Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Note on the text
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- I Ancient idealism
- II Idealism and early modern philosophy
- III German idealism
- 5 Immanuel Kant: cognition, freedom and teleology
- 6 Fichte and the system of freedom
- 7 Idealist philosophy of nature: F. W. J Schelling
- 8 Hegel and Hegelianism: mind, nature and logic
- IV British idealism
- V Contemporary idealisms
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
7 - Idealist philosophy of nature: F. W. J Schelling
from III - German idealism
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Note on the text
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- I Ancient idealism
- II Idealism and early modern philosophy
- III German idealism
- 5 Immanuel Kant: cognition, freedom and teleology
- 6 Fichte and the system of freedom
- 7 Idealist philosophy of nature: F. W. J Schelling
- 8 Hegel and Hegelianism: mind, nature and logic
- IV British idealism
- V Contemporary idealisms
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Despite monographs on him by philosophers such as Martin Heidegger, Karl Jaspers and Jürgen Habermas, and more recently by Manfred Frank and Slavoj Žižek, F. W. J. Schelling's work remains largely unknown. Part of the reason for this stems from Hegel's criticism that Schelling “conducted his philosophical education in public” (1970a: vol. 20, 421), that is, developed no fixed or final system. In consequence, philosophers tend to follow Nicolai Hartmann's (1923–29) account of Schelling, and Fichte before him, as incomplete Hegels (Kroner 1921–24), and not therefore as presenting a philosophy worth studying on its own terms. Even the post-1950s “boom” in Schelling scholarship, although it disputes Hartmann's conclusion, tacitly accepts Hegel's by dividing Schelling's work into roughly five periods, a division that really only Heidegger resists. These periods are: Fichtean (1794–97); philosophy of nature (1797–1800); identity philosophy (1800–1807); the philosophy of freedom (1809–27); and the positive philosophy (1830–54).
Heidegger's 1936 Schelling lectures begin by accepting the mutability of Schelling's thought that Hegel notes, but dispute that these diverse expressions express correspondingly different philosophical positions.
When Schelling's name is mentioned, people like to point out that this thinker constantly changed his standpoint, and one often designates this as a lack in character. But the truth is that there was seldom a thinker who fought so passionately ever since his earliest periods for his one and unique standpoint.
(Heidegger 1985: 6)Even when it is accepted that Schelling offered “one … unique standpoint”, the question of what it might be remains controversial.
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- IdealismThe History of a Philosophy, pp. 129 - 143Publisher: Acumen PublishingPrint publication year: 2011