scholarly journals Thom Brooks and the ‘Systematic’ Reading of Hegel

2012 ◽  
Vol 33 (02) ◽  
pp. 16-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Allen Wood

Hegel was a systematic philosopher, who grounded his system on a speculative logic. But his greatest philosophical contributions lie in his reflections on human culture: ethics, social and political philosophy, aesthetics, religion and the philosophy of history. This fact poses a problem for anyone who accepts it and then attempts to provide a philosophical discussion of Hegel's thought with the aim of making it available to a later age.There can be no doubt that any authentic treatment of Hegel's social and political philosophy must take account of Hegel's explicit intention to ground it in his logical system of thought-determinations. But if we simply take that intention at face value, we make our appropriation of Hegel hostage to his philosophical system and speculative logic, which now are at best outdated and, though they may themselves contain some insights of lasting philosophical value, are not of nearly as much philosophical interest as Hegel's thoughts about human culture, society and history. A Hegel whose ethical, social, historical and cultural insights could be appropriated only by those who accept his speculative logical system would be a Hegel few would ever read or learn from.The other horn of the same dilemma is that those interpreters who are honest enough that they don't accept uncritically Hegel's own account of the structure of his philosophical accomplishments will inevitably be charged with doing violence to Hegel's thought, ignoring its true structure and unity. To quote a passage from Fred Beiser, which Thom Brooks uses to pillory all such Hegel scholarship: ‘We make Hegel alive and relevant, a useful contributor to our concerns; but that is only because we put our own views into his mouth.

2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 62-67 ◽  
Author(s):  
Linda Barclay

Philosophers and bioethicists are typically sceptical about invocations of dignity in ethical debates. Many believe that dignity is essentially devoid of meaning: either a mere rhetorical gesture used in the absence of good argument or a faddish term for existing values like autonomy and respect. On the other hand, the patient experience of dignity is a substantial area of research in healthcare fields like nursing and palliative care. In this paper, it is argued that philosophers have much to learn from the concrete patient experiences described in healthcare literature. Dignity is conferred on people when they are treated as having equal status, something the sick and frail are often denied in healthcare settings. The importance of equal status as a unique value has been forcefully argued and widely recognised in political philosophy in the last 15 years. This paper brings medical ethics up to date with philosophical discussion about the value of equal status by developing an equal status conception of dignity.


2012 ◽  
Vol 33 (02) ◽  
pp. 23-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thom Brooks

Hegel'sPhilosophy of Rightis more than a major work of political and legal philosophy; it is a battleground for two different interpretive approaches. MyHegel's Political Philosophy: A Systematic Reading of the Philosophy of Rightargues that these approaches are mistaken about their differences and that one approach offers a more compelling interpretation ofHegel's Philosophy of Rightthan the other. I will briefly outline my defence of the systematic reading of thePhilosophy of Rightbefore replying to the constructive criticisms raised by Redding, Rosen and Wood.There are two different interpretative approaches to understanding Hegel'sPhilosophy of Right. These are the metaphysical and the non-metaphysical readings. The former often highlight Hegel's insistence that some political states may be considered more ‘true’ or ‘actual’ than others. This reading also often emphasises the special place of religion in Hegel's philosophical system, for example. In contrast, the non-metaphysical reading argues that such an interpretation is not only unattractive, but perhaps even unnecessary because Hegel's views on ‘actuality’ and ‘actualization’ are less controversial than traditional metaphysical readings of Hegel's philosophy have claimed. Commentators must choose between these competing camps and interpretations of Hegel's work are conceived within these approaches. Importantly, each reading claims that its approach best captures Hegel's philosophical importance. But would Hegel endorse either the metaphysical or non-metaphysical reading?The problem is that this debate rests on a central misconception about Hegel's philosophy. The debate is characterized as a disagreement about the role and perhaps the very existence of metaphysics in Hegel's philosophy. But this is a false impression. It is virtually nowhere in doubt that metaphysics is present in Hegel's philosophy, including hisPhilosophy of Right. Therefore, the debate between a ‘metaphysical’ and ‘non-metaphysical’ reading of Hegel's works is not a debate about whether these works contain metaphysics. The characterization of the debate invites a false impression about what is at stake.


2020 ◽  
pp. 12-23
Author(s):  
Vadym Chuiko ◽  
Valerii Atamanchuk-Angel

Almost all philosophy about the state system has concentrated on the authorities. Any function of the state can be represented as a superposition of the functions of violence / coercion. Ultimately, the state appears to be a kind of plurality of subjects with a definite crater power / coercion / violence operation on it. The algebra of trust on the multiplicity of owners of themselves, endowed with free future, is each of them is only a part of nature, еру carrier of the part of the general human culture, and for their completeness, they have and understand the need for the Other. This is the philosophy of solving political, environmental, and climate challenges not through violent / voluntaristic methods, but by the recognition of sovereign rights and the search for ways to achieve sustainable development. Any cracy / power / coercion / violence must be separated from the models of society, the state. Public agreement is not an agreement with the abstract notion of the state, but an agreement with definite elected people who have gained the trust of those to whom they temporarily render their services. Contract is temporary, limited by period, with obligatory full responsibility of the parties. Scientific novelty. For more than two thousand years, long before Aristotle and Plato, European philosophical thought, reflecting on the structure of society, wanders in the labyrinths of kratia. Modern achievements of mathematics provide an opportunity to build ideal political objects, and a direct product of material and ideal government building. (Example of a trust algebra [4].)


2020 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
pp. 101-110
Author(s):  
Mateusz Falkowski

The article is devoted to the famous The Discourse of Voluntary Servitude by Étienne de La Boétie. The author considers the theoretical premises underlying the concept of “voluntary servitude”, juxtaposing them with two modern concepts of will developed by Descartes and Pascal. An important feature of La Boétie’s project is the political and therefore intersubjective – as opposed to the individualistic perspective of Descartes and Pascal – starting point. It is therefore situated against the background of, on the one hand, the historical evolution of early modern states (from feudal monarchies, through so-called Renaissance monarchies up to European absolutisms) and, on the other hand – of the political philosophy of Machiavelli and Hobbes.


2013 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 129-146 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benedikt Paul Göcke

The existence of God is once again the focus of vivid philosophical discussion. From the point of view of analytic theology, however, people often talk past each other when they debate about the putative existence or non- existence of God. In the worst case, for instance, atheists deny the existence of a God, which no theists ever claimed to exist. In order to avoid confusions like this we need to be clear about the function of the term ‘God’ in its different contexts of use. In what follows, I distinguish between the functions of ‘God’ in philosophical contexts on the one hand and in theological contexts on the other in order to provide a schema, which helps to avoid confusion in the debate on the existence or non-existence of God.


2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 163-181
Author(s):  
Laura C. Achtelstetter

Abstract This article examines differences within the theological basis of early nineteenth-century Prussian conservatism. By exploring the usage of the Old Testament in the writings of conservative thought leaders Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg, Ernst Ludwig von Gerlach, and Friedrich Julius Stahl, this article contributes to scholarship of both traditions of biblical interpretation and that of the relation of theology and political theory. The focus of this article centers on three concepts of the Old Testament and their implementation in conservative political doctrine. I will discuss Hengstenberg’s concept of biblical historicity and unity of Scripture, Gerlach’s use of the Old Testament as the source of a role model for just religious wars and a theocratic concept of law, as well as Stahl’s bible-based political philosophy of history and the resulting model of political order. Thus, the basis for different, resulting concepts of church, state, and nation that were merged into an overall religion-based political conservative doctrine in pre-1848 Prussia are analyzed.


Author(s):  
Anne Norton

This chapter examines how the Muslim question is tied to the question of democracy. In his book Voyous (translated as Rogues), Jacques Derrida referred to the United States and Islam as the enemies of democracy. In particular, he called Islam “the other of democracy.” Only Islam, Derrida insisted, refuses democracy. Derrida was not the only scholar to have made that claim. His account echoes Samuel Huntington. John Rawls thought Islam so alien that he was obliged to treat it separately. There are countless scholars, left and right, Anglo-American and Continental, who have insisted that Islam is the other of democracy. The chapter suggests that political philosophy in the Muslim (but not simply Muslim) tradition offers visions of democracy, cosmopolitanism, immigration, and integration that are remarkably familiar.


Author(s):  
Myriam Bienenstock

An outstanding Hegel scholar – his Hegel und der Staat (Hegel and the State) (1920) remains a standard work on Hegel’s political philosophy – Franz Rosenzweig elaborated, in Der Stern der Erlösung (The Star of Redemption) (1921) and several articles – notably, his 1925 article ‘Das neue Denken’ (’The New Thinking’) – a philosophy of revelation that breaks with the systematic and rationalistic premises of German Idealism. The nisus of Rosenzweig’s New Thinking was formulated as early as 1917, in a letter containing the germ (Urzelle) of Der Stern: ‘after reason, ‘‘philosophical reason’’, has absorbed everything in itself’, Rosenzweig writes, ‘after it has proclaimed its sole existence, man suddenly discovers that he is still here, although he was digested long ago…. I am still here, I – plain, private subject, with first and last name, I – dust and ashes…. Individuum ineffabile triumphans’. How can this be? The human being, Rosenzweig explains, can acquire personal identity as an individual only through the call, that is, the revelation of the Other: God – but also, some other human being. Dialogue, communication in language, comes to the fore in this philosophy, developed around the same time as Martin Buber’s Ich und Du (I and Thou) (1923). Often treated as a common ground and basis for understanding between Jews and Christians, Der Stern der Erlösung is a major source of inspiration for such contemporary philosophers as Lévinas and is widely regarded as a masterpiece of Jewish philosophy.


2019 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 296-309 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dina Sharipova

AbstractThis article examines the novel Final Respects by Abdi-Jamil Nurpeisov from a postcolonial ecocritical perspective. Nurpeisov was one of the first Kazakh writers to discuss the decolonization of the environment and the “process of self-apprehension” by writing about the tragedy of the Aral Sea, power relations between the center and periphery, and the interconnectivity of humans and the environment in the Soviet Union. Through the prism of a small fishing village, he shows the tragedy of a nation that has an impact on the entire world. The novel is thus a critique of anthropocentric policies imposed by Moscow on Kazakhstan and other Soviet republics. Throughout the text, Nurpeisov reiterates the connection between the local and the global on one hand, and human culture and the environment on the other.


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