Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T15:33:44.420Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Taylor, Transcendental Arguments, and Hegel on Consciousness

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 April 2013

Robert Stern
Robert Stern*
Affiliation:
The University of Sheffield, [email protected]
Get access

Abstract

In this paper, I consider Charles Taylor's classic article ‘The Opening Arguments of the Phenomenology’, in which Taylor presents an account of the Consciousness chapter of the Phenomenology as a transcendental argument. I set Taylor's discussion in context and present its main themes. I then consider a recent objection to Taylor's approach put forward by Stephen Houlgate: namely, that to see Hegel as using transcendental arguments would be to violate Hegel's requirement that his method in the Phenomenology needs to be presuppositionless. I concede that Houlgate's criticism of Taylor has some force, but argue that nonetheless Taylor can suggest instead that although Hegel is not offering transcendental arguments here, he can plausibly be read as making transcendental claims, so that perhaps Houlgate and Taylor are not so far apart after all, notwithstanding this disagreement.

Type
Articles
Information
Hegel Bulletin , Volume 34 , Issue 1 , May 2013 , pp. 79 - 97
Copyright
Copyright © The Hegel Society of Great Britain 2013

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

Feuerbach, L. (1983), ‘Towards a Critique of Hegel's Philosophy’, trans. Z. Hanfi in L. Stepelevich (ed.), The Young Hegelians: An Anthology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 95-128.Google Scholar
Findlay, J. N. (1958), Hegel: A Re-Examination. London: George Allen & Unwin.Google Scholar
Forster, M. N. (1998), Hegel's Idea of a Phenomenology of Spirit. Chicago: Chicago University Press.Google Scholar
Hegel, G. W. F. (1977), The Phenomenology of Spirit, trans. A. V. Miller. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Houlgate, S. (2005), An Introduction to Hegel: Freedom, Truth and History. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Houlgate, S. (forthcoming), ‘Is Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit an Essay in Transcendental Argument?’, in S. Gardner (ed.), The Transcendental Turn. Oxford: Oxford University Press (where page references are to the manuscript of this paper).Google Scholar
Lamb, D. (1978), ‘Hegel and Wittgenstein on Language and Sense-Certainty’, Clio 7: 285-301.Google Scholar
Lamb, D. (1980a), Hegel: From Foundation to System. Boston: Kluwer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lamb, D. (1980b). Language and Perception in Hegel and Wittgenstein. New York: St Martin's Press.Google Scholar
Lamb, D. (1987), ‘Sense and Meaning in Hegel and Wittgenstein’, in David Lamb (ed.), Hegel and Modern Philosophy. London: Croom Helm, 70-101.Google Scholar
McCumber, J. (1993), The Company of Words: Hegel, Language, and Systematic Philosophy. Evanston: Northwestern University Press.Google Scholar
Pippin, R. B. (1989), Hegel's Idealism: The Satisfactions of Self-Consciousness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Soll, I. (1976), ‘Charles Taylor's Hegel.’ Journal of Philosophy 73: 697-710, reprinted in M. Inwood (ed.), Hegel. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Solomon, R. C. (1983), In the Spirit of Hegel: A Study of G. W. F. Hegel's ‘Phenomenology’. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Stern, R. (2002), Hegel and the ‘Phenomenology of Spirit’. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Stewart, J. (2000), The Unity of Hegel's ‘Phenomenology of Spirit’: A Systematic Interpretation. Evanston: Northwestern University Press.Google Scholar
Strawson, P. F. (1985), Skepticism and Naturalism: Some Varieties. London: Methuen.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, C. (1972), ‘The Opening Arguments of the Phenomenology’, in Alasdair MacIntyre (ed.), Hegel: A Collection of Critical Essays. Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 151-188.Google Scholar
Taylor, C. (1975), Hegel. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, C. (1979), ‘The Validity of Transcendental Arguments’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 79, 151-165; reprinted in Taylor 1995: 20-33. References are given to the reprinted version.Google Scholar
Taylor, C. (1987), ‘Overcoming Epistemology’, in Kenneth Baynes, James Bonham and Thomas McCarthy (eds.), After Philosophy: End or Transformation?. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 464-488; reprinted in Taylor 1995: 1-19. References are given to the reprinted version.Google Scholar
Taylor, C. (1995), Philosophical Arguments. Harvard: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar