On concepts that give themselves their own actuality (Kant, Fichte, Hegel) Edgar Maraguat University of Valencia. 1. Introduction

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1 On concepts that give themselves their own actuality (Kant, Fichte, Hegel) Edgar Maraguat University of Valencia 1. Introduction The centrality of the idea of concept that gives itself its own actuality in Hegel s Logic is difficult to overstate. Indeed, this idea could be seen as the culmination of the argument he makes in The Science of Logic ( ). Hegel explains how every determination of the understanding is ultimately solved or, as he usually puts it, ultimately has its truth in a conceptual determination, in a concept, that gives itself its own actuality (see 12:20f, 24, 171, 174, 182, Enz. 1817: 161, 162 Anm., Enz. 1830: 213). 1 Taken by itself and without specifications, the so-called idea (die Idee) or concept raised to the idea, to which the concluding part of the Logic is entirely devoted, is nothing but the concept that gives itself its own actuality. The Idee is the unity of concept and objectivity, but more specifically the unity of a concept that gives objectivity, actuality, effectiveness, even external existence (in der Form äusserlichen Daseyns) to itself, by itself, from itself (see Enz. 1817: 161). This might initially seem like a bizarre notion, since we tend to understand concepts as mental representations of pre-existing (or potentially pre-existing) states of things or as mental representations of things that could come into being through the intervention of active beings like us, rather than as representations that give themselves their own actuality. However, the idea of a concept that gives itself or contains its own actuality is well known in the metaphysical tradition. It is, as a matter of course, the idea that underlies and allegedly supports any ontological argument. This being said, and although Hegel does not disregard the connection that his idea may have and does have, something he actually does not conceal at all with that tradition (see Enz. 1817: 162, Enz. 1830: 204 Anm.), when he presents his idea of idea both in the Wissenschaft der Logik and in his Enzyklopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften he links it in the first instance with Kant s practical ideas, by comparing the actuality the concept (in his opinion) gives itself with the necessity, objectivity and actuality of those Kantian 1 All references in the body of the text are to the critical edition of Hegel s works: G. W. F. Hegel, Gesammelte Werke, Frankfurt am Main, Felix Meiner, 1968ff, specifying the volume and page number. The original is only quoted in the case of the 1817 edition of the Encyklopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften im Grundrisse. 1

2 ideas (see 12:174). I think it is correct to infer from such passages that Hegel s idea springs less from the metaphysical tradition than from the Kantian critique of that tradition and, specifically, from the arguments of idealists first Kant and then Fichte and Schelling on the need for philosophy to be based on a selfaffirming principle, be it self-consciousness, reason or freedom. It is well known that Hegel frequently refers to this metaphysical tradition in a derogatory manner. In the Logic, this occurs in relation with discussions about the teleological nature of the world and the doctrine of the soul, among others. Some have thus been tempted to interpret Hegel s thought as fundamentally continuous with the transcendental philosophy of Kant and Fichte, as pursuing their project of seeking in consciousness, in the self or perhaps in moral conscience, a principle of philosophy that might replace or would at least aspire to replace the old traditional divine principle. For reasons that will briefly be stated below, however, I consider it would be hasty and indeed wrong to assume that Hegel borrowed from Kant or, alternatively, Fichte, the idea of concept that gives itself its own actuality (or becomes reality by itself). Literally speaking, it is certainly borrowed from Kant, as Hegel conceives the idea as an end (Zweck) and an end is for Kant, according to the Critik der Urtheilskraft, the concept of an object inasmuch as it is (also) the foundation of its own actuality. 2 We also find it in Fichte, who describes the activity of the self as a causation of the mere concept. 3 Nevertheless, it would first of all be strange for the apex of Hegel s Logic to display such a fundamental coincidence with the views of his idealist predecessors regarding such a fundamental matter as the relationship between concept and reality. After all, Hegel s controversial references to the way in which Kant, in particular, had miscarried once and again his philosophical discoveries are no less known than his disparaging references to the metaphysical tradition. I think his differences with Kant, as also with Fichte (expressed in so many key places) go beyond the dubious development of their well-understood and settled principles or purely structural issues in the systematics of philosophy. Regarding Kant, Hegel praises some of the fundamental distinctions he makes in his Critiques and, in connection with our topic, precisely the resuscitation of the Aristotelian idea of internal finality (innere Zweckmäßigkeit) on which, as we will see, the definition of Hegel s idea of idea will be based. However, he relentlessly observes that Kant immediately reduces this notion the principle of finality to a maxim of the understanding, thus depriving it precisely of the actuality Hegel believes it has and should be recognised to have (cf. Enz. 1830: 58-60, 12:158f). 2 See I. Kant, Critik der Urtheilskraft, B XXVIII. 3 J. G. Fichte, System der Sittlichkeit, Gesammtausgabe, I, 5:27. 2

3 With respect to Fichte, we can arguably find the presence of a veiled critique of his argumentative strategy in the first pages of the chapter devoted to teleology in the Logic, precisely the one that contains the deduction of the idea of idea, when referring to the way in which some assume the truth of the teleological principle (as others would have done with the mechanical principle) and then show that the principle they have taken for granted cannot be deduced from the other (see 12:154 and 12:15), deploying an argumentative strategy Hegel neither shares nor wants to share. All this does not obscure the fact that Hegel continues a discussion opened by his predecessors. When the time comes to presenting and examining which actuality the concept gives itself and how, the matter of the Logic has become the antinomy between fatalism and freedom (see 12:154) or, what for Hegel would be the same, the third conflict of transcendental ideas of the Critique of Pure Reason (see 12:157), about whether all causation is governed by natural laws or it is necessary to accept, in order to explain the world s phenomena, a causation through freedom as well (durch Freiheit). The issue thus becomes one that is also essential for Fichte, who saw the refutation of Spinoza s opinion on that antinomy as one of the major achievements of his Wissenschaftslehre. In my opinion, therefore, the great interest that the Logic s chapter on teleology must arouse stems from the fact that Hegel seems to explain there which is his personal resolution (or dissolution) of the third Kantian antinomy, one that was already of great importance for Kant and that Fichte s Doctrine had, if anything, emphasised. So that an examination of this chapter would make it possible to understand the critical differences between them on this point. In the short space at my disposal, I will limit myself to offer a seemingly reasonable outline of this matter. I think it is inevitable to start out by considering in some detail how Kant and Fichte respectively understood the possibility of a concept giving itself its own actuality, in order to picture the backdrop against which Hegel could define his position. I shall then explain, albeit very schematically, how Hegel understood the battle over this concept, the place where his argument starts, how it develops and where it leads him. 2. Antecedents In the specific field of the philosophy of action, what is at stake for Kant is our ability to act according to the representation of an unconditional duty, and purely because of the nature of this duty. What is at issue, of course, is whether this actually occurs, whether we sometimes act because of such a representation, regardless of the direction in which our inclinations push us, and how that might 3

4 be possible, how that representation and the feelings it certainly arouses might outdo the influence of contradictory tendencies. But Kant effectively calls into question that anyone has ever acted according to a duty purely for the sake of complying with it. As a result, he does not intend to offer any evidence that a particular action was the pure effect of a pure representation of duty. Kant limits himself to showing that we cannot think this could not have been the case and that, therefore, we are indispensably obliged to morally judge what we did in the past and what we might do in the future, from the perspective of an unconditional duty (and the existence of alternatives). For this reason, since we cannot rule out either with respect to the past or the future the possibility of having acted or acting in one way and another, against the duty and in favour of the duty, we can say this is how Kant understands it that the idea of pure duty ceases to be or simply is not a mere representation, to become or simply be a representation that gives itself its effectiveness in our (ephemeral) lives. 4 Manifestly, the basis of Kant s argumentation is to be found in the very definite way he has to understand the inevitability or necessity of adopting a moral point of view as the one he defines on ourselves. Kant believes that this inevitability arises from the very fact that we are rational beings, i.e., from the very fact that we recurrently we could almost say systematically in the colloquial sense of the term wonder about what we should think and do. What is more, we consider some opinions and intentions to be ours just because we believe ourselves able to provide reasons for having adopted and for keeping them, as one might argue. Additionally, Kant takes for granted that being rational consists in operating according to principles of fully general validity and that such generality is incompatible with any reference to factual trends or intentions. He thus concludes that, as rational beings, we are bound by a categorical imperative. It is in this obligation, inherent to the rational being, where Kant sees the realisation of the imperative, the realisation of the pure concept of duty. The main difference between Kant s view about the realisation of practical ideas and Fichte s view during the Jena period is that the former apparently believes that his arguments only provide a practical proof of that realisation, whereas Fichte does not accept a relativisation of their value. 5 Certainly, some 4 dadurch es denn geschieht, daß, da es in allen Vorschriften der reinen praktischen Vernunft nur um die Willensbestimmung, nicht um die Naturbedingungen (des praktischen Vermögens) der Ausführung seiner Absicht zu thun ist, die praktischen Begriffe a priori in Beziehung auf das oberste Princip der Freiheit sogleich Erkenntnisse werden und nicht auf Anschauungen warten dürfen, um Bedeutung zu bekommen, und zwar aus diesem merkwürdigen Grunde, weil sie die Wirklichkeit dessen, worauf sie sich beziehen, (die Willensgesinnung) selbst hervorbringen, welches gar nicht die Sache theoretischer Begriffe ist, I. Kant, Kritik der praktischen Vernunft, Akademie Ausgabe, 5:66. Robert Pippin drew my attention to this passage in Hegel s Practical Philosophy, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2008, pp. 106f. See also I. Kant, Grundlegung der Metaphysik der Sitten, Akademie Ausgabe, 4: Whether Fichte accepted in Berlin in the end a relativisation will not be examined here, as this plausible development is not relevant for understanding Hegel s positions. 4

5 ambiguities of his texts on this issue must be admitted (famously, at certain times his defence of an idealist point of view seems to have value only for those who claim it), but I consider that a triumphalist tone prevails in the 1794 Wissenschaftslehre and the new Introductions to the Doctrine in 1797 when he declares the victory of idealism on dogmatism, on every philosophy that presents reason and consciousness as products of nature and not as primordial sources of activity. In fact, as is well known, Fichte makes what he calls the self-positing (Selbstsetzung) of the self the principle of idealism in general, and not only of its practical part. The self sometimes also called intelligence or reason absolutely, unconditionally posits itself. It posits itself as the principle of all position, both with respect to itself and with respect to what it considers different from itself. Needless to say, it posits itself as an action and only as inaction when acting consists in not acting. But this does not mean, in Fichte s opinion, that it thus posits itself only when taking action, as if it were able at some point when it is not urgent to act, for instance to see oneself as an object, an effect, an inert or passive entity, rather than an agent. The argument based on which Fichte intends to subdue the dogmatic (without great expectations, it must be said, but with the conviction that no better one is at hand) exploits the fact that the dogmatic, just like the non-dogmatic, tries to form a judgment on causes and effects, on reasons and explanations, of our representation of the world and of the world itself: dogmatism as a whole is a judgement on this matter. In light of this, Fichte argues that the attempt to understand the absolute essence of the world as a blind mechanism of nature (in Hegel s words) cannot be but contradictory. For one thing, nature can certainly be considered to consist of blind mechanisms, but those who contemplate nature as thus constituted cannot consider themselves as a part of nature, since judging and becoming aware of could not be, by itself, the effect of a blind mechanism. Fichte is very explicit in this regard. 6 He understands that it is completely unacceptable that the content of the judgement be at odds with or deny the act of judging, the judgment as such. In this sense, Fichte assumes that the Doctrine contains from the outset a refutation of the mechanistic or naturalistic dogmatism. From the start, indeed, since the self from where all positing, all judgement and all conclusion are derived, the self whose self-positing he declares the principle of the system, cannot but be considered, as I said, primordially and essentially active. Reflections on this character of the self led Fichte to unconditionally affirm the 6 See Zweite Einleitung in die Wissenschaftslehre, für Leser, die schon ein philosophisches System haben, in: Fichtes Werke, herausgegeben von I. H. Fichte, Berlin, Walter de Gruyter, 1971, vol. 1, p

6 actuality of the representation of the fact that I think. The fact that I think is not merely something I think. It is assumed that my judgements effectively raise something to consciousness. So that we can say about them that a concept has objectivity and about ourselves, in general, that we are something necessary, a concept or, even better, the concept that gives itself its own objectivity. 3.The starting point of the chapter on Teleology Nevertheless, when Hegel discusses in his Logic the third Kantian antinomy, the conflict between the Fichtean principle of activity and the dogmatic principle of mechanical causation, he does not feel the need (if he ever felt it) of examining the realisability of moral duty or the unsurpassable character of a subjective principle of judging. In Hegel s view, the question is, first of all, how the general concept of end (Zweck) can be considered the truth of the concept of natural necessity. Although this could admittedly announce a revision of Kant and Fichte s arguments on the issues highlighted above (duty and selfconsciousness), it immediately becomes clear that Hegel worries on this point are rather about a slightly different Kantian topic, first addressed in Kant s critique of the teleological judgement : whether it can be said of something that exists, objectively, that it is an end in itself and by itself. Certainly, the truth of teleology and, indeed, the untruth of mechanism have already been settled before the chapter on teleology in the Wissenschaft der Logik starts. It is assumed that the previous chapters have shown, at the very least, that the mechanistic view of the world is inherently contradictory. Hegel describes the mechanical object by remarking that, in order to explain each of its determinations, those of another object are pointed out; but the latter turns out to be as indifferent as the former both with regard to its being somehow determined and to its active and determinative behaviour with respect to other objects (including the first). Hegel perceived an absurdity in all this: a way of understanding the explanation that, by always referring to something else, turns explanation into an empty word (12:135). The Logic suggests that the deterministic worldview incurs in the contradiction of representing the objects as mutually indifferent and, therefore, self-sufficient, and yet as identical to one another in their indifference to their own determinations. It is in that representation of objective relations, in that concept of the object, where in Hegel s opinion lies the truth (and the untruth) of causal relationships (see 12:137). This truth can be expressed by saying that it is a contingency for the object to be the cause of something else. Indeed, it seems contradictory that the 6

7 point of view which treats natural necessity as the only explanatory principle of what is ends up affirming universal contingency. By stating that the mechanistic, dogmatic vision is contradictory, it could nevertheless seem that Hegel is espousing the views of Fichte. But this is not so. Fichte considers that the contradiction of the mechanism occurs between the (mechanistic) form of judgement and the (mechanistic) content of judgement. In Hegel s opinion, by contrast, the concept of (general) mechanism is contradictory in itself. It should be assumed that this mode of argument that does not presuppose a subjective principle of judgment, a mode of argument exemplified by the chapters on mechanism, natural necessity and determinism (the main part of the section on objectivity ), is characteristic of the method of The Science of Logic. It remains to be examined in what sense, in the transition to the chapter on Die Teleologie, the contradiction of mechanism leads to the affirmation of teleology. In my opinion, this should be done by considering what concept of Zweck opens this chapter. In this concept, as I see it, it is immediately decided that the discussion of teleology in the Logic does not raise for Hegel the issue of a causal power related only contingently to an external existence. Hegel indicates the nature of the starting point of the chapter in a way that makes evident from the outset that his approach differs from that of other idealists: an end, he says, is not a cause, certainly not in the sense in which Kant speaks of the will as a cause whose faculty of action is determined through concepts. 7 Hegel is thinking here about ends that are needs, impulses and the like (see Enz. 1830: 204 Anm., 12:160) and not about mental representations of desirable states of things that might govern the action, the will of rational beings like us, or about the faculty of being thus governed. As an end, Hegel says, the concept is the unity that repels itself (die sich von sich selbst abstossende... Einheit) and is preserved through that repelling (ibid.). This is how the concept gives itself objectivity. An impulse is not an end that someone tries to actualise. The relationship between an impulse and the definite activity by which the impulse is preserved and revealed is immediate. One could say that to be hungry is to treat (in practice) certain things as edible: to seek them in order to eat them, to eat them when they are found. Hegel famously refers to this immediate behaviour that disrespects things (that shows no tenderness for them) in the first chapter of The Phenomenology of Spirit (as in the Logic, the issue there is the certainty of the unessentiality of the external object, ). 7 I. Kant, Critik der Urtheilskraft, B

8 4. The logic of the realisation of the Zweck He nevertheless accepts in the Logic that those ends are externally related to the means for their actualisation and therefore calls them subjective. Moreover, he warns that the concept of necessity or impulse inherently encapsulates, as immediately as the activity, the concept of an external objectivity, mechanical and chemical, confronting the end, in which the end should be actualised (see 12:161). Therefore, the chapter examines the logic of the actualisation of an external and subjective end within that objectivity. There he discovers, once again, a contradiction. An infinite process of actualisation is inherent to that externality, by the interposition and operation of a series of means (see 12:168), but by this work it can both be said that the end is actualised in fact and that the product of the actualisation is but a(nother) means (and the difference between both claims would not be an objective determination, as Hegel points out). At least insofar as the product must be a (mechanical and/or chemical) object, it can only actualise the end provisionally and precariously. The objects wear out, are consumed by that activity. In fact, the more they work toward the end, the more they are rendered useless and (in the long run) stop actualising it (see 12:169). Perhaps an example can illustrate this point. Driven by the need for shelter and protection, we use stone and wood to build a house. The house is certainly the goal of the building process. But when it is complete, we are left with nothing more than stones and timbers exerting mutual pressure to keep the house standing. We are only left with means and yet, with an actualised end. But Hegel believes that this is not the only conclusion to be drawn from the examination of that logic. It should also be noted that an internal end-relation (innere Zweckbeziehung) (in principle in the Kantian sense), an objective end (in Hegel s words), is the truth of the external end-relation, both in the sense that in the process just considered the exteriority and self-sufficiency of objects and means are cancelled and in the sense that the immediacy by which the end firstly relates to those objects and means is cancelled as well. Hegel considers the movement to be especially difficult (see 12:171). He attempts to retrace the objective return of the concept to itself, its true objectivation (die objective Rückkehr des Begriffs in sich, d. i. die wahrhafte Objectivierung desselben). This occurs in a (new) repelling of itself (Abstossen von sich) in which the identity of the concept with itself comes to be precisely what is determined as indifferent and external. That identity, turned over itself, is its own other, says Hegel. I interpret such a conclusion as follows. An end is truly objectified when the means for its actualisation are configured and arranged so that they obey but their own existence. In that case, one can say that they obey an end that is not 8

9 external anymore. And it is through the means themselves, that are external in themselves, that the identity of the concept comes into being. This leads Hegel from the concept of end to the concept of end-in-itself (Selbstzweck) as an actualised end. Kant, as is well known, calls into question the actuality of such objective (or, as he calls them, natural) ends because, in his view, we cannot conceive their possibility a priori. 8 This leads to what Hegel considers the lowering of the teleological principle to a maxim of the understanding. Following this maxim, according to Kant, we talk about nature as if it contained intentional ends, while aware that it is unacceptable to attribute such ends to nature. Although there is a major difference between man-made machines (devices which serve ends) and (natural, living) organisms (there is, at most, a distant analogy between the two 9 ), as the parts of the machine are previous to the machine while the members of an organism are generated by the organism itself, the idea that the concept of a whole determines the form and existence of its parts, that is fundamental in the representation of the organism, is considered by Kant under the model of the causation of reason which arranges and makes use of means. In this sense, we can say that he understands the organisms or living beings through the concepts of intention, finality (purpose) and instrument, which are seen as acquiring meaning for the first time in our practical experience as agents. Hegel opposes this approach. It could even be said that, by trying to prove that the concept of internal end-relation is the truth of the external end-relation, he reverses Kant s argument. First and foremost, he opposes Kant s conclusion, his resistance to consider the teleological principle as something more than an imperative of our understanding. For Hegel, the objective process of differentiating oneself and reproducing oneself from the living reveals the emergence of subjectivity, of the concept that exists for itself (or of the being for itself of the concept) and, in that emergence, the actualisation of the concept as such, as what highlights itself, becomes independent and produces for itself and on its own an exteriority (and thus an interiority). The (conceptually) relevant differences between living beings are determined by their own faculties and actions claws and teeth, swats and nips to distinguish themselves from other living beings (see 9:140f, 12:219; see also Enz. 1830, 351). To be sure, much has been said about the nature of Hegel s affirmation of true ends or ends in themselves. It is Hegel himself who paradoxically speaks about the existence of the concept as soul as being nicht seelenvoll (12:177). But, as I have already pointed out, in the conclusion of the analysis on the concept of teleology he tries to make the claim that the actualised end is nothing 8 I. Kant, Critik der Urtheilskraft, B I. Kant, Critik der Urtheilskraft, B

10 but a means compatible with the claim that this means is, after all, an actualised end. Hegel asserts that in living beings, the concept penetrates exteriority, the objectivity of the living is the means and the instrument of an end in complete conformity with itself (12:184). The paradox is generally expressed with respect to the ideal in the introduction of the final section of the Logic, on The idea. This is what Hegel refers to when he speaks about the most stubborn opposition (12:177) that the idea contains. Everything that has any particular content does and does not actualise, necessarily, its (own) idea. 5. Concluding remark Let me conclude. In Hegel s analysis of teleology as an actualisation of the concept, three theses stand out: (1) from the outset, ends are seen as no mere representations, and certainly not as representations that are contingently related to their own actualisation; (2) an objective process is considered as the actualisation of the concept; and (3) the actualisation for itself is not just any kind of effectiveness but only an objective process that turns over and reproduces itself, existing in any case as external and giving rise to the (self-)production of an exteriority The research for this paper was financially supported by the Spanish Government (Research Project FFI P). I must also thank my colleagues Sergio Sevilla, Manuel Jiménez Redondo, Berta M. Pérez and Andrés Alonso for valuable comments on a previous draft. Pier-Luc Dupont helped me to turn the original Spanish version into a readable English-language text and I am indebted to him for this. 10