Professional paper
Hegel's concept of beginning
Ivan Lorger
orcid.org/0009-0005-4644-1383
; Centre for Croatian Studies, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
The main aim of this paper is to give an analysis of the short introductory essay With What Must the Science Begin?, which is in Hegel’s work Science of Logic. Before the analysis I will discuss two concepts: logic (Logik) and beginning (Anfang). After clarifying these concepts, the analysis will take place. The beginning of Hegel’s logic will be discussed through the distinction between immediacy and mediation. In the analysis the beginning will be considered both as mediated and as immediate. In the first case, the beginning of the logic is mediated, i) because it presupposes the standpoint of absolute knowing which Hegel developed in the Phenomenology of Spirit, or ii) it is mediated because it presupposes the standpoint of the absolute idea which is the result of Science of Logic. In the second case, we will discuss the possibility of beginning immediately, through an “arbitrary resolve”, to observe thought itself. This immediacy will be defined as pure being. Subsequently, I will discuss the implications of beginning with pure being, and answer the question what it means to begin with pure being. I will try to explain that philosophy must begin by presupposing nothing. Finally, I will argue that the beginning is perhaps best understood in the light of the immanent development of the logic and consider that the concepts of mediate and immediate are, for Hegel, inseparable and unseparated, and try to answer why this separation is necessary at the beginning.
Keywords
Logic; beginning; immediate and mediate; pure being; immanent development of logic
Hrčak ID:
81089
URI
Publication date:
23.2.2012.
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