The Objectivity of the Concept

Chapter 6 explores the transition to “Objectivity,” continuing the investigation into the role of the Gattung as an objective universal. Hegel’s chapters on “Mechanism,” “Chemism,” and “Teleology,” establish the genus not only as an objective context of predication but also as the necessary context of objective existence, determining the degree to which self-determining activity can be realized. This chapter defends Hegel’s employment of the ontological proof and argues that the being or existence that can be inferred from the Concept is being as self-individuating activity. The processes of mechanism, chemism, and external purposiveness all fall short of self-determining activity, which is marked by descriptions of striving and violence. This chapter also discusses what Hegel calls “objective judgment,” and considers its relation to the practical syllogism. Hegel’s analysis reveals that there is an irreducible role for judgment as an act of self-determination and self-constitution, an activity that is immediately manifest in the activity of life.

Hegel’s Speculative Identity Thesis

This chapter explores Hegel’s speculative identity thesis, defending the importance of Schelling for Hegel’s appropriation of Kant’s purposiveness theme. It provides an interpretation of Hegel’s first published text, the Differenzschrift, and analyzes the relation between “subjective subject-objects” and “objective subject-objects” as an early presentation of Hegel’s philosophical method. In addition to defending the contribution of Schelling, this chapter provides an interpretation of Fichte’s contribution via his notion of the self-positing activity of the I. It then turns to a reading of Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit, demonstrating that the notion of “negativity” can be understood along the lines of speculative identity. The chapter argues that Hegel presents life as constitutive for self-consciousness by way of a three-dimensional argument: the employment of an analogy; a transcendental argument; and a refutation of idealism argument. It concludes by briefly outlining how the speculative identity thesis is carried forward in the Science of Logic.

Life as Ground, and the Limits of the Subjective Concept

Chapter 5 argues that the Subjective Logic can be read as Hegel’s “critique of judgment” by turning to the importance of Hölderlin. Adopting Hölderlin’s understanding of judgment as “original division,” Hegel traces the ground of judgment not to the original unity of “Being” but to what he calls “the original judgment of life” (das ursprüngliche Urteil des Lebens). What this denotes is an original form of activity, an original division and unity, that opens up intelligibility as such. This chapter argues that organic unity and form provide a standard for the unity and form of Concept, judgment, and syllogism. The key to this argument hinges on Hegel’s understanding of Gattung-concepts (a genus, species, or kind) as the objective, universal context of judgment. The chapter provides a detailed analysis of the “Judgment” chapter in particular, and argues that what Hegel calls the judgment of the Concept (essentially, evaluative judgments) is modeled on Kant’s understanding of reflective, teleological judgments.

The Idea of Cognition and Absolute Method

Chapter 8 completes the interpretation of the Logic offered in this book by taking up the final chapters of that text on “The Idea of Cognition” and “The Absolute Idea.” The logical form of life enables and constrains the activities of theoretical and practical cognition, and this chapter argues that cognition is understood by Hegel to be the result of life’s self-division from itself, a result of the Idea “doubled.” As self-conscious life, theoretical and practical cognition produce various self-conceptions, which have various limitations and powers. These limitations are overcome by the unity of theoretical and practical cognition. The chapter concludes with a discussion of absolute method as the ongoing dialectic between life and cognition. It argues that method is “unbounded,” and provides a discussion of the role of beginning and dialectic in Hegel’s method.

Life as the Immediate Idea

Chapter 7 explores Hegel’s chapter on “Life,” focusing on the discussion of logical life as “original judgment.” It argues that the Idea must be understood in two senses: as ground and as “doubled.” Returning to a passage from Faith and Knowledge, this chapter argues that the doubling of the Idea is Hegel’s attempt to replace Kant’s doctrine of the two stems of knowledge, where life and cognition take the place of intuitions and concepts. To understand how this works, this chapter provides a detailed account of Hegel’s chapter on “Life,” suggesting that it provides an a priori schema that at once enables and constrains the activities of self-conscious cognition. The three processes of logical life—corporeality (Leiblichkeit), externality (Äußerlichkeit), and genus (Gattung)—are interpreted as three a priori form-constraints presupposed by the actualization of self-conscious cognition—three processes without which cognition would be “empty,” or without actuality.

Introduction

This chapter provides an introduction to the main arguments and themes of the book. It presents three central claims: first, that the core tenets of Hegel’s philosophy, and in particular Hegel’s “Concept,” should be understood as developing around a purposiveness theme deriving from Kant’s third Critique; second, that the speculative identity thesis is key for Hegel’s overarching philosophical method and can be understood as a relationship between life and self-conscious cognition; and third, that Hegel’s Subjective Logic can be read as his version of a critique of judgment. This chapter also provides arguments against two prominent interpretations of the trajectory from Kant to Hegel: one that revolves around a self-consciousness theme, and one that revolves around the importance of the intuitive understanding. It then provides chapter outlines for the remainder of the book.

Actuality and the Genesis of the Concept

Chapter 4 takes up Hegel’s genesis of the Concept argument presented in the concluding section of the Doctrine of Essence on “Actuality.” Hegel traces the origins of the Concept to two sources: Spinoza’s notion of substance and Aristotle’s notion of ènérgeia. Hegel aims to show that the unity and activity of the Concept is immanent in actuality, and the goal of the concluding section of the Doctrine of Essence is to provide an account of actuality as activity (Tätigkeit) and activity of form (Formtätigkeit). To understand the process of actualization in terms of activity, the author defends two arguments. The first concerns why actuality is not adequately captured in terms of sheer contingency or blind necessity. The second concerns the concept of reciprocity (Wechselwirkung) and how the process of actualization can be understood as being a cause and effect of itself, displaying the activity and unity of self-determination.

“Kant’s Great Service to Philosophy”

This chapter introduces the purposiveness theme from Kant’s Critique of Judgment. It argues that Kant’s innovation consists in the claim that purposiveness defines the space of judgment and that purposiveness plays a much larger role in Kant’s philosophy than is usually assumed. It begins by considering Kant’s theory of judgment in the first Critique, arguing that the problem of purposiveness is already present there in a nascent form. It then turns to the third Critique, arguing that internal purposiveness (an organic model) has priority over external purposiveness (a designer-artifact model) in connection with judgment’s powers, exploring Kant’s conception of internal purposiveness of form. The concept of a natural purpose (Naturzweck) is central for understanding Kant’s expanded understanding of conceptual form. The chapter also discusses Kant’s antinomy of teleological judgment and argues against the need for positing the idea of an intuitive understanding in the resolution of that antinomy. The chapter concludes by responding to an initial objection against Hegel’s claim that purposiveness is constitutive—namely, a worry about hylozoism.