I have been reading Charles Taylor’s book “Hegel” and his discussion of the Phenomenology of Spirit on “Reason”. What follows are notes on my reading and my reaction to Hegel’s ideas.
The discussion begins with an evolved consciousness; one with the intuition that rationality is both the principle of its thought and that which determines reality. This awareness is what Hegel refers to by the consciousness of “Reason”. It follows for Reason that it is native to the world, continuous with it, or as Hegel says: Reason knows that it is all of reality. This is the assumption which Reason tests as it struggles with itself, developing through 3 distinct stages.
Post-script: I later wrote a further description of Reason, with the intention of fleshing out the idea of “Reason”, yet which is to be most beneficially read with a pre-existing familiarity of the chapter’s structure (ergo after reading this writeup).
I. Seeking reason through science
Reason seeks proof that things are rationally determined, and so undertakes empirical studies. It begins with observations of regularity in nature, and later searches for laws to explain those regularities. The laws it manages to prove for itself are nonetheless contingent and unexplainable (by science).
It starts with the inanimate, then the animate, and finally humankind itself. These advances in study are motivated by a goal to find self-maintaining forms, which would thus be demonstrations and proof of Reason’s place in the world. But even the study of man fails, limited as it was by the scientific perspective that treats a person only as an object, whereas man is both a given object and an autonomous expression.
All in all, empirical science discovers contingencies, which serve the interests of science but not the hunger for validation of Reason.
II. Seeking reason through worldly satisfaction
Now consciousness expects that – since its rational being is matched to the reason of the world – it will be able to achieve satisfaction in the world. The paradigm Hegel describes for this seeker of pleasure is sexual, and wherein the other has its nature of “other-being” removed.
There is however a limit to this otherwise simple project of desire: If a man defines his existential fulfilment as synonymous with the experience of pleasure, then the fact of his inevitable demise undermines the possibility of meaning. This failure can only be overcome by an individual perceiving themselves as something larger, and reconciling their own individual autonomy with the fate imposed upon it. This enlightenment would allow one to recognize the oneness of their goals and their fate, since the two are the same perceived by oneself and by the cosmos.
But of course, the man still stuck in his certainty of absolute particularity can only consider death as “a pure leap into the opposed term“, which motivates Reason to mature further towards the aforementioned enlightenment. Consciousness now conceives that its desires are actually desires for the general good – a change that appears to universalize what was previously an entirely individualistic venture.
This first attempt at uniting the particular and universal is – more precisely – the belief that humanity is natively altruistic, and that the faults of humanity are the direct result of a social environment that corrupts. But this is not sustainable; everyone believes their heart to be true, and so endorsing a “law of all hearts” would only lead to a world of fanatics.
This gives rise to another dialectical reversal: If the world order is the ‘law of all hearts’ then it expresses the universal and therefore the individual should morally negate himself (thus becoming universal). Hegel (derisively) names this aim ‘virtue’ (cf. stoicism). But even this retreat does not fulfil Reason’s goal. It is not even ontologically possible to suppress one’s particularity and become only a vehicle of the universal – the universal cannot find expression except by being embodied in particulars.
The next (dialectical) step will be for consciousness to know itself as realizing the universal in its actions, thus fulfilling its need to find itself (Reason) in the world, yet without being undone by paradoxes of a particular that is also universal.
III. Perceiving reason through society
Nota bene: The unity which is sought here is the Reason which rules both the self and the world known by the self.
A society is both its own entity and a combined collection of individuals. On one side, a society is the collection expressions of its people, and on the other, each person is an expression of their society’s culture and history. The equality of these perspectives is the unity of Reason.
Hegel names this aspect of society that allows self-conscious Reason to know itself – and that is Geist reflected in the life of a people – ethical substance.
The ethical substance can be thought of as the essence of self-consciousness; but this in turn is the reality and determinate existence of the substance, its self and will. [349]
In other words: Society (e.g. nation, religion, tribe) is man-made in an absolute sense; it is a paradigm based upon my reason, and therefore exemplifies my reason. What’s more, the constituents of society are both its creators and its expression, and as a member I am both a particular and a universal’s embodiment. When I realize my place within social group then I am at home in my reason: my reason is mirrored in my environment.
Although the ethical substance of a people can only exist via individual subjects, it may be that they are not aware of this (e.g. preceding this realization by the reasoning consciousness). In those cases it is a society that is less consciously developed, as were for example the Ancient Greek states, whose people were true expressions of their society and yet unconscious of this relation. That awareness requires the development of consciousness and – so Hegel believed – was in fact occurring presently (viz. circa 1807 in Prussian Germany).
Meta and biographical notes
I have been slowly reading Hegel himself, alongside a few secondary texts, and reached the first few parts of the chapter “Reason”. I have been posting notes on my readings, including the secondary text “Hegel” by Taylor. This is the first time I am skipping reading Hegel, and am depending instead on Taylor for my edification. This is a compromise, although the precise nature and details of what exactly I am missing is both various and arguable. In any case, one compromise is the bias inherent in any secondary text – its particular understanding and interpretation.
Among the benefits of Taylor’s explanation is his tying in historical ideas, and showing how Hegel is responding or expressing them. An example of this is the section of writing around the ‘law of hearts’. It repeats an idea which was developing and gaining tract during the Enlightenment: first, that the desires of humankind exist in harmony with the world and are fundamentally good; later, that man is basically altruistic, and that his corruption only occurs by society (cf. Rousseau).
I have previously noted that Hegel makes unconvincing transitions between arguments; often between shapes of consciousness. Here too.
