1770–1831

GEORG HEGEL was born on 27 August 1770, in Stuttgart, Germany. He studied philosophy and classics at Tübingen, and, after graduation, he became a tutor and explored theology. Hegel taught at Heidelberg and Berlin, where he wrote and explored philosophical and theological concepts.

Hegel was a major figure in German idealism. His historicist and idealist account of reality was revolutionary at the time and a major factor in the development of some radical threads of left-wing political thought. His major work, The Phenomenology of Spirit (or mind), was published in 1807. Many of his ideas were developed in other deeply complex works until his death, from cholera, in 1831.

Almost everything that Hegel was to develop over the rest of his life is prefigured in the Phenomenology. The book and text is far from systematic and is generally accepted as difficult to read. The Phenomenology attempts to present human history, with all its revolutions, wars, and scientific discoveries, as an objective and idealistic self-developing Spirit or Mind.  

Hegel is a notoriously difficult philosopher to understand. For a beginner with next to no grounding in the Greek logic of Aristotle and the later works of Descartes, Hume and Locke it is probably a forlorn task best left until the fundamentals of philosophy are mastered. Being able to comprehend what he writes requires a grasp of at least the basics. Hegel still causes frustration among academics and one of the philosophers that give the discipline its forbidding reputation.

For example, in his book Hegel, Edward Caird writes: “But the height of audacity in serving up pure nonsense, in stringing together senseless and extravagant mazes of words, such as had previously been known only in madhouses, was finally reached in Hegel… and became the instrument of the most bare-faced general mystification that has ever taken place, with a result which will appear fabulous to posterity, and will remain as a monument to German stupidity.”

To have any chance of understanding Hegel one must first come to terms with the principle of the dialectic method. This is a type of argument or discussion between two or more opposing viewpoints whereupon the outcome or truth can be distilled. As the mechanism for this process Hegel proposed variations on the three “classical laws of thought” – that is, the law of identity (essentially “truths” that are taken to be self-evident), and the laws of [non]contradiction and the law of the excluded middle. Paraphrasing these last two suggests respectively that contradictory statements cannot both be true but that either proposition must be true. This is the kind of difficulty that any student of philosophy will be faced with.

Hegelian dialectics is based upon four concepts:

. Everything is transient and finite, existing in the medium of time.

. Everything is composed of contradictions (opposing forces).

. Gradual changes lead to crisis or turning points when one force overcomes its opposing force (quantitative change leads to qualitative change).

. Change is helical (spiral), not circular.

In summary, Hegel believed that when our minds become fully conscious, awakened, or enlightened, we will have a perfect understanding of reality. In short, our thoughts about reality, and reality itself, will be the same. He argues this by showing that the mind goes through an evolution on its way to what he calls “absolute spirit”.

Because Hegel’s philosophy requires a journey it can be seen that it is the process and not just the result that is important. A struggle exists between one viewpoint (or thesis) to which there might exist one or more opposing viewpoints (or antithesis). A process of debate or connected dispute such as revolution or war might lead to a higher level of understanding (or synthesis) to which another antithesis might emerge and thus the process towards truth will continue. This is a Hegelian description of all history as an inevitable progression towards truth. It is complex and a difficult area of study.

Hegel’s mark on history has been profound, in that his influence has spread throughout both left- and right-wing political thought. Marx drew influence from Hegel by developing the idea that history and reality should be viewed dialectically and that the process of change – the struggle – should be seen as a transition from the fragmentary towards the complete. Yet, this is a skewed development of what Hegel tried to suggest in Phenomenology. However, in practical terms it is likely that Hegel may have approved of Marx’s revolutionary interpretation, as he was witness at close hand to revolutionary Europe towards the end of the eighteenth century.

. Hegel on Reason and Experience

“Truth in philosophy means that concept and external reality correspond.

Genuine tragedies in the world are not conflicts between right and wrong. They are conflicts between two rights.”