In the first paragraph of FatU, Hegel talks about the object of consciousness now being an "unconditioned universal." I'm not quite sure what he's talking about.
He first mentions such a thing back in §129: "From a sensuous being [the object] turned into a universal; but this universal, since it originates in the sensuous, is essentially conditioned by it, and hence is not truly a self-identical universality at all, but one afflicted with an opposition; for this reason the universality splits into the extremes of singular individuality and universality, into the One of the properties, and the Also of 'free matters.' These pure determinatenesses seem to express the essential nature itself, but they are only a 'being-for-self' that is burdened with a 'being-for-another.' Since, however, both are essentially in a single unity, what we now have is unconditioned absolute universality, and consciousness here for the first time truly enters the realm of the Understanding."
So if we are to understand the unconditioned universal, that paragraph seems like the place to look, but I can't make much sense of it. It seems that since "conditioned" universality has to do with the senses, unconditioned universality must be non-sensuous. And this unconditioned universality somehow comes about by recognizing that being-for-self and being-for-another are part of a unity...
Wait, that makes sense, I think. Unconditioned means that we aren't making a distinction between "for self" and "for another," and thus we are unifying the in-itself and the for-us under one universal.
Any ideas? I kind of thought out loud, so I apologize if this post seemed disorganized.
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It sounds right to say that "unconditioned" universality has (seemed to) move beyond the condition of a sensuous given (with thought being merely receptive or passive or *conditioned*) and also it has moved beyond the condition of being-for-another (which again determines thought to be something other than what it holds itself to be), which is to say it has unified the extremes of perception (One and Also).
ReplyDeleteThe fact that I can write such things as the above and believe I am making perfect sense is perhaps troubling. Hegel probably wrote FatU and thought, "Wow, I've made that very clear."