HEGEL
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What's surprising to me is that some people take his ideas so seriously. They're interesting, but it's baffling to read this stuff and go "Yeah, sounds about right".
Sugrue emphasises this re: Heidegger too. He makes a big deal out of the fact he started out as a Jesuit seminarian.
dilbert1
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Its the perspective of the high pomp of the Enlightenment. His philosophy is talked about as the German equivalent in thought of the French Revolution, almost like they’re interchangeable as events/signifiers in that way. A very confident outlook that fell out of favor and was never really ever restored to its original stature post-1848. That’s when he became a “dead dog” as the saying goes
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The End of History's such an absurd idea. You can see it plainly in the Hegel then Kojeve references in that article I linked to. Napoleon is the End of History, no, no, Stalin is the End of History. Seems completely delusional to proclaim any political system the endpoint.
Benny Bunter
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It's often said Marx "turned Hegel on his head" isn't it? Can anyone explain in simple terms what this means?
From the tiny knowledge that I have of either of them, Hegel's ideas seem way cooler than Marxs'.
From the tiny knowledge that I have of either of them, Hegel's ideas seem way cooler than Marxs'.
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Materialism.
Benny Bunter
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That's not an explanation, that's just one word!
version
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Marx starts from material conditions, Hegel from ideas. Marx is saying everything's downstream from economics, resources, etc. and Hegel's saying everything's downstream from ideas.
Benny Bunter
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So its like the difference between aristotle and plato?
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This is Marx himself saying it,
My dialectic method is not only different from the Hegelian, but is its direct opposite. To Hegel, the life-process of the human brain, i.e., the process of thinking, which, under the name of “the Idea,” he even transforms into an independent subject, is the demiurgos of the real world, and the real world is only the external, phenomenal form of “the Idea.” With me, on the contrary, the ideal is nothing else than the material world reflected by the human mind, and translated into forms of thought... The mystification which dialectic suffers in Hegel’s hands, by no means prevents him from being the first to present its general form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner. With him it is standing on its head. It must be turned right side up again, if you would discover the rational kernel within the mystical shell.
Economic Manuscripts: Capital Vol. I - 1873 Afterword [Abstract]
Capital Vol. I : 1873 Afterword
www.marxists.org
Benny Bunter
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Marx seems a lot more boring than hegel to me instinctively.
version
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Goes back to what I was talking about in 'Fragments'. You get talk of "reading Hegel against himself" or how Kojeve plucks out the master-slave dialectic. People pick and choose the useful bits. Hegel's doing it himself if we follow the line it's secular theology.