Ralph Dumain wrote:

> I agree completely, but I believe that Omar was treated unfairly. The
> clash of people's orientations is helpful when there is someplace to go,
> such as in the old hegel-l dialogues between Beat Greuter and Bruce
> Merrill. Beat has consistently done more than anyone else on any of
> these
> lists to explicate Hegel's positions on issues which apparently clash
> with
> fundamental concerns and orientations of others. In this type of
> dialogue,
> the combination of insider-outsider perspective is helpful to all.
>
> In this regard, the playing off of Kant and Hegel--which occurs in so
> many
> different discussions is instructive. But in the end there may be yet
> another perspective that identifies and explains these tensions on yet
> another level. My interest is not to interfere with this dialogue,
> but to
> point out where and why it goes wrong.
>
> At 06:39 AM 6/10/2003 +0800, Maurizio Canfora wrote:
> >P.S.: As far as the list policy is concerned, I wish to clarify that I
> >didn't want ostracise anybody from the list. What I (personally) do
> not like
> >is when discussions become merely an end in themselves, so that one
> affirms
> >his position and the other criticizes it without actually responding
> to it
> >or showing a lack of knowledge of the very argument we are dealing with.
> >This is just a form of boring sophistry, in my opinion, and although
> others
> >may like it (this is an unmoderated list), I prefer to pull out and make
> >clear why I pull out. Dialectics means also learning from each another.
> >Clearly, when there is no interest in listening, there is no aim in
> >discussing.

I agree with this. Omar was treated unfairly also by my recent comment.
I appreciate Ralph Dumain's sense for justice. However, for me tolerance
has also its limit. Hegel is often treated as a maniac of reason, above
all by Kantians and at universities. No student who ever has listened to
such lectures will ever be concerned with Hegel again. Behind this a
dogmatic attitude can be observed which tries to exclude Hegel from any
serious discussion, basing on a mixture of ignorance and maliciousness.
The problem is that Kant frequently is taken as a stylite instead of
reading him critically as Fichte, Schelling and Hegel did. But to read
such a man uncritically means the death of his critical thought as
already the several dogmatic interpretations at those days had shown. It
were Fichte, Schelling and Hegel who opposed to such interpretations.

With Bruce Merrill and me it was different. Bruce is as well an
excellent expert in the German idealism after Kant and has much
knowledge on other traditions of philosophical thought. This was the
reason why the discussion between a Non-Hegelian and a Hegelian worked.
My more serious occupation with Kant's philosophy came only later.

Regards,
Beat Greuter