Lately I have been thinking about Hegel but only a little so no worry. I asked my wife this question and her first response was simply, “that’s nonsense”. I suppose that was my first impression years ago as well but certainly Hegel was a genius and many bright folks after him have taken him seriously. This question comes in the seminal beginning of Hegel’s Logic. Even now we are facing the neo-to-the-nth post Hegelians at the disruption of post modernism and its critique of metaphysics. The recent Hegelians seem to think whatever has replaced post-modernism is some kind of extreme pluralism. They appear to believe that Hegel can save us from such indeterminacies. It seems to me that they think certain underlying metaphysical assumptions are still at work in the pluralists. Namely, the mind-body metaphysic; a reduction of pure mechanism. Underneath the hood of indeterminate pluralism resides a determinacy of neutrality. They seem to think a profound disassociation lies at the root of this contemporaneous confusion. Following Hegel, their tact is to start with the beginning, Hegel’s Logic.

These Hegelians are very fond of criticizing those who would extract Hegel’s overwrought trope which appeals to thesis-antithesis-synthesis. They spend much time telling us why we should not critique Hegel based on the abstraction of methodology. They go to great explanatory lengths to tell us we should let Hegel’s dialectic speak for itself without bringing in the extraneous arguments for method. They tell us to deal with the text itself not irrelevant arguments about approach and method. They tells us these tactics bring in assumptions which interfere with Hegel’s own highly acclaimed lack of assumptions. Well, it may be an assumption on their part that they have no assumptions and anyone who argues with them, therefore, has assumptions. Anyway, after all the typical and extended Hegelian prelude about what we should and should not do to receive the words of Hegel, we can finally get to the actual recommended approach, the text itself.

Oh but before I can, in Hegelian fashion, let me add that once we start through the text I have heard another commentary arise from the newest Hegelians. We should not inquire too deeply about particular moments of the dialectic but defer any overly-complicated objections until we get to the end of the Logic or until senility and incontinence finally takes its toll, whichever comes first. Any attempt to halt or delay the moments are really only extraneous assumptions trying to sneak back into the assumption-less dialectic.

Be that as it may we should take the recommended approach and look at the text:

Hegel’s Logic begins with the dialectic of being and nothing which are essentially the same but distinctly different. Don’t worry about these minor details. You can read them here if you are confused, Hegel’s Science of Logic Volume One: The Objective Logic Book One: The Doctrine of Being Quality – Quantity – Measure Section One: Determinateness (Quality).

Here is the gist:

Pure Being and pure nothing are, therefore, the same. What is the truth is neither being nor nothing, but that being — does not pass over but has passed over — into nothing, and nothing into being. But it is equally true that they are not undistinguished from each other, that, on the contrary, they are not the same, that they are absolutely distinct, and yet that they are unseparated and inseparable and that each immediately vanishes in its opposite. Their truth is therefore, this movement of the immediate vanishing of the one into the other: becoming, a movement in which both are distinguished, but by a difference which has equally immediately resolved itself.

Got it? Let’s go on to the sublation which is becoming:

Becoming is the unseparatedness of being and nothing, not the unity which abstracts from being and nothing; but as the unity of being and nothing it is this determinate unity in which there is both being and nothing. But in so far as being and nothing, each unseparated from its other, is, each is not. They are therefore in this unity but only as vanishing, sublated moments. They sink from their initially imagined self-subsistence to the status of moments, which are still distinct but at the same time are sublated.

Here, in the interest of having a life I will need to take this one little piece, and in full knowledge of bringing in extraneous assumptions, make one ‘relatively’ small point.

The Hegelians tell us, the moment of becoming cannot remain within itself. The essence of becoming is to become therefore, becoming must become. When becoming becomes, it becomes determinate. Thus, the question I started with, “Can Becoming Become”?

In full knowledge of my sin, I must ‘assumpt’.

If I say A is A I have made what philosophers call a tautology (not to be confused with the Greek word for toilet paper). The history of tautologies is quiet interesting. It proceeds along these lines, either it is absolute proof of the existence of God or it is the most ridiculous, nonsense ever thought in the history of mankind. The gray area is non-existent. A is A is an identity. An identity cannot be other than itself, right? So what if I were to say “Can A’ing A”. You would probably say what my wife said unless you have a career to protect but let’s not get personal (…or,) shall we?

Hegelians tell us “Becoming must Become” otherwise it would not be becoming, right? We can blink and not try to act dumb or we can say, “huh”? Either way we are screwed. If I say, “Can A’ing A” I know that I have brought in an assumption vis-à-vis the ‘ol ‘you-are-making-an-argument-based-on-method’ critique. So, let’s just focus on the notion of becoming.

When I think of becoming, I think of change. Change does not necessarily mean, or lead to, determinacy. In the pure profane, mechanism of reductionary science, there is something called entropy. Entropy leads to less determinateness in many ways. Girls no longer think you exist. Atoms need Viagra. Oh, forget the Freudian slip. There is also something called non-continuous functions. The superposition method of quantum mechanics gives us a way to get around the lack of a continuous function. If we keep adding terms which cancel themselves out if they have little or no effect on observed phenomenon, then we are left with a kind of probability-determinacy. After many empirical observations, we can gain confidence that our superposition formula will mostly be correct. What underlies this is that determinacy is relative. Determinacy and indeterminacy are really two sides of the same coin so to speak. Just because becoming indicates change does not mean the changing has to result in more determinacy. It may just as well result in more indeterminacy.

Well, in Hegelian speak I guess that means we are back to the being-nothing thing. Therefore, for them, we simply have not evolved, sublated, lifted up, Aufhebung‘ed. The terms that give rise to becoming, being and nothing, are themselves indeterminate so if we do not admit becoming must become and thus lift up to determinacy, we can only lift down to indeterminacy. Oh, but not to be haughty to indeterminacy we must follow up with the observation that indeterminacy is a legitimate moment of determinacy. It is just that it is not the, shall we dare say, higher notion of determinacy. So change can go in either direction of determinant or indeterminate but we will carefully privilege determinacy over indeterminacy (can we say apotheosis?…look it up).

What we have here is a movement not to be confused with something bowels do. The movement is something which we must believe is from necessity (maybe it does have to do with bowels). But the movement can go either way, yuk. Also, even then, we do not know for sure that all we are really doing is re-affirming a tautology, that becoming is becoming when it becomes (don’t go there).

Seriously, why should we just accept that becoming must become determinate? Is it because we will feel dumb if we don’t think it necessarily has to go that way? Is it because we must accept that some supposed ‘logic’ of language would make anything else nonsense? It seems to me that there is simpler explanation, “Can becoming become?” is pure non-sense. I am willing to argue with any Hegelian which can stoop to the level of the profane but I have not met one yet. I guess ignorance is bliss, I just do not know who is ignorant me or them. Maybe it is indeterminate from an absolute sense. Just pick your poison and go with it. What I do know is that absolute certainty can be quite the dangerous notion but as the pluralists say if it feels good do it.

I think if you discredit the possibility of making any prior assumptions for the true path of knowledge and understanding, insist on the clear and transparent, non-duality of the unity of ontology and thought in Bergriff (absolute concept), you are either a genius or trying to explain the mind of Donald J. Trump…fine line I guess for the unbeliever.

I will stick with the Muses I discussed at length in my philosophy series:

Tell me all of this, you Muses who have your homes on Olympus, from the beginning [archê, ἀρχῆς], tell who first of them (the gods) came-to-be [genet’, γένετ᾽].

First of all Chaos came-to-be [genet’, γένετ᾽]; but then afterwards…