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为什么西方哲学界读不懂黑格尔? 2021-01-23 09:23:45

不久前我给出了一个西方专业哲学界读不懂康德的例子(详见西方哲学界读不懂康德之一例),最近又遇到一个西方专业哲学界读不懂黑格尔的例子。这里是链接:https://www.academia.edu/s/823b25b8fd?source=link,有兴趣的读者可以自己也去参与那里的讨论。这个例子比上次那个例子更震撼,因为,这里除了作者之外,有好几个一看就应该是所谓的黑学专家,但是明显地,他们没有一个人读懂黑格尔的《精神现象学》。

当然,西方专业哲学界读不懂黑格尔,康德,亚里士多德,柏拉图,就如同中国专业哲学界读不懂老子一样,或者说全世界的专业哲学界读不懂那几位的哲学一样,早已不是新闻。今天的专业哲学界甚至连尼采这位诗人的非常直白的文章都会觉得是高深莫测的哲学大典,就别提上面那几位相对深奥的哲人的文章了。不过,这里我要讨论的上面那个链接所给出的例子有其特殊性。如果专业哲学家因为康德,亚里士多德,柏拉图,和老子的文章,或黑格尔的其它文章的文字难度大,逻辑比较复杂而读不懂也就罢了,可他们在上述这个例子中表现出来的对黑格尔的《精神现象学》的误解有其特殊性。不是说这本书的文字有多难或有多容易,而是说他们表现出来的问题还不仅仅是对文字的理解有缺陷的问题。

黑格尔的《精神现象学》的文字是出了名的难懂,甚至被认为是最难懂的文章,因此如果读者们在细节上遇到困难,或读不懂具体的段落中的某些话,都是完全可以理解的。但是,这些专业哲学家们至少应该知道黑格尔在那本书里主要在说些什么。这是因为黑格尔不是象我这样为拯救世界哲学而孤军奋战之士,他在世时是堂堂的大学哲学教授,不但有学生去听他的课,而且有一大堆哲学界的朋友,其中甚至包括歌德,谢林等大家,就是作为他死对头的叔本华也与他有社会交集,因此,他就算不可能给当时读者详细解释那本书的具体细节,只要告诉他们那本书说的是什么,那么他的那些介绍就必然会随着一代代的课堂教学而口口相传,就会被记载在迄今为止已经出版的成千上万本介绍黑格尔哲学的专著中。

即便是黑格尔这个人比较粗心而没有考虑到读者们可能会完全不理解他在干什么,只要那些人当读不懂那本书时问黑格尔一句,“你的那本书的出发点到底是什么?你讨论的到底是什么内容?”,黑格尔自然会告诉他们他在《精神现象学》中是考察人的意识如何得出人们所掌握的对于整个世界和人生的各种真理,并将个人的意识看作是一个整体精神Spirit的特例,因而从对于个人的认识过程来探讨文化现象这样一个基本的思路,以及他的这本书与康德的哲学的关联与不同等基本要点。

这里尤其重要的一点是,黑格尔在《精神现象学》一书中对于意识的考察完全不同于今天的实验科学从外部验证的方法,是站在意识本身的角度来看待知识是如何形成的或真理是如何获得的。但他这种内视又显然不同于古东方的那种所谓内观,而是回到意识内部来看外部。这种特殊的观察方式,除非读者足够细心从他的文中把握了这一点(他在书中其实有提到),或者他明白地告诉了读者,一般人是很难想象得出的。而今天居然专业哲学界似乎无一人把握了这种考察方式,可见过去这两百多年里他们既无一人如本人这样细心地从他的书中把握了这一点,他黑格尔也从未明确地向他人讲解这一点(否则一定会代代相传地记录下来)。尽管黑格尔其实把这些都写在了那本书中,但是由于那本书的表达方式之特殊和语言之难懂,如果他能提纲挈领地将该书的要点向当时的读者介绍一下的,今天这个世界对该书的理解就会大不相同。

这里的读者如果有兴趣可以去那个链接读一下原文,再看一下那些黑学专家们的留言(除了我在那里的留言之外),就会发现,他们居然直接将黑格尔在《精神现象学》的第四章中所说的主仆关系直接就用来解释现实社会中的主仆关系并进一步上升到社会阶层的对立和斗争的问题,而完全忽略了黑格尔那是在借用生活中主仆关系来讨论自我意识的认识世界和得出真理的过程。

当然,既然黑格尔用现实生活中的主仆关系作为比喻,那就必然涉及到他对于现实生活中主仆关系之特点的观察和理解。因此,作为一般读者你非要说你根本不在乎他对于意识和自我意识的讨论,你只对黑格尔对于现实生活中的主仆关系的领悟和表达感兴趣,那也无可厚非;毕竟对于任何一个作品,读者都可以按照自己的需要和理解来从中得到启发。但是,作为一篇专门来讨论《精神现象学》的文章,以及专门研究黑格尔《精神现象学》的专家们在向这个世界介绍这本书的时候,作者以及参与讨论的专家们就不能完全忽略黑格尔到底在讲什么而将他用来比喻的内容作为他的主要论点来介绍。

这里最大的要害是,当黑格尔用主仆关系来比喻自我意识的活动时,尽管会涉及到他对于现实生活中的主仆关系的观察和理解,但他毕竟不是在那里对现实世界的主仆关系进行全面的讨论。换句话说,如果他要是对现实社会的主仆关系进行全面的讨论的话,那他就不会只局限于文中所涉及到的那些非常片面的特点。。。在这样的情况下,你将他在那里涉及到主仆关系的话拿来作为主仆关系的一般的全面的真理,并引申到社会阶级的对立和斗争,那就过于偏颇了,只能说明你根本不知道黑格尔到底在说些什么。别忘了,他们可都不是在随口乱说,而都是根据各种不同的名人的参考文献来发言的,也就是说,过去两百多年里的参考文献就没有一篇正确地告诉他们黑格尔在《精神现象学》里到底都在干些什么(或到底是如何考察意识并进而对精神Spirit的特性进行工程浩大的相当全面的讨论)的。

回到前面的话题,要知道黑格尔在出版《精神现象学》之后,还活了几十年,在大学教了几十年的书,他那个时代的人有大把机会来向他提出上述问题。因此,他有大把机会向他们做出一些关于那本书的最基本的解释。如果当时的人没有错过那样的机会的话,也就不至于出现今天的黑学专家们都不知道黑格尔在那本书中到底在干些什么的状况。

因此,这里我们可以对为什么今天的专业哲学界会读不懂黑格尔的《精神现象学》的原因做出一个合理的判断:因为当时有机会向黑格尔提问的人没有要求黑格尔对于他那本书的出发点和到底在讲什么做出提纲挈领的解释,而黑格尔也因为觉得既然都在书中提到了,就不必专门再讲了。

其实,这个现象并不仅局限于黑格尔的《精神现象学》,它所反映的是存在于黑格尔的所有著作,以及康德,亚里士多德,柏拉图,老子等作家的所有著作的一个普遍的现象 --- ---人们在这些作家活着的时候并不稀罕去要他们解释清楚他们的作品,而是等他们死后才开始发挥自己的想象力来对那些作者的著作进行正确的或胡乱的解释。这里的要害不是他们没有机会在那些作者活着的时候问他们,而是在于那“不稀罕”这三个字。正如老子活着的时候感叹道:“我的话非常容易懂,却没人在乎(吾言甚易知,甚易行。天下莫能知,莫能行。)”,而等他死后,整个世界都开始煞有介事地对老子的话进行诠释翻译了。

那么为什么会出现这种现象呢?这里有两方面的原因,其一是前面提到的,在那些人活着时候其他人不稀罕来问他们,至于为什么会是这样我就不在这里深入探讨了;其二是那些人死后,研究那些人的文章就变得非常的稀罕了。当然这里的一个最基本的原因是那些人的文章确实有价值,对于人们的生活有指导意义,而且能让人们通过阅读它们得到智慧的享受。不过,这只是对于一般人来说的基本原因也是最主要的原因甚至可能是唯一的原因,却不是对于在那些作者死后来研究他们的作品的专家们来说的最主要的原因。。。对于那些专家们来说,那些作品在作者死后变得特别稀罕是因为对他们来说好处大大滴,这里指的不是从那些作品中获取智慧的好处,而是对名声地位和金钱来说的大大滴好处。。。。。。君不见那些作者在世时往往如老子哀怨那样是“怀里揣着真理的宝玉,身上却披着破棉袄(知我者希,则我者贵。是以圣人被褐怀玉。)”,而他们死后,却可让成千上万一代又一代的研究人员借着对他们的作品的正确的或胡乱的解释而名利双收裘马扬扬,制造出一个个读不懂他们著作却想象力丰富的专家大师来

所以,西方专业哲学界读不懂黑格尔,或康德,亚里士多德,柏拉图,老子的真正原因并不完全在于他们的文章难懂(尽管那也确实是一个重要的原因),更在于人类文明机制中存在着的骄傲和利益的因素;并不完全在于今天的学术界的阅读力的不足(尽管那也是一个重要的原因),更在于当初的读者们没有稀罕地去向那些作者问个明白。

当然,真正吃亏的并不是那些死去的作者,而是用社会资源供养那些专家的社会大众。他们原本以为他们的信任和资源的付出可以让那些专家们为他们带来对于经典作品的正确的解读,带来理解和应对现实生活的真正的智慧,但是,他们没有意识到的是人类文明的机制中存在着很多有悖于真理和智慧的因素,而那些因素常常在操纵着社会的运作,包括对于真理和智慧的探索和介绍。。。。。。

 


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作者:慕容青草 留言时间:2021-01-28 09:53:12

为了帮助那些专业哲学家们搞清楚黑格尔到底在说什么,我刚才又去那个讨论链接留了下面这个评论:

In my previous comment I mentioned that there are two levels of allegorical writing in this post. Somehow, that seems to have caused some confusion here. So I guess it might be beneficial for me to briefly lay out how I read the section of "Lordship and Bondage" in The Phenomenology of Spirit.

It looks clearly to me that Hegel was ingeniously using the metaphor of master-slave relationship to depict a picture how the self-consciousness operates in our mind, and from there he further leads the discourse to reveal a big picture of how Spirit operates universally.

There are two levels of prerequisites for understanding this: the level of the mind, and the level of the world.

At the first level, as I mentioned in my previous comment that we need to do some introspective examination of how the mind works as Hegel did in The Phenomenology of Spirit, then we can correctly apprehend his use of the master-slave model for the elaboration of how self-consciousness works, not the opposite, i.e. not how self-consciousness helps to elucidate how master-slave relationship operates as has been so commonly assumed in the academia of philosophy.

At the second level, it is very difficult for readers without any religious background (which might possibly be the majority in nowadays academia), and thus without knowing the concept of "Providence", to relate the personal self-consciousness to the universal work of Spirit. As Hegel later mentioned in some other lecture that he does not "make a demand on" the faith of the audience, but he would "appeal to your belief in it, in this religious aspect".

Now let's come back to the section of "Lordship and Bondage" in The Phenomenology of Spirit, which starts with the following sentences:

[Φ 178. SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS exists in itself and for itself, in that, and by the fact that it exists for another self-consciousness; that is to say, it is only by being acknowledged or “recognized”. The conception of this its unity in its duplication, of infinitude realizing itself in self-consciousness, has many sides to it and encloses within it elements of varied significance....] (The Phenomenology of Mind, tr. J B Baillie)

It is so obvious that in the above passage Hegel was talking about how self-consciousness works; nevertheless, in order to apprehend this, we need to look a bit how self-consciousness works in our own mind. The only reason that we are aware of the existence of self-consciousness is because we know that we are knowing what we know, which reveals the two sides of the self-consciousness: one side we know, and the other we know we are knowing what we know.

SO the wording of "duplication", "unity", "distinction", "distinguished", and "recognized" are all elegantly proper to depict the above mentioned fashion of the work of self-consciousness.

Now let's look at the next:

[Φ 189. In this experience self-consciousness becomes aware that life is as essential to it as pure self-consciousness....The one is independent, and its essential nature is to be for itself; the other is dependent, and its essence is life or existence for another. The former is the Master, or Lord, the latter the Bondsman.]

Here Hegel introduces the so-called master-slave relation into his depiction of self-consciousness, which is naturally and unambiguously allegorical.

Now let's come back to the passage which might have caused the most confusion:

[Φ 187. The presentation of itself, however, as pure abstraction of self-consciousness consists in showing itself as a pure negation of its objective form, or in showing that it is fettered to no determinate existence, that it is not bound at all by the particularity everywhere characteristic of existence as such, and is not tied up with life. The process of bringing all this out involves a twofold action — action on the part of the other and action on the part of itself. In so far as it is the other’s action, each aims at the destruction and death of the other. But in this there is implicated also the second kind of action, self-activity; for the former implies that it risks its own life. The relation of both self-consciousnesses is in this way so constituted that they prove themselves and each other through a life-and-death struggle. They must enter into this struggle, for they must bring their certainty of themselves, the certainty of being for themselves, to the level of objective truth, and make this a fact both in the case of the other and in their own case as well. And it is solely by risking life that freedom is obtained; only thus is it tried and proved that the essential nature of self-consciousness is not bare existence, is not the merely immediate form in which it at first makes its appearance, is not its mere absorption in the expanse of life. Rather it is thereby guaranteed that there is nothing present but what might be taken as a vanishing moment — that self-consciousness is merely pure self-existence, being-for-self. The individual, who has not staked his life, may, no doubt, be recognized as a Person; but he has not attained the truth of this recognition as an independent self-consciousness. In the same way each must aim at the death of the other, as it risks its own life thereby; for that other is to it of no more worth than itself; the other’s reality is presented to the former as an external other, as outside itself; it must cancel that externality. The other is a purely existent consciousness and entangled in manifold ways; it must view its otherness as pure existence for itself or as absolute negation.]

First of all, the beginning sentences

[The presentation of itself, however, as pure abstraction of self-consciousness consists in showing itself as a pure negation of its objective form, or in showing that it is fettered to no determinate existence, that it is not bound at all by the particularity everywhere characteristic of existence as such, and is not tied up with life. The process of bringing all this out involves a twofold action — action on the part of the other and action on the part of itself. In so far as it is the other’s action, each aims at the destruction and death of the other.]

unambiguously depict how self-consciousness operates.

However, the confusion might arise when it comes to the third sentence

[But in this there is implicated also the second kind of action, self-activity; for the former implies that it risks its own life. ],

although it should not.

Again, we need to do a bit introspective meditation to read The Phenomenology of Spirit. Just close your eyes, and try to see what you know at the moment. I am very sure that as soon as you did what I suggested, your attention will be directed to "what you know", not the content of your knowing...that is to say you come back to your master self-consciousness, and lose your slave self-consciousness. The rest of the above passage Φ 187. should be read similarly.

BUT on the other hand, can we learn something about the social relationship of master-slave in the world from the section of "Lordship and Bondage" of The Phenomenology of Spirit?

Yes, we can, and it is actually a valid inference of that section for two reasons: 1) the use of the master-slave model is not a pure fabrication out of imagination, but based on his observation of real life; 2) it comes to the stage between the first level of individual consciousness and the second level the universal work of Spirit as I mentioned earlier: the reality of the social world shares some patterns with the individual mind.

However, if this section is not about self-consciousness but about the relationship of master and slave, then it would be definitely elaborated in a very different way, since the description of the relationship of master and slave in this section is so partial and meagre, while its depiction of self-consciousness is so thorough and rich.

Therefore, the correct way of looking into the issue of master-slave relationship from the said section is to start from the position of individual consciousness to look out at the master-slave relationship, instead of taking the whole text as a discussion on that relationship by using the metaphor if self-consciousness.

Once again, it is extremely important to respect and hold onto the original text even if it is very difficult to read!!!

Thanks

Ron

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作者:慕容青草 留言时间:2021-01-26 08:52:09

今天有点多余的精力,去那个讨论链接(https://www.academia.edu/s/823b25b8fd#comment_722859)对那位Mark Alexander的可笑的评论中关于我的部分进行了回复。。。下面是我的回复原文。。。在贴原文之前,先指出一点:我并没有象在本文中那样告诉他黑格尔到底在讲什么,而只是指出他的评论的荒唐。。。熟悉我在网上讨论风格的人都知道,这是我的一贯做法---如果有人出于无知来胡扯,我只负责指出他的荒唐之处,而不负责给他补习辅导,对待中文网军如此,对待脸书上的网军或PP如此,对待这位Mark自然也不会例外。。。下面是我的回复:

Hi Mark,

Although historical background could be helpful for us to read the text, it is the text that we should focus on. Unfortunately, very often we could see commentators habitually resort to borrowing historical background for their reading of classic texts that they feel difficult with. After all, today in our contemporary cultural political environment, not all people write in the exactly same tone, and it has always been the case, including the days when Hegel was writing The Phenomenology of Spirit.

As a matter of fact, it is the same with reading any text, no matter a classic like The Phenomenology of Spirit, or a simple short text, such as my previous comment on this post --- you just have to focus on the text itself to avoid misreading the text.

It looks to me that you just missed the point of my comment completely in your mentioning of my previous comment.

I did not have any intention to diminish the value of the use of any model, and I still could not read from the text of my comment any tone of criticism of his use of the model; hence, I am bit loss about what you tried to address by 'if Hegel is not offering us a “model to describe the world” then his ideas would be considerably less useful to us'......

Although I don't judge whether it is possible for Hegel to use another approach of discourse for the self-consciousness issue besides the master-slave model, I never denied the good role of the use of that model either.

As for the specific context in my previous comment, what I was trying to point out is that we should not treat the example used by Hegel to elaborate the main theme as the main theme itself. But even if you don’t read in the way as I intended to express in the comment, I still don’t see how you figured out that I was trying to deny the usefulness of the mode……Now if we come back to a bigger context of the complete book of The Phenomenology of Spirit, I am sorry to say that I don’t feel that you get the point of what The Phenomenology of Spirit is about either.

We just cannot use the historical background or other works (e.g. Philosophy of Right) to replace the text of The Phenomenology of Spirit when we talk about the meanings of the text of The Phenomenology of Spirit.

Please allow me to say that Honesty is often reflected in the respect of and holding onto the original text even if it might be difficult to read!

Regards,

Ron

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作者:慕容青草 留言时间:2021-01-25 12:18:01

专业哲学界流传着一个故事说黑格尔临死前道,只有一个半人读懂了他的哲学。。。不知此言是否属实或为专业哲学界用来遮羞的借口,但是这次的经历告诉我们,显然迄今为止参与讨论的专业黑学家们没有一个读懂黑格尔的!!!

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作者:慕容青草 留言时间:2021-01-25 06:25:38

不知这里的读者这两天有没有机会去那个讨论网页看热闹。。。今天又来了一个读不懂黑格尔的黑学专家。。。因为他的留言太过经典,典型的是读不懂文章就乱扯历史背景,好像一扯历史背景就不需要读文章了。。。按照这样的荒唐逻辑,今天这个世界上所有的作者都应该写同样的文章了。。。这是今天的专业哲学界乱用遮羞布的堕落的一个太典型的表现了。。。所以,我不由得要将他的评论转载于此,好让读者们好好认清一下今天的专业哲学界到底是什么样的一个状况:

Mark Alexander 3 hrs ago

Thank you for inviting me to contribute to this stimulating debate, which has clearly generated a lot of interest. The sheer variety of standpoints represented by the participants here demonstrates, I think, the continuing relevance and importance of Hegelian thought in today’s polarised and fragmented world. I suspect, were he alive today, Hegel would not only have found the present political landscape uncomfortably familiar, but would be lamenting our lack of progress.

The chief premise of Ilario’s provocative essay is that, in the end, “the Master-Slave dynamic is nothing more than a failed recognition”, in which both parties go through a rather straightforward reversal of roles that not only levels the playing field between them, but render the entire ‘fight for recognition’ redundant (or ‘self-defeating’ as Adrian describes it in this discussion) because “we have returned to our starting point”. Whilst this is an interesting view, there are a number of reasons why it cannot be sustained. Ilario is effectively saying that nothing is achieved by the dialectic process, that the Slave simply becomes as despotic as his former Master, while the Master renders himself as powerless as his former Slave. Unfortunately, as I will attempt to explain, this fundamentally misinterprets Hegel’s project.

It is worth placing Hegel’s ‘Phenomenology of Spirit’ (PS) within its historical context. After all, Hegel recognised himself as “a son of his time” and that “philosophy is its time apprehended in thoughts” (Preface to the ‘Philosophy of Right’). Written in 1807 – the same year that slavery was abolished in England –in the wake of the demise of the Holy Roman Empire, and at the height of Napoleonic rule, Hegel interprets Western civilisation at a moment of unprecedented change. On the one hand, the chaotic fever of revolution continued to in turns inspire and terrify citizens across the West, whilst on the other, a remarkable project of rational codification, harmonisation and centralisation rippled across these very same nascent states. From the enlightened despots of the time emerged documents like the French Code Civil of 1804 and the Austrian Code of 1811, translating natural law principles into rational systems designed to unify the diverse customs and traditions of disparate European peoples.

This is important because Hegel is writing about the oppressed, not from the perspective of a colonial or bourgeois class, but from the position of those beleaguered Europeans living under occupation. Raad – in this discussion – raises important questions here about imperialism, but such a critique is arguably ethnocentric in itself. There is – sadly – not a nation on earth which doesn’t oppress some group or minority within its borders in some way or other. This is Hegel’s insight, drawing on what Kant calls the “unsocial sociability of man”. It is a universal truth, inherent in our nature. The Master-Slave dichotomy is alive in every one of us. It is this internal conflict, reflected onto others in a Hobbesian struggle, played out across history, that Hegel unravels and which will later form the key premise behind his Philosophy of Right.

Paulo Freire’s ‘Pedagogy of the Oppressed’ is an excellent example of how Hegel’s dialectic can be adopted in practice, and just why the Master-Slave allegory is more about overcoming oppression than it is about ‘willingly’ coming to terms with and accepting one’s oppressed status. The idea that the emancipated Slave simply swaps places with his former Master, so that both parties are effectively back to square one, completely ignores the potentially transcendental nature of the journey itself. The experience of oppression is so fundamentally transformative that one cannot realistically claim that no change has occurred within the formerly oppressed individual. Doing so risks not only insulting the former Slave, but overlooking the value of their lived experience and the dialectic process itself. Put simply, no-one who experiences hardship or suffering comes out the same as they were to begin with. I argue this is true of all life-changing, traumatic events. As Hegel puts it, self-consciousness “will enrich itself... in the course of its experience” (PS §173), “we are in the presence of self-consciousness in a new shape” (PS §197).

Phenomenology is after all the very process by which we develop self-consciousness and knowledge in the course of our lived experience, with each painful moment in our lives being integral to the whole, precisely because it shapes who we are in the present. In my 2018 paper, ‘A Phenomenology of Freedom: finding transcendence in captivity’ (www.academia.edu/39623855/A_Phenomenology_of_Freedom_finding_transcendence_in_captivity), I explore how we can only truly appreciate the nature and meaning of ‘freedom’ when it is taken away from us. As Alexandre Kojève explains in his brilliant ‘Introduction to the reading of Hegel’, “the Slave – through the fear of death – understands himself, understands Man, better than the Master does” (p. 48). Hegel tells us that “the fear of the Lord is indeed the beginning of wisdom” (PS §195). By his model, oppression is therefore a prerequisite to transcendence (PS §196). “Man achieves his true autonomy, his authentic freedom, only after passing through slavery” argues Kojève (p. 27).

Hegel need not assume, as Raad suggests in this discussion, that the slave is a willing party to his enslavement who merely “surrenders to the Master”. It is after all, a position reached after a ‘life and death struggle’, not some negotiation process. Writing this from my prison cell as I battle with my own struggle for recognition, I know all too well the powerlessness and fragility of the Slave’s position, a product of injustice and inequalities in the balance of power. Yet the changes that can occur within an individual through the process of enslavement are important. The idea of transformation or purification through ordeal is not a new one. It has existed for centuries, embodied in stories and legends like those of Orpheus and Eurydice, Jason and the Golden Fleece, or the trials of Tamino in Die Zauberflöte.

As Freire identifies, “the oppressed must not, in seeking to regain their humanity, become in turn oppressors of the oppressors, but rather restorers of the humanity of both” (p. 18). A truly dialectic process must result in unity, or synthesis. That means that the enlightened, emancipated slave, becomes not merely the product of both Master and Slave, but a sum greater than its parts with the power to bring about harmony between the two factions. This, as Freire argues, “is the great humanistic and historical task of the oppressed: to liberate themselves and their oppressors as well... Only power that springs from the weakness of the oppressed will be sufficiently strong to free both”.

Ron rightly suggests in this discussion that Hegel’s dialectic method relies on allegory, but if Hegel is not offering us a “model to describe the world” then his ideas would be considerably less useful to us. Remember, Hegel is all about action. In his Preface to the Philosophy of Right he describes philosophy as “an inquisition into the rational, and therefore the apprehension of the real and present”. He has no interest in merely describing “a castle in the air”. The Phenomenology represents more than just the evolution of a single mind, but the destiny of mankind itself, unfolding through time. The actions of individual consciences which he describes, have a collective force and impact. They combine to create historically significant effects that shape our world. It simply isn’t possible for the journey encompassed in the Phenomenology to occur in the course of one lifetime, within one individual. Rather, Hegel’s Phenomenology sets out the course of humanity, described allegorically through the primordial, pre-social, sense-conscious man or woman.

As Guy rightly mentions in this discussion, Sartre’s argument misses the point, but I disagree with Guy’s interpretation that “Hegel is not interested in any clever argument about whether a struggle for recognition could be overcome”. As Kojève explains, only “the Slave knows what it is to be free… the experience of the Fight and its result predispose the Slave to transcendence, to progress, to History” (p. 22). “Only the Slave can transcend the given World… Only the Slave can transform the World that forms him and fixes him in slavery” (p. 29) and so “he is led to transform the given social conditions of his existence, that is, to realise a historical progress… This progress has meaning for him which it does not and cannot have for the Master” (p. 50). “In dialectical thought, world and action are intimately interdependent” remarks Freire (p. 27). “There would be no human action if humankind were not a ‘project’, if he or she were not able to transcend himself or herself, if one were not able to perceive reality and understand it in order to transform it”.

We can say then that Ilario’s thesis only holds for the Master, enslaved at the end of the process to materialism. There is an interesting question I think about whether the ‘reflection into unity’ holds true for subsequent generations. Do the descendants of the Master and Slave inherit their forefathers’ hard-won insights, and if so, by what means? If humanity gradually develops its capacity for reason over time, with each generation progressing “from one stage of insight to the next” as Kant puts it in his ‘Idea for a Universal History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose’, we must assume surely, that the ‘fight for recognition’ is translated into different forms for each generation. In this way, mankind makes its steady march towards the “final cause of the World”, the ‘End of History’ when freedom is fully actualised on earth. Even so, without reliving the same ‘life and death’ struggle staked by the Master and Slave, Kojève argues that modern man transcends himself “by projecting himself on the idea of private Property, of Capital, which enslaves him… it is from himself, therefore, that he must free himself” (pp. 65 – 69).

The same cannot be said however, for the Slave, represented today by the struggle of oppressed people across the world. They play a key role in the liberation not only of themselves, but of mankind. This is a role that requires real action, activism, and political engagement. “As the oppressed, fighting to be human, take away the oppressors’ power to dominate and suppress, they restore to the oppressors the humanity they had lost in the exercise of oppression” (Freire, p. 30). The unfolding of freedom in the world, Hegel’s ‘End of History’, requires the eradication of oppression in all its forms.

Ideas shared by Mark from his prison cell and transcribed here exclusively for academia.edu by the freeMarkAlexander.org campaign

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作者:慕容青草 留言时间:2021-01-23 16:14:42

鉴于这里的大多数读者都无暇去阅读本文提供的链接中的讨论文章原文和黑学家们的评论,我这里把我在那里的发言转贴一下以帮助大多数感兴趣的读者对本文有更好的了解。。。先说明一下,参加讨论不是写文章,因此不宜写的太长,我的评论已经很长了,再长就不好了,因此我在评论时是尽量压缩,捡最重要的要点来说:

Hi Ilario,

Thanks for the invitation. It’s a very interesting writing, and the following is some of my thoughts:
1) The article starts with several interesting sentences:
[The master/slave dialectic is one of the most analysed and celebrated passages of Hegel’s Phenomelogy of Spirit.][ In it, Hegel proposes two budding forms of self-consciousness, the master and the slave, which can be understood to mean different things depending on the level on analysis applied.][ As we shall see, they are most commonly taken to allegorically represent two constitutive moments of self-consciousness, the dependent and the independent, as each battles for supremacy over the other, risking its life in the process.]
Although the second sentence seems to indicate that the author would allow different interpretations of the master/slave model in Chapter IV of the book based on the needs for analysis, in the third sentence, however, the author does point out that Hegel was actually using the model “to allegorically represent two constitutive moments of self-consciousness”.
However, very soon, in the following few sentences, the author seems to have forgotten what Hegel was actually doing but starts to present the master/slave dialectic in a social interpersonal perspective, in line with what is indicated in the second sentence, and then follows it through to the end.
2) Here we see two levels of allegorical writing: a) Hegel allegorically uses the master/slave model for his elaboration of the dialectic of consciousness; b) The author allegorically uses Hegel’s model of consciousness back to human master/slave relationship.
Then the question arises: is the analysis of social relationship the main intention of Hegel in Chapter IV of the book? Or is the reverse allegorical use of the master/slave model actually the true intention of Hegel? Or does Hegel use the dialectic of consciousness solely for his analysis of social relationship in an allegorical way, instead of studying the nature of consciousness itself?
Based on what have been talked about the Chapter IV of the book, or what have been talked about the whole book of The Phenomenology of Spirit, I guess many would answer positively to the above questions, which seems to have been the view shared by many in the academia, and unfortunately it is wrong.
The reason why I would give a negative answer to the questions is quite simple: as the name of the book “The Phenomenology of Spirit” tells, it is NOT a book of “The Phenomenology of Things”, and therefore, Hegel was not using the dialectic of consciousness as a model to describe the world, but occasionally used life examples to help him to understand and elaborate the dialectic of consciousness.
3) Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit needs to be read with some introspective meditation. It is hard to imagine that one can understand the book without doing some introspective meditation since that is obvious what Hegel was doing. Only if we read the book with introspective examination of how consciousness works or struggles its way to get the truth of everything, we can better understand what Hegel was talking about.
4) Would this understanding of the book make it lesser in philosophy comparing to making it a buoyant enlightenment or edification for social practices?
My answer is no. To contrary, it would make that book even more important philosophically since it can help many to think more profoundly as Hegel did. But lesser or more important, either way, we have to respect what the truth really is.

Regards,
Ron

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