Individual’s relationship to others is the primary way in which God figures out who He is. The human world is radically and antithetically different from God, and God discovers himself by working out complexities in the human world. Complexities in the human world are expressed primarily through an individual’s relationship to other individuals. This is because self-consciousness, the human realization that one is alive, comes about “only by being acknowledged or ‘recognized.’” (Hegel) Since self-consciousness comes about when an individual enters into relationship with others, these structures of relationship are the ways in which god actualizes himself.
This has several implications for how individuals must then relate to other individuals. First, each person must believe he or she is free – the expression of free will is central to God’s self actualization. And second, individual’s relationships with each other will, over time, be filled with more and more justice and freedom. This is because God is good. Each “evil” in the world is just a moment in historical time, and the trajectory of history is from necessity to freedom. As God actualizes himself through human relationships over time, those relationships become more and more good.
In addition, individuals must receive authentic feedback from others to be truly conscious and free. When situations arise where one individual has the power to violate another, such as slavery, the “master gets his recognition through an other consciousness,” and therefore the master is highly dependent upon his slave for validation and self-identity. Independent and free individuals are the ones who do not rely on others within their control to validate them.
*And, on a side note, I just wanted to add my two favorite Jamie quotes from the last week.
"Hegel has as much difficulty being concrete as freshman have being abstract"
"Love? That's a while totality of emotion and desire and blah blah blah"
Hey Dan,
ReplyDeleteOverall, this is a very strong post. You seem to have a clear understanding of the central Hegelian points. I especially like your first paragraph. It is very clear.
A few questions:
I want to hear more about the WHY in the second paragraph. You talk about "freedom" and then "justice and freedom" and this seems sketchy without explanations to back it up.
Also in the second paragraph: I think Hegel would argue that all moments (good AND bad) are just moments in time. The "trajectory from necessity to freedom" (nicely phrased, by the way) occurs because... maybe because there are just more good moments as humans get freer and juster? I would be careful about putting generalizations on history, though this part wasn't entirely clear to me. We can talk about it.
Third paragraph: Your argument seems to fall apart in the last sentence of this paragraph. You stated in the first paragraph that "the human realization that one is alive, comes about 'only by being acknowledged or ‘recognized.’'" In the last sentence of the third paragraph, though, you say that "Independent and free individuals are the ones who do not rely on others within their control to validate them." These ideas seem contradictory. Can you clarify?
Like I said, overall good job. I'm impressed by your understanding.
Sarah
Sara-Good points, with regards to history...I am still unclear about this in my own thinking, and am generally confused whether or not Hegel argues that history improves throughout time. And if it does (...and I think it does) I am confused as to why.
ReplyDeleteThe second thing. I forgot to make this important distinction: free individuals are the ones who are validated or recognized by people who are free to tell them the truth. What I was trying to say in the 3rd paragraph was that when slaves tell masters "good master," they do not really mean it, so that is not an authentic way of being recognized. Hopefully that makes more sense.
Also--check out the Jamie quotes I added :)
ReplyDeleteDan-
ReplyDeleteI enjoy your discussion of the validity of human self-consciousness. This brings an important question to mind: is it possible for me to think that i am self-consciousness and recognized by my contemporaries, but actually not be? can one be under a misconception of self-consciousness? You're post is an excellent prelude to answers to questions of this kind.
As you mentioned, the master is "dependent upon his slave for validation and self-identity". I would point out that similarly, by Hegel's own hypothesis, the slave is also dependent on the master for his identity. The relationship between master and slave very quickly becomes a search for identity for both parties, whether or not the search is a conscious one.
This is relevant to our discussion of the negritude movement in Jon's class, and the search for various identities in colonial society. Hegel's thoughts were clearly profound if they can be translated into so many different social structures!
good work big bro
Dan - Nice work. From what my foggy brain tells me, this is a good post. I would like to hear what you think would happen if the reverse were true in some of these situations (ex. slavery - individuals who are slaves probably will not see themselves as free. What effect does this have?).
ReplyDeleteSorry for the lack of discussion. Hopefully I will see you all in class tomorrow, but if not, have fun with Marx!
"First, each person must believe he or she is free – the expression of free will is central to God’s self actualization. And second, individual’s relationships with each other will, over time, be filled with more and more justice and freedom. This is because God is good."
ReplyDeleteHere are my questions for you and they more or less all boil down to pieces of the quote above.
Firstly is god actually necessary for the argument to hold up?
Secondly is free will just apparent or is it an actual principle?
Thirdly does god actually have an inherent morality? does morality actually exist if it only manifests itself as moments in time and god is fundamentally outside of time?
Emma in her response brings up something which i think really allows us to see the beauty in hegel. I think, that for the most part, if jamie had not specifically told us that the overarching metaphysical scheme was one of god's self actualization that none of us would have read that out of the texts. This goes to Emma's last point that Hegel's thoughts are applicable in a variety of different contexts. When we see that his logic operates on all levels and they can be in a sense regarded as independent we can get beyond our struggles with the idea of God.
I think that brining God into the equation is really not a jump we need to make and perhaps is one we shouldn't. It is similar to the way in which Descartes’ first principle “I think therefore I am” is really all we take away from his meditations. By examining the logic at every stage of an argument we can gain insight and knowledge even if we radically disagree with the eventual conclusion.
On a side note I probably shouldn’t stay up till 4 and write about hegel….
Eric-
ReplyDeleteI can answer your first question fairly easily. No. I think you're right in that bringing god into the picture can make Hegel *less* useful to (at least my personal) thinking.
You second question...at this point I am unsure. Is free will actual or apparent? My question is, "is there a difference?" It is my belief that everyone acts on their perceptions of the world, that what I think is true in my mind is absolutely true for me. beliefs create reality, if think that I have total free will, than for all intents and purposes it is actual. Is there any way to know for sure?
Is there an inherent morality attached to God? To me personally, no. But I understand and respect that for many, God is the source of morality in the world, and I don't want to fight with people who hold those beliefs. But, I also think that there is a lot to the saying "religion is the opiate of the masses"
These were all really good questions and thoughts, thanks for commenting. At 4am.
The only point i want to talk about further is the one of free will.
ReplyDeleteI think that i do agree with you about relativity in truth. Even though i struggle with it absolutism seems flawed. I would agree that people construct their own realities and that really it is up to the individual to answer big questions about free will and morality.
I think for Hegel, however, that free will is absolutely necessary. If it did not exist and there was no risk involved in the system then it would become like the dialectic of the master and the bondsman. Sublation would be completely impossible if we did not have free will.
Perhaps this reliance on a relative principle as an absolute is a major flaw in Hegel. When you look at his entire metaphysical ideal it is based in free will (or at least it seems to be from what we read). Without the acceptance of free will as a principle of nature more or less all of Hegel can be thrown out the window using his own arguments.
Eric--
ReplyDeleteYou have a very strong point about free will. I agree that if humans do not have free will, the relationship to God is a master/slave relationship and therefore does not help God self-actualize.
Emma--
I want to make an amendment to your post. According to Hegel, the slave does not look for self-actualization from the master. The slave's self-actualization comes from his direct relationship to his work. The master does not have this direct relationship to the material world, and must look for self-actualization in from other sources, such as the slave.
This conversation is really interesting. Thanks for chiming in, Eric!