view of evolutions in physics, Stallo widely followed
Hegel but sometimes digressed to criticize him for failing to fuse idea and
phenomena. For example, he noted that Hegel's view of single and double
diffraction of light did not account for certain observed deviations or distor-
tions, and the mutual dependencies of refraction and reflection as well as the
limit of refraction could not be derived from his theory at all. 1S Though
Stallo endorsed Hegel's general conception of light as reciprocal manifestation

or 'showing,' an "exhibition of the Spiritual One in the materially Dual," he
found a defect in the development of this idea, a point where Hegel's view
was abstract and infected with "a hypostatic notion of universality." Stallo
argued that generality and individuality in existence were not be to identified
with sun and planets as Hegel had done. Rather, "the solar systems are the
first cosmic individuality, not the isolated planets" and the universal as such
cannot be the concrete material sun. In short, Stallo found an abstraction in
Hegel's view, a point where he failed to follow through on his own premise
that objects consist of their relations and their unity lies in a system, in laws
of and in the moving phenomena. Stallo found the same mistake in Hegel's
political theory where the king is the incorporated universal corresponding to
the sun. The universal, Stallo argued, is rather "nothing but the pronounced
unity of the individuals," and this implies that only a democratic republic,
not monarchy, can be fully "adequate to the idea.,,19
Seventeen years later Stallo's criticism of Hegel's abstractness was more
pointed and sweeping. Writing on the foundations of scientific knowledge, he
noted that Hegel's view of history did make some provision for "geographic
conditions" but Spirit as "developed logic" moved high above and beyond
external conditions and held firm against the contingencies it employed. 20
Finally in his book of 1881 on Concepts and Theories of Modern Physics
Stallo's criticism of Hegel reached its climax. He was not, he said, further
developing the doctrines of his General Principles though there was much in
it of which he was not ashamed. It was, unfortunately, written under the spell
of "Hegel's ontological reveries ... one of the unavoidable disorders of intel-
lectual infancy." In particular, he regarded Hegel's Absolute or Being as a
monstrous verbalism. It was a reified summum genus, "the specter of the
copula between an extinct subject and a departed predicate, ... a sign of
predication which 'lags superflous on the stage' after both the predicate and
that whereof it is predicated have disappeared.'>21 In this respect Stallo
regarded Hegel's thought as the very model of a major 'metaphysical error' in
the interpretation of scientific concepts. Through the study of comparative
linguistics he had become sensitively aware of the unity of thought and
language and the way metaphors are inseparable from language, but in science
they must be controlled by precisely observed correspondences, relations of
structure, and functional equivalence. 22
Yet in spite of Stallo's claim to have broken decisively with Hegel's
philosophy, the main points of his theory of cognition in Concepts and
Theories may readily be identified with Hegelian principles he espoused in
296 L. D. EASTON
The General Principles three decades earlier. The theory of cognition was
fundamental in Concepts and Theories, and Stallo regarded it as the central
point and purpose of the whole book. It undergirded his continuing criticism
of materialism, the "atomo-mechanical view of nature." The atomic theory,
he allowed, was useful in chemistry as an expository device, but for its most
vigorous defenders it was "substantially identical with the cardinal doctrines
of ontological metaphysics" and could not in main features be squared with
data of observation and experiment. Stallo's theory of cognition was also the
basis for detecting 'metaphysical errors' that he illustrated in detail in the last
eight chapters of Concepts and Theories where he criticized the 'absolute
space' of Newton and Euler, the notion of absolutely independent physical
objects, and cosmological speculation about "the origin of the universe as an
absolute whole in the light of physical and dynamical laws."
The first point in Stallo's theory of cognition asserted that thought deals
not with things themselves but with "states of consciousness" and every
object of cognition is a synthesis of subjective and objective elements so
"all knowledge is relative to the cognizing faculty." He had said substantially
the same thing in The General Principles where, following Hegel's Pheno-
menology, he saw perception and observation as involving an interchange
between conscious mind and apparently external objects and the reality of
consciousness in and through them. Secondly, Stallo's theory of cognition
asserted that objects are known through their relations and have no attributes
except through their relations. In 1848 he based this conclusion on Hegel's
view that the 'sense certainty' of objects perceived as 'here' and 'now'
involves grasping them as relationships, but in 1881 it was supported from
Helmholtz's research on vision. Helmholtz, as Stallo may have known, had
attributed the nineteenth century schism between philosophy and science to
Hegel's Naturphilosophie that seemed "absolutely crazy" to the scientists,
an attempt "to construct a priori the results of other sciences.,,23 The third
main point in Stallo's theory of cognition asserted that thought deals only
with a selected class of relations, so our thought of-things is always 'symboli-
cal.' Concepts and Theories identified this point with views of Leibniz and Sir
William Hamilton, but in The Phenomenology of Mind, which Stallo had
summarized three decades earlier, Hegel maintained that abstractions ("things
of the intellect") are indispensable to perception. In wider implications of
this theory of cognition, which Stallo called 'phenomenalism,' there was a
vivid echo of Hegel's coherence theory of truth. "There is no physical reality,"
Stallo held, "which is not phenomenal. The only test of physical reality
is sensible experience." What, then, about the conflicting deliverances of
experience? What is 'apparent' in contrast to what is 'real,' Stallo concluded,

is merely a partial deliverance of sense mistaken for the whole because the
senses are not fully and precisely interrogated, their whole story is not heard.
With 'Absolute' in place of 'real' he had earlier ascribed this position to Hegel
for whom truth was the "Whole in its development" involving "phenomenal
existence" in the fmdings of natural science. 24
Concepts and Theories of Modem Physics won increasing recognition as an
important contribution to philosophy of science. It was part of an eminent
scientific series, went through several printings and translations and was
reissued in 1960 by Harvard University Press as a "landmark of intellectual
history" with an introduction by P. W. Bridgman. In Europe its importance
was appreciated largely through the attention of Ernst Mach, father of the
recently prominent 'scientific empiricism.' Mach became interested in the
book whose "scientific aims so closely approximated" his own and wrote a
special foreword to the German edition. He shared Stallo's rejection of
metaphysics in the mechanical-atomic theory, agreed with his view of
physical concepts as relations, and concurred with him in rejecting pro-
nouncements on "the world as a whole." Mach also found in Concepts and
Theories "traces" of Stallo's earlier "Hegelian lines," though he did not
specify them. 25 Those lines are apparent in the main points of his theory of
cognition as already noted. They suggest an interesting irony in the history of
ideas - namely, that Stallo's phenomenalism, anticipating forms of empiri-
cism that have become increasingly prominent in America since William
James, was rooted in the ideas of the one philosopher most empiricists have
regarded as their arch-enemy, Hegel.
IV
Early and late in his lifetime Stallo saw his philosophy of science as implying
and supporting freedom of inquiry, the fullest freedom of mind. He was
aware that Hegel had supported freedom of inquiry in discussing the relation
of church to state but had grounded it in constitutional monarchy. But Stallo
held that only a democratic republic, not monarchy, is "adequate to the
idea." Only democracy is consonant with Hegel's premise that the substance
of society and history is spirit as reason, and reason, Stallo argued, involves
the unity of system and relationship, not the extraneous unity of a single
man. Universal reason in society is nothing but law reproducing itself in and
from the individual. "The organization of society," he concluded, "is, there-
fore, essentially democratic." Furthermore, social development is a 'dialecti-
cal process' in which partial points of view and particular errors are required
298 L. D. EASTON
for the emergence of truth. Such a process requires freedom of thought and
inquiry as its essential medium. Similarly, but on different grounds, Stallo
saw his mature philosophy of science - his phenomenalism that professed to
repudiate Hegel altogether but actually extended major 'Hegelian lines' -
as a means of freeing intelligence for growth and openness to experience. Of
his Concepts and Theories of Modem Physics he said:
Its tendency is throughout to eliminate from science its latent metaphysical elements, to
foster and not repress the spirit of experimental investigation, and to accredit instead of
discrediting the great endeavor of scientific research to gain a sure foothold on solid
empirical ground, where the real data of experience may be reduced without ontologi-
cal prepossessions. 26
Thus Stallo's philosophy of science in its beginnings and in its maturity was
fully and unswervingly committed to freedom of thought and inquiry, to the
free mind.
Ohio Wesleyan University

Delaware, Ohio
NOTES
1 For biographical and historical details see L. D. Easton, Hegel's First American
Followers, The Ohio Hegelians - J. B. Stallo, Peter Kaufmann, Moncure Conway, and
August WilUch (Athens, Ohio University Press, 1967), Chs. I-III presenting the nub of
the main theses in this essay, but here those theses are developed further, with details of
Stallo's criticism of Hegel.
2 Cf. Franz Wiedmann, Hegel, trans. 1. Neugroshel (New York, Pegasus, 1968), pp. 32-
33,36,44.
3 J. B. Stallo, The General Principles of the Philosophy of Nature (Boston, Crosby and
Nichols, 1848), pp. vii-viii. Some sixty pages of this scarce book are reproduced, with
original pagination in square brackets, in an appendix to Easton, op. cit.
4 Ibid., p. 43.
5 Ibid., p. 333, 345.
6 Cf. Stallo, General Principles, pp. 50-51.
7 General Principles, p. 44.
8 Ibid., p. 24; cf.ibid., pp. 51, 345,45-46.
9 Encyclopiidie der Philosophischen Wissenchaften ed. G. Lasson (Leipzig, Felix Meiner,
1930), §§ 249, 339. (Stallo used the Michelet text and Zusiitze of Hegel's 'Natur-
philosophie. ')
10 General Principles, p. 44; cf. ibid., pp. 6-7, 11-12.
11 Cf. J. N. Findlay, 'Foreword,' Hegel, Philosophy of Nature, trans. A. V. Miller
(Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1970), p. xv; Hegel, A Re-examination (New York, Macmillan,
1958), p. 272.
12 General Principles, p. SO
13 For further details and specific documentation in Emerson's writings see Easton,
op cit., pp. 45-49 and A. W. Plum stead, and W. H. Gilman, eds., The Journals and
Miscellaneous Notebooks of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Cambridge, Belknap Press of
Harvard University Press, 1975), Vol., XI, p. 200.
14 Cf. 1. N. Findlay, 'Some Merits of Hegelianism,' Proceedings of the Aristotelian
Society 56 (1956), pp. 7 -9.
15 General Principles, p. 337.
16 Ibid., pp. 131-34.
17 Ibid., p. 360.
18 Ibid., p. 74.
19 Ibid., p. 72; cf. ibid., pp. 158-62,517-18.
20 Stallo, Reden, Abhandlungen und Briefe (New York, Steiger, 1893), p. 112.
21 Stallo, Concepts and Theories of Modern Physics, ed. P. W. Bridgman (Cambridge,
Mass., Harvard University Press), p. 178; cf. ibid., pp. 6-7.
22 Cf. ibid., pp. 10-11; Stallo, "Speculative Science," Popular Science Monthly 21
(1882), pp. 151-53. In General Principles Stallo did not summarize Hegel's views on
language in Philosophy of Mind (trans. William Wallace from The Encyclopaedia of the
Philosophical Sciences (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1894), § 459), views that resembled his
own mature conclusions at some points. Cf. Easton,op. cit., pp. 215-19.
23 Cf. W. C. Dampier-Whetham, A History of Science (New York, Macmillan, 1929),
p. 313 quoting from Helmholtz, Popular Lectures on Scientific Subjects, trans. E.
Atkinson (London, Longmans, Green, 1873), p. 5.
24 Cf. Stallo, Concepts and Theories, Ch. IX, p. 216; General Principles, pp. 131-35,
354-57;Phen [B], pp. 168-78,80-81.
25 Ernst Mach, 'Vorwort' (1901), J. B. Stallo, Die Begriffe und Theorien der Modernen
Physik, trans. H. Kleinpeter (Leipzig, Barth, 1911), pp. x-xiii.
26 StallO, Concepts and Theories, p. 4; cf. General Principles, pp. 158-67,517-18 and
PR, §§ 270, 275-80.
PART THREE
DIALECTICS AND LOGIC

YVON GAUTHIER
HEGEL'S LOGIC FROM A LOGICAL POINT OF VIEW 1
My title is not intended as a pun. Rather it should be interpreted as a ques-

tion: how to deal with Hegel's logic from a logical point of view? I mean here
by 'a logical point of view' the point of view which adheres to the body of
logical truths that we can formulate in classical propositional logic and first-
order predicate logic. That is not necessarily a conservative stand, only a
careful one. The question indicates that one should be prepared to adopt a
critical point of view concerning Hegel's logic. The fact that most logicians
are not interested in Hegel's logic is a sign that such a critical attitude is not
uncommon. Three years ago, I asked Professor Quine how one could go about
Hegel's dialectical logic. He simply answered that one would have to change
the laws oflogic in order to make sense of Hegel's logic. 2 I doubt that there is
anyone who would be ready to support Hegel to such an extent as to
abandon the corpus of our logical laws. I do not think either that one has to
drive to extremities to extract some logical sense from what Hegel called Die
Wissenschaft der Logik.
1. What kind of logic is Hegel's logic? It is certainly not formal logic as we

understand it, with a limited number of primitive terms, axioms and rules of
inference. If there is such a thing as a formal system of Hegelian logic, it is
certainly buried under a rich coat of nonlogical notions. A different and
much easier answer to our question would amount to saying that Hegelian
logic is a transcendental logic; transcendental logic would then be the study
of the a priori structures of logical thought in contradistinction to formal
logic as the study of the laws or operations that obey the logical structures of
the human mind. Kant had already delimited the provinces of formal and
transcendental logic:
Eine soiehe Wissenschaft, welche den Ursprung, den Umfang und die objektive
Giiltigkeit solcher (Verstandes - und Vernunft -) Erkenntnisse bestimmte, wurde
transzendentale heissen miissen. 3
For Hegel transcendental-speculative logic reaches even further: what he calls

objective logic is nothing less than metaphysics in the traditional sense
(WL [L], 1, p. 46); Hegelian logic is therefore transcendental-metaphysical.
303
R. S. Cohen and M. W. Wartofsky reds.), Hegel and the Sciences, 303-310.
304 YVON GAUTHIER
Transcendental or speculative logic deals with the most general features of

thought. Such an undertaking, from Kant to Hussed, is amply justified by its
philosophical bearings. 4 Philosophical logic, for being less ambitious, is
endowed with more indistinct traits. Metalogical considerations of any sort
do not have, however, direct connection with Hegel's logic. Heidegger was
probably closer to Hegel's intent when he designated Hegel's logic as an
'Onto-Iogik'in his work Die onto-theo-logische Verfassung der Metaphysik. 5
I prefer to call it simply an onto-logic, meaning a logic of being, instead of
using the old ambiguous term 'material logic' . Since we do not have a formal
logic, formalization, if it is attempted at all, must be a specified procedure.
When we want to formalize or axiomatize a given theory, mathematical or
else, we look for the barren structures of the theory and give the essential
relationships between the found structures.
With Hegel's logic, we are not given at first an axiomatic skeleton, an
uninterpreted or a semi-interpreted language, but a fully interpreted one. We
are faced with the interpretation and we have to make our way to the
abstract framework. Obviously, if we could uncover the abstract structure
totally, there would not be any major problem. Unfortunately, we have to
work with an interpretation of the interpretation. Here one can see that our
inverted course does in no way raise the question of instantiation. We start
with the instantiation and we have to reascend to the pure structure or frame-
work.
There is a second characteristic of Hegelian logic: besides being transcen-
dental or ontological, it is dialectical. Dialectics, as everybody knows, does
not have a unique meaning. Many more or less conflicting models of dialectics
can coexist. There are more ways than one to formalize the notion of
dialectics.6 The added difficulty of interpreting dialectics in the Hegelian
sense involves a thorough examination of Hegel's intended meaning.
2. It is important to notice that dialectical logic in the Hegelian sense is, in

principle, amenable to a formal treatment. Of course, the self-movement of
the content (die Selbstbewegung des Inhalts) does not yield as such to forma-
lization. What we can formalize is again the structure of that movement and it
happens that the dialectical movement is endowed with a structure or rather
structures.
Hegel himself tells us in the Introduction to his Logic that "die Methode
ist das Bewusstsein tiber die Form der inneren Selbstbewegung ihres Inhalts"
(WL [L] 1, p. 35). If Hegel warns us that we cannot separate content and
method, he does not deny that the method has a form, what I call a structure.
HEGEL'S LOGIC FROM A LOGICAL VIEWPOINT 305
It is clear that the method in question here is the dialectics. That there are
different forms or models of dialectics is again not to be doubted. I am allud-
ing here not only to Plato's dialectics, but to post-Hegelian dialectics, the
Marxist and the Neo-Marxist models. Even within the restricted range of
Hegelian dialectics, there are many models possible, for instance, the dialecti-
cal models of Well and Kojeve and others.? Leslie Armour has given recently
yet another model of Hegelian dialectics in his Logic and Reality [Assen,
1972] . From the logical point of view many variations of dialectics can be
conceived, for instance the models of GUnther, Asenjo, Kosok and my own
models. It is not surprising then that logicians like Beth s and Lorenzen 9
express a strong scepticism about the interest and the validity of dialectical
logic, notwithstanding the efforts of contemporary Soviet logicians. To put it
bluntly, the dialectical method is not a logical method and Hegel's endeavour
from a logical point of view does not deserve the name 'logic'.
3. How can we escape such a devastating criticism? It will not suffice to say
that most logicians do not know anything about Hegel's logic. If it is objected
that Hegel's logic is at the same time and indissolubly an ontology or a meta-
physics,1O the critics can add to their arsenal the charge of irrelevance.
Hegel's dialectical logic thus seems unsalvable. It would not do either to argue
that Hegel's logic has no similarity at all with classical or orthodox logic and
that is what explains most misunderstandings. There are, to be sure, non-
classical systems of logic, e.g. many-valued systems or intuitionistic logic, but
their spirit of logical revisionism does not affect the foundations themselves,
but specific logical laws, like the law of excluded middle. I do not plead here
for logical exclusivism, I am only dispelling illusory hopes or expectations.
What are we left with, if we still want to pursue a formal approach to
Hegel's logiC? If we exclude non-classical or unorthodox approaches and I
do not see what in Hegel's logic would compel us to abandon classical logic -
the subsequent analysis of Hegelian logic tries to justify that statement -
there is a variety of standard methods that can be used. It seems to me, for
example, that one could do for Hegel's logic what Chomsky has done for
transformational grammars, to propose a recursive treatment. Of course,
natural languages and ontologies or ontologics are subject to algorithmic
limitations that make it difficult to transcend the level of trivial generalities,
but with the help of recursive analysis, one could defme, for example, the
generative structure of the dialectical scheme, the invariance properties of
dialectical determinations or moments, the continuity of dialectical passage
(Uebergehen) from one moment to the others, the formal conditions of the
306 YVON GAUTHIER
circularity of the system, and so on. Another closely related approach is the
combinatory approach. I have made some suggestions in that direction in a
previous paperY Here one concentrates on the logical operations of Hegel's
system and attempts to show their reducibility to some fundamental
constants, their inter-connection, the cyclic permutation oflogical categories.
One could then obtain a relational logical algebra in the sense of Curry.12
Both approaches, the recursive and the combinatory ones, share a common
idea: the algebraic perspective. The general algebraic approach seems to me to
be a fruitful undertaking. Boolean structures, group structures, graph
structures, lattice structures, all could contribute to a better understanding of
Hegel's logiC. The question is how to apply those abstract structures to
Hegel's particular form of logic. Uses and abuses proliferate. One has only to
remember the intricacies of quantum logic. The problem of Hegel's logic is
not without similarity with the situation in quantum logic. However,
quantum logic has to do with a more limited (non-simultaneously measur-
able observables), if not less ambiguous, state of affairs. The solution devised
for quantum logic, the modular lattice, has only a faint affmity with the
logicisation of Hegel's logic. Hegel's logic, as was pointed out above, is
constituted by an interpretation which covers up, supposedly, an axiomatic
skeleton. I indicated how a very close analysis of Hegel's work was necessary
to avoid substituting an alien model to Hegel's model of dialectical logic,
since as Asenjo rightly emphasizes, "But here there are too many existing
applications of dialectic that are far from convergent.,,13
In my opinion, attempts to formalize Hegel's logic all suffer from an
insufficient interpretation of Hegel's writings, mainly Die Wissenschaft der
Logik. Formal treatments of dialectics, despite their intrinsic interest, have to
be judged on their relevance for Hegel's logic and at the same time for their
logical fertility. I have explained earlier that formalisation in the case of
Hegel's logic has a special meaning: formalisation does not exhaust the
content of Hegelian dialectics, it aims at disentangling the structural features
of the dialectics or, as Hegel puts it, the form of the self-movement of the
content from the content itself. In particular full axiomatisation in the usual
sense is excluded. On the other hand, I insist upon that point again, the
mathematical-algebraic-structures used in the formalization must have a
logical meaning. Very often a mathematical structure serves to represent a
logical relation, but it remains an empty representation or an 'analogical'
abstraction; it gives then only a formal image without any real gain as far as
explanation or foundational depth is concerned.
4. Algebraic logic, in the sense of Tarski or Halmos, is the discipline that

endeavours to represent logical relations by the means of algebraic structures
without renouncing logical meaning and, at the same time, foundational
relevance. Algebraic logic as a representational theory has not yet succeeded
in integrating the whole of classical orthodox logic; it appears rather paradox·
ical then to propose a logico·algebraic treatment of Hegel's dialectical logic.
But, in my view, it is the most logically fruitful, if not the only valid one.
Of course, what I have said about such an approach in my paper on
'Dialectic Logic and Algebraic Logic' gives a very dim idea of that fruitful·
ness. But my intention in that paper was to indicate that a closer analysis of
Hegel's text was necessary, if a better formal treatment is to be expected. An
analysis of the follOwing chapters of Die Wissenschaft der Logik would
provide us with a larger basis, but we have got already with the first chapter a
formal inductive structure that is indicative of the whole. For our logico-
algebraic-treatment - here we use the simpler form of polyadic algebras - we
need a Boolean algebra (with possibly an enriched structure of additional laws
or operations, as is suggested in my other paper), a set for category, subcate-
gories, etc., a function T for transformations, e.g. cyclic permutations and the
existential quantifier tI. With the Boolean algebra we have propositional
logic, with the existential quantifier, we have (first-order) predicate logic.
If we wish to introduce new algebraic operations, it does not mean that we
have to change propositional logic, only to expand its domain. But if we want
to add new operations and expand the Boolean framework, then we have to
resort to a multiplicity of algebraic varieties, lattice structures and group-
theoretic structures. The problem with those structures is that they can be as
empty as metaphysical notions. Mathematics is not in itself a warranty of
validity, we know that from set theory and especially from the theory of
large cardinals. Mathematization does not necessarily yield significant results.
I think that to obtain logically significant results, we have to keep a constant
control of our mathematical apparatus. By mUltiplying mathematical struc-
tures 'sine necessitate', we simply lose in foundational meaning what we gain
in mathematical scope. That is the lesson, in my view, of algebraic logic, a
lesson that dialectical logicians should not neglect.
Once we have understood that structural representation does not add to
the fundamental stock of logical notions, we still can draw from jUnctional
representability. That's a resource not only in algebraic logic, but in many
fields of logic, among which many-valued logics. I mean by functional
representation, a mathematical model which emphasizes process and continui-
ty rather than moments, levels and structures. In the case of Hegelian logic,
308 YVON GAUTHIER
the function T for transfonnations or cyclic pennutations could be intro-

duced besides the function for sursumption as defmed in my other paper;
other transformational operations, for example, hierarchisation of positions
(of the different categories), the circular completeness of the system, would
be given a natural formulation in that manner. I can only indicate such an
orientation; it is only after significant progress is made in that direction that
one will be able to judge the merit of the approach. My aim is to provide an
epistemological justification for the idea of a fonnal approach to Hegel's
logic.
It should be clear, after what I have said, that I privilege a rather cautious
approach. I think there is enough to do with the logic we have already got,
especially from the mathematical point of view, that we should not hurry to
invent parallel logics. The example of many-valued logics, mentioned above, is
instructive. Many-valued logics, in spite of their conceptual interest, have not
contributed essentially to a better understanding of logical thinking, at least
up to now. 14 It appears to me that higher-order predicate logic, for example,
is capable of mathematical developments beyond comparison with any logical
variant. A constructivist viewpoint which favors foundational fruitfulness
over conceptual free enterprises inclines to a monistic attitude, which is
hardly objectionable on philosophical grounds 15 Areas of fertile work in
contemporary logic, if we except such borderline fields as modal logic and
inductive logic, point to an overwhelming constructivism (recursive and
metarecursive function theory, subsystems of analysis, hyperarithmetical
hierarchy, functionals, etc ...) while the realism of set-theoretical high
cardinalities appears more and more problematic. The onto-logic of idealist
dialectics in its Hegelian sense would be close, in my opinion, to the realistic
trend and as I have pointed out repeatedly, less susceptible of foundational
interest, unless one is prepared to reinterpret idealist dialectics as a general
theory oflanguage. 16
5. The interconnectedness of logic and language in a Hegelian perspective

may be a more promising study than the tentative formalizations that have
been proposed. Dialectical logic, after all, may be more appropriate for a
henneneutical enterprise interested primarily in the methodological problems
of the social and human sciences and I would suggest conSidering analyticity
and dialecticity or henneneuticity as the opposite poles of scientific inquiry. 1 7
I do not go as far as to say that axiomatics and dialectic are irreconcilable,
but it strikes me that dialectical thinking is at its best when it deals with
complex phenomena that are refractory to an analytical treatment. This new
form of the traditional opposition between 'Naturwissenschaften' and

'Geisteswissenschaften' is probably not reducible methodologically. The
conflict of methods does not lead to dualism, it forces a more harmonious
vision of the hierarchical system of knowledge. Hegel certainly strove toward
such a vision. His own systematic endeavour, however, did not make much
room for the complementarity of methods or approaches. That is due partly
to a failure of his time. The contemporary philosopher lives in a different
world. Logic does not require any more a ready-made ontology, physics does
not need a metaphysics and philosophy has to learn more than to dictate.
Nevertheless, theoretical justification and fundamental speculation remain
the perennial task of philosophy and in that Hegel is still a master. Integral
understanding of the whole of experience and reality must be pursued, even if
it is at inflationary costs. Theories of logic share that ambitious and risky
search, to give a structure to totality and a global meaning to our particular
points of view. For those who cannot be satisfied, fortunately or unfortunate-
a
ly, with a down-to-facilities pragmatism fa Quine,IS there is still the intellec-
tual adventure of Hegel's logic, from a dialectical point of view.
University ofMontreal
POSTSCRIPT (NOVEMBER 3,1978)
Instead of attempting to revise my paper, I'll sketch very briefly my present

position on dialectical logic. The logico-algebraic approach described in the
text has been pursued by Dubarle with the help of what he calls hyper-
Boolean algebra (cf. D. Dubarle and A. Doz, Logique et dialectique (pariS,
l.arousse, 1972»; for my criticisms, see Dialogue 13 (1974), pp. 203-205).
There is also the formalization proposed by Rogowski (see J.L. Gardies,
La logique du temps (paris, P.U.F., 1975». Since I have not been working on
the subject for some years, I shall limit myself to a few remarks. Dialectics
could still be a useful tool in social-historical analysis, even though it cannot
be considered as an alternative logic, in the sense of intuitionistic logic; the
essence of dialectics seems to rest on the interpretation of negation - I have
dealt with a notion of 'local' negation, but in a different context (see my
'Intuitionistic Logic and Local Mathematical Theories', Zeitschrift for
mathematische Logik und Grundfagen der Mathematik 23 (1977),411-414
and Fondements des mathematiques (Montreal, Presses de l'Universite de
Montreal, 1976».
Local negation, in my view, would allow for the dialectical passage
310 YVON GAUTHIER
'Aufhebung' which I translate by 'sursumption', from particular moments or

domains to the comprehensive or integrative structures, as in The Science of
Logic. The process from the local notions to the global ones would be accom-
plished by negating only locally (in algebraic terminology, complements
would be relative or pseudo-relative complements as in Heyting algebra).
NOTES
1 This paper should be considered as a preface or an introduction to my paper 'Dialectic

Logic and Algebraic Logic' circulated before the Congress 'Hegel and the Sciences'.
2 In his book Philosophy of Logic (Englewood Cliffs, N.J., Prentice Hall, 1970) Pro-
fessor Quine does not even mention Hegelian logic in his chapter 6 on 'Deviant Logics'.
3 Kritik der rein en Vernunft (Hamburg, Felix Meiner, 1956), p. 99.
4 See P. K. Schneider, Die Wissenschaftsbegriindende Funktion der Transzendentalphilo·
sophie (Freiburg/Munchen, Karl Alber, 1965).
5 Identitiit und Differenz (pfullingen, Neske, 1957), p. 56ff.
6 See R G. Asenjo, 'Dialectic Logic' in Logique et Analyse, no. 4, 1965, pp. 321-326.
7 See La dialectique, Actes du Congres de Nice (Paris, Presses Universitaires de France,
1969).
8 Dialectica 6, 1948.
9 See Lorenzen's remarks at the end of Gotthard Giinther's paper 'Das Problem einer
Formalisierung der Transzendental-dialektischen Logik' in Hegel-Studien, Beiheft 1,
Heidelberger Hegel-Tage, 1962, pp. 65-123.
10 See Georges Noel, La logique de Hegel, 2nded. (paris, Vrin, 1967),p.19.
11 'Logique Hegelienne et formalisation', Dialogue 6 (1967), pp. 151-165.
12 See H. B. Cllrry, Foundations of Mathematical Logic (New York, McGraw-Hill,
1963), chapter 4.
13 Asenjo,op. cit., p. 325.
14 See A. A. Zinoviev, Philosophical problems of many· valued logics, revised edition, ed.
and trans. by G. Kung and D. D. Corney (Dordrecht, Reidel, 1963).
15 Cf. my paper in the Canadian philosophical review, Dialogue: 'Logique mathematique
et fondements des mathematiques' (Dialogue 10 (1971), 243-275).
16 See my book L 'arc et Ie cercle. L 'essence du langage chez Hegel et Holderlin (paris,
Desc1ee de Brouwer, 1969).
17 See remarks in the same direction by Zinoviev,op. cit., pp. 112-113 and 117-118.
18 Quine,op. cit., p. 102.
M. KOSOK
THE DYNAMICS OF HEGELIAN DIALECTICS,

AND NON-LINEARITY IN THE SCIENCES
INTRODUCTION
The specific question to which this paper is addressed is the relevancy of

Hegel to contemporary science. However, in order to show how Hegel is rele-
vant, it is extremely important to read Hegel from the perspective of aware-
ness that modern science is in the process of developing, in order to see
whether there are any formulations explicitly or implicitly expressed by
Hegel that touch on the central issues of contemporary science. As will
become evident in the paper, the problem of Non-Linearity in the sciences is
regarded here as an all-encompassing question, and one which furthermore is
inseparably related to the problem of formulating a dialectic logic of rela-
tions. However, the dialectic nature of Non-linearity proceeds from an
awareness of relations that is not usually found in the approach most inter-
pretators of Hegel take. Hegel's system presents an awesome structure of
categories and it is very easy to get lost in them, if one has not grasped the
essential dynamic that flows through them, a dynamic, which, from a non-
linear perspective, turns out to be a most valuable insight in Hegel's system.
We shall therefore reapproach Hegel's system - his Science of Logic in parti-
cular (although it is not limited to this) - from the perspective of the dyna-
mic of movement which generates his categories, stating in fact that it is this
very movement that constitutes the content of the categories generated, and
not the particular categories themselves, regarded as identifiable and analys-
able terms. For, as we shall see, it is precisely this identification process,
singling out terms or elements from their dynamic of relation and movement,
which destroys not only the dialectic of relation, but the very terms
themselves.
Now it is precisely this last statement - namely the assertion that in no
way can Hegel's system or logic be understood through an identification
procedure - which is to be taken as radical and revolutionary in the fullest
sense possible. Usually, any approach to Hegel's logic at one point or another
involves an identification process in which some central notion is converged
upon - such as Being, Becoming, the Absolute, dialectic movement - and
then regarded as an orientation perspective for analysis. This holds true for
both the traditional non-formal approach in which Hegel's logic is looked
311
312 M. KOSOK
upon as an ontological self-development, and modern formal approaches in

which the logic is regarded as an algebra of terms-in-relation. For what results,
in either case, is the presentation of a set of qualities determined in some
simple or complex way, to an observer, reader or consciousness, in which the
dialectic of awareness co-relating subject to object is hypothesized into a
fixed state: Hegel's logic is then a simple product, result or object of consci-
ousness, and not at the same time tqe subject of consciousness in its activity
of awareness. It is true that one result of awareness consists in identification,
but - as we shall see - this process of quality-localization is but a more
complex form of non-linear dynamics in which all elements are always
elements of movement and never elements in movement, there not existing
in any way elements - as such, not even as illusions, or fictions. Conse-
quently, we are asking the reader to experience Hegel's logic and non-linearity
as sheer-movement.
In order to see how this perspective makes Hegel relevant to modern
science, and furthermore that this perspective was also Hegel's very own,
requires a return to the originating gestalt with which Hegel begins his Science
of Logic.
As complex as Hegel's philosophy appears, there are a few fundamental

statements appearing in the beginning of his Science of Logic (from his
preface to and including the first chapter) which clearly and unambiguously
set forth his entire gestalt. Thus, Hegel states that "the headings and divisions
which occur in this system (his Science of Logic) are designed in themselves
to have no other significance than that of a Table of Contents" (SL [J/S] 1,
p. 66). These divisions and headings
do not belong to the content and body of the Science, but are compiled by external
reflection, which has already run through the whole of the scheme, and hence knows and
indicates in advance the sequence of its phases, before these introduce themselves in the
subject itself (SL[J/Sjl, p.65).
Hegel then comments, however, that " ... the necessity of connection and the
immanent origination of (these) distinctions must show themselves in the
discussion of the subject matter, for they are part of the self-development of
the concept" (SL [J/S] 1, p. 66). And what is this "necessary connection"?
Hegel goes on to say that "That by means of which the Concept forges ahead
is the ..... Negative which it carries within itself; it is that that constitutes
the genuine dialectical procedure" (SL [J/S] 1, p. 66).
DYNAMICS OF HEGEL'S DIALECTICS 313
Now this all important 'Negative', which the concept carries within itself,
which forges the true dialectical movement, is introduced by the very bold
statement that "The one and only thing for securing scientific progress is
knowledge of the logical precept that Negation is just as much Affirmation as
Negation ... " (SL [J/S] 1, pp. 64-65), and this declaration reappears in the
form that "neither in heaven nor on earth is there anything not containing
both Being and Nothing" . . . because Being and Nothing "are absolutely
distinct and yet ... inseparable" and furthermore "This unity of Being and
Nothing, as being the primary truth, is, once and for all, the basis and element
of all that follows: therefore, besides Becoming itself, all further logical deter-
minations such as Determinate Being, Quality, and in short all philosophical
concepts are examples of this unity" (SL [J/S] 1, pp. 95,97). In summary,
Hegel refers to this both singular and universal paradox of being and nothing
or affirmation and negation (or immediacy and mediation) characterizing at
once his whole science and the dialectic, as the 'aujheben' or transcending
process in which "a thing is transcended only in so far as it has come into
unity with its opposite ... " (SL [J/S] 1, p. 120), a transcendence process
which Hegel in his preface refers to as the 'immanent soul" of the content of
knowledge and the "schema of movement of all concrete knowing" (SL [J/S]
1, p. 37).
Thus, all the various complex identities, divisions and headings Hegel
displays in his system are in themselves not the content: it is the self-develop-
ing Negative as a 'scheme of movement' which is the only content, and as a
schema of movement it must serve as the basis or 'soul' of all concrete know-
ledge. What one must grasp, therefore, is this schema or dialectic movement
in its singular and universal nature if one is to judge the significance and
relevance Hegel has for the sciences of knowledge as we know them today,
and not get lost in an analytic dissection of the various categories or identi-
ties which Hegel clearly dismisses as being besides the point. Indeed this very
distinction that Hegel makes of the categories in-themselves as not being the
content but rather their necessary connection and origination, should warn
the reader that any attempt to hypothesize this movement-of-identities into
a set, sequence, or algebra of well-defined terms is doomed from the start,
and thus should the reader disdainfully display a proof that all sorts of self-
contradictions appear when analyzing the movement of distinct terms as
separate entities in relation, or that the movement of terms can be reduced to
a given pattern of relations, then he would merely be displaying his ignorance
of what the point of the whole dialectics is in the first place.
Grasping directly the essential point being made, however, takes us on a
314 M.KOSOK
voyage totally removed in spirit from what our usual conception of logic or
structure is, if our training and conditioning rests upon a heavy dosage of
what is usually referred to in the sciences as 'linear-thinking' ... and unfor-
tunately our most cherished responses and habits of consciousness are so
weighed down with automatic 'linear-response' that we are not aware most of
the time of the type of assumptions and Simplifications introduced by this
mechanism of linearization . . . . it appears so 'natural' that it disappears as a
problem. And yet, it is precisely this problem of linearity that not only
characterizes the paradoxes and boundaries of all the modern sciences and
humanities, but at the same time becomes the means, when properly resolved,
by which Hegelian dialectic reappears transformed as a revolutionary perspec-
tive of integration and transcendence for the sciences and humanities as they
are developing today.
Both the problem of linearity and Hegel's paradoxical unity of being and
nothing or affirmation and negation can be grasped with the understanding of
what is involved in the activity of 'identification,' or simply put, what one
means by the 'identity' of that which our awareness is concerned with. To
identify means to bring into focus a certain element, quality, fact, condition
... a certain event, state of events or experience in such a way as to be able
to refer to it in some categorical way. Without identification, our awareness is
in a state of immediacy which is not defined in relation to categorization.
This, however, means that a genuine state of immediacy cannot be charac-
terized as either including or excluding any mediation or categorical state lest
this immediacy is 'itself then perceived as an identified state and hence not
immediate. Thus, true immediacy is not an irrational/indeterminate anti-
categorical state of dissolution in opposition to a rational/determinate
categorical state of resolution, since both involve a specification or positing of
specific qualities. Indeed, a state of direct:presence and immediacy presents a
logical paradox right at the beginning for not only cannot it be regarded as a
well-defmed element capable of being identified with a given 'truth value,'
but this very 'lack of value' cannot be regarde4, upon reflection, as its
identity either. Identity of any kind sets limits and boundaries, while a state
of immediacy is a trans-b,ounded 'totality' or 'singularity', meaning that it
cannot be regarded as either determined positively by the presence of a
boundary or negatively by the absence of a boundary, for both presence and
absence, inclusion or exclusion of limits or boundaries are mediations or
modifications delimiting and defining that which it stands in relation to.
Even the notion of trans-bounded, if identified or localized by appearing
in opposition to non-trans-bounded, cannot describe immediacy, yet
immediacy cannot simply be dismissed as 'something' not-characterizable

altogether for not only is this comment about immediacy itself an identifiable
state, but the very awareness of the paradox which immediacy as a trans-
bounded state must present, makes immediacy not an arbitrary variable
simply left for the poets to sing hymns to.
Immediacy or direct awareness is ... which is to say that as such it appears
as a kind of trans-bounded or trans-identifiable 'totality' or 'singularity' that
must be in a state of being-experienced in order to be-known, any mediated
reference to it failing to capture or delimit it into an identity. Immediacy
means the complete co-incidence of experience and the knowing of that
experience - of object and subject - and thus concrete and non-questionable
- any question appearing as a mediation or negation of immediacy by localiz-
ing one aspect in opposition to another, creating identifications and
categories. And yet consciousness or awareness also identifies, focuses, makes
categories and distinctions - namely it mediates immediacy. What then can
one say about the relation between immediacy and mediation - or direct
presence and its identification without merely throwing up our hands and
calling this a meaningless problem not recognizing that this very dismissal in-
itself is an identifiable response and hence not a way out of the problem?
This question takes us to the heart of our problem - namely that of
grasping both the Hegelian dialectic and the modern notion of non-linearity
as manifestations of awareness experiencing or forming identities out of
immediacy: a non-dialectic logic and linearity on the other hand works only
within a system or structure of already-given identities and is not concerned
with their activity of appearance, creation or formation ... they are concern-
ed with what has-been ... the past ... and not with 'what-is' ... with images,
projections, categories and memories qua produced, and not even with
images, projection and memories as an active and on-going process and thus
an integral aspect of what is. In science, to linearize means to separate out
into manipulative variables distinctions which constitute a given gestalt -
namely distinctions which are perceived as constituting a totality to begin
with and not distinctions which are first fixed and defmed as isolates and
then as separate distinctions, fit together as 'parts' into a 'whole'. lineariza-
tion is not only useful as a means of reducing the complexity of a given
totality of appearance, but also necessary if one wants to define, measure and
predict - i.e., if one wants to be present as an active and creative element in
the world. But then one has to be self-aware of what identification and
linearization means in order not to be blinded by the beauty of our own
products - i.e., by hubris. All identification is a process that has to appear
316 M. KOSaK
out of a pre-identified (i.e. pre-defmed and pre·measured) state and is not

God-given to Man. Thus identification into separate categories is a condition-
ed and mediated presence, and not in any way absolute, unconditioned,
essential truth or the answer and response to anything other than the specific
conditions that generated the identities out of a non-identified state of
immediacy displaying identification and conditioning as the very price one
has to pay in order for awareness to be active. However, we are so used to
manipulating, both intellectually and emotionally categories or 'abstractions'
of experience that one can become insensitive to our existence as an imme-
diate awareness in which our habitual categories (such as logic, matter, self,
world, freedom, necessity etc.) are neither identified as given or counter-
identified as not-given, but in a 'fluid' state of identities 'being-given' and
'being-formed', and for that matter, re-formed, unformed, transformed and
thus expressive of a state or condition that is radically open and not fixed
... and hence not fixed by the very mediations, identities and words being
used to describe what is happening. To be radically open does not merely
mean to be free as opposed to being determined, for in this form both are
closures of meaning bouncing each other. To be radically open means not
even being bounded by having to not have determination, form, delimitation
and structure . . . ; to be radically open means experiencing no position or
counter-position already determined and fixed in a certain relation of
inclusion or exclusion ... it means experiencing one's being-in-the world as a
singular totality being-evolved and transformed in boundless multiplicity and
thus not in any way a simple detached entity contemplating other detached
entities playing a cosmic game of hide and seek. Words, symbols and identifi-
cations have a truly hypnotic spell, freezing into a mold that which is being-
experienced into 'an experience' that is separated from the activity of
experiencing. But a little reflection or awareness of this condition further
reveals that any attempt to then separate out the condition of immediacy as a
'pure-state' from the identification process as a categorical or 'impure' state is
but another example of the categorization of immediacy, and in fact one
of the most damaging for, through this particular maneuver, the genuine
presence of immediacy becomes eclipsed by the very attempt to 'save' it as
something separate from identification - not recognizing that immediacy or
that 'which is' cannot itself be delimited by manipulation or categorization in
any direct or indirect way, but rather must express itself as a totality or
singularity in and through whatever process or state is present, and this
includes the various states of identification, categorization and abstraction
taking place.
Actually immediacy or any paradoxical identity-transcending 'state', not

being bound by the self-affirming law of identity that A is A, means that such
a state need not be self-affirming but also could be self-negating, which in
turn implies that a trans-identity state can appear both trans-identical and
non-trans-identical. Thus immediacy, precisely because it is not an identity,
is free to appear either in pure non-identity form, or in impure identified
form, displaying categories of mediation without contradiction, for it is only
identities that must remain consistently self-affirmative in order to be
meaningful. In our blindness, we tend to regard the law of identity that A is
A as also being applicative to that which is non-identical, not recognizing that
non-identical immediacy, to be immediate, cannot be externally delimited by
mediation and identity reducing immediacy to a mediation-by-contrast
called 'mere immediacy', but must be a totality capable of expressing both
immediacy and its negation into mediation and identity, making all mediation
a self-mediation of immediacy.
Put in simple terms, one cannot 'stop the world and get off for even one
instant - and in what suspension capture the world by an identity - for
any activity of awareness, be it defining or measuring, thinking or acting,
making abstractions, meditating or producing goods, is a state-of-presence
which qua state of presence is what one means when one uses the terms
concrete, existential, active, dynamic or immediate to describe that 'which
is'. In modern scientific terminology - as distinct from the classical position
- one recognises that the very act of observing involves, forms and transforms
both the observer and the observed - and to first postulate a so-called 'meta-
physical' sub-structure of hypothetical and hypothesized identities is to
fix our minds into a detached-reflective mode manipulating already formed
elements that no longer display a state of immediote presence. The task is,
therefore, to become aware of the phenomenology of reflection and identifi-
cation as it manifests itself without pre-empting it into an already given
identity structure. Thus the very appearance of a reflection condition within
immediacy implies that what originally was present - namely a pre-reflective
element-of-immediacy, which we shall refer to as e, is now a determined or
posited element +e ('plus e') co-existing, however, in relation to its mutually
determined context of reflection -e ('minus e'), both the posited element +e
and its context as its negation -e being necessary to define a singular boun-
dary of identity or form ±e of which +e and -e are its inseparable distinctions.
If one were simply to 'remain' with the original undefined state of immediacy
e, one could not in any way refer to it, and hence the initial e 'as such' is not
in any wayan identity. Recognition of e is literally a re-cognition of e and
318 M. KOSaK
hence a transfonnation of e into a state of determination and mediation:

awareness is transformation. However, mediation is never one-sided, for any
posited or determinate immediacy, given now as +e co-exists only in relation
to a counter-determined state -e in which both are mutually co-defmed and
thus mutually in co-balance qua mediation, no mediated state negating the
totality of immediacy within which mediations appear: identification is
always a relational activity and not a matter of simply picking out a singlet
without also at the same time revealing a relational boundary condition,
expressive of an immediate totality. Thus, starting from a pre-mediated
immediacy e, the phenomenology of reflection discloses a state of paradoxi-
cal mutual-mediation t e to appear in which every distinct identity only
co-exists in relation to a counter-identity, every action in relation to its
reaction, every assertion in relation to its negation, every subject in relation
to its object, every 'matter' in relation to an 'anti-matter', such that the
boundary is not constructed out of the distinct elements regarded as already
separately conceived or experienced and then brought into a linear compound
or 'synthesis', (which would be a contradiction of terms) but rather the state
of boundedness or transition (i.e. 'becoming') between any element and
anti-element (i.e. between any notion of being and not-being) is what is
immediately present as a non-linear singularity or totality whenever a simple
or 'pure' immediacy - called here e - reveals an identification process. Thus
te or the selfmediation of e into a plus-minus mutuality is the self-trans-
formation of e or immediacy and we can refer to it as e' or the totality of the
'elements' +e and -e and the co-relation te as a singularity self-generated
from an initial singularity. The first order determination of immediacy e
creates a cycle or triad of immediacy returning as e'. Naturally, e' as the new
singularity can in turn recycle and exhibit e", which in turn can reveal e"', -
without end - all of which are further self-mediations all within the dynamics
of an e-ing process of immediacy, each newer level not being an addition to
the previous one, but rather a deepening of that which is being-revealed, in
each case the revelation of mediation coming in mutually bounded pairs (e.g.
+e' and -e') and in each case, the increase of the complexity of mediation
involving a transfonnation of the type of structure being-revealed.
We have thus presented the essence of both Hegel's dialectic - namely his
scheme of movement - and the essence of non-linearity itself, seeing that
both are a dynamics of the phenomenology of awareness in its state of
revealing distinctions. This clearly reveals that dialectics is not a linear prog-
gression from a given thesis +e, to an anti-thesis -e, and then to a synthesis
te, but rather a non-linear unfoldment-of-what-is, wherein all being is being,
and all becoming is self-becoming and transformation. Not grasping the e ,e',
e" e-ing state of immediacy within which the + and - functions develop,
reduces dialectics to an absurdity, and makes non-linearity in the sciences a
mystery. Hegel, unfortunately, did not explicitly spell out the whole
dynamics of such a non-linear self-mediation process, and as a result it
became easy to get lost in a myriad of categories instead of becoming free of
them. Thus the boundary-transitional nature of Becoming, resting as it does
on both the distinctness of +e and -e and the inseparability of +e and -e,
was not sufficiently brought out as an immediate transition from Being
appearing simply as e, and here is where a marriage of Hegelian dialectics with
non-linear topology in mathematics would be extremely fruitful, for each is
involved - from a different perspective - with the same problem. Hegel's
triad of Being, Nothing and Becoming, when analysed in detail amounts to
the same logic as presented here (i.e. this is not a sequence of Being, then
Nothing and then Becoming) but the singular dynamics of its origination is
somewhat obscure.
Now the importance of such a dynamics of immediacy, being the unfold-
ment of what-is and revealing the coming-to-be of identities in a non-linear
topology or context-of-relations, is that it does not present one with an
identity structure predicated on a given structure, but rather is totally void
of specificity other than the experience of immediacy. To the degree to
which one does experience himself-in-the-world as a dynamic immediacy,
together with the forming and transforming of his identities and categories
of immediacy, then to what degree will this dynamics reveal itself in and
through the identities appearing and not appear as an external structure or
mold into which to put or place an assortment of categories, if what has been
presented does 'correspond' to the life and structure of immediacy. This in
tum implies that the 'test' of meaningfulness such a dynamics of immediacy
or dialectic has for knowledge in general and for the sciences in particular
initially rests on the degree to which one is capable of regarding his total
being-in-the-world - namely his feeling, ideas, actions and thoughts in terms
of such a dynamic of self-transformation. Otherwise, this scheme of move-
ment merely becomes but a more complex identity structure as linearized
into a pattern of relations as any other system. This means that all the various
identities and boundary conditions continually confronting one's existence
must be grasped in their paradoxical state of transition and levels of transi-
tion, including of course any reflected notions of the dynamics of immediacy
itself when regarded as a structure among other structures in the world of
dynamic appearance. The paradoxical state of dialectic self-becoming is thus
320 M. KOSOK
not only about immediacy, but also, paradoxically, within immediacy, and
one must not therefore conclude that the present form of analysis, using as it
must linear words and symbols historically conditioned, is the /ast-analysis.
However, the beauty - if you will - of a paradoxical dynamic structure, is
that its own transition as a structure of identifiable elements is not a contra-
diction to its power of revelation, but is indeed exactly that which must be
expected if it does indeed reveal the continual self-negating and transforming
nature of any identity! Paradoxical non-linear dialectics is never an end (Le.
an identity finally given), but always a beginning, and hence is a logic of
creativity and revolution whose activity is the revelation in depth of aware-
ness - and thus self-awareness, for as we have seen, all mediation and reflec-
tion is always self-mediation and self-reflection - the world of dynamic
appearance being the content of this awareness.
II. DEVELOPING DIALECTICS AND NON-LINEARITY AS A

DYNAMICS OF IMMEDIACY
The problem now in front of us is 'what to do' with the dynamic of

immediacy once we have - if we have - experienced it. However, if we do
something with it, one must be prepared for a linearization of the entire
dynamics to express itself, for immediacy is always a state of self-actual-
isation and totality, while simple directional activity implies a narrowing or
focusing of perspective - whether that narrowing is called 'looking at the
elements or parts' (+ and -), looking at the whole (±), or any identifiable
aspect of transcending, transitory totality. Of course, such a linearization is
itself but an expression of a non-linear totality, but if this totality is lost
sight of, expressing itself only indirectly or 'unconsciously', then lineariza-
tion also expresses self-alienation - a type of self-negation in which any
original paradoxical totality appears visible only in terms of its negation and
not directly as such. And the negation of paradox through linearization is
none other than being caught up in the trap of 'diction' vs. 'contradiction'
which GOdel's theorems beautifully express as the fate of all linearizable
(arithmetizable) logics.
Thus, if we 'take' the dynamics of immediacy from e to e' and linearize
it, then the three inseparable distinctions appear as separated distinctions
obtaining +e as A or the standard assertion, -e as not A or the standard
negation, in which case ±e or the boundary element would merely appear as
an indeterminate 'middle' which if retained in a system would lead to a con-
tradiction (being both +e and -e or A as diction and not A as contradiction),
or if rejected from a system would lead to incompleteness (i.e. the transition

state being excluded). Once linearized, +e and -e, being and nothing, or any
element and its context, any particle and its space or field, any ego and its
world cannot be 'brought back together again' without producing either an
overlapping (inconsistency) or underlapping (incompleteness) of identities
that are each held to have their own separately determined boundaries and
thus void of genuine relation. We see, here, how GOdel's incompleteness-
inconsistency opposition follows directly from the linearization of the funda-
mental paradoxical triad of dialectic. Thus a three value, n-value or infmite
value logic does not yield a dialectic logic - dialectic movement dealing with
self-mediated transition states of immediacy and not identity values such as
true and false, or for that matter any kind of value including the value of
'indeterminacy' as long as these values can appear arithmetized or linearized
in any direct or indirect or even 'partial' way as a sequence 1,2,3,4 .... Of
course, for the purposes of Simplification one does introduce linearizations
and intermediate values, but these become delusions and not clarifications if
one forgets the state of immediacy and existential presence that our whole
totality is an expression of, within which identity appears as a process that is
being-formed and not merely appearing as a product already present (like the
numbers 1,2,3,4 . . . , regarding numeration linearly as a given-structure and
not dynamically as self-related transitional values whose 'discreteness' is not
absolute but only provisional).
The only 'road' or 'Tao' that the dynamics of immediacy follows is sui
generis and only those who are an integral aspect of such a state of experi-
encing can discover directly or indirectly aspects of its self-expression. We
shall follow the singular e, e', err, e'" ... e-ing process or state (not to be
confused with either a simple sequence or set) fust in our already express-
ed variables of + and - interrelatedness, and then tie this dynamics of
immediacy with the Hegelian logic, at the same time showing the intrinsic
relation this logic has with the formulation of non-linearity in modern
scientific theoretics. Once one grasps the initial dynamics of immediacy from
e to e' as the unfoldment of three inseparable distinctions, now written in
the form e' = (+e -e ±e), expressing what e must appear like when referred to
or identified within a state of immediacy, then one can also see that err would
be a further self-transformation of that immediacy now appearing in the form
err = (+e' -e' ±e'). Although these look like a discrete leveling of similar
separate phases, they are only indeterminate singularities whose dynamic
interrelatedness is yet to be revealed. Thus, err would now have to appear
as a two-dimensional triadic transition of a triadic transition state and hence
322 M. KOSOK
a nine-term expression of relations occurring simultaneously on two distinct

but inseparable levels: e" thus appears qualitatively distinct from e'. This can
be expressed thus!:
+e' + (+e -e ±e) ++e+-e+±e
e " =-e, (+e -e ±e = +e -e ±e
±e' ± (+e -e ±e) ±+e±-e±±e
In general, one obtains (mathematically) a progression e, e', e", e'"
generating an ever-increasing matrix of transition states, such that as the
number of levels or dimensions on' increases according to the numbers 0,1,2,3
... n, the number of terms-in-transition increases correspondingly according
to the progression 1,3,9,27 ... 3n , (i.e. triads of triads of triads ... etc.),
realizing of course that such a numerical localization is in linear form - as
any explicit symbolic relation must be. The only way in which not to lose
sight of the non-linear dynamics of immediacy, is to grasp whatever is
present in terms of a functioning totality - i.e. as a topology of dynamic
relations. (Thus, in e", the 9-term totality reveals 4 oppositional terms
++e, +-e, -+e, --e; 4 partial transitions +±e, -ie, ±+e, ±-e, and 1 complete
transition - Le. a transition of a transition tie, a119 acting as a singular two-
dimensional dynamics). In the form presented, we see that as the number of
dimensions increases to the denumerable infmity on' in the 'limit', the number
of transition terms increases to the indenumerable inftnity '3 n , in the limit,
these two infInities being but the initial modality of infInitization that the
e-ing state can reveal. In effect, the infinite transition condition of the
dynamics of immediacy is but a way of expressing the fact that all elements
involved 'in' a transition-state are not 'elements-in-transition', but rather
'elements-of-transition', meaning that the elements as such are not primary,
but rather the transition-relation is - which in tum means that any expres-
sion which formulates a transition relation between two elements on one level
(level n) must also reflect this transition within each of the elements on a
deeper level (level 'n plus l' for example) lest the "elements appear separable
into complete parts independent of their relation, making transition only an
'external' matter and not the very dynamics or 'soul' of immediacy. However,
this is but a way of demanding an unending infmity of transitional relations,
for either transition is being-experienced as a singular totality without com-
ment, in which case one does not single or linearize out anything, or one has
made a comment which singles out some level or level of relations 'n', which
as a linearization is incomplete without a deeper one 'n plus 1', which in tum
is incomplete if singled out without still a deeper one, etc. Thus, should any
immediacy appear reflected or determined as an identity, it must be transi-

tional and thus revelatory of sub-identities-of-relation (e.g. e into e'), there
not being any ultimate identity, sub-identity or meta-identity reflected upon
that is not itself also transitional. Transcendence is total transition appearing
at any stage - i.e. total 'clarity' of being or 'enlightenment', be it called the
Absolute of Hegel, the Void of Zen, the non-localizable I and Thou of Buber,
the radical negativity of Nietzsche, or in modern scientific terminology, the
non-linear totality of inseparable distinctions expressive of the primary
immediacy of experience.
Reviewing the entire dynamics of immediacy once more as a singular
experiencing state of selfmediation, having now 'spelled out' the particular
modality of linearization used here as its expression (namely the infmity of
multi-dimensional matrices of transition-elements), one can get an intuitive
feeling of the entire process if one regards e as a signification of the singu-
larity of immediacy in any form; e' that singularity appearing as a first order
boundary relation; e" appearing as a second order mutuality or boundary
relation of elements ... each element in turn explicitly exhibiting a boundary
relation of mutuality, and so on . . . the number of boundary relations
present being a function of the complexity of depth a state of immediacy
displays. Indeed, turning to Hegel, we can see that this is exactly how he
introduces transitions that move beyond the first order transition called
Becoming. In describing the two moments of becoming called arising and
passing away, Hegel states that "Becoming thus contains Being and Nothing
as two such unities, each of which itself is a unity of Being and Nothing ...
One of these is Being taken immediately and as related to Nothing (Le.
passing away); the other Nothing taken immediately and as related to Being
(i.e. arising) . . . . In this manner Becoming is a two-fold determination"
(SL [J/S] 1,p.118).
In terms of our matrix presentation of dynamic immediacy, Becoming as
the first transition state is ±e, or e' as a totality of relation between Being
determined or posited as +e and Nothing counter-posited as -e (both of
which originate and are expressions of the original expression of pure or sheer
immediacy e, simply called Being). Now a second-level reflection starting with
e', would give te' as a posited or determined state of becoming, which would
in turn reveal -e' as a counter-determined state of becoming, meaning that no
longer do we have a simple boundary relation between te and -e expressing
the immediate form of transition called e'. Thus te' would be a posited or
direct form of relating +e to -e in e' or becoming in contradistinction to
-e' as the counter-posited or inverted form of relating te to -e in e': whereas
324 M.KOSOK
te' represents the original state of direct relation between being and nothing,
each one posited as itself, -e' would reveal an inverted counter-relation in
opposition to this posited state and this would mean a state in which being
appearing as nothing would be in relation to nothing, appearing as being.
Thus, -e' as 'counter-becoming' would be a relation of terms each one of
which appears as its opposite in order to counter +e' in which each term
appears only as itself. Hence, if +e' represents, for example, an energy
exchange relation between charges (of electricity), -e' would represent an
inverse energy exchange relation between the same charges, tending to
counter-act and stabilize a transition state into two transition states moving
in opposite directions. In terms of a general topological dynamics, whereas
e' in effect appears as a relation due to a simple balance of two opposite
elements as a result of a self-differentiation of e into te and -e, e" now
appears as a balance of two opposite relations, appearing as a result of a
self-differentiation of e' into te' and -e', producing a singular relation-of-a-
relation. This, of course, means that in e", not only must there exist +e and
-e elements, producing a posited relation, but each in turn must also mirror
its opposite in order to manifest a counter-relation between them, which,
at the same time, mirrors the original relation of transition between them,
also within each. Thus, intuitively, a second level two-dimensional relation of
dialectic opposition reveals not only X and Y, let us say, as oppositions, but
also its inverse as X(Y) and Y(X), such that there are four X - Y relations:
the direct relation between X and Y, the counter-relation between (Y) and
(X), the relation within X (between X and (Y)) and the relation within Y
(between Y and (X)). Finally, there is the en tire structure as a whole, which is
nothing but the X - Y relation now taken not as a simple one-dimensional
unity, but as a self-differentiated unity - i.e. a unity of unities, or a unity
between X and Y each of which is also an XY unity. (This nine-term analysis
is an intuitive simplification of the formal two-dimensional, nine-term matrix
appearing on page 322.) Clearly, higher order matrices would then not only
develop further unity within unity within unities, but each quantitatively
higher order dimension would require a higher order topology of relations in
order to grasp all possible relations as a Singular dynamic whole: a three
dimensional reflection would have to spell out 27 terms, simultaneously
related in a three-dimensional space thus displaying qualitatively newer
modalities of existence not previously visible. Thus the dynamics of imme-
diacy not only represents the initial 'triad' of dialectics non-linearly, but
subsequent triadicies continually expand the dimensionality or perspective of
the dynamics present and hence the nature of the terms one is in relation to,
revealing a power expansion which in the limit generates an indenumerable

number of terms in an infinite space. In no way, therefore, is dialectic a term-
by-term expansion: it is a self-evolving unfoldment of possibilities of rela-
tions, any specific structure reflective of the richness of the paradoxical
immediacy or totality present.
Returning to Hegel's analysis of the Logic, we can now observe the
progression of dimensionality within which the terms or categories express
meaning, without which his logic is reduced to a linear term-by-term unfold-
ment, or an a-logical presentation of generally related intuitive notions. For
Hegel, +e -e +-e form the first triad of Being, Nothing and Becoming.
However, this entire triad, as an immediate totality e' in turn develops as a
triad of triads +e' -e' +-e' which he calls Being (Being-as-such), Determinate
Being, and Being-for-Self, which in turn, as a Singular totality e" is called
Quality. Thus Being-as-such or +e' is actually the initial 3-term state of
becoming posited as a fully immediate state, Determinate Being or -e' is
then its negation into counter-becoming or anti-becoming, dealing with
the determinate structures of stabilized becoming (such as finitude and
infinity) as a counter 3-term state of mediation emerging from the 3-term
state of becoming, while Being-for-Self or +-e' is the unity of becoming
with anti-becoming (or the unity of non-determinate 'universa1' transition
and movement with determinate structures of particularity) yielding the
final 3-term self-determinate state which is the unity of indeterminacy and
determinacy.
All in all we have nine terms for a second order dynamics of identification
e" called Quality. The zero order state e is pure immediacy as being; the first
order determination e' is being-determined-as becoming its own other through
negation. However, and this is extremely important, since the relation be-
tween positive and negative or being and non-being within becoming is not
strictly symmetric, e' or becoming is the determination of the immediacy of
being referred to as e: the negative or any reflection or mediation is not an
originating primary state capable of appearing in a simply immediate form.
All determination is self-determination within being. (In mathematics the
negative is defined as a reflection from what is posited as positive: it is a
relation-state to begin with, such that -1 times -1 is a double-reflection back
to the positive direction. Positive and negative are asymmetric-symmetries of
relation: +1 times +1 is +1, but -1 times -1 is not -1 . . . it is also +1 ,
indicating that all symmetric alterations that occur between + and - cycles
are asymmetrically based on the positive.)
Thus e' is a development of a relation between being and its negation out
326 M.KOSOK
of the immediacy of being or e. It is hence only within e' that the negative
makes its first appearance. This means that e" as the development of e' will
now start with both being and negation as positive immediacies in +e', and
only then develop each of these as mediated negative terms in -e', wherein
the original positive and negative immediacies within +e' each now reveal
their complimentary opposites (i.e. being revealing negation and negation
revealing being through mediation). However, since +e' or posited becoming
is also the asymmetric movement of being into negation, -e' is then the
counter asymmetric movement of mediated being into mediated negation -
or negation back into being: -e' is thus the anti-state of counter-becoming
balancing the original state of becoming +e', such that te' or e" is now both
the symmetric balance of becoming and antibecoming, and the asymmetric
movement of being into becoming-its-negative (e into e') which has now in
turn expanded with a return movement of negation back to being, for only in
e" do we first find a double-negative term (--e) representing the return
movement of being from negation. Thus e, e' and e" develop an overall cycle
from immediate being (e), through being-revealing-the-becoming-of-negation
(e') to the becoming-of-negation, re-revealing the presence of being as a
return state (e"). In e" being is revealed as the end-state of all becoming,
because now being reveals itself through negation as self-being or being-for-
self. Quality as the full dynamics of e, e', e" is thus the permanence of being
or immediacy through any determination, limit, negation or becoming. The
nine-term matrix e" is thus the full self-determination of being or e and it is
this matrix of double-transition which is the essential building unit of Hegel's
logic, as much as any triad of single transition is the interconnecting move-
ment or energy which constitutes the component aspects of such units.
Specifically, the details of the dynamic unit of Quality e" can best be re-
vealed by returning to our initial cycle or triad e' where we can see the cycle
itself recycled, first determined as an immediate positive cycle, then as the
mediating negative cycle. (i.e. the cycle e' will be recycled as +e' -e' and te'
all within e", just as e originally appeared as +e, -e and te within e'.) In the
immediate or positive cycle, all the forms present are now in immediate form,
which means that the original selfmediated state of becoming +-e containing
+ and - in mutual identification now collapses as Hegel often puts it, into
only an immediate form of itself: the Being and Nothing or + and - within
Becoming or e' appear' as indifferent immediates or distinctions which have
not yet explicitly developed each opposite within itself (Le. e' is now part of
itself as e" which is to develop). This leaves us now with the mediating or
negative cycle. Here all the forms present become mediated: the positive
appears mediated into the negative, and the negative mediated into the
positive, each immediate or apparently indifferent term revealing the other
within and relative to itself. Consequently the identity between the positive
and negative which was originally totally immediate in the cycle e' , and which
in the positive cycle appeared as a paradox of two immediacies in a co-
immediate state, has now become self-separated in the negative or mediating
cycle because each immediacy is now turned to the opposite within it as a
derived opposite, and is not directly or immediately in relation with the
opposite 'itself. Each opposite appears self-bound and not other-bound. In
Hegel this means we have moved from the initial or positive triad of Being
Nothing and Becoming (itself called Being) to the triad of Determinate Being.
Relative to this triad, Being or the positive form of the first cycle appears as a
determined Being called Something or Finitude (mediated self-referral), while
Nothing or the negative appears as a counter-determined Other or Non-finitude
(the bad infinity of open-ended other-referral): the 'Something' is actually
Being acting in a delimited negative way, i.e. it is a bounded system, while
the 'Other' is actually negativity acting in a positive way - i.e. it is the context
or the determinate space within which the system as a something appears
determined: Determinate Being is System in a Context (Diagram, p. 345).
Now the unity of the Something and Other (the two fundamental oppo-
sites on the negative level) is naturally not the state of immediate becoming
or the co-immediacy of Being and Nothing, but rather the mediated state of
Anti-Becoming, or the co-mediated state in which a determined Being and a
determined Negation relate to each other as apparently external elements.
This, however, immediately collapses, for the system and its context in
unity generate a synthesis called True Infinity - each determinate Being (as
a something) in revealing within itself Negation, in turn is but a revelation of
the negative itself qua Other, which relative to its domain in turn is the
revelation of Being: i.e. being externalized within negativity is now a return
to immediate Being. This, hence, leads us to consider the unity of the positive
or immediate cycle of BeCOming and the negative or mediating cycle of
Determinate Being, for not only does a system and its context now ex-ist as
distinguished independent and self-related entities, but each in turn has
revealed the dependency and other-relatedness previously expressed directly
in the pure state of Becoming.
In the self-mediated cycle, then, each opposite, both the positive and
negative, now express a total cycle of return, for each opposite is (1) both
its immediate presence and hence in a direct relation to its opposite as a co-
immediate (2) a revelation of its complementary opposite as a derived or
328 M. KOSaK
mediated presence within itself separating each opposite from its immediate
relation to its actual immediate opposite and now (3) a return to itself
through its own opposite - i.e. a return as a self-mediated immediacy having
explicitly developed within itself its own opposition. This means, however,
that the opposites, as immediates are once more in a direct relation of unity
with each other as in Becoming, but at the same time, each is also a unique
monad of the other within it. Hence each opposite itself is in a state of Self-
Determination and a unity of opposites, while at the same time the opposites
together are also in a state of direct unity: This is the Being For Self stage in
which the unity of being and nothing is also a unity of unities: Being, having
emerged into a determined Something or system, returns to itself as the One
of Attraction; Nothingness - having emerged into a counter-determined
context, also returns to its negativity as the Many of Repulsion. The Unity
of the One and Many, or attraction and repulsion is the overall unity for the
e" cycle. It is a unity in which the original element of immediacy called e or
Being, having become a transition state e' and a revelation of its negative as
Nothingness, has in tum generated a higher order negation, in which both
Being and Nothingness, as two co-immediacies, have each become negated
within themselves, only to reveal a counter-transition to the e', in which Being
not only disappears into Negativity, but any Negativity as an immediate
element itself in turn reveals Being. Hence with e", being or e is in a double
transition state, explicitly returning being to itself through any negation
which has emerged from it. Being as containing all determination and
negation within it is Quality.
Now in mathematics, the movement from e to e' to e" is structurally
similar to the movement from a function to its first derivative, and then to its
second derivative, which is not as such a linear one-dimensional sum of two
derivatives, but a derivative of a derivative, or a state of transition-in-
transition. In physics, position, velocity as the first derivative (like becoming)
and acceleration as the second derivative (the motion itself in movement)
likewise express three states of space-time relation important to describe
fundamental types of movement possible. Position is simple 'being', velocity
is simple 'change-of-position', and hence position vs. velocity merely describes
the simple opposition between non-action and action. However, in order to
describe inter-action, or a state of non-action (like a body at rest) which is
actually in a sub-state of action (like sub-units in movement), then the
acceleration of changing velocities (and hence forces, dynamically speaking)
are required, for now not only is there simple movement in one-direction, but
there is also the movement of this movement changing it into an opposite
direction - and continually re·changing it if this accelerated sub·movement

is stabilized into a body (e.g. stabilized into harmonic oscillating motion).
Consequently, simple position can only express mass or inertia - a state of
rest. Then simple velocity or movement expresses momentum - a state of
action or activity. Finally, a state of interaction describes a physical system of
units in dynamic relation, in which both non·activity of rest (for the system
as a whole) and the activity of movement (for every part of the system) can
coincide to express a condition of dynamic·equilibrium: viz., a state of mass
expressing its movement as internal energy. Thus with only position, there is
no motion evident at all, with velocity there is only explicit motion, but
with accelerations and changing velocities, a system can display implicit
motion in the form of stored energy (e.g., rest-energy, potential energy).
Now in mathematics, not only are there an infinite number of derivatives
possible and hence states of transition, similar to the e, e', e" infmite
matrices of transition, but complex number theory likewise shows that the
type of number·structures possible also - theoretically - build up in complex
matrix form - giving us the 'hyper-complex sequence' (real, complex,
quaternion, caley etc.) continually expressing more and more subtle dim en·
sionalities (i.e. qualitative aspects) of number. In physics there are, of course,
an infinite number of derivatives of motion possible, and the qualitative
complexity of interaction depends upon the number, ordering and inter·
relation of these states of movement. Thus the dynamics of the logic of
Hegel, when expressed in terms of the e, e', e" e·ing process of transition not
only accounts for the dimensional non·linear complexity of his logic, but
has immediate relation in mathematics and physics to the structures with
which they present their modalities of transition.
One can now move beyond e" or the state of Quality as such and generate
e'" as a three·dimensional transition state involving +e" or Quality posited
against -e", Quantity, generating +e" called Measure - which is a triad of
9·term matrices, giving us 27 basic terms for the state of Measure. The entire
triad e'" is called Being (as a totality). If Quality is the self·determination of
Being, then Quantity is the self·determination of its opposite - namely Non·
Being or the 'other' of Being. Thus Quantity is the externalization of Quality,
and Measure is the unity of both Quality as 'internal Being' and Quantity as
'external Being', giving us e'" as the totality of Being. Dynamically, this
means investigating the state of transitions which a self-integrated state of
Becoming (i.e. e") can display, or the complexities of three transition states
simultaneously interrelating. Finally, in Hegel's logic, only one more reflec·
tion is needed, and the entire structure is displayed: +e'" as Being, -e'" as
330 M. KOSOK
Essence and ±e'" as Notion gives us the fourth-dimensional state of transition

called e"" or the Logic itself revealed in four reflections and 81 basic transi-
tion terms (i.e. 3 4 is 81). Dynamically, this means that starting with e"
or Quality as our basic initial term (the state of self-integrated Becoming),
one can generate a second two-dimensional matrix with the 'sequence' e",
e"', e"" similar to the previous sequence, e, e', e" which ended with e".
Thus e"" is to e", as e" is to e. This means that e"" or the entire logic of
Hegel is structurally the Qualification of Quality, or a display of a meta-
Quality state (e"") each term of which is a positive or negative state of
Quality (e") or self-integrated Becoming similar to the way in which Quality
itself (e") was a meta-Being state (i.e. the return of Being to itself or Being-
for-itself) in which each term was a positive or negative state of Being (e).
In this way, one can also relate the two intermediate e' and e"' states to
each other. Thus, whereas +e', -e' and +-e' stood for Being (as such), Deter-
minate Being and Being-for-Self, +e''', -e'" and +-e"' stand for Being (as
a totality), Essence and Notion - making the last triad but a higher order
version of the former. Indeed, the even number dimensions, e, e", e"", are
all forms of doublets or doublets of doublets (of transition) and hence all
in a form in which any given transition or negation is coupled to another
transition and negation, producing a negation-of-the-negation or return to
Being-type-of-structure, while the odd number dimensions e', e'" are all
forms of singlets of negation or transition, and hence in a Non-Being or
Negation type of structure, not forgetting however that each succeeding
higher even or odd dimension is not a mechanical repetition of the previous
one, but rather is a development of the previous one in conjunction with an
intermediate opposite.
In developing Hegelian dialectic as a dynamic topology of transforming
dimensionality, one can visualize this process geometrically (i.e. linearize it
into a specific model) by considering it as an evolution of spaces - from the
point (zero dimension), to the line, the surface, the volume and higher order
spaces, in which one obtains (1) a complete one-to-one correspondence
between all the topological elements present in a particular space and all the
dialectic terms present in a particular dimension of transition - and (2) a
complete correspondence between the topological relations present in that
space, and the dialectic relations present for a particular dimension. Thus for
3 n , the first value is n = 0, giving us 3° or the value 1. This is both the
element e, and the singular point. For 3 1 , we obtain the value 3, and this
corresponds to the first dimension e, in which +e and -e correspond respec-
tively to the two end points of a one-dimensional line, while ±e corresponds
to the line itself - i.e. to the line of co-relation determining the two end
points or polarities. Thus, the original zero·dimensional space - namely the
singular point - now appears within the one-dimensional space as a double-
term or double sub-space (i.e. as two points) giving expression to a new
singular space - namely the line itself. For 3 2 we obtain the value 9. As
previously pointed out, a two-dimensional dialectic matrix has four opposi-
tion elements «++e, +-e, -+e and --e), four partial transitions (+ +-e,
- +-e; and +- +e, +- -e), and one complete transition (+- +-e). The four
oppositions correspond to the four points of a square-surface, the four partial
transitions correspond to the four lines connecting these points, and the one
total transition corresponds to the two-dimensional square-surface itself
whose boundary is now composed of four one-dimensional lines simul-
teneously in co-relation. (Looking back at the matrix on page 322, together
with its analysis on the pages following, will enable one to intuit the corre-
spondence outlined. Besides the obvious properties mentioned here, there are
others to be considered, e.g. the role of the diagonals, which all give addi-
tional expression to the topology of dialectic relations.) Thus in moving from
one- to two-dimensional dialectic, the elements in relation are no longer
points, but lines (i.e. relations themselves) and furthermore, the Singular space
they generate is not according to the same kind of structure found in the
more simple one dimensional dialectic of a triad. A two-dimensional dialectic
has to be grasped as a singular 9-term relation of relations generating simul-
taneous transitions in a two-dimensional space.
For a three-dimensional dialectic, 33 gives 27 terms. This corresponds to
the cubic volume which has 8 points, 12 lines, 6 planes and one singular
volume - namely the entire space itself as a three-dimension transition space.
We see that the complexity of transition relations jumps qualitatively, each
time the previous space becomes a sub-space or element within a larger
singular space. For a four-dimensional dialectic, 3 4 gives 81 terms. This
corresponds to the 'tesserac' - i.e. a four-dimensional cube having 16 points,
32 lines, 24 surfaces, 8 volumes and one four-dimensional volume that is
bounded by the 8 volumes (as the three-dimensional volume is bounded by
6 planes). Hegel's logic, as a 3 4 or 8l-term dialectic generated through four
major transition states, which function simultaneously in co-relation, is thus
mapped topologically into a 'tesserac' - i.e. a four-dimensional cube, which
gives a singular expression to these 81 elements of transition in a singular
gestalt! Small wonder that it is difficult to imagine as a totality, let alone
higher order spaces into 5,6, ... etc., etc. dimensions not even considered.
Two immediate observations appear. First, the number of singular points
332 M.KOSOK
or opposition elements (of zero dimension) present in each space generate

a 'sequence' I, 2, 4,8,16 ... or 2n within the overall3 n 'sequence', showing
us that Hegel's dialectic is in effect the infinitizing of the basic 'two-value'
(i.e. 2n) nature of paradoxical oppositions, giving us an indenumerable
number of inseparable elements (2n is mathematically the power of the
continuum of points) - i.e. illustrating that dialectic logic is actually a
singular 'value' continuum of transition points appearing through a paradox-
ing process of self-opposition in which all distinctions are inseparable (but not
indistinct). Ordinary 2-value logic is hence a first order approximation to a
dialectic logic, as is a 4-value modal logic a second order approximation. In
general any n-value logic is an approximation within the continuum of
inseparable transition points. Secondly, a topological logic demands that the
terms or elements present in any perspective are not all of the same power -
i.e. certain terms are 'point-like', others, line or surface-'like' - indicating that
one must be aware of the dimensionality of the terms present as expressions
of different stages of transition-relation - i.e. of different stages of self-
oppositional relation. In conclusion, we can see that dialectic is expressible
through non-linear, topological continuum states of transition and not linear
algebraic atoms of fixed identity, and the model here presented is itself but
a simple-geometry of such a dialectic, which, as a dynamic of immediacy,
cannot be bound to anyone linearized presentation of non-linearity.
The above topological presentation of dialectic structure as a non-linear
transition complex both generating and functioning through a multi-
dimensional 'space' (or rather 'space-time' since it is a dynamic-of-becoming
presenting not only symmetrical-'spatial' forms of +-e mutuality, but
asymmetrical.'temporal' modalities of transcending-mutuality e, e' ... ) has
been hitherto completely neglected in any analysis of dialectic, but is here
regarded as its most significant essence - and furthermore one which opens
up its immediate relevancy to the sciences and humanities. Consequently, we
can now indicate two crucial aspects necessary in any non-linear or dialectic
process: (1) its 'symmetric' modality of expressing all elements as +-e mutual
transition elements functioning within qualitatively distinct states of
dimensionality, thus eliminating the notion that dialectic builds up elements
in a singular linear term-by-term progression: elements appear in qualitative
'jumps' of 1, 3, 9, 27, 81 grouping of elements according to a power expan-
sion 3n which reflects the changes of perspective needed whenever there is a
change in the quantity of +-e transition states existing in a non-linear com-
plex (e.g. e"' or 27 terms involving three simultaneous +- transition or bound-
ary states) - and (2) its 'asymmetric' modality of expressing an 'infinite' or
'open-ended' transformation process e, e', e", e'" ... that is consequently

free of restricting the results of this transformation to any final identity. Thus
dialectic non-linear logic is a logic which is beyond any relation to an intrinsic
ontology, being instead a logic of phenomenology (Le. the 'ology' of
phenomen-ology), and thus a logic dealing with the specific characteristics of
non-linearity as they appear through the dynamics of phenomena, all
ontological states being then linearized and identified references to the
various mediations and determinations of self-mediating immediacy.
With regard to relating these two necessary aspects of a non-linear dialectic
to Hegel, the first aspect demands that the various categories generated in any
portion must be grasped in relation to their specific dimensionality as the
determining context of movement determining their nature as a moment-of-
transition (and not a moment-in-transition). Thus, as already explained, the
entire Logic of Hegel has 81 basic terms (plus many sub-terms which are
always capable of appearing through the infinity of reflection possible on any
particular element or groups of elements in their dynamic of immediacy):
these 81 terms are, however, generated through only 4 fundamental changes
of perspective, due to the fact that there are only 4 simultaneous transition
states in co-relation, e"", expressing 34 or 81 terms arising out of the non-
linear triadic process of constant self-triadicity (Le. triads of triads of triads
.... etc. etc., taken four times). Hence one has to first be aware of the 'type
of sp'ace' present - in reading Hegel - within which the 'points' express
themselves as 'monadic' reflections of that dynamic space - the space
referring to the dimensionality, the points to the categories, and the 'mona-
dic' relation referring to the dialectic between point and space (which is the
same type of relation, which Leibniz as the inventor of the Calculus - and
the 'monad' concept - attributed to the mathematical concept of point and
space in the dynamics of differentiation and integration). Thus Dialectic-non-
linear logic or 'language' is to standard linear logic or language, as the Calculus
(or what is called 'analysis') is to algebra: the first is dynamic-generative and
the second is static. Consequently, in analyzing categories in Hegel's section
of the Notion, for example, it would be destroying the non-linear dialectic
of the categories - and hence the very categories themselves (categories
being terms of but not in dialectic movement) if they are merely linearly
read as a term-by-term elaboration, and not seen as sub-terms, and indeed
sub-terms to the fourth power (3 4 ) of the original immediacy (i.e. e or
Being) expressing its dynamic now as a fourth order self-mediated imme-
diacy (Le. e' or Becoming). To arbitrarily start at some middle point in the
Logic without full and explicit awareness of the generating movement of
334 M.KOSOK
immediacy it is expressing, is to either degenerate the terms into linear,

algebraic abstractions, or to regard that particular starting point once again
as the original starting point, expressing Being, Becoming, Quality etc. - all
of which are but lower order transition states already transcended and
'aufgehoben'. This, however, demands a knowledge of the 'dialectic-matrix'
of multi-dimensional transition states (as, e.g. outlined in simple form on
page 322) seen as a dynamic topology (Diagrams, pp. 345, 346).
But, non-linearity and topological relations likewise express themselves
through their opposite - namely linear algebraic localizations of identity -
non-linearity being the scientific expression of dialectic paradox. Hence,
while non-linear dynamic generation is the content or 'substance' of the
elements or 'terms' of movement, linear identifications are the fonn (Le.
literally 'outline' of determination) expressed by these elements, causing
them to appear as categories or 'words' of experience: this is generating
'logos' or mediated categorical-relation out of 'eros' or dynamic immediacy,
in order to give a higher order expression to the self-generating 'telos' of self-
mediated immediacy - Le. the dynamic immediacy or becoming which now
includes within itself its own 'concept' or category of becoming. Consequent-
ly, linearization and categorization represents the particularity of the specific
historic (space-time) act, giving finite fonn or localization to the trans-
historical' content of immediacy in contradiction to the 'historical' form of
mediation: as dialectic opposition or mutuality, both are simultaneously an
expression of the singularity of non-linear immediacy. If one gives 'priority'
to non-linear trans-historicity in opposition to historical form taking on
specific localization, then not only is non-linear trans-historicity as a dynamic
immediacy destroyed, but what replaces it is the notion of an a-historical
'eternity' of non-temporal existence in contradiction to historical tem-
porality. Dialectic immediacy as trans-historicity then appears as a type of
alienated idealism taking place in a purely non-human impersonal dimension,
of which the world as a materialism is but a 'poor' unauthentic copy - at
best. Unfortunately, Hegel's linearization of his non-linear dialectic expresses
itself in many cases as an idealism of 'pure thought' which seems to reduce
the essence of awareness or consciousness to a spiritual process which is
cleansed of all impure 'material' localizations historically determined, while
on the other hand, the existence of awareness - i.e. in Nature - then
introduces (in opposition to the essence of awareness as Logic) this essence
as a mechanical mirroring into an alienated existence. Consequently, when
Spirit issues from Nature as the reality of awareness and the transcendence of
alienated objectivity, we shall see that either (1) Nature or objectivity is
only cancelled but not preserved or (2) only preserved but not cancelled.
Transcendence is dialectic paradoxical immediacy, so if Nature or objectivity
(Le. sensual, material interaction) is regarded as an altogether other-ness not
already present within Logic or subjectivity, then there indeed is a mysterious
'jump' from one domain into another, with which the idealists feel at odds,
and to which the materialists can rightly point as a flaw. Spirit, as the
mutuality of a pure Logic and an alienated otherness called Nature is then a
diction vs. contradiction polarity and not a paradox, Le. Nature within
subjectivity can either (1) appear only as a vanishing moment - the otherness
cancelled - and hence a mechanical return to the logic of subjectivity·
without being genuinely integrated or (2) remain within the subjectivity -
preserved - as an alienation in the heart of awareness - and most likely
combinations of both. Nature, objectivity, or space time historicity as a
particular determined here-now localization must be the authentic self-
otherness to which subjectivity as a dynamic essence or Logic (an Eros) or
field-ofpresence must have reference, as its form (Le. its Logos of determina-
tion) in the modality of events of existence such that in reality, Spirit or
Geist is a field-event mutuality - a phenomenology of subject and object
in which neither as an identification has any meaning without the other.
Consequently Marx attempted to reintegrate sensual materialism into the
dialectic process of Hegel - and this perspective as a whole is best outlined in
his famous Theses on Feuerbach, where he criticizes both onesided idealism
and materialism as destroying the genuine mutuality between the active
subject and the object-of-action. Unfortunately - and dialectically - this
reintegration of authentic objectivity with the spirituality of Hegel likewise
has tended to become a counter one-sided distortion in the hands of the
materialists.
The genuine content of dialectic is con§equently a dynamic of immediacy
(e, e', e" ... ) which on the one hand is, as-a-totality, ever-present as a trans-
temporal immediacy (Le. the whole dynamics itself expressed as an ever-
present singularity e), while on the other hand, its reflection can take the
Logos or form of a triadic mutuality (+e, -e, +-e), the +e now being the
identifiable or linearizable dynamic of immediacy posited as a given essence
or subjectivity (Le. sheer immediacy now pictured as a Logic of field of
relations); the -e, now the counter-identifiable mediation counter'posited as
negativity, determination, objectivity ('gegenstdndlichkeit') or the events of
existence (Le. mediation as Nature); and +-e as the self-mediated mutuality
of essence and existence, subjectivity and objectivity called reality or Spirit
(Geist). Naturally in this modality, Hegel's Encyclopedia of Logic, Nature and
336 M.KOSOK
Spirit are all three modalities of a higher order dynamic of immediacy whose
three initial mediations (i.e. Logic as +e, Nature as -e and Spirit as the
mutual mediation +-e) are each already the entire dynamic of immediacy -
i.e. each is a reflection of the entire e, e', e" ... relative to one type of
fundamental mediation. Logic regards the entire +, -, ± self-mutuality
process relative to the positive modality of presence (i.e. a field of presence
regarded as a given universe of possibility), Nature the same process relative
to the negative modality of localized events of eXistence and extension, while
Spirit is the same process relative to the transitive modality of mutuality
between the field of presence and its events. Such an interpretation of both
the dynamics of immediacy and Hegel's system requires a detailed investiga-
tion into the dialectic of infinity - for it presupposes that the entire non-
linear totality expressed here as the e, e', e" ... e-ing state or process can
itself be experienced and grasped as a singularity relative to which higher
order e-ing states of immediacy in turn appear. Furthermore, it opens up
the possibility of an infinity of infinities ... ad infinitum of dynamic transi-
tion states, each dimension of infinity opening up newer interpretations
of the fundamental +e, -e, ±e mutuality expressive of any e to e' transition.
Naturally, all such e to e' transitions would represent a form of the original
Being-Nothing-Becoming triadicity. However, if it is permissable to speak
about levels of infinite totalities, then each higher order level would require
a qualitatively more developed presentation of the original triadicity. It is
suggested here 2 that Logic, Nature and Spirit in Hegel's Encyclopedia
represents such a higher order form of Being, Nothing and Becoming - a
form in which the implicit phenomenology of subject-object co-relation
inherent in the first order dynamic of immediacy (expressive of such terms-
of-movement as Being, Becoming, Quality etc.) now becomes an explicit
phenomenology, the subjective aspect seen as Logic, the objective as Nature,
and their co-relativity as Spirit. With such a form of relations, the terms or
elements appearing in all three modalities would be of the same quality: not
only does nature or objectivity appear as a linearizable localization into
definitive determinations appearing in space and time, but logic or the subjec-
tive field of relations likewise appears linearizable into definitive determina-
tions historically conditioned in space and time (and Similarly for Spirit).
The point of such a presentation is to illustrate the following fact of
dynamic immediacy: the dynamic has to be total and singular at any stage,
and should one reflect on this totality as a condition of presence (i.e. as a
field of presence or Logic) in opposition to that which is present (the
particular events), then both the immediacy as a field and its opposite -
namely the events of mediation are now co-mediations within a larger totality
and immediacy. Hence one cannot separate out the dynamics of immediacy
as a fixed point of immediacy - Le. as a given logic, relative to which the
world appears as its content without at the same time mediating that
immediacy into a larger and as-yet-unfixed or un-mediated state, within
which it now functions as but a co-relative variable. Hence, once Hegel
decides to localize his Logic of dynamic immediacy by mediating it relative to
Nature, then both are but co-relative sub-mediations within a larger dynamic
- now given as Logic, Nature and Spirit. At no time can one come up with a
particular logic of relations - spelling out a definitive structure that is merely
a subjective thought un-conditioned by objective existence: to specify (Le.
linearize out) a field of presence or 'subjective space' of essences, is to
counter-specify a co-relative state of existential events or 'objective space',
both of which are co-determined. Consequently, logical relations must reflect
their objective conditioning as referring to events-in-a-state-of-interaction, and
natural events must in turn - if specified out as 'facts' - refer to the subjec-
tive field of presence to which they appear as facts. In reality, Geist or Spirit
is then the mutual co-relativity of fact and essence, each only linearizable in
relation to the other.
What has been thus far outlined for a non-linear presentation of dialectic
has only taken into explicit consideration the first aspect of non-linearity
previously mentioned - namely the appearance of all elements within a
dynamic dimensionality or space. We now turn to the second aspect -
namely the infinite nature of such a dimensionality, which has already
appeared in the first aspect as a potentiality - in other words - as a way of
giving expression to orders or levels of dynamic immediacy that give explicit
expression to the dialectic phenomenology of subject-object relation. We can
now justify the usage of such a method of presentation - showing the
actuality or reality of dialectic infmity - not only as a notion within a
dynamic of immediacy but as a quality of that dynamic itself. Just because
there is no final transition state in the e-ing process, and furthermore, because
all of these stages of transition themselves form a Singular inseparable
dynamics (e, e', e" do not form a sequence of separate terms), this dynamics
neither converges to a final limit point, nor diverges into a plurality of
isolated steps or positions. One can say, instead, that it trans-verges, repres-
enting a self-mediating totality whose singularity expresses itself through
mutuality of opposition and vice versa. Rather than ending up in a static
being (Le. a posited Absolute), or not-ending up at all, but merely generative
of an endless state of becoming (Le. an anti-Absolute, Absolute), the dynamic
338 M. KOSOK
of immediacy is a movement of selfbecoming which as a singular state of

immediacy is as totally present at anyone state, as it is at any other, but in
terms of the depth of relations visible at any stage of awareness, shows a
defmite leveling of complexity, or dimensionality. Thus, dialectic movement
is neither a mere a-causal immediacy of indeterminacy, nor a mere mediated,
causal process ever-striving toward a determined limit which does not actually
exist. Dialectic movement is always an expression of self-movement and
self-transcendence, meaning that it expresses mutual causation or self-
causation of all its elements simultaneously effecting and being-effected and
hence giving rise to either shallow or rich expressions of such a self-totality
of movement.
Consequently, dialectic movement is a self-infinitizing whole, which can
either be regarded from the perspective of 'the whole as a process', or 'the
process as a whole'. The process as a whole is the reality of the singular aspect
of self-infmitizing, while on the other hand, the whole as a process gives
reality to the multiplicity this whole expresses, such that each element
reflects the whole, and at the same time the whole is a reflection and response
to each element: universality of the whole is co-determinate with the unique-
ness of each element, whole and element (or space and event) being but
co-relative aspects of a functioning totality which cannot be reduced to
either a plurality of atoms or a monolithic gestalt.
Returning briefly to Hegel, one can now state that his Logic and his
Encyclopedia (and his Phenomenology as a dialectic of consciousness) must
all be re-viewed in terms of an un-ending infinity of possible terms, and that
the 34 terms appearing as the major categories of his logic are consequently
only the way in which this self-infmitizing totality expresses itself in 4 major
changes of perspective. Indeed, there is nothing in Hegel's works that suggests
the necessary appearance of a terminating absolute at any particular point
in its development. Rather what does terminate the discussion at a fmite
place (Le. after a finite number of steps), is the very table of contents given in
the beginning which comes from external (Le. linear) reflection, and which
represents in Hegel's specific terminology the extent of historical and cultural
development thus far taken place. If we keep to Hegel's own presentation of
his overall gestalt as outlined in this paper at the beginning - not delimiting
and linearizing the self-movement into a particular set of identities historical-
ly conditioned, then one is left with a dynamic 'schema of movement' as the
phenomenology of awareness which, precisely because it is trans-identical
and beyond being bound to any linearized ontological system of ontology, is
then open to act as the logos or logic of any modality of appearance or
phenomena appearing (Le. appearing as events) within the history of aware-

ness.
III. CONCLUDING REMARKS: TOWARDS A MODERN VERSION OF

HEGEL'S ENCYCLOPEDIA OF THE SCIENCES
Having described the dynamic of immediacy not only as a trans-historical

presence, but also as a historical process - regarding Hegel's Encyclopedia
essentially as an expanded phenomenology of subject-objectivity, we can now
utilize the Encyclopedia as a guiding principle in bringing about a modern
dialectic of the sciences, which will at the same time be a non-linear 'rejuvena-
tion' of the Encyclopedia.
Thus, the Encyclopedia regards the science of man to be an integral
activity of consciousness, displaying its distinctions dialectically - and
consequently generating domains of science, each of which views the entire
universe relative to a particular mode. The major triadicity is of course the
science of Logic as the field of presence (subjective space), the science of
Nature as the events-present (objective space), and the science of Spirit as the
field-event mutuality (transitive subject-object space). The central issue in-
volved is the 'de-ideologizing' of the sciences, (Le. the transcendence of their
one-sided identifications) and the creation of a dynamic integrative perspective
which is functionally relevant for the development of the particular sciences.
Non-linearity becomes, consequently, the essential process to discover and
elucidate within the sciences, reflecting as it does, the transitive and hence
integrative nature of all historically determined categories, identities and con-
cepts utilized in the scientific acts of definition and measurement. The project
thus amounts to viewing science as a process of formation and transformation
in which all elements are seen to be elements-of-transition - including their
identifications. This in tum requires an investigation of the various 'boundary
questions' continually plaguing and threatening the essential identities of the
various sciences. In the mathematical-logical disciplines, we find the problem
of 'undecidability'; within physics and natural phenomena, there exists the
corresponding problems of 'indeterminacy', while in the psycho-social sciences
of Spirit as man, there is the question of the 'ambiguity' of human identity.
However, instead of seeing these as 'problems', dialectic rather grasps these
conditions as the very expression of the overall paradox of immediacy, and
consequently as a posit~ve-sign of health; any closed and fully determined
system would be taken to be a sign of decadence and degeneration. In the
three overall domains of science, one can point to the three fundamental
340 M.KOSOK
problems of identity (the same three Nietzsche points to in Beyond Good and
Evil!): the status of 'the symbol', 'the material object', and 'the ego' or self.
In modern science, the classical atomicity of regarding existence essentially in
terms of a linear composition of identifiable units - such as words, objects
and persons (and thus groups of words, objects and persons giving us language,
nature and society) is precisely what has been put into question by the 'un-
decidability' of symbols, the 'indeterminacy' of objects and the 'ambiguity' of
the ego. From a dynamic of immediacy, however, the paradox of transition
inverts one's 'normalized' (Le. one's linear identity) awareness by becoming
aware of the non-existence of any kind of 'Ding-an-sich' or singular point of
reference such as the symbol, object or ego. 3
Thus, for example, it is Gbdel's theorems themselves which show that any
arithmetizable (linearizable) logic is bound to be either inconsistent or in-
complete and hence 'undecidable'. Furthermore, this undecidability arises
exactly at the boundary between anyone symbol and its context or negation.
Thus, in attempting to give expression to the coupling between a term and its
negation - expressing therefore a boundary condition of co-relation - this
co-relation leads either to an inconsistency if accepted into a logic, or an
incompleteness if excluded. Only by regarding the boundary itself as a
dynamic transition generating its terms, instead of first regarding the terms as
pre-given and then put into co-relation, can one truly transcend the limitation
of Gbdel's theorems. Hence the so-called Liar's Paradox, which prompted
Gbdel's formulations, is seen to be but the immediate state in which all
symbolic terminology must give expression to: transition generates self-
opposition between mutually conditioned elements such as true or false,
present or absent (being or nothing). Any symbol, word, term or designated
element at once presents and denies - it presents itself through denying its
context, and it denies its context through presenting itself, hence condition-
ing the presence of a term by the very de-lineation it has with its context.
Thus if one learns that the truth or presence of a term is conditioned by its
negation, then simply negating the term will not be a transcendence of that
term but only a reference to the 'other-side' of the mutually co-determining
boundary, and hence a negative referral to that identity. (To say that "I am
not going to the movies" is only a reference to the movies as a possible but
lacking content and does not of itself refer to anything else.) Thus all nega-
tion is self-negation, meaning that it expresses the intrinsic paradox between
any mediation and its co-mediation. Rebellion as an act of denial is but the
mirror-image of conformity: revolution or real-transformation must grasp
both what is and what is not as a Singular self-related totality - revolution
must be a dynamic of immediacy which transcends mediation by including

both mediations in a single perspective that transcends one-sided linear ideas
and 'ideology'. However, by then regarding this immediacy, revolution, or
transition itself as an exclusive position in opposition to mediation, non-
revolution or non-transition, is to destroy its transition. Transition, once
identified, must itself be in transition in order to express itself. Thus levels
of transition and movement (and paradox) must express themselves through
alternating mediations of both transition and non-transition-movement and
rest, paradox and non-paradox (i.e. identity and contra-identity or contradic-
tion). There is no problem to either the Liar's Paradox, the 'class of all classes'
or the infinity of infinities, for in non-linear transition dynamics, all elements
are selfreferential and hence self-transcending by their very nature.
This now takes us from logic to physics or natural phenomena, for there
the very formulation of how particles exist in the so-called physical vacuum
(as element and context) is but a material counter-part to the symbolic
formulation of boundary-transition states. Thus the physical vacuum is not
just empty, but is characterized by energy-levels and potential processes;
charges as particles are defined in co-relation with their space as fields and so
on. As scientists are discovering, physical 'contact' and interaction itself is
not just a linear interaction (as Newtonian, relativistic and quantum mechani-
cal interaction is usually described), but involves complex dimensions of
activity in which the ordinary conservation principles of momentum and
energy are put into question. Indeed, conservation principles, symmetry
relations, elasticity (restoring forces), constancy of action (such as the speed
of light for relativity and Planck's constant for quantum mechanics) and
closed systems (second law of thermodynamics) are all linear expressions of
interaction which hold true only to the degree to which one can assume a
fixed identity or parameter governing a state of movement. The state of
movement itself is always open to its context of interaction, which can be
ignored in order to obtain focused knowledge about a given structure, should
this context not appear significant: knowledge is based upon ignorance -
i.e. ignor-ance, while wisdom on the other hand (as the 'pure foof instinc-
tively knows) must transcend the Hubris of its own possessions - i.e.
accumulated knowledge or 'facts', by recognizing the limitation of limitation
- i.e. the mutuality between any delimited element and its context: wisdom
is thus the awareness of double-negation (double-and-mutual mediation or
limitation), and hence the self-negation of paradox, revealing the totality of
immediacy.
Detailed analysis on the physical level reveals, consequently, that any kind
342 M.KOSOK
of fixed constant of motion is actually a parameter which itself can function

as a variable within expanded domains, and are therefore first order approxi-
mations of a general non-linear state in which no particular identity need be
conserved (or need be non-conserved) - but only relatively conserved.
(Indeed, one can rephrase the logic of non-linearity by stating that the
contradiction between constant and variable is replaced by a range-presenta-
tion of parameters, a parameter being a constant of motion or relation
relative to one system, but a variable in tum when that system is itself subject
to change relative to a more comprehensive system. Thus parameters of
motion give expression to transitory states of stability, and stabilized modes
of transition and thus levels of material interaction (e.g. electronic, chemical,
biological). Thus relativity and quantum mechanics, as sophisticated as they
are, still give rise to confusion and complexity (and contradictions) because
the non-linear complexities they do reveal, are revealed in a linear way,
hiding the richness of relation instead of exposing it. Indeed, from a non-
linear point of view, quantum mechanics and relativity give expression to the
mutuality between whole and part (space and elements) - relativity stating
that no absolute whole or space exists, the whole existing only relative to
each element, while quantum mechanics in turn states that there exists no
absolute part or determined element, each element or particle existing only
in relation to the whole of space (as a wave-function). This mutuality,
however, is lost sight of by the linear presentations of this dynamic between
whole and part.4
Finally, coming to the science of the Spirit, or the domain of psycho-social
existence - the fundamental problem comes down to clarifying the boundary
between the ego and the world, or between self and nature - Le. the relation
between subject and object itself. From a linear perspective, ego and world,
mind and matter, feeling and fact, soul and body (ad nauseam) must all lead
to ambiguities, for with such a co-relation, Godel's theorem on the coupling
of contraries (Le. identities regarded as separate though related) must demand
either inconsistencies or incompleteness. Thus, any given self appears without
itself being a world (Le. body-less) and the world it faces appears without
selfhood (Le. a world absent of 'other' selves), if we regard subject and object
as separable distinctions, resulting in ambiguity and alienation. On the other
hand, should the boundary of coupling between self and world itself be
regarded as the immediacy present, then a body-less self or a self-less world
would be impossible: as a transition state, each exists only relative to the
other and 'within' the other as a co-determining presence. Thus, every I or
self is automatically a world-conditioned self - i.e. a body, and the world in
turn is a self-conditioned world - i.e. one displaying self-hood - and

consequently a world recognizable as a society of selves. Consequently, the
dialectic between self and world on a higher dimension or level reveals the
fact that the self itself is a self-world sub-relation, and the world a world-self-
sub-dialectic. As a result, the relation between ego and nature or self and
world is not only a relation between them, but also within each - meaning
that on the one hand, a self-world relation is a world-world relation of
naturalism (between self as a world or body and the world), and a selfself
relation of humanism (between a given self and an 'other' self or selves-in-
the world): the appearance of the self as a world or body is thus co-relative to
the world appearing as a self. The self-world relation is automatically both a
physical one and a spiritual subjective one, any ego being subject to both
natural and social 'laws' of existence. Hence the psychology of the self or ego
involves an intrinsic natural and social perspective - and the unity of the
two. s
Indeed, the selfinjinitizing relation between self and world is precisely the
domain of philosophic-religious experience, meaning that psychology, social-
dynamics and spiritual awareness are all but different manifestations of the
same dynamic.
Now a rejuvenated Hegelian Encyclopedia of the sciences would have to
give expression to both (1) the dynamics of Logic, Nature and Spirit as
expressed here, but now developed in detail - i.e. as levels, sub-levels and
meta-levels of coordinated transition states displaying an e - e' - e" topology
(as briefly indicated above) and (2) the co-relation between subjective-logic,
objective-nature and .mutual spirituality - a co-relation demanding a strict
phenomenological approach showing how the dialectic within each domain
at the same time is an expression of the dialectic between them, and vice
versa.
We have therefore - in conclusion - mapped out both a 'general' and a
'special' Hegelian dialectic, viewed in terms of non-linearity and a dynamic
of immediacy. The general or 'universal' dialectic is the dynamics of
immediacy itself - regarded as a trans-historical experience that is totally
void of identification. The special or 'particular' dialectic, however, is the
self-manifestation of the 'universal' trans-historical immediacy through its
historical appearance, revealing identities and focused consciousness, such
that both the universal and particular (immediacy and mediation) are co-
simultaneously the very way in which the universal dynamic appears as a
self-mediating and self-negating process. Actually, all analysis, presentation
and description is historical ... all identification is mediation and opposition,
344 M. KOSOK
including the very reference to a dynamic of immediacy. Consequently, the

only way in which to grasp the 'purity' of the universal dynamics is to
recognize the fact that anything visible or anything grasped is but an identity
which is conditioned and partial - no matter how lofty, spiritual or idealistic
it is designated or intuited to be - functioning within the void of silence -
the singular totality of immediacy, whose total absence as an identity itself
is the only way in which it functions as a total-presence: life is the absolute
paradox of being.
(For a summary of Hegelian dialectic in terms of a non-linear matrix
topology, please see the charts on pp. 345-347.
Fairleigh Dickinson University

Rutherford, New Jersey
NOTES
1 See my articles, 'The Formalization of Hegel's Dialectical Logic', International

Philosophical Quarterly 6 (1966), 596-631; and 'The Dialectical Matrix', Telos, no. 5
(1970), 115-159.
5 See 'The Formalization of Hegel's Dialectical Logic', op. cit.
3 See my 'The Dynamics of Paradox', Telos, no. 5 (1970), 31-43.
4 See my articles on paradox and on the dialectical matrix in Telos, no. 5, cited above.
5 See 'The Dialectical Matrix', op. cit.
CHART - PART I
Hegel's Logic as a 4-Dimensional, Nonlinear 'Matrix-Topology'

o
><:
z
Being Negation Unity ~
I ..c1 ~
B N------+ ------+ BN ] g From Being (B) to Quality (B*) in 2 n
~ ~ ~
1st Beginning Dimension is ~ dimensions: 3 2 = 9 terms-oftransition; 0
,-... (4th end Dimension) a Dialectic-Matrix simultaneously emerging, 'Tl
.-t
§ Being - - + Nothing --+
Becoming non-linear in two-dimensions g;
§ ~ Bas B N as N BN as BN From Quality (B*) to Absolute Idea (B**)
.s g;
.~ .Ei ~ ~ ~ (5 ~ in 2 additional dimensions: ~
~ i5 Something Other Determinate ~ '0 3 2 X 3 2 = 3 4 or 9 X 9 = 81 transition- 0
a~ ------+ ------+ Being ] ~ terms of a Dialectic Matrix-of-a-Matrix ;;
.S 'E B as N N as B BN as NB 0 u:: simultaneously emerging, nonlinearly in ~
a e ~ ~ ~ \I 4 dimensions creating the entire Logic: ~
~ The One The Many Being-for-self ~ all Being is, Be-ing: Dialectic as sheer ~
'"d ------+ ------+ II self-reflexive Being
~ B as BN N as NB BN as BNNB ~
(inner unity) (outer unity ) (unity of unities) ~
w
~
V1
CHART - PART II w
-I'>-
0\
BEING ESSENCE NOTION
Presence, Immediacy, Field Reflection, Mediation, Self-Reflection, Self-
~CIl
of Being B* Negating activity N* Mediation, Self-Acting- } .~ g
>-...:i
~
Field of Being B*N*
1st End Dimension

--(4th Beginning Dimension)
~
"2 QUALITY REFLECTION SUBJECTIVITY **

co
.~ Immediate Presence & Universal Immediate Reflection & Immediate Self-Reflection '-'
on
.~ Field B* as B* .. or Universal Activity N* as N* & Universal Self-Acting- .S
0) ~
Field B*N* as B*N* co
~ (B* as Immanent-field)
1 ....
0)
~
1 1 0) 0
.c: C/O
.i§ QUANTITY APPEARANCE OBJECTIVITY tZl 0
Objectified Self-Reflection .... ~
.~ Objectified Presence &
Q)
Objectified Reflection & 0
oj
co Particularized Field B* as N* Particularized Activity & Particularized Self- Q)
""0 ;:8
.... N* as B* .. or Acting-Field B*N* as N*B*
M <!)
'---' ....;::l
d
0 (N* Irevealing B* as '0
';;J CIl
d
j Appearing-field) ..0
Q)
.§ -I-
j <
Q MEASURE ACTUALITY IDEA
""0 Integrated Presence & Integrated Reflection & Integrated Self-Reflection *co
~ Total Field B* as B*N* Total Activity N* as N*B* & Total Self-Acting-Field *Z
""0
d B*N* as B*N*N*B* .. or *Z
("l
*co
(B* revealing B* through N*:
the Self-Appearing-Field)
tj
-<
Z
);-
Logic ----+ Nature ----+ Spirit

S 8.
} .~ ;§ s::
;:;
Sheer Being as· Sheer Being as Sheer Being: Self j .g (/l
Intension B** Extension N** extending Intension ~ g o

'Tl
B**N** ~ ~ :r:
----------------------- S tTl
(")
Spirit as ----+ Spirit as ----+ Spirit as } 2 ~C!) tTl
t-'
Mediation Selfmediation The SelfDialectic of Spirit: Hegel as (/l
].u { Immediacy
~ ~ Hegel's
~ ~ Phenomenology
Hegel's
Science of Logic
Hegel's.:", ~
Encyclopedza
~]
'i ~
I Nonlinear Dynamics tj
);-
-
t-'
S· S-+ S:J ~'O tTl
(j
--l
;:;
(/l
w
.j:>.
-J
H. C. SABELLl
MATHEMATICAL DIALECTICS, SCIENTIFIC LOGIC AND

THE PSYCHOANALYSIS OF THINKING
As an experimental scientist, my interest in dialectics lies in its use as a logic

of science and I chose this particular aspect of it in order to include a dis-
cussion of the work of Kosok and Gauthier at the Boston Symposium. At
that time, I proposed to utilize dialectics as an intuitive model from which to
construct mathematical structures applicable to evolutionary theory and to
the logic of real thinking. I have not changed the article for pUblication: its
message, I feel, is still valid and the task, unaccomplished. But, to accurately
reflect my present viewpoint, I have added a brief discussion of dialectics as
one of the natural patterns of thinking. The naturalistic observation of
dialectical thinking may contribute to our understanding of philosophical
dialectics; conversely, it suggests a possible contribution of dialectics to
psychological science.
The establishment of the groundwork for the development of mathema-
tical dialectics is the great value of the recent work ofM. Kosok, Y. Gauthier,
F. G. Asenjo, G. Gunther, and a few others. Such an attempt transcends the
mere formalization of the Hegelian system because mathematical dialectics
as a logic of science must also be rooted in mathematics and in contemporary
science. Therefore, it implies an actual revision and critique of Hegelian
dialectics.
Kant proposed that discipline achieves the status of science only with the
use of mathematical methods. Mathematization thus liberates science from
empty speculation, dogmaticism and blind empiricism. In spite of its limita-
tions, mathematical logic based on non-dialectic Aristotelian logic is used in
computation, in mathematical research and as a logic of science. Such is not
the case with dialectics that has not been so formalized. Thus, dialectics must
become mathematical dialectics.
On the other hand, symbolic logic needs to incorporate dialectics since, as
Hegel indicated in his famous dictum, rationality is the adaptation of thought
to reality. Natural, historical, and psychological processes, as described by
modern science, do not satisfy the postulates of classical non-dialectic
ontology; this is in part described by what Kosok calls the 'non-linearity of
science'. More generally, since the mathematical model of natural processes
has required the development of many different mathematical structures,
349
350 H. C. SABELLI
mathematical logic cannot be limited to the logical interpretation of lattice

theory as a calculus of propositions. Group theory, topology, etc., can also
be given a logical interpretation. Such extended mathematical logic is
equivalent to the formalization of some aspects of dialectic logic. In fact,
dialectics is defmed as the science of the most general laws of motion of
matter, history, and thought (logic); mathematics is the formal science that
constructs abstract models for natural processes including the most general
laws of motion. Thus mathematics is mathematical dialectics if given an
ontological and logical interpretation.
WHAT ARE THE ELEMENTS OF A MATHEMATICAL DIALECTICS?
In The Science of Logic, Hegel rejects the concept that logic makes abstrac-
tion of the content of thought. Thus, the elements of a mathematical
dialectics, concepts or propositions, must be taken simultaneously in exten-
sion and in intension. Set theory can be used to develop a logic of the
connotation of concepts in which simple attributes can be taken as elements
and compound attributes as sets. The lattice of attributes is not isomorphic
to that of classes (in contradiction to Boole's first law). For instance, there
is an infinite number of attributes corresponding to the extensional empty
set. Moreover, as the definition of a given class is more sharply defined, the
defmition of its connotation becomes less well-defined and vice versa. For
instance, the well-defmed attributes 'liquid' and 'solid', 'acid' and 'base', do
not correspond to well-defmed classes; a given substance can act as an acid if
and only if there are other conditions under which it will act as a base.
Extension and connotation are related by an uncertainty principle equivalent
to the relation between position and momentum in Quantum Mechanics.
Thus, a concept taken both in intension and extension satisfies Kosok's
requirement that an element of a dialectic calculus cannot be well defmed.
Let us then defme a concept as an ordered pair < a, ii> the first element of
which is a connotation (set of attributes) a and the second member in the
corresponding class ii of objects. We now say that concept < a, ii > implies
< b, b > if and only if a < band ii < b. This double implication solves many
of the paradoxes of implication that plague classic Boolean logic and as a
consequence, Hempel's theory of confirmation.
One needs to consider the connotation of concepts to formalize the
Hegelian categories because all such categories are co-extensively universal.
The interpretation of concepts in connotation allows for and requires the
logical interpretation of more powerful mathematical structures than set
COMMENT ON GAUTHIER AND KOSOK 351
theory. In particular, attributes can be so defined as to allow for stronger

forms of negation than complementation. For instance, physical dimensions
are so defmed as to allow for a propositional logic based on group theory.
NEGATION: SYMMETRIC VS HIERARCHICAL
One of the advantages implicit in the use of mathematical models is that they
clarify our ideas. There are, in fact, different conceptions of dialectic nega-
tion, but this multiplicity is often obscured by the ambiguity of the language.
In Kosok's conception of dialectics, negation is symmetric. Reflection upon
any immediate unformed element e is not a single element but rather a pair
of elements +e and -e emerging by mutual opposition. In other words, the
initial, immediate term serves as a base for both mediated terms, positive and
negative. The terms are like the three vertices of a triangle standing on one
vertex. Assertion and negation are equally potent. The relation between them
Kosak's system:
symmetric R 5
Relations
non-symmetricR 1 , R 2 ,R3, R4
Sublation
Rl = R2 = sublation relation -I-

R3: order relation <
Fig. I.
352 H. C. SABELLI
is symmetric and they are both sublated by their synthesis, which is inter-
mediate in quality between the two. This hierarchy of elements does not
imply evolution in time. The immediate inferior term e coexists with the
superior mediated terms +e and -e (Figure 1, top).
In classic mathematical logic, negation .is complementation, that is to say,
absence. Kosok also interprets dialectic negation as an absence; he exemplifies
negation by the pair: "I am going to the movies", "I am not going to the
movies". This is not sublation, which implies a hierarchical order. Moreover,
group inverses may be interpreted to formalize negation as an absence, there-
by introducing one of the most powerful mathematical tools in the formaliza-
tion of dialectics.
Already Gauthier mentioned the use of group theory in the formalization
of Hegelian logic. Group inverses obviously abstract the characteristics of
symmetric negation. Group theory allows many values in addition to an
element and its inverse, thereby eliminating the principle of excluded third,
the excluded middle. Moreover, it allows for contradictory statements
(elements that are their own inverses). Group theory, however, emphasizes the
reversibility of processes, the 'return' of the synthesis to the thesis, by allow-
ing the existence of an identity element. It does not model dialectic negation.
The assertion of both a proposition (a) and its denial (a-I) implies the
assertion of neither in group theory. In contrast, the assertion of a hypothesis
(thesis) and its refutation (antithesis) implies the denial of the former, the
assertion of the latter, and the synthesis of a new hypothesis accounting for
both the former hypothesis and its counterexample.
Symmetric negation emphasizes the mutually exclusive character of the
two terms of a contradiction. Hence, dialectics is described as the need for
two consistent (non-contradictory) but incomplete descriptions of the world.
Kosok proposed a 'principle of non-identity': "It is impossible to have both
the law of contradiction and the law of the excluded middle"; hence, a
description of reality can be consistent but incomplete, complete but in-
consistent. A more essential form of negation is the hierarchical non-
symmetric negation known in dialectics as sublation and in philosophy of
science as refutation or falsification. It implies evolution in time and similarity
between the terms of the contradiction. The opposition of the two terms of
the contradiction is transient, their unity is essential and becomes permanent
in a consistent and complete synthesis. The relation between thesis and
antithesis and in the same manner the antithesis is sublated by the synthesis.
Each term creates new properties by conserving, transcending and super-
seding the other terms.
Dialectic movement is represented as a helix because evolution has two

components: (i) a reversible change in which thesis and antithesis symmetri-
cally negate each other and the synthesis represents a return to the thesis,
following its definition as a negation of the negation; and (ii) a non-reversible
process for which all three stages represent a movement in the same direction.
ALGEBRAIC MODEL OF SUBLATION: HELIX THEORY:
The notion of sublation can be abstracted by a mathematical relation defined

by the postulates of asymmetry (Figure I, bottom):
PI For no pair a and b, a .j, b and b .j, a
and indirect transitivity:
P2 If a {. b and b {. e and e {. d, then a {./e (direct intransitivity) and
a .j, d (indirect transitivity)
a {. b will be read 'a is sublated by b' and a {./b will be read 'a is not sublated
by b'. The first postulate may be read to mean that if a proposition a is
refuted by another proposition b, then b cannot in turn be refuted by a. The
second postulate then states that if proposition a is refuted by proposition b
and, in turn, proposition b is refuted by proposition e, e actually does not
refute a. In fact, it is quite obvious that the refutation of a refutation is a
confirmation. If, in turn, e is refuted by another proposition d, d is a refuta-
tion of a. From postulate I, one can immediately demonstrate that sublation
is non-reflexive. As the binary relation of order defmed in lattice theory
formalizes verbs such as 'to be', 'to imply' and 'to include' because it is
reflexive, antisymmetric and transitive, the binary relation of sublation
formalizes verbs such as 'to sublate', 'to become' and 'to refute', for instance,
the refutation of a hypothesis by a contradicting observation. Thus, this
axiomatization of dialectics may be interpreted as a calculus of falsification
(as defmed by Popper) similar to the calculus of confirmation developed by
Hempel to formalize inductive logic.
Sets of elements ordered by a sublation relation will be called Helicoids.
Figure 2 shows the graphic representation of some finite Helicoids. Each dot
represents an element (for instance, a proposition) and each arrow represents
a sublation relation. One can easily demonstrate as a theorem that a set of
elements ordered by a sublation relation is divided into two sets which we
will call colors. These two colors are disjoint subsets, and moreover, the union
of these two subsets is equal to the total set. For those of you familiar with
354 H. C. SABELLI
/\ \/
o VTwo-valued logic
i
o
ri
o
x
o
./~
V
The direct product of two two-element Helicoids corresponds to Kosok's R (e)
Fig. 2.
mathematical terminology, a Helicoid is the algebraic representation of

bipartite oriented graphs. Of course, one can also develop algebraic systems
for oriented graphs of more than two colors to represent other types of
periodicity such as those found in Mendeleyev's table of chemical elements.
One can prove that each subset (color) is internally ordered: if a is sublated
by band b is sublated by c, then the relation holding between a and c satisfies
the postulates of the order relation < 'weaker than'. As in Boolean logic, we
can take order to represent 'implication' and we say that 'a implies c'. Thus,
each element implies the antithesis of its antithesis. For instance, the state-
ment of a hypothesis implies that any of its refutations in turn can be
refuted. This is in contrast to classic logic in which the negation of the
negation is identical to the initial element.
In two-valued logic, the value 'false' is weaker than the negation of 'true'.
Thus, 'false' is sublated by 'true' according to our mathematical definition
of sublation. Hence, two-valued logic is simply a two-element Helicoid and
the present model of mathematical dialectics may be considered as a general-
ization of two-valued logic. This serves as a validation of our model and
reflects the fact that logic is contained in dialectics.
Note in Figure 2 that the direct product of two-element Helicoids (= two-
element chains) is a four-element set which corresponds to Kosok's R (e).
Helicoids have important algebraic properties. One can derme binary opera-
tions similar to those of classic mathematical logic to represent the connec-
tives 'and' and 'or'. These connectives, however, differ from those of classic
logic because truth values need not form a totally ordered lattice (as in the
two-valued propositional calculus). Moreover, a Helicoid may have any
number of truth values (including infinite) and such truth values alternate
in two colors; elements of one color are consistent between themselves and
contradictory to those of the other color.
Mathematical logic refers only to the composition of unchanged atomic
propositions into a compound statement. Atomic propositions may be
changed in their meaning as a result of their combination into compound
statements in a similar manner as in nature the interaction of two elementary
particles generates new ones. The synthesis of hypotheses and their refuta-
tions is essential to the formulation of new hypotheses. An example of the
synthesis of two conepts into a new one is the synthesis of rest and motion in
inertia.
A Helix is a Helicoid in which we can define a unitary operation antithesis
and a binary operation synthesis, to model such non-linear combinations of
concepts, and more generally to abstract the dialectic laws of movement. To
present the mathematical theory of helices at this point would require
considerable space. An article describing the model as well as its use in the
interpretation of empirical data has been published (H. C. Sabelli, 'A Pharma-
cological Approach for Modelling Neuronal Nets' in Biocybernetics, Vol. IV,
H. Drischel and P. Dettmar, editors (lena, VEB Gustav Fischer Verlag, 1972)).
Let me now touch some more general points raised by the work of Kosok
and Gauthier.
First, the relation between dialectic and non-dialectic logic: Most modern
logicians have simply ignored dialectics. Conversely many dialecticians have
regarded mathematical logic as sterile. The best description of the worst
conception of the relation between dialectic and formal logic is given by
Zinoviev:
Dialectics by its very essence cannot be subjected to formalization by way of a formal
calculus; it has other tasks than logic, and solves them by oth~r methods .... Dialectics
did actually point to the fact that two-valued logic has limitations, once it excludes
situations of the kind a(x) p (x) and p' (x). But this limitation is one which makes
science viable.
This statement recognizes the actual meaning of the non-formalization of
dialectics: science is outside the domain of dialectics. I conceive dialectics as
a set of heuristic rules which guide us to search for probable (but not certain)
phenomena.
Any attempt to develop a mathematical dialectics is a search for a synthesis
of symbolic logic and dialectics. The nature of their relationship, however, is
356 H. C. SABELLI
yet to be established. The logical principles of non-contradiction and ex-

cluded middle are often interpreted as absolute laws, preventing, eliminating
or forbidding contradictions throughout the objective world and not only in
its model in consciousness. The dialectic principle states that real processes
include contradictions within themselves which, however, cannot be per-
manent but lead to changes that solve the contradiction. The contradiction
between hypotheses and counterexamples leads to the synthesis of new non-
contradictory concepts governed by the logical principle of non-contradic-
tion. Thus, the principle of non-contradiction is a particular case of the
principle that contradiction causes a change that abolishes the contradiction;
non-dialectic logic is a part of dialectic logic. Both contradiction and non-
contradiction are real; the initial contradiction causes change leading to non-
contradiction.
Kosok, on the other hand, places immediacy beyond the domain of
diction and contradiction. The opposition of subjectivity, immediacy and
essence, to objectivity, mediacy and categorization, is rejected by Hegel. In
his Science of Logic, he points out that "Neither in heaven nor on earth, in
the spirit or elsewhere, is there anything not containing the immediate and
the mediation".
Secondly, an important contribution of Kosok's paper is his emphasis on
the notion of structure, a central concept for structuralism and general
systems theory that needs to be incorporated into classic dialectics. likewise,
the probabilistic view of the world developed by modern science may generate
- when incorporated into the Hegelian framework - a new 'probabilisitc
dialectics' which may account more clearly for the existence of change and
contradiction.
like Sartre and other modern dialecticians, Kosok rightly notes the
increase in structural complexity with time (formalized by his expanding
matrices) and the existence of two alternating phases in dialectic develop-
ment, a phenomenological or analytical phase (exemplified by the need of
classification and specialization in science) and a synthetic phase of conver-
gence. But I think that he incorrectly stresses the symmetry between the two
terms of a contradiction. Mathematical logic is governed by the laws of
duality. The so-called postulates of symmetry are so widely accepted in
physics that many as yet unobserved phenomena have been formulated for
reasons of symmetry. However, symmetry breaks down in the most impor-
tant parameter: time. The Hegelian categories are highly asymmetric.
Much more work will be needed to actually formalize dialectic structures
and probably different mathematical configurations will be required to
abstract the different dialectic categories. Moreover, the consideration of

order and structure is not sufficient. Even more important is that of time-
dependent, changing orderings and structurations. The process of ordering
is both logically and existentially prior to the static order that it generates.
Thus, Kosok points out the need for a dynamic mathematical strncture to
formalize dialectics. Order is abstracted by lattice theory; ordering has not
as yet been formalized mathematically. However, if one accepts that all
reality is dialectical, then all the basic mathematical structures (groups,
lattice, topology) must be given a logical interpretation.
Third, is the dialectic principle a natural law or a law of thinking? Gauthier
proposes that "there is only one real dialectics, the dialectics of language".
Many authors, including many Marxists such as Sartre, Lefebvre and Deborin
have interpreted dialectics as belonging to the spirit or to human history. As
a scientist, I am attracted to dialectics because I see evolution and contradic-
tion as the main features of both natural and human processes. In the intro-
duction to the Science of Logic, Hegel rejected this notion that contradiction
exists only in the thought but not in the 'thing-in-itself. Black and white, he
says, make grey both on the wall and on the painter's palette.
Finally, let me point out that the value of mathematical models of dialec-
tics and of dialectic logic itself, is their application to the logic of science. It
is often contended that symbolic logic provides exact rules of inference,
whereas the attempt to guide our thoughts by the laws of dialectic logic in
the absence of sufficient concrete information can often lead to false conclu-
sions or even to the ability to prove one proposition and its opposite. The
merit of symbolic logic lies in its usefulness (e.g., Boolean algebra in circuit
design). In fact, symbolic logic itself is far from consistent (as witnessed by
the set theory paradoxes). Exactness alone is no praiseworthy merit. Mter all,
a clock that does not run will be the only one to tell the exact time twice a
day, and "He alone won't betray in whom none will confide. And the nymph
may be chaste that has never been tried" (Congreve, Love for Love).
A characteristic of the thinking brain is its ability to suffer delusions,
illusions and hallucinations. The usefulness of a logic of science is measured
by its fruitfulness as a heuristics for hypothesis formulation and testing rather
than by the exactness of its conclusions in the absence of experimental data.
Scientific hypotheses are based upon and tested by experiment, observation,
practice.
The dialectic notion of the unity of content and form implies that the
axiomatization of dialectics is neither impossible nor trivial. On the other
hand, scientific theories (including dialectics) are neither static nor defmitive;
358 H. C. SABELLI
hence, a mathematical calculus can only formalize some aspects of dia-

lectics.
ADDENDUM: DIALECTICS AND THE PSYCHIATRIC

ANALYSIS OF THINKING
Dealing with the concreteness of human thinking rather than with simplified
psychological or logical constructs, psychiatry necessarily speaks dialectics.
Psychiatrists often do so unknowingly, as Monsieur Jourdain spoke prose, but
the validity of their contribution to a multidisciplinary study of thinking
cannot be overlooked. Piaget has, in fact, revolutionized the study of thought
via his concept of experimental epistemology. His pediatric studies have
shown an ordered sequence of development in which different mathematical
structures successively serve the normative role of an organizing logic. Group
structures, for instance, characterize certain stages of development, while
the overall evolution of thinking is obviously more complex than Hegelian
dialectics. Within this framework, dialectic thinking is one among many
natural patterns of thinking (e.g., abstract-mathematical, mechanistic,
autistic, free-associations, etc.). It seems likely that biological evolution has
selected such multiplicity as being more advantageous than a single pattern of
thinking. Within his view, the rejection of anyone of these thinking modes
may be a misguidedly premature attempt to correct evolution. A naturalisitc
study of dialectic thinking may offer significant contributions to philosophi-
cal diale ctics.
Conversely, there is a wide range of applications of dialectics to psychiatry,
particularly because contradiction is an essential component of many differ-
ent types of thinking processes. For instance, the brilliant analysis made by
1. Lakatos of the logic of mathematical discoveries via the contradiction of
'Proofs and Refutations' illustrates the dialectic nature of creative thinking;
and of course, one of Freud's main contributions was his discovery of the
'illogical' but not random nature of the 'primary process' thinking observed in
dreams, psychoanalytic free-associations, errors and slips of the tongue, etc.
Because dialectics deals with contradictory thinking - which non-dialectic
logic excludes - it may have a clinical application in psychiatry in the inter-
pretation of the covert and often contradictory meaning of thinking and
behavior. For instance, the dialectic notion that opposites imply each other
provides a 'dictionary' for probable (but not certain) psychoanalytic inter-
pretations (e.g., irritable <+ irritating <+ irritated, dominant ,.,. submissive;
anger <+ fear). Freud discovered that in dreams things are often represented
by their opposite and most psychiatrists utilize their expectation of associa-

tions between contradictory moods and attitudes as heuristics for emotional
insights. likewise, the Hegelian concept of the master as the slave of the slave
(the asymmetric reciprocity of sublation) fmds wide applications in family
therapy, suggesting to search for the covert domination which others exert
upon the overtly dominant family member. The law of the reciprocal trans-
formation of quantity and quality serves as a warning against the logical
fallacies which may be involved in 'a potiori' arguments (to focus on the
extreme and most clearly identifiable phenomenon of a group to analyze the
whole range of related processes), which, following Freud, have become
characteristic of psychoanalytic reasoning. The dialectic notion of change as
the result of the interaction between internal and external contradictions
supersedes the sterile polemiCS of nature vs nurture, intrapsychic vs inter-
personal, etc., etc. 'Interactionism' is a modern name for this Hegelian thesis.
A scientific revolution (from reversible mechanicism to the irreversible dia-
lectic evolution of thermodynamics) occurred when physicists turned their
eyes from celestial bodies to the concrete pursuits of human labor. In a similar
manner, philosophical dialectics may find new avenues of development by
focusing on actual thinking. Contemporary science shows the fruitfulness of
combining experimental, axiomatic and theoretical approaches: for instance,
theoretical physics enriched both experimental physics and mathematical
geometry. likewise, dialectic theory may serve to develop mathematical logic
into a mathematical dialectics, and to provide a theory ('psychodialectics')
for the psychoanalysis of interpersonal dialogue. Philosophy has already had a
major impact in psychiatry as illustrated by the phenomenological approach
of Jaspers (now used widely in diagnosis) and the use of dialectic concepts by
Erikson, Piaget and others.
IVAN SOLL
COMMENTS ON KOSOK'S INTERPRETATION

OF HEGEL'S LOGIC
Kosok's interpretation as well as philosophic endorsement of Hegelian logic

and dialectic does not even pretend to rest on a painstaking examination of
Hegel's logic in its entirety, but rather upon what Kosok considers to be "a
few fundamental statements appearing in the beginning of Hegel's Science of
Logic ... , which clearly and unambiguously set forth his entire gestalt"
(p. 312). Examining the handful of sentences Kosok quotes I do not fmd any-
thing like an entire Gestalt of Hegel's logic or dialectic set forth, not even set
forth unclearly and ambiguously. But rather than quibble about what can or
cannot be 'found' in these eight sentences or sentence fragments, I would
like to deal directly with Kosok's conception of Hegel's logic.
Kosok asks us to view Hegel's logic as 'sheer-movement,' and he claims
that, "it is this very movement that constitutes the content of the categories
generated, and not the particular categories themselves, regarded as identifi-
able and analysable terms" (p. 311). This call to adapt a dynamic view of
Hegel's logic - which so formulated rings somehow virtuous but extremely
vague - is given more content by coupling it with a prohibition against what
Kosok terms "the identification process, singling out terms or elements from
their dynamic of relation and movement ..." (ibid.). "To identify (Kosok
tells us) means to bring into focus a certain element, quality, fact, condition
... a certain event, state of events or experience in such a way as to be able
to refer to it in some categorical way." Furthermore: "Without identification
our awareness is in a state of immediacy which is not defined in relation to
categorization" (p. 314). Kosok takes what he calls a 'state of immediacy' to
be central to Hegelian logic and dialectic. In fact he offers the definition that
"dialectic is the dynamics of immediacy" (p. 343).
Since our awareness is in a 'state of immediacy' only if there is no identifi·
cation, and identification is defmed as the structuring of our awareness by
means of categories, the state of immediacy Kosok indicates seems to be a
state of awareness in which there is no structuring of consciousness through
the application of concepts, no division or grouping of experience into similar
parts or aspects, no identification or even discernment of particulars in
experience or of particular kinds of experience. The state of awareness
indicated seems to be what philosophers in the Kantian tradition have either,
361
R. S. Cohen and M. W. Wartofsky reds.), Hegel and the Sciences, 361-364.
362 IVAN SOLL
like Kant himself, held to be an impossible state of affairs, or like C. I. Lewis,

a rare and evanescent one, or even if more common and stable, an inchoate
demiconsciousness, "nothing but the dream of an incomprehensible present"
(to use Josiah Royce's formulation) - and according to all versions not a
state to be considered human consciousness in its full form. On the other
hand, Kosok's talk of a state of immediacy is reminiscent of various laudatory
descriptions of states of enlightenment or exaltation induced by faith,
pharmacy or philosophical meditation. Kosok seems to fit neatly into this
second tradition when he claims that immediate awareness is itself ineffable.
But his is not the hackneyed and trivial claim that certain kinds of experience
cannot be completely captured in language. His is the far more radical claim
that 'immediate awareness' cannot be characterized at all, identified in any
degree, or even referred to. His general argument is that any category - no
matter how apt - used to characterize this state of awareness functions, like
all concepts and categories, only by having a contrastive set and thus charac-
terizes immediate awareness by contrasting it to what it is not or, in Hegelian
terminology, through the mediation of what it is not. Yet immediate aware-
ness is defmed as a state free of distinctions and contrasts. Thus immediate
awareness cannot even be characterized as immediate "lest this immediacy
is 'itself then perceived as an identified state [i.e. in opposition to a mediated
state] and hence not immediate" (p. 314) and "even the notion of trans-
bounded, if identified or localized by appearing in opposition to non-trans-
bounded, cannot describe immediacy" (ibid.). Moreover he says "immediacy
cannot simply be dismissed as 'something' not-characterizable altogether"
(p. 315) for this again contrasts immediacy to something which is characteriz-
able. Again, I suppose, because simple reference relies on contrast, "If one
were simply to 'remain' with the original undefined state of immediacy ... ,
one could not in any way refer to it ... " (p. 317).
This geileralline of argument rests, I believe, on a confusion between being

able to characterize or refer to the kind of state Kosok calls 'immediate
awareness' and being able to do the same while remaining in such a state. If
one were in such a state of awareness, it would be impossible to characterize
or refer to it - that is, it would be impossible to characterize or refer to a
state of immediate awareness and remain in that state. One could of course
refer to or characterize a state of immediate awareness by freely using
categories that have contrastive sets. In so doing one would be performing
actions Kosok does not allow to someone in a state of immediate awareness,
but why must the characterization of such a state be self-characterization and
ON KOSOK'S INTERPRETATION OF HEGEL'S LOGIC 363
any reference to it be self-reference? All Kosok's arguments even tend to

show is the impossibility of self-reference and self-description by someone in
a certain state while he is in that state, yet he writes as if he has shown that
nobody can ever characterize or refer to this state. What Kosok has done is
analogous to arguing that a man in a coma cannot describe his facial features
while in the coma, and taking this as tantamount to showing those facial
features to be intrinsically indescribable. But the man can come out of the
coma and describe what his facial features were even at the time of the coma
and certainly someone else can describe those features. What does the fact
that Rembrandt cannot paint a self-portrait while holding a golden helmet in
one hand and an Edam cheese in the other have to do with the possibility of
his posing full-handed for Franz Hals or his posing the objects and painting a
similar self-portrait with the aid of a mirror and memory.
In light of this criticism what remains of "the paradox which (according to
Kosok) immediacy ... must present" (p. 315). If immediacy is a state of con-
sciousness in which no self-reference or self-characterization can be made and
- let us remember - no reference or characterization of any kind can be
made, then anyone desiring to engage in these activities of 'identification'
must move out of a state of immediacy to perform them. If one, in fact,
cannot eat his cake and have it too, does that constitute a paradox?
Kosok thinks that what he takes to be the inevitability of this alleged para-
dox "makes immediacy not an arbitrary variable simply left for the poets to
sing hymns to" (ibid.). Instead he sings hymns of his own. Hegel, however,
did not sing such hymns. As Kosok points out, Hegel associated the notion of
immediacy with the beginning of his logic and with Being, its first category,
but Kosok neglects to point out that Hegel went on to stress the intellectual
and conceptual poverty of the beginning of any philosophical enterprise and
the conceptual vacuousness of the category of Being. Furthermore in the
Vorbegriff to the Encyclopedia, Hegel devotes an entire section to a disdain-
ful rejection of 'immediate knowledge,' i.e., of claims to non-conceptual,
intuitive knowledge by post-Kantian romantics like Jacobi. For Hegel, the
knowledge presented at the beginning of the logic like the knowledge offered
by the intuitionists is immediate in that it lacks the painstaking conceptual
development of the logic itself. Hegel stresses the virtue and necessity of this
development, which he often describes as a process of 'mediation.' The same
theme of the necessary mediation of knowledge through the careful analysis
and development of concepts is stressed throughout the preface to the
Phenomenology, where a state of awareness approximating Mr. Kosok's
immediacy is famously lampooned as "the night in which all cows are black."
364 IVAN SOLL
Hegel, in contrast to Kosok, generally uses the notion of immediacy pejora-

tively. How Hegelian then can a theory be which views dialectics as the
dynamics of immediacy?
Kosok's answer to this question would, I suppose, lie in his claim that:
"Hegel starts with immediacy and remains within immediacy, all mediations
being self-mediations of immediacy." Is this a deep dialectical truth or
double-talk? In what sense does Hegel 'remain within immediacy' in his logic?
Though Hegel associates immediacy with Being, the first or immediately
encountered category of the logic and claims that all later categories of his
logic are further determinations of Being, he also says that these categories
'mediate' the original category of Being. Though Kosok's state of immediacy
is defmed as free of categorization, identification or mediation, he quixoti-
cally tries to fit Hegel's complex analysis of many categories and their
relations into his categoryless state of immediate awareness by claiming that
the mediations are mediations of immediacy. But is this not like arguing that
a certain artist's designs are monochromatic because, though he uses different
colors, he applies them to a canvas that is monochromatic at the outset?
Kosok might want to rejoin that Hegel remains within immediacy because his
mediations are self-mediations of immediacy. But even if the categorization
and mediation in Hegel's logic are somehow self-generated, how does that in
any way alter the fact that the body of Hegel's logic is structured and thus
mediated by categories.
Kosok is here stressing an idea that, unlike some of his other ideas, is
actually to be found in Hegel, namely, that the logic is self-generating.
Leaving aside the question of whether Hegel's logic is really self-generating,
the logic offered by Kosok is not. The state of immediate awareness as
delineated by Kosok does not inexorably generate any further state. Only an
attempt to characterize, identify or refer to it generates further states or
further logical complexity, and this act of referring or characterizing is, on
Kosok's own account, extrinsic to what Kosok defmes as a state of
immediacy.
However interesting one fmds Kosok's dialectical logic, its deviations from
Hegel's logic are as striking as its similarities. To follow Kosok's advice and
leave behind Hegel's myriad of categories or the Hegelian analysis and dis-
section of the various categories may well be to leave behind any logic
deserving to be called Hegelian.
University of Wisconsin
Madison
HEGEL AND THE SCIENCES
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
[The contributors have referred to various editions and translations of Hegel's

texts. The relevant bibliographical data are listed below, as well as the
abbreviations used for citation in the text. In addition, the standard transla-
tion of Kant's First Critique is listed at the end. - Ed.]
COLLECTED WORKS
1. Werke. Edited by P. Marheineke, J. Schulze, E. Gans, L. Henning, H. Hotho, K.

Michelet, F. Forster ... 19 vols. in 20. Berlin, Dunker and Humblot, 1832-1887.
2. Siimtliche Werke . Edited by G. Lasson. 18 vols. [Some titles went through more than
edition.] Leipzig, Meiner, 1905-1940.
In the course of publication, J. Hoffmeister began to edit some of the volumes of this
series in a 'critical edition'.
3. Siimtliche Werke. Jubilaumsausgabe. Edited by H. Glockner. 26 vols. Stuttgart, From-
mann, 1927-1940. 3rd ed. 1949-
A 'facsimile' edition based on the original Werke which began publication in 1832.
4. SIi"mtliche Werke. Neue kritische Ausgabe. Edited by J. Hoffmeister. Hamburg,
Meiner, 1952 -.
Based on the Lasson edition.
INDIVIDUAL WORKS
GP Vorlesungen iiber die Geschichte der Philosophie. Edited by H.

Glockner. 2 vols. (Jubiliiumsausgabe 17,18,1928).
The first edition of this work (in three volumes) was edited by
Michelet and published in the Werke (volumes 13-15) in 1833-36; a
second, emended edition followed in 1840. For English translation
seeHP.
GPR Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts. Berlin, Nicolai, 1821. For
English translation seePR.
HP Lectures on the History of Philosophy. Trans. E. S. Haldane and
F. H. Simson. 3 vols. [London, Kegan Paul, Trench, Truebner,
1892-1896]. London, Routledge and Kegan Paul; New York,
Humanities Press, 1955. Translation of Vorlesungen iiber die
Geschichte der Philosophie (GP) , based on the second emended
edition of 1840.
365
R. S. Cohen andM. W. Wartofsky (eds.), Hegel and the Sciences, 365-367.
366 HEGEL AND THE SCIENCES
L [W, 1892] The Logic of Hegel. Trans. W. Wallace. 2nd rev. and aug. ed. Oxford,
Clarendon Press, 1892. Translation of Logik, Part I of the Encyklo-
piJdie der philosophischen Wissenschaften, 1830.
L [W,1975] Logic. Trans. W. Wallace; with a foreword by J. N. Findlay. Oxford,
Clarendon Press, 1975. Translation of Logik, Part I of the Encyklo-
piJdie der philosophischen Wissenschaften, 1830.
Logik Logik (Part I of the Encyklopiidie der philosophischen Wissenschaf
ten). Edited by L. Henning. (Werke 6, 1840). For English translation
see L [,1892] and L [W, 1975].
PG Philosophie des Geistes (Part III of the EncyklopiJdie der philosoph is-
chen Wissenschaften). Edited by L. Boumann. (Werke 7, 1845).
Phan [G] Phanomenologie des Geistes. Edited by H. Glockner. (Jubilaumsaus-
gabe 2, 1927). For English translation see Phen [B] andPhen [M].
Phan [H, 1937] Phanomenologie des Geistes. Edited by J. Hoffmeister. 4th ed.
(Siimtliche Werke (Lasson ed., critical ed.) 2, 1937). For English
translations see Phen [B] andPhen [M].
Phan [H,1952] Phanomenologie des Geistes. Edited by J. Hoffmeister. 6th ed.
(Samtliche Werke (new critical ed.) S, 1952). For English translations
seePhen [B] andPhen [M].
Phen [B] The Phenomenology of Mind. Trans. J. B. Baillie. 2nd rev. and corr.
ed. London, Allen and Unwin; New York, Macmillan, 1931. (Reprint-
ed several times.) Translation of Phanomenologie des Geistes (Phan
[G,H]).
Phen [M] Phenomenology of Spirit. Trans. A. V. Miller, with analysis of the
text and foreword by J. N. Findlay. Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1977.
Translation of P/'lanomenologie des Geistes (Phan [G, H]).
PM Philosophy of Mind. Trans. W. Wallace, together with the Zusatze in
Boumann's text (1845), trans. A. V. Miller; with foreword by J. N.
Findlay. Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1971. Translation of Philosophie
des Geistes (PG) , Part III of the Encyklopadie der philosophischen
Wissenschaften, 1830.
PN Philosophy of Nature. Trans. from Nicolin and Poggeler's edition
(1959) and from the Zusatze in Michelet's text (1847) by A. V.
Miller; with foreword by J. N. Findlay Oxford, Clarendon Press,
1970. Translation of Naturphilosophie, Part II of the Encyklopadie
der phl10sophischen Wissenschaften, 1830.
PR Philosophy of Right. Trans. T. M. Knox. Oxford, Clarendon Press,
1942. Translation of Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts (GPR).
SL [J/S] Science of Logic [1929]. Trans. W. H. Johnston and L. G. Struthers.
2 vols. London, Allen and Unwin, 1951. Translation of Wissenschaft
der Logik (WL [L]).
SL [M] Science of Logic. Trans. A. V. Miller, foreword by J. N. Findlay.
London, Allen and Unwin; New York, Humanities Press, 1969.
Translation of Wissenschaft der Logik (WL [L]).
WL [1812] Wissenschaft der Logik. 2 vols. Nuremberg, Schrag, 1812-1816. For
Eng1ish translations see SL (JIS, M].
WL [L] Wissenschaft der Logik. Edited by G. Lasson. 2 vols. (Siimtliche
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 367
Werke 3,4, 1923; 1934, reprinted 1948). For English translations see
SL [J/S, M].
CPR Immanuel Kant: Critique of Pure Reason. Trans. N. K. Smith.

London, Macmillan, 1929. (Reprinted several times.)
INDEX OF NAMES
Adorno, T. W. 156,158 Bloch, E. 191

Albert, H. 156 Boehme, J. 33
Alembert, J. L. R. d' 42,53 Bohr,N.69,207,225,230,243
Allport, F. 212 Bole, T. J. 138
Ampere, A. M. 223 Boole, G. 350
Anaxagoras 202 Boumann, L. 366
Anaximander 202 Bradley, F. H. 10,113,150
Anaximenes 202 Bridgman, P. W. 121,297,299
Anshen, R. 10 Broglie, L. de 60, 84, 207, 212
Anthony, H. D. 84 Broglie, M. de 207
Apel, K.-O. 241,264,265 Brooks, C. C. M. 138
Aristarchus of Samos 203, 206, 224, Brown, John 126,129
238 Buber, M. 323
Aristotle 55,57,61,68,74,79,95,96, Bubner, R. 156
102,116, 162, 171,201,203,206, Buchdahl, G. 35,37-39,237
208, 209, 210, 220, 242, 251, 271, Buckle, H. T. 157
272,280 Buffon, G. L. L. 113,207
Armour, L. 305 Bunge,M.241,251
Artelt, W. 139 Buridan, J. 201,206,209,210,224
Asenjo, F. G. see Gonzalez Asenjo, F. Burks, A. W. 264
Asquith, P. 237 Burnet, J. 120
Avineri, S. 159 Buttel, C. D. von 140
Butts, R. 238
Bacon, F. 55,56,248,251
Bacon, R. 251 Caesar, J. 70
Baer, K. E. von 207 Callipus 203
Baillie, J. B. 366 Campbell, N. R. 35
Barrow, I. 65 'Candidus' 124,139
Bartlett, F. 212 Carnap, R. 236,237
Bauer, B. 262 Caspar, M. 35
Beck, L. W. 191 Cavalieri, B. 64
Berghoff, E. 138 Cavendish, H. 111,207
Bergman, T. O. 44,54 Chew, G. F. 263
Bergson, H. 115,116,117 Chomsky, N. 305
Berkeley, G. 65,207,221,245,266 Churchman, C. W. 244-245,263,266
Berthollet, C. L. 19,45,54 Cioffari, V. 84
Berzelius, J. J. 19,20,43,45,54,226 Cohen, M. R. 35
Beth, E. W. 305 Collingwood, R. G. 197,206
Black, Joseph 208 Colombo, R. 207, 208
Blanshard, B. 212 Comte, A. 223
369
370 INDEX OF NAMES
Condillac, E. B. de 42,46,54,191 Einstein, A. 3, 55, 66, 68, 69,70,71,

Congreve, W. 357 72-73, 74,75,76-77,.78,80,81,
Copernicus, N. 79, 80, 203, 204, 206, 82,84,85,204,207,209,210,224,
207,208,224,238 231,263
Cornford, F. M. 120 Eiseley, 1. 120
Cousin, V. 114,120 Elliott, J. 43,54
Cramer, K. 156 Emerson, R. W. 292, 299
Cranefield, P. F. 138 Empedocles 120
Croce, B. 3,5,8,9,10,107,109,111, Engels, F. 241
115, 120 Epicurus 62
Crombie, A. C. 138 Erikson, E. 359
Curry, H. B. 306,310 Erxleben, J. 1. P. 42,43,54
Cuvier, G. 1. 112,207 Eudoxus 203
Euler,1. 27,65,70,296
Dahrendorf, R. 156
Dalton, J. 45,54,111,222,290 Fabricius, H., ab Aquapendente 207,
Dampier-Whetham, W. C. 299 208
Dante 56,61,84 Faraday, M. 71
Dantzig, T. 67, 84 Fermat, P. de 65
Darden, 1. 238 Feuerbach, 1. 257
Darwin, C. 58,112,113,207,209,241, Feyerabend, P. 216,225,230,238
292 Fichte, J. G. 106, 107,113,165,174,
Darwin, E. 207 175
Davy, H. 45,54 Findlay, J. N. 34, 37, 56, 57, 76, 84,
Deborin, A. 357 101, 103, 104, 107, 109, 113, 115,
Democritus 61, 62, 68, 84, 263 119,120,298,299,366
Derbolav, J. 191 Fischer, W. 139
Descartes, R. 30,35,57,67,102,162- Forster, F. 365
163,174,207,251 Fourcroy, A. F. de 54
Dettmar, P. 355 Francoeur, 1. B. 35
Diderot, D. 113,251 Frege, G. 33
Diepgen, P. 138, 139 Fresnel, A.-J. 27
Dietrich, A. 138 Freud, S. 99,358,359
Dilthey, W. 146-147,148,150,157 Freyer, H. 148
Diogenes 64 Fuhrmans, H. 107
Dove, K. R. 191,237 Fulda, H. F. 280
Doz, A. 309
Drabkin, I. E. 35 Gadamer, H.-G. 156
Drischel, H. 355 Galen 207, 208
Dubarle, D. 309 Gailleo 21,55,56,67,78,79,80,109-
Duhem, P. 35,62,75,82,83-84,85 110, 201, 206, 207, 209, 218,224,
Durande, J. F. 54 228,231
Dyck, W. von 35 Gans, E. 365
Gardies, J. 1. 309
Easton, 1. D. 157, 298, 299 Gardiner, P. 157
Eckhart, J. [Meister Eckhart] 33 Garrison, F. H. 139
Eddington, A. 81,85,110,120 Gauthier, Y. 349,352,355,357
INDEX OF NAMES 371
Gell-Mann, M. 263 Hertz, H. R. 27, 71

Geoffroi Saint-Hilaire, I. 207 Hesse, M. 231
Geoffroy, I. S. C. 44,54 Higgins, W. A. 45,54
Gibson, J. J. 200 Hirschfeld, E. 139
Gilbert, W. 207 Hisinger, W. 54
Gillispie, C. C. 121 Hiilderlin, J. C. F. 34
Gilman, W. H. 299 Hoffmann, K. R. 127,140
Glockner, H. 158,191,365,366 Hoffmeister, J. 84, 139, 140, 141,280,
Gmelin, L. 45,46,54 365,366
Giidel, K. 320,321,340,342 Horkheimer, M. 156,158
Giiden, H. A. 126,138 Hotho, H. 365
Goethe, J. W. von 20, 28, 30, 34,97, Hufeland, C. W. 124,138,139,140
118, 181 Humboldt, K. W. 287
Gonzalez Asenjo, F. 305,306,310, 349 Hume, D. 101,162,181,191,221
Graham, T. 290 Hussed, E. 304
Gruber, G. B. 138 Huygens, C. 30,119
Guddat, K. H. 157 H!6ffding, H. 111,115,120
Gunther, G. 305,310,349
Gurwitsch, A. 191 Infeld, L. 84
Guyton de Morveau, L. B. 44, 46, 54,
208 Jacob, F. 242
Jacob, W. 138
Habermas, J. 156,159 Jacobi, F. H. 165,363
Hackel, E. 265 Jahn, F. 140
Haldane, E. S. 365 James, W. 8,116,117,120,177,191,
Hales, S. 208 241,264,297
Halrnos, P. 307 Janet, P. 114,120
Hals, F. 363 Jaspers, K. 359
Hamilton, W. 296 Joan of Arc 132
Harris, E. 212, 215-216, 220, 223, Johnston, W. H. 366
224, 226, 228-229, 230, 231-232,
235,236,237,238 Kastner, A. G. 42,54
Hartmann, P. C. 124,139 Kant, I. 6-8,9, 19, 23, 24, 25,32,35,
Hartshorne, C. 265 39, 101, 102, 103, 104, 107, 146,
Harvey, W. 204,205,207,208,228 162,164,166,167,170,171,174,
Haym, R. 104, 107 175, 179, 182, 189-190, 191, 195,
Hecker, A. F. 124,138 196, 199,200,207,223,241,242,
Heidegger, M. 99, 304 243,244,245,247,248,250,251,
Heinroth, J. C. A. 127,140 253, 254, 259, 263, 266, 287, 288,
Heischkel, E. 139 289,291,293,303,304,362,367
Heisenberg; W. 68,207 Karst, W. 140
Helmholtz, H. von 243,265,296,299 Kepler, J. 18,21,31,35,56,61,67,
Hempel, C. G. 350,353 68-69, 77, 79, 80, 82, 109, 110,
Henning, L. von 84,365,366 119, 204, 205, 207, 208, 209,210,
Henrich, D. 141,280 219
Heraclitus 9,112,113,115-117 Kierkegaard, S. 257
Herschel, William 28,205,223 Kimmerle, H. 107
372 INDEX OF NAMES
Kirchhoff, G. R. 242, 265 Marcuse, H. 156

Knox, T. M. 366 Maret, H. 54
Kojeve, A. 305 Marheineke, P. 365
Kosok, M. 305, 349, 350, 351-352, Markovic, M. 241
354,355,356-357,361-364 Marx, K. 58, 145, 148, 149, 157, 215,
Kuhn, T. 152,210,215,216,220,224, 236,241,257,266,335
225,229 Maull, N. 238
Kyburg, H. 237 Maxwell, J. C. 71,204
Mendel, G. 209,265
Lagrange, J.-L. 21,65 Mendeleyev, D. 354
Lakatos, I. 215,216,358 Merlan, P. 281
Lamarck, J. B. 112,113,114,207,209, Merleau-Ponty, M. 212
210,241,291 Meyer-Abich, A. 243-244,265
Landen, J. 65 Meyer-Steineg, T. 138
Lask, E. 158 Meyerson, E. 111,114,120
Lasson, G. 298, 365,366 Michelet, K. L. 84,111,298,365,366
Laudan, L. 237 Milch, W. 139
Lauer, H. H. 139 Mill, J. S. 157,223
Lavoisier, A. L. 43, 44, 46, 54, 111, Miller, A. V. 34,57,119,120,298
205,207,208,228 Mink, L. O. 157
Lefebvre, H. 357 Mischel, T. 191
Leibbrand, W. L. 138, 139 Mitscherlich, E. 46,54
Leibniz, G. W. 30, 35, 65, 163, 253, Moleschott, J. 257
296,333 Moliere O. B. Poquelin) 56
Lektorsky, V. A. 239 Monod, J. 210,242,263
Lenin, V.I. 252,257,267 Moore, G. E. 150
Lenk, K. 158 Morveau, Guyton de see Guyton de
Leucippus 61 Morveau, 1. B.
Lewis, C. I. 362 Milller, F. von 139
Ley, H. 266 Milller, H. 138
Lobkowicz, N. 239 Milller, T. 266
Locke, J. 162,266 Munson, T. N. 10
Lowith, K. 157 Murray, J. C. 238
Lorenzen, P. 156,305,310
Lotze, H. 147,158 Nagel, E. 35,157,267
Lovejoy,A.O.117,120 Narski, I. S. 241
Lukacs, G. 267 Ne'eman, Y. 263
Lwoff, A. 242-243,263,265 Neithammer, F.I. 286
Lyell, C. 207 Neubauer, J. N. 140
Newton, I. 18, 22, 23, 27-28, 30, 35,
Mach, E. 35,66,73,75,81,119,207, 55, 56, 58-62, 64-67, 69, 70, 71,
297,299 73, 74, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82-83,
McLellan, D. 157 109, 110, 111, 116, 119, 204,205,
McMullin, E. 237, 238, 239 207, 208, 209, 210, 218, 219, 221,
McTaggart, J. M. E. 113,114,120,150 253,263,296
Ma11arme, S. 34 Nicole Oresme 207
M!lnnheim, K. 148-149 Nicolin, F. 191,286,366
INDEX OF NAMES 373
Nietzsche, F. 323,340 Rousseau, J. 1. 5

Noel, G. 310 Royce, J. 362
Ruge, A. 145
Oken,L.126,127,140,288,292 Runciman, W. 158
O'Malley, J. J. 84 Russell, B. 33,68,72-73,84,150
Pagel, W. 139 Sabelli, H. C. 355

Parmenides 113,114, 116 Sartre,1.-P. 356,357
Peirce, c. S. 241-242,264,265 Schadewaldt, H. 138
Petry, M. J. 119,237 Scheidler, K. H. 138
Petty, W. 252-253 Schelling, F. W. J. von 23,41,106,107,
Piaget, J. 358,359 118, 120, 123, 124, 126, 137, 195,
Pico della Mirandola, G. 10 241,258,287,288,289,292
Pilot, H. 156 Schipperges, H. 139
Pinel, P. 141 Schmitz, K. 1. 107
Pinner, Dr. 140 Schneider, P. K. 310
Pitt, J. 238 Schober, K. 139
Planck, M. 68,75,78,80,207,224 Schroedinger,E. 207
Plant, R. 237 Schulze, J. 365
Plato 97,116,143,271,273,305 Seidler, E. 139
Plumstead, A. W. 299 Selby-Bigge, 1. A. 191
Poggeler, O. 84,107, 139, 286, 366 Siebenthal, W. von 140
Poincare, H. 207 Simson, F. H. 365
Popper, K. 143-145, 149, 156, 157, Snell, W. 30
158,203,215,216,245,353 Sohni, H. 139
Priestley, J. 111, 208 Solomon, R. C. 191
Ptolemy, C. 29,35,203,206,208 Spencer, H. 265
Spinoza, B. 162,163,259
Quesnay, F. 252 Stahl, G. E. 208
Quine, W. V. o. 216,217,309,310 Stallo, J. B. 34,119,287-299
Stark, K. W. 140
Rather,1. J. 138 Steinkraus, W. E. 107
Reil 124 Struthers, 1. G. 366
Reinhold, K. 1. 158 Stuewer, R. 35
Rembrandt 363
Ribbert, H. 138 Tarski, A. 307
Richter, J. B. 44,45,54 Taylor, C. 233,235,237,238,239
Rickert, H. 147-148,158 Taylor, 1. W. 34
Ricoeur, P. 241 Temkin, o. 138,139
Riemann, B. 67,74 Thales of Miletus 110
Riese, W. 138 Toulmin, S. 215,216,220,224
Ringseis, J. N. von 127,140 Trede, J. H. 107
Risse, G. B. 139,140 Trendelenburg, F. A. 114,120
Ritter,1. 159 Trommsdorff, J. B. 43,46,54
Rogowski, 1. S. 309 Troxler, I. P. V. 126
Rosen, G. 139
Rothschuh, K. E. 138, 139 van Ghert, P. G. 141
374 INDEX OF NAMES
Vasiliev, A. V. 84 Whitehead, A. N. 57, 68, 118, 119,

Vesalius, A. 207,208 121
Volta, A. 45,54 Wiedmann, F. 298
Volz, R. W. 140 Wiehl, R. 156
Wieland, C. M. 158
Waddington, C. H, 209,212 Windelband, W. 147,157,158
Wallace, W. 34,57,299, 366 Windischmann, C. J. 125,127,139,140
Weber, M. 147,148,149,158 Wittgenstein, L. 216
Wegener, A. 224 Wohler, F. 44,54
Wei!, A. 305 Wright, G. von 157
Weismann, A. 265
Weiss, F. G. 238 Young, James 30
Weiss, P. 265
Weizsiicker, C. F. von 244,266 Zeno 64,75,202
Wenzel, C. F. 44,54 Zilsel, E. 157
Whewell, W. 223 Zinoviev, A. A. 310,355

AND Sciences: Hegel THE

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

AND Sciences: Hegel THE

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

AND Sciences: Hegel THE

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

HEGEL AND THE SCIENCES

BOSTON STUDIES IN THE PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE

EDITED BY ROBERT S. COHEN AND MARX W. WARTOFSKY

D. REIDEL PUBLISHING COMPANY

Main entry under title:

Hegel and the sciences.

(Boston studies in the philosophy of science; v. 64)

Published by D. Reidel Publishing Company,

Sold and distributed in the U.S.A. and Canada

In all other countries, sold and distributed

All Rights Reserved

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS TO THE SYMPOSIUM

GERD BUCHDAHL / Conceptual Analysis and Scientific Theory in

II. PHILOSOPHY AND METHODOLOGY OF SCIENCE

ERROL HARRIS / The Dialectical Structure of Scientific Thinking 195

HERMAN LEY / Some 'Moments' of Hegel's Relation to the Sciences 241

III. DIALECTICS AND LOGIC

YVON GAUTHIER / Hegel's Logic from a Logical Point of View 303

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 365

INDEX OF NAMES 369

Center for Philosophy & History of Science ROBERT S. COHEN

Department of Philosophy MARX W. WARTOFSKY

We gratefully acknowledge permission by the respective publishers to reprint

THE SCHOLAR, THE LIBERAL IDEAL,

science, some conscientious truth-seeker has been warned, suppressed,

no freedom to question the fundamental validity of certain hard-won truths,

search for 'true freedom' was a continuing concern as he tried to understand

whatever the specific good in question, each reasoning person is to respect

tenable solution? As he says, the self-determining conscientious individual is

imprisoned by their ideal unless they are responsibly-responsive to those who

CONCEPTUAL ANALYSIS AND SCIENTIFIC THEORY

In a popular textbook on physics, written with an historical and philosophical

When we speak of Hegel's Logic, we need to keep in mind of course the

So far, however, I have talked as though 'notional determination' was at best

theoretical articulations? And as a special case we must pose the question:

I think this point need no longer be laboured, although it is necessary always

In a similar way, the notorious Hegelian legend of the a priori deduction of

In general, we can see that the relations between notional investigations,

1. Consider, as a first instance, Hegel's attitude towards atomistic theories

up-to-date), of the atomistic interpretation of what happened in chemical

2. The same opposition to existential or independent reification of forces

3. In the instance just mentioned, we have a case where notional determina-

a body is falling freely with uniformly accelerated motion are developable

explanatory terms of the optical theory of traditional science. Further, we

made explicit in Hertz's Mechanics, and which is reflected in the standpoint

purely descriptive alternative to that of Newton (PN, § 270, Remark, p. 68).

Still, for us the moral is interesting: between notional determination,

"This is the sort of way in which this phenomenon must to be grasped",

a quantum by way of comparison" (PN, § 293, Remark, p. 127). In this way

Clearly, this is a different world. Hegel appreciates this; he offers us certain

he received so much (Goethe, Holderlin) and to whom he bequeathed at least

A COMMENT ON BUCHDAHL'S 'CONCEPTUAL ANALYSIS

In his 'Foreword' to the English translation of Hegel's Philosophy of Nature,

I. One option is a conventionalism of scientific theory. It is to treat the

THE CHEMICAL SYSTEM OF SUBSTANCES, FORCES

The study of Hegel's philosophy of nature offers the possibility of allow-

into mineralogy, botany and zoology. However, these fundamental criteria

To the concept of element corresponded the concept of compound. By

Hegel's philosophy of chemistry is a unified system of empirical chemistry;