Half Hour Hegel: The Complete Phenomenology of Spirit (Preface, sec 15-17)

In this seventh video in the new series on G.W.F. Hegel's great early work, the Phenomenology of Spirit, I read and comment on the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth paragraphs of the text, from the Preface. In these sections, Hegel continues discussing the one-sided approaches to scientific cognition mentioned earlier in paragraph 14 -- including a formalism that, while seemingly addressing a wealth of content, really just repeats the same treatment -- leading to the "night in which all cows are black" line.

Hegel then, in section 17, introduces a new idea -- that the Absolute is not only Substance, but also Subject. . . .

In this video series, I will be working through the entire Phenomenology, paragraph by paragraph -- for each one, first reading the paragraph, and then commenting on what Hegel is doing, referencing, discussing, etc. in that paragraph.

The introductory music for the video is: Solo Violin - BWV 1004 - Partita for Violin No. 2 - Recorded in Brooklyn June 26, 2011 specifically to be dedicated to the Public Domain

#Hegel #Phenomenology #Philosophy #Idealism #German #Dialectic #Spirit #Absolute #Knowledge #History

[tolgacan]

Lenin had said, one cannot be a Marxist without reading Hegel, and got into his Logic himself, keeping notes. I, as a non-philosopher (at least not on the paper), find a chance to decrypt his idiosyncratic and "annoying" language with these great video lectures. Thank you!

[TheJOEISANERDS]

#17 actually broke my brain. I'm really confused by what is meant by substance and subject

[Tompsykhe]

Dear viewers: If you thought your mind was blown by the past videos of the series, this one will definitely take you to a whole new level of mindblowing philosophical awesomeness.

[lyndonbailey]

When you see Hegel attacked by people unfamiliar with him, they seem to be thinking of him as exactly the kind of thing he is critiquing here.

[jonathanmichael]

Outstanding. I've got a graduate seminar on the Phenomenology coming up. This by far surpassed my expectations of what you could find online for lectures. I'll typically read a large passage, come back and watch your videos on it, go back and read it again. It's a great companion to the reading, and independent of the reading serves as great lectures. I'm a fan.

[zachbagnell]

Love hearing Bach at the beginning of each video :)

[QuintessentialQs]

Thank you so much for this series! I powered through the Preface, Introduction, and first 2 chapters of this book on my own, and it seemed like complete gibberish. And I'm pretty used to reading 18th and 19th century writers.

I've been binging these videos over the last two days, and I am finding your expositions a key that unlocks the peculiarities of Hegel's writing style. I'm not unconvinced as yet that Hegel isn't a bit masturbatory, perhaps overrated, and certainly not very good at writing for clarity. But I'm coming around to the idea that he was at least a profound thinker.


I've even been able to skip back ahead to the first chapter and find him rendered much more intelligible by the context provided so far. You're doing the Lord's work, here!

[groovybrat]

thank you sir, these lectures are truly delightful.your method of explaination is very clear and insightful, i am very new to this subject but my interest is only growing .thanks again i really appreciate it.

[eddiebarger]

Thank you so much for all your videos. They've been instrumental in my self-study of philosophy. I've specifically enjoyed this video series and your other lectures about Hegel you've posted. It's been very rewarding to finally be able to wrap my head around such a difficult philosopher. If you ever get the chance, I'd love to see you put out something about his Science of Logic or Philosophy of Nature outline. Anyway, regardless of whether you do or don't cover more Hegel, thanks again, and I hope you continue all the other good work you do.

[theamici]

Lol we are still at the preface. If commentary videos (it's a bit like a documentary I think, like documentary-commentary video being a subgenre of documentary in general) had its equivalent of Magnum opus, I think this would be your Magnum opus xD

You should seriously get paid for the amount of work you're obviously putting into this. Give me a paypal link and I'll give just to be symbolic about it!

[davidgaughran]

Is 'If the conception of God as the one Substance shocked the age in which it was proclaimed...' a reference to Spinoza? By the way your videos are a great and valuable resource.

[eylon]

here after reading Marx being like "Ahhh so that's the context of what he wrote" every other second

[mburkhart]

I was feeling a little momentum until I hit paragraph 17. I knew it was mind blowing but couldn't follow it very well. Excellent commentary!

[isaacpeachey]

The expression of knowledge through the universal is reminiscent of how, in Marx's Capital, he described how value can be expressed through exchange.

[isaacpeachey]

If I hadn't read Marx prior to picking up Hegel, I would be lost. The similarities make it easier for me to both understand Hegel and connect him to Marx.

[SteppinDarqawa]

I'll take a watching brief, 'til I've had an opportunity to access/assess Mr. Hegel's proposition in full.

[thegrandprole]

I wonder if Hegel would apply a similar criticism to his successors in the Marxists. Marxist historians (at least those in the 20th century) in particular are often criticized for their approach of applying class struggle to the whole of a history. Would you say they are sort of missing Hegel's point in doing so?

[lyndonbailey]

I'm still not sure if I get the for/of distinction with relation to knowledge and being

[Garland]

I can't help but struggle to work through the implicit and explicit uses of Spinoza in 17. The struggle is caused by the relationality of Substance and Subject. For, in some sense, it seems that Hegel is adding the dimension of Subject to Substance, but the question of how that affects things eludes me. That is, is Subject itself a dynamism with Substance (an internal motivator or mobilizer), or is Substance like Spinoza and the Subject all the perspectives possible in Substance (i.e. similar to the modes in Spinoza). I do this not to read Hegel through Spinoza, but to get to the particularity of Hegel's thought as a negation of other thoughts. I do this as well in order to consider which argument I believe to be stronger because I have to understand if Hegel means Spinoza's Materialism by this statement "self-consciousness was only submerged and not preserved" which, if it was, then from my history with Spinoza, I don't think Spinoza would believe that. I'm sorry if this isn't a useful comment or, "I should try to understand Hegel by Hegel, not by Spinoza, " but I find the Hegel as Hegel and Spinoza as Spinoza and the Spinoza or Hegel question, the comparison to be interesting at this point in the book. I've said in the past that I am reading this with a group, they have not read Spinoza, we all have our different influences, but we each come at Hegel from a different perspective and relate what he's said to what we've read to further expose what he might be meaning. So, again, I hope if this comment is seen, that it is not seen as a useless comment.

[larianton]

7 videos down. Now this is starting to get interesting! I see a lot of non-duality in this passage. Is it just my bias, or is Hegel thinking along those kinds of lines?