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From the Separateness of Space to the Ideality of Sensation. Thoughts on the Possibilities of Actualizing Hegel's Philosophy of Nature1
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 June 2015
Abstract
The Cartesian concept of nature, which has determined modem thinking until the present time, has become obsolete. It shall be shown that Hegel's objective-idealistic conception of nature discloses, in comparison to that of Descartes, new perspectives for the comprehension of nature and that this, in turn, results in possibilities of actualizing Hegel's philosophy of nature.
If the argumentation concerning philosophy of nature is intended to catch up with the concrete Being-of-nature and to meet it in its concretion, then this is impossible for the finite spirit in a strictly a priori sense — this is the thesis supported here which is not at all close to Hegel. As the argumentation rather has to consider the conditions of realization concerning the Being-of-nature, too, it is compelled to take up empirical elements — concerning the organism, for instance, system-theoretical aspects, physical and chemical features of the nervous system, etc. With that, on the one hand, empirical-scientific premises are assumed (e.g. the lawlikeness of nature), which on the other hand become (now close to Hegel) possibly able to be founded in the frame of a Hegelian-idealistic conception. In this sense, a double strategy of empirical-scientific concretization and objective-idealistic foundation is followed up, which represents the methodical basic principle of the developed considerations.
In the course of the undertaking, the main aspects of the whole Hegelian design concerning the philosophy of nature are considered — space and time, mass and motion, force and law of nature, the organism, the problem of evolution, psychic being — as well as Hegel's basic thesis concerning the philosophy of nature, that therein a tendency towards coherence and idealization manifests itself in the sense of a (categorically) gradually rising succession of nature: from the separateness of space to the ideality of sensation. In the sense of the double strategy of concretization and foundation it is shown that on the one hand possibilities of philosophical penetration concerning actual empirical-scientific results are opened, and on the other hand — in tum — a re-interpretation of Hegel's theorem on the basis of physical, evolution-theoretical and system-theoretical argumentation also becomes possible. In this mutual crossing-over and elucidation of empirical and Hegelian argumentation not only do perspectives of a new comprehension of nature become visible, but also, at the same time — as an essential consequence of this methodical principle — thoughts on the possibilities of actualizing Hegel's philosophy of nature.
- Type
- Hegel Today
- Information
- Bulletin of the Hegel Society of Great Britain , Volume 21 , Issue 1-2: number 41/42 , 2000 , pp. 86 - 103
- Copyright
- Copyright © The Hegel Society of Great Britain 2000
Footnotes
1
Translated from the German by Edward Kummert, edited in association with Timo Klein.
References
2 About this Wandschneider, D. (1998) “Was stimmt nicht mit unserem Verhältnis zur Natur?”, in: Fornet-Betancourt, R. (ed. 1998) Armut im Spannungsfeld zwischen Globalisierung und dem Recht auf eigene Kultur: Dokumentation des VI. Internationalen Seminars des philosophischen Dialogprogramms. Frankfurt/M. 1998 Google Scholar.
3 Leibniz, G. W., Metaphysiche Abhandlung, in: Krüger, G. (ed. 1949), Leibniz. Die Hauptwerke. Stuttgart 1949, S. 49 Google Scholar.
4 “Until 1970 there was hardly anyone among the Hegelians, let alone among the philosophers dealing with natural sciences, who was willing to accept Hegel's philosophy of nature as a serious field of research”; in Petry, M. J. (1981) “Hegels Naturphilosophie — Die Notwendigkeit einer Neubewertung,” in: Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung 35 (1981), 618 Google Scholar. From 1970 the number of relevant publications increased rapidly; cf. Neuser, W. (1987) “Sekundärliteratur zu Hegels Naturphilosophie (1802–1985),” in: Petry, M. J. (ed. 1987) Hegel und die Naturwissenschaften. Stuttgart 1987 Google Scholar. Important articles on this change have subsequently been written by D. v. Engelhardt and M. J. Petry.
5 References of this kind refer here and in the following to: Hegel, G.W.F., Werke, eds. Moldenhauer, E./Michel, K.M., Frankfurt/M. 1969 ff, here especially vol. 9, p. 15 Google Scholar; ‘add.’ refers to the inserted ‘additions’.
6 In my book, Wandschneider, D. (1995) Grundzüge einer Theorie der Dialektik. Rekonstruktion und Revision dialektischer Kategorienentwicklung in Hegels ‘Wissenschaft der Logik’ (Stuttgart 1995)Google Scholar, I have worked out elements of a dialectical logic. Attempts according to dialectics concerning the categories of nature can be found in my paper Wandschneider, D. (1993) “Natur und Naturdialektik im objektiven Idealismus Hegels,” in: Gloy, K./ Burger, P. (ed. 1993) Die Naturphilosophie im Deutschen Idealismus, Stuttgart 1993 Google Scholar.
7 An example for this is also, for instance, Kant's thesis on the impossibility of a ‘Newton of the blade of grass’: Kant gives reasons for this by demonstrating that life itself is characterized by self-preservation and therefore by ‘inner teleology’ [‘innere Zweckmäßigkeit’], that is, the total interchangeability [‘Wechselseitigkeit’] of means and end (Kant, Kritik der Urteilskraft (KU), quoted from the third original edition, Berlin 1799, § 63 ff, § 82). However, according to Kant, something like this cannot be realized causally, because it would require (a) the reversibility of cause and effect and (b) an aimdirected causality. But in fact, from Kant's point of view, causal processes are irreversal (directed from cause to effect) (KU 289), and furthermore ‘blind’ (KU 270, 326) and therefore not aim-directed. Nowadays we know that both conditions indeed can be realized technically, namely in the form of a ‘feedback’ of the effect to the cause, mediated and controlled by a ‘norm value’. If the ‘technical inspiration’ in Kant's lifetime had been able to imagine conditions of realization of ‘inner teleology’, Kant's ‘Kritik der Urteilskraft’ would have had another result: Not just a subjective ‘as-if-teleology’, but the view of an objective teleology of nature. (For details see Wandschneider, D. (1988) “Kants Problem der Realisierungsbedingungen organischer Zweckmäßigkeit und seine systemtheoretische Auflösung,” in: Zeitschrift für allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie, XIX (1988))Google Scholar.
8 Cf. Wandschneider (1993).
9 About this Wandschneider, D. (1989) “Der überzeitliche Grund der Natur. Kants Zeit-Antinomie in Hegelscher Perspektive”, in: prima philosophia, Bd. 2 (1989)Google Scholar.
10 Cf. Wandschneider D. (in print) Hegel und die Evolution.
11 Wandschneider, D. (1982) Raum, Zeit, Relativität. Grundbestimmungen der Physik in der Perspektive der Hegeischen Naturphilosophie. Frankfurt/M. 1982 Google Scholar.
12 The additional seven (or eight) dimensions postulated by the 'superstring-theory’ of physics, which, however, are to be ‘wrapped up’, have hypothetical status within the framework of a theoretical model, for which furthermore there is much need of explanation.
13 Cf. Wandschneider (1982), Kap. 6; Wandschneider, D. (1987) “Die Kategorien ‘Materie’ und ‘Licht’ in der Naturphilosophie Hegels”, in: Petry, (ed. 1987)Google Scholar.
14 Cassirer, E. (1972) Zur modernen Physik. Darmstadt 3 1972 Google Scholar.
15 Reichenbach, H. (1924) Axiomatik der relativistischen Raum-Zeit-Lehre. Braunschweig 1924 Google Scholar; Reichenbach, H. (1928) Philosophie der Raum-Zeit-Lehre. Berlin, Leipzig 1928 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
16 ‘Mass’ and ‘matter’ are used here quite generally and therefore synonymously; by ‘mass’ Hegel understands more precisely a quantum of matter (cf. 9.64).
17 Physically: due to various energy states in space.
18 Physically: due to the possibility of dynamic states of stability, e. g., in the form of relative minima of the potential energy in a field of force.
19 Cf. Ashby, W. R. (1966) Design for a Brain. London 1966, esp. ch. 7 and 9Google Scholar. In this respect, Ashby speaks — a little misleadingly — of ‘ultra-stability’. Accordingly, the self-preservation of the organism is to be understood basically in this way that self-regulation of the system is controlled by the norm values of the system-existence itself, thus by the constitutive physiological parameters of the system.
20 The fact that dividing a worm in half results in two worms is based in this specific case on a specific characteristic of the species (in the sense of a specific survival-strategy); a division of the worm in its length would, on the contrary, be lethal. — Basically, in this sense the very far-reaching possibilities of division with regard to the plant can be obviously understood, too.
21 Wandschneider (in print), Hegel und die Evolution.
22 M. Eigen has presented a detailed bio-mathematical theory on this matter, cf. Eigen, M. (1977) “Wie entsteht Information? Prinzipien der Selbstorganisation in der Biologie”, in: Berichte der Bunsen-Gesellschaft für Physikalische Chemie 80 (1977)Google Scholar; also instructive is the presentation of the theory of Eigen in Stegmüller, W. (1975) Hauptströmungen der Gegenwartsphilosophie, Bd. 2. Stuttgart 1975 Google Scholar.
23 Though Darwin himself was sceptical concerning the possibility of an explanation of an evolutionary process of upgrading; comp. Hösle, V., Willies, C. (1999) Darwin. Freiburg/Basel/Wien 1999, p. 90 Google Scholar.
24 A simple example: Two cylinders of a different radius show, when they are given a push, a uniform rolling movement on a smooth plane. But when they are put inside one another, the emerged new system rolls in the form of a trembling motion.
25 Cf., e.g., 9.15.