Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t8hqh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T19:53:10.706Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Hegel on the Normativity of Animal Life

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 July 2020

Nicolás García Mills
Nicolás García Mills*
Affiliation:
Tufts University, [email protected]
Get access

Abstract

My aim in this paper is to show that and how animal organisms are appropriate subjects of normative evaluation, on Hegel's view. I contrast my reading with the interpretive positions of Sebastian Rand and Mark Alznauer. I disagree with Rand and agree with Alznauer that animal organisms are normatively evaluable for Hegel. I substantiate my disagreement with Rand, and supplement Alznauer's interpretation, by spelling out the role that the ‘generic process’ or ‘genus process [Gattungsprozess]’ plays within Hegel's account of animal organisms and their normative evaluability. In the course of my discussion, I highlight the main differences that Hegel purports to identify between animal and vegetable organisms and suggest that the upshot of those differences is that some but not all plants are normatively evaluable, by his lights. I also situate Hegel's discussion of the Gattungsprozess within the debate on biological functions in the philosophy of biology over the last few decades.

Type
Articles
Information
Hegel Bulletin , Volume 41 , Special Issue 3: Hegel and the Philosophy of Biology , December 2020 , pp. 446 - 464
Copyright
Copyright © The Hegel Society of Great Britain 2020

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alznauer, M. (2016), ‘Hegel's Theory of Normativity’, Journal of the American Philosophical Association 2:2: 196–211.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baldwin, T. (1991), ‘The Identity Theory of Truth’, Mind 100:397: 35–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brinkmann, K. (1996), ‘Hegel on the Animal Organism’, Laval Théologique et Philosophique 52:2: 135–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cummins, R. (1975), ‘Functional Analysis’, The Journal of Philosophy 72:20: 741–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garson, J. (2016), A Critical Overview of Biological Functions. Cham: Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haase, M. (unpublished), ‘Vegetation and Individuation: What Can the Plant Teach Us About Thought?’Google Scholar
Halbig, C. (2002), Objektives Denken. Stuttgart: Frommann-Holzboog.Google Scholar
Khurana, T. (2013), ‘Life and Autonomy: Forms of Self-Determination in Kant and Hegel’, in Khurana, T. (ed.), The Freedom of Life: Hegelian Perspectives. Berlin: August.Google Scholar
Khurana, T. (2017), Das Leben der Freiheit. Berlin: Suhrkamp.Google Scholar
Kreines, J. (2013), ‘Kant and Hegel on Teleology and Life from the Perspective of the Debates about Free Will’, in Khurana, T. (ed.), The Freedom of Life: Hegelian Perspectives. Berlin: August.Google Scholar
Kreines, J. (2015), Reason in the World. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McLaughlin, P. (2001), What Functions Explain. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Millikan, R. (1984), Language, Thought, and other Biological Categories. Cambridge MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Millikan, R. (1989), ‘In Defence of Proper Functions’, Philosophy of Science 56:2: 288–302.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mossio, M., Saborido, C. and Moreno, A. (2009), ‘An Organizational Account of Biological Functions’, British Journal of the Philosophy of Science 60: 813–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neander, K. (1991), ‘The Teleological Notion of Function’, Australasian Journal of Philosophy 69:4: 454–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rand, S. (2015), ‘What is Wrong with Rex? Hegel on Animal Defect and Individuality’, European Journal of Philosophy 23:1: 68–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stern, R. (1993), ‘Did Hegel hold an Identity Theory of Truth?’, Mind 102:408: 645–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stone, A. (2018), Nature, Ethics and Gender in German Romanticism and Idealism. London: Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar