Hegel: dialectical philosophy

In this video, philosophy professor Ellie Anderson introduces G.W.F. Hegel's dialectical method. Professor Anderson also touches on the themes of passion, spirit, freedom, reason, alienation, and self-estrangement in his work, as well as how the dialectical method is used in Hegel's philosophy of history.

This video was created for Professor Anderson's Spring 2021 "Continental Thought" course at Pomona College. The text discussed is G.W.F. Hegel's Introduction to the Philosophy of History.

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[brahimilyes]

Very illuminating. You did something virtually unfound on Youtube: explaining Hegel without oversimplifying or taking a decade to explain a paragraph. Well done!

[fatenumberinfinity]

I wholeheartedly appreciate your work. Your presence on Youtube is much needed. Keep it up.

[martinheidegger]

I have been attempting to tie together Hegel from many secondary sources and this video succeeded in doing what many others could not. Thanks

[MegaMatzzz]

This is by far the best explanation of hegels dialectics. Congratulations!

[ykmedia]

You actually grasp these concepts of philosophy which is impressive given the state of YouTube.

I once saw a video about Kant by a philosophy Youtuber and it only contributed to my misanthropy.

[seamuscannon]

I like that this channel doesn't try to say, welp, there you go, after this 5 minute youtube video you can add Hegel to your list of philosophers you get and please click on the next one to add Socrates to your collection, rather it just hosts some concisely illuminating discussion that makes no claims to being a replacement for reading the actual works.

[robertmontgomery]

Nails it on self-estrangement! Few do. Well referenced.

[tomasfletcher]

I just graduated from a great books program at Dharma Realm Buddhist University, a small university in Ukiah, CA. We study texts from a wide range of traditions - Western, Chinese, Indian, Buddhist etc. This channel would have been very helpful when reading some of the more difficult texts I studied like Hegel or Husserl! You explain things very clearly. It would be great if you could come visit our university some day and give a lecture.

PS One suggestion would be to include more direct quotes from the text to exemplify your point, and including them in the video so viewers can read along.

[rkmh]

Thank you for the fantastic and illuminating discussion! You asked for comments regarding the teleology apparent in World Spirit Actualization. In idealist biology and in cosmology in general there is a principle of principles: all order is an emergent structure supervening on random fluctuations in a field of chaos. Contemporary idealist biology will take this cosmological meta-principle and with a four-dimensional perspective understand the development of a structure through time not in any one instance at a time but as the whole spacetime world line/trajectory and read the emergent properties, since supervening on initializing conditions, as not only a consequence but also as cause for the development of the four-dimensional structure through time and space. This feat is accomplished typically via the idealist self-assertion that all relationships in a four-dimensional spacetime are intrinsic relationships [basically just ignoring Russell et al. at the turn of the 20th century.] Thus all parts of the whole contain the whole in some sense. In Buddhist thought, the doctrine of Dependent Origination might accomplish the same conceptual feat. I do not know if this perspective counts as teleological in the strict Aristotlean sense but it appears to have a parallel structure. The idea missing from this perspective is the Universal Particular. Is that a pun? Irony? just nonsense? Time will tell. Much love!

[keymibenitez]

Thank you so much for this video, I studied a bit of Hegel and I found him very interesting, but I was so unsatisfied with the amount of understanding I got, so this was super helpful.

[dr.jonahkangogo]

Hegel was absolutely original in his thinking. This is my beset reference on Hegel in YouTube

[abooswalehmosafeer]

A pleasure to listen to this eloquence of explanation of stuffs that so elude the mind.

[damonzex]

An outstanding elucidation of becoming and the self consciousness of Spirit.

[amritsharma]

Very nice.
Well presented.
Especially liked that spirit section.
I could connect with Hegel to some extent, with regard to the stages of the spirit..

[TheGarudaman]

I just discovered you and David. This video was the first I watched of Dr. Ellie. It’s a great presentation. I checked your other productions and Overthink. I still like this one best 😊. (Just a little fan feedback 👍. Keep being good!

[felooosailing]

Great explanation. Concise, works well. The first 2 minutes of the talk are so, so good that they do not lapse into the simple example this is, as you mention, an example of alienation and substation in the concept. I really loved it.

[Artteacher]

Firstly, Thank you !
what jumped out at me was my earlier reading of a philosophical disagreement between Wittgenstein and Turing about a mathematical issue of contradiction . Turing took a platonic view insisting that contradiction can never be in a math equation or else the whole thing would collapse, . Wittgenstein argued contradictions can be a valuable part of the equation adding no bridge has not yet fallen because of a contradiction in the equation . The article though is quite long but i could not help but thing of Hegel upon reading of Wittgenstein argument against Turing .
Also i upon listening to this could see Kierkegaard see how his dislike for Hegel is reflected in his three stages of transformation ( final as Leap of faith ) opposed to Hegel three stages of Spirit . Thanks in advance for reading .

[A]

This is quite an impressive, succinct overview of Hegel. I have to say, given Hegel's legacy, I would never had thought to bring W E B Du Bois in conversation with Hegel. What a remarkable, and ironic, achievement - simultaneously bring to mind Hegel's Master/ "Servant" dialectic from another of your essays. I found myself chuckling from the implications of the marriage of these two thinkers. 

Hegel's notion of Spirit being "estranged" from itself reveals much about the inner workings of Hegel. There seems something torturous about Hegel's thinking and the ramifications of his ideas. I believe that you embodied this in the delivery of this essay, as you often subverted your eye contact with the camera during key moments while discussing his ideas. This is something that does not happen as nearly as much with your delivery of the ideas of other philosophers. I think we all suspect that no matter how insightful Hegel can be, there is something behind it that doesn't feel quite right - and yet his ideas seem to serve as the foundation for much of how the West has come to view the world.

[naqeebhussain]

Very well elucidated. Please 🙏 also make a series of videos on Western Political Thought.

[addammadd]

6:00 makes me think of mixing watercolors. Considering the combination of one or more pigments resulting in not only a cancellation of the former two, but a preservation of each in the resultant hue.

Not sure if that works but it’s the thought this inspires, perhaps if someone sees something lacking in that observation they might help me see what that is.