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- Oct 2 2:43 PM[Alan]
> Pure thought thinking itself is not something that simply happens while> we observe.I've already provided the significant quote:"If pure being is taken as the content of pure knowing, then the latter must stand back from its content, allowing it to have free play an not determine it any further." (SL p.73)So, your above statement is in direct conflict with the above phrase.I don't take pure being as the content of pure knowing, but instead take "pure being …as the unity into which knowing has collapsed at the extreme point of its union with the object" (p. 73). The reason why I don't take being as isolated over to the one side (as content), is because this strategy is susceptible to the traps that you fall into.[Alan]> One reason why we know this is that if we forget Hegel for> the moment and just offer the observation that pure being is nothing we> can then ask what comes next. From this simple observation nothing> comes next by which I mean there is no next. Thought immediately> grounds to a halt. Being is nothing, full stop.
There are a few ridiculous items that you ask us to accept:You first ask us to forget about Hegel on a Hegel-list. But, then you follow with an appeal to the observing of an "ordinary thinking" to demonstrate your point about the nature of the beginning of the Science of Logic, yet with "pure being", what is demanded from us is to enter into the highest abstraction of thought.If you were consistent, this same "observer" would have a problem not only with "nothing is being", but would have an equally difficult time arriving at the reason why "being is nothing".Yet, for those who have entered into this most abstract of all thoughts, not only will they be forced to concede that "pure being is nothing" (whether they like it or not), but will also be forced to concede that the "nothing is".[Alan]> This is what happens if thought functions in the usual manner. It is the point of> Pippin's problem. If someone tells me that being is nothing and then challenges> me to derive in some logical sense what comes next what everyone who is not> Hegel will say is that there is nothing that in any recognizable sense logically> comes next.
Don't forget that this move was first made by Heraclitus. But you are right--yet like I said above, I would go even further--from the standpoint of "ordinary thinking" there is no way to get from nothing to being.But for me, you are getting tripped-up on the "names" of the two terms that unfold in the opening sequence of the SL. Let me see if I can change the names of being and nothing in such a way where they lose any concret ordinary meaning, and instead capture the logical meaning of the sequence.Q1: Firstly why does Hegel use "pure being" as his first term which actually means "indeterminate immediacy"?Answer:Well if we look at p. 69 of the SL where Hegel first introduces the term we find out:--------------[Hegel] With What Must the Science Begin?-------------"Pure knowing as concentrated into this unity has sublated all reference to an other and to mediation; it is without any distinction and as thus distinctionless, ceases itself to be knowledge; what is present is only simple immediacy.Simple immediacy is itself an expression of reflection and contains reference to its distinction from what is mediated. This simple immediacy, therefore, in its true expression is pure being." (SL p.69)-------------O.K. so it is abundantly clear that the reason why Hegel likes the term pure being, is not only because there is a correlate with its use in Parmenides, but because the term "immediacy" contains mediation (and also indeterminacy).But what if we try to replace being and nothing with "indeterminate immediacy"? Will this solve our problem?In one of my posts yesterday, I pointed to what seems to be a regular occurrence, viz. that "immediacy" in the unfolding of the logic, is always followed by "the removal of immediacy" (or there is sublation).But, in the opening move of the SL-- the removal of "indeterminate immediacy" is equally "indeterminate immediacy", and therefore it too, is immediately removed, and yet the removal of "indeterminate immediacy", is equally "indeterminate immediacy", and thus it is immediately removed…and so on and so forth
As we can see in the above sequence, "indeterminate immediacy" is both removed, and the removal. Moreover, each side forms a unity, where there is "the removal of indeterminate immediacy" (i.e. there is "ceasing-to-be") and there is "the indeterminate immediacy of the removal" (i.e. there is coming-to-be).
Each side, of "indeterminate immediacy" and its removal, is an unstable unity that moves in opposing directions.
O.K. before I comment on what I think the deficiencies and merits are of the above approach, I will sleep.
R
"indeterminate immediacy" of the removal
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