Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2000 23:31:25 +0100
Subject: Re: BHA: Hegel and Kierkegaard


Phil wrote:
>I have no
>hesitation in saying that if Hegel had not lived the development of humanity
>would have been retarded by decades if not centuries.
Great Man Theory of History! Idealism! Individualism! What is to be
done? - the spirit of *From East to West* is infecting even the most
recalcitrant.... (This is not to dispute Hegel's greatness as a
thinker).

Mervyn

Phil Walden <phillwalden-AT-email.msn.com> writes
>Hi Gary,
>
>Good to hear that you agree about the progressive nature of philosophical
>system-building.  However, I have to say that I would question whether some
>of the statements you have made about Kierkegaard in earlier posts are
>compatible with this.  I would not dispute that Kierkegaard is a progressive
>thinker on religious matters, but his whole method is unamenable to system
>(or precision) which is why he is regarded as the founder of postmodernism.
>I call him a lesser philosopher because of his unsystematic approach.
>Contrast this with a philosopher like Adorno who was suspicious of system
>but still laid out his ideas in a systematic manner.
>
>On Hegel, I can't let you get away with the old chestnut that he was "an
>apologist for the status quo" without some comment.  Some scholars and Hegel
>experts now believe, and it was aired at the Warwick Critical Realist
>conference, that Hegel avoided public criticism of the Prussian regime in
>his later years because he considered this necessary in order to preserve
>the continuation of philosophy in Prussia.  Is this a cop-out?  I would
>direct you to the recent biography of Hegel by Terry Pinkard for an argument
>that it is in fact the truth.  In the unlikely event that you are right and
>Hegel did sell out in the 1820s this would not negate the massive importance
>of his earlier works, particularly The Science of Logic.  I have no
>hesitation in saying that if Hegel had not lived the development of humanity
>would have been retarded by decades if not centuries.  Marx's Das Kapital is
>methodologically based on the first hundred pages of The Science of Logic.
>For me, Hegel was the greatest philosopher and thinker who has ever lived.
>
>Warm regards,
>Phil
>
>
>
>
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-- 
Mervyn Hartwig
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